So it is not surprising that the three-day ‘Global
Minorities Meet’ held in New Delhi in March attracted little media
attention. A big pity that. Had the media reported on the accounts of
the meet’s participant academics, activists, legislators and jurists
from across the globe, we would all have learnt how similar we all are
across the borders of nationality, religion, language, ethnicity, race
and ideology. Governments everywhere pay lip service to the principle
of non-discrimination that is recognised in all international human
rights instruments. The UN Declaration on the Rights of Persons
Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities
makes it obligatory on the part of states to encourage conditions for
the promotion of communitarian identity. In practice however, be it
democracies such as India and the UK or self-proclaimed Islamic states
such as Pakistan and Bangladesh, the minorities are discriminated
against. In the worst cases, forget equality and equal protection of
law, there is little security for the life or property of minorities.
It is the same story everywhere: majoritarianism.
In Hindu majority India, Muslims, Christians,
Neo-Buddhists (Dalits) and other minorities are discriminated against
and frequently targeted. In neighbouring Pakistan and Bangladesh – both
call themselves "Islamic states" – the tormentors and perpetrators are
the Muslim majority while Hindus, Christians, Buddhists and Ahmadis are
at the receiving end. In Sri Lanka, it is the Sinhalese Buddhist
majority that denies Tamils – Hindu, Muslim and Christian – the dignity
of equality and equal opportunity. In Christian majority UK, those of
Asian and African origin continue to face serious problems. In other
words, while the majority in one country is the minority in a
neighbouring one, the misconduct of the majority against the minority
follows the same pattern.
The sameness does not end there. For women from the
minority communities there is a double jeopardy. Besides their
vulnerability as part of the minority, they are also victims of the
patriarchal practices of their own men pretending to be upholders of
their distinctive culture and belief system. Muslim women in India
continue to be subjected to the indignity of the obnoxious practice of
triple talaq. The Indian Muslim male married under the Muslim personal
law enjoys the rare privilege of divorcing his wife in an instant via a
one-line letter, telegram, telephone, email or text message. The Muslim
Personal Law Board continues to defend this inhuman anti-woman practice
as theologically "valid" and in accordance with the Allah-given "Shariah"
law. Mercifully, in the last few years an increasing number of
non-Muslim judges in the high courts and the Supreme Court of India have
started quoting the Koran back at Muslims. There are several court
rulings which now assert that divorce without the Koranic stipulation of
some valid reason and an attempt at reconciliation is not acceptable to
the courts of secular India.
If that is the case in India, the story is no
different for Hindu women in Bangladesh. According to a paper presented
to the meet, "Hindu women suffer not only as minorities but also from
discriminatory family laws within their community. Violence within
families often goes unreported and unaccounted for though the family
itself may perpetrate violence. Divorce is not allowed under Hindu law
while men can remarry. Dowry is the root cause of violence against women
of the Hindu community. Because, in practice, the gifts given to women
as part of the marriage ceremony are not treated as "stridhana",
which should actually be the property of women. Women of the Hindu
community are also not entitled to inherit property from their fathers
or husbands."
It only remains to be pointed out that if the reality
on the ground is the same everywhere, the demeanour and conduct of state
agents everywhere is also very similar. Masters of the pious word, they
all focus on the wonderful Constitution, laws and policies that are in
place in their respective countries. But none of them wants to address
the vast gap that lies between theory and practice, the gulf that lies
between constitutional provisions and institutional malpractice. In his
inaugural address at the Global Minorities Meet, Pranab Mukherjee, the
union minister of external affairs, after assuring everyone of what a
haven India was for its minorities, shocked participants with his
warning to minorities to beware of the fundamentalist forces in their
midst!
Except for the paper on the situation of minorities
in Pakistan, which we have reproduced from elsewhere, all others are
written presentations to the meet, made available to us by Navaid Hamid
of the South Asian Council for Minorities.
Our heart goes out to the kith and kin of those
killed and those injured in the Jaipur bomb blasts on May 13. We
strongly condemn the perpetrators of this inhuman deed, whoever they may
be.
