Saffron tint in the Swamy’s soul

Swami Agnivesh is a confused conservative who is unable to oppose the Sangh Parivar because he shares so many of their authoritarian assumptions

The Prime Minister has called for a national debate on conversions (see, for example, Times of India 11/1/99). Is it really a good idea to call for such a debate at this time? It all depends on what you mean.

Fascism needs scapegoats. There is no time or space here to analyse the reasons why this is so, but we can take a quick look at the way in which fascist movements create and use scapegoats to consolidate their power. (1) They select a vulnerable religious and/or ethnic minority (e.g. the Jews in Germany) against whom there is already widespread prejudice (e.g. anti–Semitism). (2) They fan smouldering prejudice into the flames of hatred by systematically spreading lies about the community and verbally attacking its rights. (3) They follow this up with physical attacks and pogroms, trusting that the majority, whose minds have been poisoned by lies and prejudice, will not stand up for the rights of the victims. At this stage, typically, the state colludes with the fascist mobs, either passively standing by while they carry out their pogroms or actively participating in them, arresting the victims, and so on. (4) The final stage is the fascist transformation of the state, which then imposes its authoritarian rule on the majority and perhaps, as in Germany, exterminates the minority.

This is the process which is underway in India today. The fascist movement is the Sangh Parivar in its multifarious guises. Until very recently, the scapegoats were Muslims; now they are Christians. Various explanations have been offered for this shift — e.g., that after the bomb blasts in Bombay and Coimbatore, a decision was made to shift to a softer target (Dipankar Gupta, Times of India, 20/1/99) — but we need not go into these here. Popular prejudices against Muslims and the way they have been exacerbated by systematic lies are too well-known to require repetition. In the case of Christians, the main popular prejudice is that they have been undermining the majority religion by carrying out conversions, and this is the prejudice that has been played up by Hindutvavaadi bigots. They have done their best to stir up hatred by spreading lies about Christians.

Lie no.1: Large–scale conversions to Christianity have been taking place. (The reality is that the proportion of Christians in the population has been falling with every census, and came down from 2.6 per cent in 1981 to 2.5 per cent in 1991. Some conversions are being carried out by Christian fundamentalists, but many of these are conversions from other Christian denominations. No doubt these fundamentalists are obnoxious, but they are hardly a threat to the Hindu majority. So long as they do not use force, the only legitimate way to stop them is to educate people to reject fundamentalism and communalism in all its forms.) 

Lie no.2: Forced conversions to Christianity have been taking place. (In fact, not a single instance has been reported.) 
Lie no.3: Christians working among poor and oppressed sections of the population are “missionaries”, especially if they happen to be foreigners. (This implies that their “mission” is to convert people to Christianity, whereas in fact most of them are engaged in education, health care, liberation of bonded labourers, land rights for Dalits, and other forms of social activism. Graham Staines, for example, was treating and caring for leprosy patients, and their grief and despair at his funeral bears testimony to the commitment with which he carried out his task.)

Lie no.4: Material incentives are being offered to those who convert to Christianity. (The truth is that Dalits who convert to Christianity lose their reservation rights. There are, on the contrary, material incentives for them to remain Hindus or convert to Hinduism.)

The second line of attack is to challenge the Constitutional right to profess, practice and propagate one’s religion. This attack has implications not just for Christians but for all Indians. Attacking the right to propagate what one believes (so long as it does not violate the rights of others) is a denial of the right to freedom of expression, while objections to people joining the religious group of their choice interferes with the right to freedom of association. Abolish one right, and the others will follow soon after. The fascist agenda of the Sangh Parivar, smuggled in under cover of attacking Christians, is revealed here.

The third stage — physical attacks and pogroms — is what has been going on for the past year or so. And, as in Germany, the BJP and BJP/Shiv Sena state governments have colluded with the fascist mass organisations, while the BJP at the Centre has white–washed the culprits, with the help of George Fernandes, whose outrageous suggestion that a foreign hand was at work in the Bajrang Dal’s brutal murder of Graham Staines and his two little sons would be funny if the occasion were not so tragic. Vajpayee’s statement that if (voluntary) conversions to Christianity are allowed, then (forced) “reconversions” (described in Communalism Combat 12/98, p.6, and 1/99, p.13) cannot be stopped, virtually gives a green light to the fascist storm troops and guarantees them immunity from prosecution for breaking the law.

In this context, what are the implications of calling for a debate on conversions? Undoubtedly, it tends to reinforce the lies propagated by the Sangh Parivar, and thereby justifies the violent attacks on Christians as well as the state’s collusion with the culprits. By blaming the victims, it encourages more such attacks; Vajpayee may say he hangs his head in shame at the burning alive of a good man and two innocent children, yet he shares the moral responsibility for this atrocity. Secondly, it reinforces the idea that Constitutional guarantees of fundamental rights are in need of revision, and thus moves forward the Sangh Parivar’s agenda of bringing about a fascist transformation of the state.

When Vajpayee says such things, it need not surprise us: he is, after all, a member of the Sangh family. But what are we to think when Swami Agnivesh concurs with him (CC, 1/99, p.9)? In an earlier issue of CC, we had said that the Swami ‘shares the communal attitudes and prejudices which the Sangh Parivar articulates in a more explicitly political form’ (11/97, p.17), and his latest contribution vindicates this charge. In his own way, he repeats the lies of the Sangh Parivar. 

For example, in saying that ‘the coercion and inducement alleged in the context of conversions, are exerted not only by Christian missionaries but also by the abominable and oppressive caste system that treats millions of human beings worse than animals’ (italics added), he not only alleges that Christian missionaries are using coercion and inducement, but equates their behaviour with caste atrocities like the barring of Dalits from using ponds which even cattle are allowed to bathe in and pollute with their dung, and the recent Ranvir Sena massacre of Dalits in Jehanabad. There is not a shred of evidence to back up this allegation. 

Again, he alleges that ‘the lower castes who flee from their traditional spiritual homes to escape the demon of caste oppression find themselves plagued by the same in other faiths too’. Firstly, it seems bizarre in the extreme to refer to a religion which treats you worse than an animal and slaughters you if you try to resist as your ‘traditional spiritual home’, especially since it is questionable whether most of the Dalits and tribals in question were really Hindus in the first place! And secondly, while it is true that casteism is not absent from religions other than Hinduism in India, it is simply not true that all Dalits and tribals who convert to Islam, Christianity or Buddhism suffer the same oppression within these religions. That they continue to be oppressed by upper–caste Hindus is surely not the fault of Muslims, Christians or Buddhists, nor sufficient cause to charge them with ‘deceit’ and ‘false promises’!

Coercion, inducement, deceit and false promises — what is this if not a reinforcement of fascist propaganda? In a context, where Christians are being persecuted and killed, anyone who propagates such lies shares moral responsibility for the atrocities committed against them — just as anyone who propagated anti–Semitism in Germany in the 1930s shares moral responsibility for the Holocaust. 

What is perhaps even more serious, however, is the Swami’s questioning of the Constitution. He refers to conversion as an ‘unnatural matter’. What a strange adjective to use! It might, arguably, be appropriate if people are going in for sex change operations or plastic surgery to alter their features radically — although even then someone might object that nothing humans do, from wearing clothes to cooking their food to living in houses, is purely ‘natural’, and therefore the statement is meaningless. But what is ‘unnatural’ about deciding for yourself what you believe in, or choosing to follow a moral code you consider superior? 

(And surely, moral codes which advocate equality, non–violence, liberation from bondage, and compassion, love or solidarity towards fellow-humans are ethically superior to moral codes which justify inequality, violence, enslavement to authority, and indifference, contempt or hatred towards other human beings? The former set of values can hardly be called ‘alien’ or ‘foreign’; they are universal human values, which were articulated in India more than two–and–a–half millennia ago by the Buddha.)

What is ‘unnatural’ about trying to convince people that all human beings are equal and therefore must be treated with equal respect? What is ‘unnatural’ about wishing to associate and be identified with those who treat you as an equal rather than those who treat you worse than an animal? Isn’t the freedom to do these things a fundamental human right? And isn’t the Indian Constitution, therefore, absolutely right to protect it? One can understand why fascists might wish to perpetuate caste hierarchies by denying Dalits and tribals the freedom to escape from their lowly status, but why does the Swami find the prospect of their liberation so very unnatural and disturbing?

I am not implying that the Swami is a fascist; he is merely a confused conservative who is unable to oppose the Sangh Parivar because he shares so many of their authoritarian assumptions. He sympathises with their hostility to freedom of religion even while he regrets the violence with which it is expressed. He deplores the inhuman treatment of Dalits and tribals, yet he himself regards them as naïve and gullible, lured into conversion by false promises. It doesn’t seem to have occurred to him that they may have a higher level of social awareness and clarity than he does. If the state relegates you to a religion which assigns you a sub–human social status from birth to death, how do you escape from that status except by converting out of that religion? (Dr. Ambedkar came to this conclusion a long time ago, and Firoze Mithiborwala has re–iterated it in a stronger form more recently (e.g., CC 11/97, p.18) arguing that conversion is central to the liberation of Dalits, tribals and OBCs. 

I am not in total agreement with the latter position, because (a) some of the oppression suffered by Dalits — including oppression from OBCs — has a class basis, and conversion will not solve the problem; (b) if religion is primarily a matter of social identity and community rather than spirituality and a moral code, it can be manipulated for political purposes; (c) if the goal is equality, it would be pointless to convert out of a religion that justifies caste inequality into one that justifies a different type of inequality and discrimination, e.g., based on gender. I am merely arguing that anyone from any caste, who is attracted by the spirituality and ethical values of another religion — including a casteless Hinduism — or by non–religious humanism, should be at liberty to convert out of the religion he/she rejects).

In fact, if Swami Agnivesh himself were serious about fighting casteism, wouldn’t he have to set up a casteless Hindu sect and go all out to convert people to it? Isn’t it obvious that had Buddhism remained strong in the land of its birth instead of being all but wiped out by a Hindu ‘reconversion’ drive, we wouldn’t still be plagued by untouchability on the eve of the 21st century? As Teesta Setalvad observes (CC 1/99, p.8), opposition to conversions in India is inextricably linked to fear by the upper castes that conversions will deprive them of their privileged social status. And many commentators have pointed out that even die–hard anti–conversionists are keen to send their children or grandchildren to schools and colleges run by Christians; it is only when Christians are engaged in educating Dalits and tribals that they are seen as a threat.

I have taken up the Swami’s views at some length because they are probably held by a significant minority of Hindus. Fortunately for democracy in India, however, the majority still seem to be tolerant, humane and broad–minded enough not to feel threatened by Christianity. For example, Rahul Dev and others wrote: “Nothing could have been more unfortunate and degrading for Indians than the attack on Christian churches and schools on Christmas day, which is symbolic for not just the Christians but also the weak, the suffering, and all who stand for humanity. These are not chance attacks. They have not only hurt and wounded the Christians, but also lowered the image of Hindus and Hinduism. More than anything else, they have inflicted severe blows on the soul of an ancient civilisation in whose name so much is done. This civilisation had welcomed and assimilated various traditions and cultures, not spurned and maimed them as is happening under the votaries of Hindu rashtra.” (Mid–Day, 30/12/98).

Again, Bulan Banerji wrote, “When the Babri Masjid was demolished, we thought that our civilisation and culture had reached the ultimate low. Today, the degradation is complete. We cannot possibly sink lower, considering that our self-styled leaders from the religious and political majority have challenged the Constitution of India by waging a war against the minorities. Who are these religious fanatics anyway, who are out to destroy the largest secular democracy in the world and its majority religion that has its foundation in tolerance and non–violence? …Who are they to decide the God we would pray to?’ (Mid–Day, 8/1/99). Many more letters and public protests expressing similar sentiments indicate that democracy still has a chance of surviving in India. 

We should not be too complacent, however. The Sangh Parivar’s campaigns of misinformation, hatred and violence have succeeded in seriously eroding the basis for democracy. Had the BJP obtained sufficient seats in the last general election, they would have been in a position to carry out the Sangh Parivar’s project of transforming the state into a fascist one. This is still a very real danger, if they succeed in further eroding public support for fundamental rights guaranteed in the Constitution. In these circumstances, there is an urgent necessity for a broad–based movement, not merely to defend human and democratic rights but to insist that they be translated into practice instead of remaining on paper, and to popularise a culture of democratic rights within the country. Only if such a movement gains momentum can the fascist project of attacking these rights be defeated.

To return to the question we began with: Do we need a national debate on conversions? The answer is: Yes, we certainly do, but not in the sense that the Prime Minister means. We need to debate whether or not people should support the Sangh Parivar’s violent and illegal attempts to convert not merely a few Christians but the majority of Hindus to their degraded brand of Hindutva, and to convert India into a fascist state. And while we are about it, why not also debate whether we want another millennium of caste oppression, and if not, what action we can take to abolish it?