The age of competitive communalism https://www.hindustantimes.com/opinion/the-age-of-competitive-communalism-101631878165725-amp.html
Think of the agony and struggle of an Indian Muslim today, sandwiched between the Hindu Right and Islamist extremism
By Barkha Dutt SEP 17, 2021
https://www.hindustantimes.com/opinion/the-age-of-competitive-communalism-101631878165725-amp.html
This week, when Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath took a swipe at Muslims, by insinuating that those who said “abba jaan” used to get a disproportionate piece of the development pie, I found myself thinking about how isolating it must feel to be a middle-class, libertarian Indian Muslim.
And, on the other end of the spectrum, in what is a mirror image of the same sort of prejudicial mindset, are the self-appointed custodians of the Muslim Personal Law Board (MPLB), who repeatedly sully the community’s interests, with their atavistic and antediluvian remarks. Most recently, two of its members hailed the ascent of the Taliban, and though the board distanced itself from those comments, the damage was done.
And pluralism has been violated by the Hindu Right, with its brazen and coarse questioning of the patriotism of Muslim citizens. Viral videos of Muslim men being beaten as they are made to say Jai Shri Ram or urged to sing the national anthem have a subtext that goes beyond ugly mob violence. The subtle signalling is the suggestion that Muslims are not patriots.
Yes, two members of the MPLB only furthered this baseness with their romancing of the Taliban, but it is entirely unacceptable to expect Muslim citizens to stand up and prove their distance from the terrorists in Kabul.
And yet, when a Naseeruddin Shah or Javed Akhtar does precisely that, they are pounded upon. The Hindu Right hates them because they call out “love jihad” and hate crimes against Muslims. The Muslim Right loathes them because, in their minds, they are not true believers anyway. Akhtar and Shah are celebrities whose stardom will offer them protection, even if their words are placed under a microscope for the same reason.