India: A Fabric Torn at its Inception?

-Syed Shakeel Imdad

What we see unfolding in the capital today and what was the case in the numerous riots which have plagued India since a long time are connected. The triggers may be different or the ways of expression might alter their egos. But it is essentially a function of the threadbare social fabric which we have harped on about for generations now.

The unity in diversity rhetoric is nothing but a hollow bubble that is (or at least was) kept in check by force but the entropy of this system has now scaled beyond reversible limits.

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That bubble was not destined to last - however much we shed tears and be emotional about the beautiful Ganga-Jamuni tehzeeb. And it is not restricted to Hindu-Muslim binaries. An equally valid argument can be made about the class and caste divisions that corrode and erode lives daily. The biggest mistake of the liberal class (mostly the elite) has been to tag all untoward or displeasing elements and incidents as “fringe”. They are and have been wrong. The “fringe” is what they have been celebrating for decades now. The “mainstream” still fights over the bloody remnants of a failed partition, for starters.

"There always was a latent hatred. It has been given wings now"

Then there’s caste, language, regionalism - too many ingredients to the soup of hatred. The mainstream carries wounds that they want vindication for - they won’t ask questions of the political powers but will very well burn a neighborhood home or lynch a fellow worker or rape a sister from the gully. That has been the manner of exacting revenge for historical baggage for decades in India now. Target what’s nearest to you. When we talk of inter-religious or even inter-caste marital unions and try to raise issues around rights and privileges of certain sections of the society - we are building castles, ones with legitimate and fair walls, but only in the air. The foundations are rotten.

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An often repeated statement I hear these days is that the current ruling party is to blame for the worsening of social bonds and that the congress was better. No. The BJP might very well be a potent catalyst but it is not the reactant. The reactants are us and it has always been us. Don’t blame the catalyst for the entirety of misgivings.

And before holding the gun at the BJP’s head alone, do recall what happened in Delhi 30 odd years back in the anti-Sikh riots. It is the same monster - as I said, it just mutates and represents itself time and again. For a community like the Dalits, it has been a struggle for survival forever - there need not be Dalit cleansing pogroms because that is an incremental and daily affair. I am not cataloguing examples here or playing whodunnit or even doing a root cause analysis. That is the realm of academics and researchers and maybe even journalists. Nor am I equipped to pronounce judgments or a poet to write elegies on the ‘have beens’ and the ‘could have beens.’ I am but asserting a simple fact that is willingly overlooked.

The Indian Union is a masterpiece not because of the perceived ubiquitous Unity in Diversity - but because it has shielded and normalized the fault lines created by innumerable factors with tremendous resolve and exquisite mass-amnesia.

There was always latent hatred. It has just been given wings now. And it will be continue to be so, as history has told us: time and again. Another day in another form, in another region.

And remember: if you feel this write up contests your understanding and experience of living in this country, of interacting with your friends and neighbors and the overarching theme of societal and communal harmony that you espouse and the wide-scale intermingling of families and fate and faith, remember: YOU ARE THE FRINGE.

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