Secularism

Secularism or pseudo secularism?

This is the unwritten, unread yet existing burning question against India.

The dawn of 21st century has brought many goodies for both.

Keeping the Indian context aside, let's try to understand what is secularism.

Upto the best of my understanding about secularism, it is assertive acceptance of peaceful coexistence. It is the most legitimate son of democracy. It gives meaning and space to one's existence. In a nutshell, it is a subset of the superset called RIGHT TO LIVE.

Coming back to Indian context, secularism is multifaceted here. It has multiple limbs, if one of the limbs is amputated; it loses its equilibrium. India cannot afford this equilibrium to be lost, because secularism carries a big responsibility on its shoulders, that of national harmony and peace. Unfortunately so called "secularists" (read pseudo secularists) have been axing certain limbs of it.

Secularism blossoms when a Muslim respects a temple and a Hindu respects mosque, and atheist respects both. The very idea of democracy gives me the freedom to choose my religion, my faith and that should exclusively be decided by me. I reserve all rights to follow my religion within constitutional limits, but when these limits are exceeded, the boon turns out to be a curse. The major problems that Indian secularism is facing today are minority oriented votebank politics and majority oriented extremism. As I've mentioned in my earlier posts too, why should there be a difference in the retaliation against demolition of a mosque or temple? Why should there be a difference in retaliation against what happened in Godhra and what happened as a reaction?

We cannot afford to have the luxury of spending centuries to understand that neither a single killing nor a genocide is justifiable under religious reasons. I hate those Hindus who curse Islam, and I hate those Muslims who curse Hinduism. To enjoy the luxury of democracy, we need to be libertarian, we need to be accommodative (by we, I mean Indians; not Hindus or Muslims). A state of mutual respect is ideal.

The government should not have any reluctance in curbing Islamic terrorism, neither should it be double minded in controlling anti Muslim activities of VHP or Bajrangdal in parallel.

The problem with extremist Hindus is that they think every person with a white cap and a beard is a terrorist (which proves their lack of common sense). The repercussive complexes in Muslims' minds do nothing but add fuel to the fire. The extreme Hindu complexes are driven by rampant Islamic terrorism, which is a result of twisted preachings in the Madrassas.

In all this turmoil the Indian common man is lost. He is the victim. Let this victim breathe. Let him live. Let him be whatever he is. Catch the culprits, not the victims. This is no idiocy; in current social framework, it is always the common man who loses.

Instead of fighting over Hinduism or Islam, why can't we think of fighting against poverty, lack of quality education and social evils? We need to wide open the petals of thoughts and let them merge with the horizon of humanity...


P.S. The piece of work published above is inspired by the book titled "સેક્યુલર મુરબ્બો" by renowned Gujarati writer Gunvant Shah.