LETTER TO THE EDITOR:Indian Judiciary should not cross the Green Line

Sunday, January 24, 2010

LETTER TO THE EDITOR:

Indian Judiciary should not cross the Green

Line

An Indian court decision had seriously challenged the constitutional right of freedom of religion of a Muslim woman, under the threat that if she is not willing to lift her veil for a voter’s card and subsequently an identification check at Election Booth, she would not be allowed to vote.

This is like instant disenfranchising of a citizen without any recourse to any legislated law of the land.

For 63 years Muslims women had been most enthusiastic in lining up to vote and had been part of that Muslim vote bank, that proved to be a make or break difference to the fortunes of many a legislator all around the nation. The burqa, niqab, hijab or chaadar of Indian Muslim women had never been a problem. To make that an issue, probably taking a cue from Western world’s current wave of Islamophobia unfortunately has some local references too.

There is conscious attempt to neutralize the crucial Muslim vote bank in as many ways and in as many pretexts as the some vested interests could devise. While at one point, BJP’s newly appointed President Nitin Gadkari has rooted for compulsory voting, to ensure that Hindus too vote en mass and thus neutralize the block voting by Muslims, the wording of the judicial judgment in this case has some intended or unintended corollaries, that will call for a swift review.

At another level, India’s constitutional secularism too is at stake. The general definition of ‘secularism’ all around the world is based on the separation of State and religion in state affair. Our coming Republic Day is most appropriate time to reflect on the working of our constitutional secularism. Sadly, however,it is open to public scrutiny that in practice in India, religion and especially the supposedly Hindu cultural – a heavily colored religious version of Hindutva, the new political face of Vedic Brahminical dominance of the social polity, is allowed to rule the roost even in the portals of secular institutions.

Judiciary is one such area, where recently a spate of judgments has been coming forth, which is openly directed towards India Muslims and their religious affairs. Muslim organisation, including All India Muslim Personal Law Board is apparently snowed over by having to deal with the avalanche of such judicial judgments that would ordinarily provoke a Shah Banu like response from the community at large. General feeling among Muslims is that whatever may be merit of points raised by the Judiciary, the underlining attitude is to narrow the area of freedom that all religious groupings have a right to expect from India’s secular constitution. The entire exercise is looked upon by a cross section of Muslim community as a new form of communalism wrapped in the cloak of justice and fairplay. Justice not only should be done, but should be seen to be done. On that count the current season of anti-Muslim focus of forced reform is more to create disunity among the community and to introduce the divide and rule strategy, as long as Muslim are kept on the sideline of Indian polity. The so-called liberals and that includes even some of politically savvy Ulema too, are dithering in their responses and willing to compromise as far as possible. However, unless they draw a Green Line and let the State know, where the secular government should not cross it, the social polity will fracture at a worst time, when its unity is so badly needed to face challenges coming from outside our borders.

Ghulam Muhammed, Mumbai

ghulammuhammed3@gmail.com

www.GhulamMuhammed.Blogspot.com

The secular cover-up By Mohammed Wajihuddin - The Times of India - CREST EDITION

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/The-secular-cover-up-/articleshow/5491359.cms

The secular cover-up

Mohammed Wajihuddin, TOI Crest, 23 January 2010, 10:56am IST

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Topics: Burqa Hindu Madrassa

Clad in a black burqa, the biology teacher walks briskly into a classroom where seventh-graders greet her with a noisy chorus of assalamu 

ALL’S VEIL: The half-a-dozen Hindu teachers at the Al-Jamiatul Fikriya school in Mumbai say the veil doesn’t come in the way of education

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alaikum. The teacher, lifting her face veil, embarks on her lecture on the food chain and regales her students with facts about the predatory habits of different animals. After the class, she leaves the room, vanishing into a group of identically dressed women teachers relaxing in the common room downstairs.

This scene could well belong to any moribund Muslim-run madrassa or maktab anywhere in the country, but it doesn't. The school in question is the Al-Jamiatul Fikriya, an Islamic international school run from a three-storied building at Mazgaon in Mumbai; more importantly, the burqa-clad teacher is not a Muslim but a Maharashtrian Hindu called Shefali Shirodkar. And Shirodkar isn't alone - she's one of half a dozen Hindu teachers who observe full purdah while they are on the premises of the school.

While liberal men and liberated women in the Muslim community desperately want to tear off the custom of wearing the "oppressive" burqa or hijab, these Hindu women seem to have no issues with it and even claim they are "comfortable" in its voluminous folds. "As a teacher, my job is to impart education. Why should a burqa be a barrier in giving education?" asks Shirodkar, who joined the school in 2008 and claims that she immensely enjoys her job along with the Islamic dress code. So does Rakhi Hawale, the school's librarian, who, however , was a bit hesitant when she first donned the tent-like gown five years ago. "I tripped a few times initially, but now I wear it with the ease of my Muslim colleagues," says Hawale who is unmarried and hasn't given a thought to whether her future spouse will object to her wearing a burqa. "I convinced my parents and hopefully will be able to convince my husband too," she smiles.

Suhail Sheikh, the school's founder, claims he is just following the Islamic principle of justice which does not allow a Muslim to discriminate against his or her non-Muslim employees. "These teachers were recruited after rounds of interviews. We told them about the Islamic dress code in advance. I think it's a healthy trend that non-Muslims have started teaching in Islamic schools," explains 41-year-old Sheikh, who himself is not highly educated but values education a lot. "It's open to everyone," he says of his school. "I hope we'll soon have non-Muslim students too."

It was this 'secular' approach of the school management that attracted retired colonel N S Rawat to the administrator's job here a year ago. "I have served in the army, which is one of the most secular institutions in our country. I also saw this job as an opportunity to understand Islam and Muslims better," he says. For the 30-odd faculty and other staff and 300 students, from standard one to ten, studying Islam is part of the ritual. So, from the morning assembly, when a hymn in Urdu is chanted loudly, to the quotes from the Quran and the Hadith written prominently on the walls, the school wears Islam as a mascot.

Both Hindu and Muslim teachers see their tenure here as a unique opportunity to bridge the communal chasm. "I knew very little about Islam and Muslims before I joined here," says Reema Dicholkar, who teaches Marathi. Dicholkar says her students - boys in kurta-pyjama and skullcaps and girls above the fifth standard in mandatory burqas - are curious to know about Hinduism. "They listen to stories from the Ramayana and the Mahabharata with rapt attention. Just as I like to hear stories about the Prophet, they are interested in stories about Hindu gods and goddesses," says Dicholkar, who was a little hesitant about working in an Islamic school when she was offered the job a few years ago. "For me it was an alien world. I never had a Muslim friend or neighbour. I thought Muslims were angry and violent. Many of my relatives didn't approve of it, but my father backed me, and now I enjoy my job," says Dicholkar who lives in Lalbaug, a Maharashtrian Hindu hub in Mumbai.

The first two hours of the day are devoted to Islamic teachings, imparted by maulanas, most of them graduates of the Islamic seminary Darul Uloom at Deoband (UP). The school, which follows two syllabi - those of the Maharashtra Board and Cambridge University's International General Certificate Education (IGCE) - despite its orthodox discipline, has instilled modern ambitions in its students. Says Mehek Beg, 9th-standard student: "I am interested in science and want to become an astronaut." When asked if the burqa will be a barrier in achieving her goal, she ripostes: "The burqa is not a barrier to my Hindu teachers, who had never worn it before they stepped in here. It should not be a hurdle on my way to becoming an astronaut, Inshallah ." To which, everyone, including chinky-eyed Beg's Hindu teachers, nod.