'Outlook Talks’ in conversation with Tanvir Aeijaz, Professor, Department of Political Science from Delhi University discussing Muslim representation in Indian politics.
The conversation addresses historical underrepresentation, the impact of socio-economic backwardness, Islamophobia, and the strategic use of religious polarisation in elections. The dialogue highlights the political challenges and systemic issues faced by the Muslim community.
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#MuslimRepresentation #IndianPolitics #Islamophobia #ElectoralChallenges
The conversation addresses historical underrepresentation, the impact of socio-economic backwardness, Islamophobia, and the strategic use of religious polarisation in elections. The dialogue highlights the political challenges and systemic issues faced by the Muslim community.
Follow us:
Website: https://www.outlookindia.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Outlookindia
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/outlookindia/
X: https://twitter.com/Outlookindia
Whatsapp: https://whatsapp.com/channel/0029VaNrF3v0AgWLA6OnJH0R
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@OutlookMagazine
Dailymotion: https://www.dailymotion.com/outlookindia
#MuslimRepresentation #IndianPolitics #Islamophobia #ElectoralChallenges
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NewsTranscript
00:00 Hello and welcome to Outlook Talks. In this, we have a series of conversations with interesting
00:15 people, academics, scholars, politicians, well, even musicians, writers, poets, whoever
00:21 we feel are interesting and are involved in the politics of the country. It is a very
00:26 informal discussion and today we have Tanvir Ejaz with us. He is a professor in Delhi
00:31 University, scholar, writer, author and Chinkee Sinha Outlook Editor. Thank you very much
00:38 Tanvir. It is always a pleasure to speak to you. Tanvir had in fact just written an article
00:42 on the Muslim question in Outlook, I think two editions, two issues ago. And so we thought
00:49 we could just sort of start off from there, taking that as a starting point. So, you know
00:53 the three things that you mentioned there of education, of their backwardness, you know
01:00 the in the sense that you know they have just no representation in politics. It's I think
01:05 it's been 4% since independence is what you mentioned. Yeah, it was around 4% you know.
01:11 Whichever party is in the in power, I mean whether it was Congress or BJP or whoever
01:16 else, right. And this goes, this is true for states too, I think in most state governments
01:21 as well. So, why do you think, I mean firstly of course why is it so low and what can you
01:26 know one do to sort of you know some reform in this area? Yeah, I think it's the question
01:32 of under-representation. You know Muslims perhaps are looking for their representation
01:38 and the story goes back to partition days actually. You know because of the partition,
01:44 this idea that Muslims they do not belong to this country and therefore you know they
01:52 should not have their representation and in fact I mean this whole idea of marginalization
01:59 of Muslims has partition in the backdrop, right. Post-partition, the political parties,
02:06 it was the job of the political parties to address to this very serious question of under-representation.
02:13 But political parties, they are the organizations and they work on certain kind of rationality
02:20 which is called as vulnerability of the candidates, right. So, therefore you know given this background
02:28 of animosity particularly between Hindus and Muslims, they were not so keen on giving tickets
02:35 to Muslims. But initially yes because of the idea of liberal India, the idea of secular
02:43 India, the idea that India will now become a sort of a not a theocratic state but as
02:52 a secular state. So, therefore we need to have representation and therefore in the first
02:57 election they had. They had Muslims, I think more than 4% of the Muslims were there in
03:01 the first elections, particularly also in the second elections. But slowly and slowly
03:06 it went, it weighed and if you make a graph you will see that it is not that in one particular
03:14 year there is high representation or any particular year there is low representation. You know
03:19 it somewhere sticks around 3 to 4%, right. Somewhere sticks around that figure, you know
03:25 because I was just looking at the map, you know. So, it appears like that. Now the question
03:30 is that what to do with this under representation. I think this question needs to be addressed
03:36 at two levels. One is the response of political parties. Now it is the political party which
03:45 needs to, I mean this whole question came up with the representation of women also.
03:49 It's very much similar to that. So, for women of course there is the question of reservation
03:56 and then the issue of reservation and there was a movement for reservation and of course
04:00 you are seeing that how now you know after some years, some time we will have 33% reservation,
04:06 the bill is passed and I mean it's very sure that the bill won't be taken back now. But
04:12 the question of reservation when it comes about Muslims, you know political representation,
04:21 there are problems. There are problems, the constitution is raked up that reservations
04:26 cannot be given on the basis of religion. Then of course, another question which is
04:34 raked up is that because they themselves are responsible, therefore, you know they cannot,
04:42 I mean they have to look for their own leaders, right. I mean who, their social, I mean their
04:48 rationality for instance, right. So, at that point of time it is particularly, you know
04:52 because I have also written a couple of pieces on Islamophobia. So, it's particularly that
04:57 Islamophobia runs deep, you know which sort of cancels the whole idea that yes they need
05:04 representation. But you know this question with most parties, the excuse that they give
05:09 up for this vulnerability, on the other side, if you throw it on the other side, isn't it
05:14 also true that you know there have really been not so many Muslim leaders who have come
05:19 from the ground, who have had a you know a slightly broader view of things rather than
05:24 you know just this community being the you know the single point of their existence.
05:30 I mean why hasn't India thrown up Muslim leaders? Right, I mean this is a very very important
05:37 question and very difficult question actually to answer. It's because of the fact that look
05:42 you'll have to also understand that they are left out, you know in terms of the whole movement
05:49 of society, you know. So, they are Pasmandas largely, right. 80-85% of the Muslims are
05:56 backward mostly in terms of socio-economic conditions and largely you know they are very
06:02 much concerned about their own security because of the kind of violence. No country, you know
06:08 you pick up any country where you have for the last 70 years such kind of a protracted
06:13 violence you know. If you look into the riots, you will see if you know there are a lot of
06:17 studies which explains that you know there is a cycle of riots actually you know after
06:22 some years you know. But now since it has waned because of the fact that there's a lot
06:26 of media presence and all those and social media also. But over the years there has been
06:32 a lot of violence, right, in terms of and which some of these scholars have called it
06:37 as institutional riots, you know. Paul Brass has called it as institutional riots system
06:42 exists in India. Now because they are insecure and because they are backward socially and
06:50 economically so I would say that yes of course they are more focused towards their religion,
06:57 right. They are more you know they are more into, they have a secular outlook in terms
07:04 of how to choose whom to choose their representative. In fact you know I was just mulling over this
07:12 fact that Muslims actually do not have a choice when they go to vote. You know they have only
07:21 one choice and that is the candidate who can defeat BJP. Exactly. Right, so they do not
07:26 have a choice like their counterpart, right, like their counterpart who can choose A, who
07:32 can choose B, who can. It's like by default rather than real choice. So when they exercise
07:36 their vote they are not exercising their rationality, right, they are exercising their fear. They
07:42 are exercising their fear, right. So therefore and then this whole politics of ghettoization
07:49 takes place because of this violence and insecurity you will see you know Muslims they cobble
07:56 up together, they stay in a specific area. So once Muslims stay in that specific area
08:02 the population of course goes beyond let's say 15 percent goes to 20 percent or maybe.
08:08 Then you know those places you find Muslim candidates are propped up by regional parties
08:14 of course maybe central parties also. But then of course the moment when a Muslim candidate
08:20 is propped up by one strong regional parties you will see a lot of other parties also propping
08:26 up Muslim candidates. That's right. Right, to cancel out each other and then finally
08:31 you will see even in Rampur also not a Muslim candidate wins. So inadvertently it becomes
08:36 a Muslim seat. So yes, yes. So therefore leadership becomes very difficult in that case, right,
08:43 A. And B, you know many times, many times some leaders have tried you know. So any Muslim
08:51 who is a modern, who is a secular, you know they somehow are rejected by the Muslim population.
08:58 I wanted to ask one thing. See you pointed it out in your earlier bit that there is this
09:04 secular, you know there is this category called progressive Muslims now. And a lot of people
09:09 talk about that. Now what is that? What is this division within the community itself
09:13 which is also propped by the other communities? You know this is a, he is a progressive Muslim.
09:18 And what's a progressive Muslim supposed to do politically and electorally? That's
09:22 one. And the second, second one is about this particular election. Obviously there has been
09:27 a trend since the 90s, you know ever since the demolition of the Babri Masjid and obviously
09:31 before that but let's not even go further back but there is a distinct trend from there
09:36 on and then 14 was Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas, then 19 comes, then more of this Hindutva
09:41 thing and now we are seeing a lot of this in the public domain. Like openly doing, like
09:47 saying things, infiltrators, you know these kinds of words are being used that they will
09:52 take away your Mangal Sutra, whatever, you know, all you know, Mujra, you know things
09:57 like that. So on two fronts, what does this signal and does it really work when you kind
10:03 of target one particular and why only Muslims have been targeted in that sense? You know
10:08 there are other communities as well. So you know the answer to your first question is
10:15 is that you know what Muslims generally would like to have their leader as as a practicing
10:22 Muslim, right? So progressive Muslims normally are not practicing Muslims, right? They would
10:28 also like to see their representative somebody like you know in terms of at least having
10:37 some symbols or markers of being identified as Muslims. So therefore, you know, I mean
10:42 it's slightly difficult to have, I mean OIC, I see him as progressive. But what is a progressive
10:49 OIC? I see him as practicing also, right? And OIC, I see him having markers of Muslim
10:58 community also, right? The visible markers, right? That is there, right? But you know
11:05 the word OIC or the name OIC generates a lot of hate amongst a lot of Hindus, right? That
11:12 he is the one, you know, he is a, he, he, he, the divisive, right? So he is the one
11:19 who is dividing the society. So anybody for that matter, right? Anybody for that matter.
11:24 In fact, even I think there are not just Muslims but even non-Muslims also, right? Hindus,
11:32 you know, who tries to represent Muslims, who speaks on behalf of Muslims, right? They
11:40 are being categorized as anti-national. Or wannabe Muslims, you know, this is like another
11:46 category of Muslims. So anti-national. Because this whole lexicon of Pakistan comes in and
11:55 Islamophobia gives them a very good excuse for dubbing them as anti-national or foreign
12:03 or something like that, right? So, so that is a difficult problem, right? It is a very,
12:10 very vexed issue actually that, that who should be the representative of Muslims. Muslims
12:17 themselves cannot become representative of Muslims because and the moment if you have
12:23 somebody you know who is actually slightly more religious like somebody in Assam, for
12:28 example, Ajmal, Badruddin. So the moment if somebody is like that, he is again dubbed
12:38 as somebody who is very, very communal, very communal, very divisive. So you Muslims are
12:47 in dire straits. They can either have a progressive leader who can represent, they can not have
12:54 they, nor they can have somebody from their community who looks like them or you know
13:01 so. So there is a problem with their representation. So yeah, I was, I mean, I was talking about
13:05 that. It is the, it is the, because you know, 200 million Muslims, one third of these states
13:12 where you have their presence who can, who can make a difference politically. So this
13:16 gives the answer to your second question is that they are, they may be invisible, right?
13:22 They may be invisible, but electorally, you know, they are decisive at a lot of places
13:29 because of the fact that we are not a two-party system. We are a multi-party system, right?
13:33 And all national parties, they have their own prop ups, right? And they calculate their
13:38 their vote shares, right? So Muslims are politically decisive, right? In Uttar Pradesh, you see,
13:46 you know, I mean, the names are being deleted, right? I mean, we just heard there was a petition
13:53 and the election commission gave it to the Supreme Court that we will see that the name
13:59 should not be deleted, right? The last time, in fact, 23, I think, election commission
14:05 gave this assurance to Supreme Court that we would not allow this to happen. You know,
14:10 the process of the electoral process, you know, Muslims going to vote that that that
14:16 is made difficult for Muslim women, for example, right? So I read a couple of pieces on how
14:23 Muslim women, you know, when they go to vote, their process of voting becomes so difficult.
14:31 They're asked Aadhaar card, they're asked to go back home, get your Aadhaar card. So
14:35 there is clearly, you know, a sort of victimization and it is it is happening in those areas where
14:41 they matter. They can matter or they matter. So therefore, and this whole Islamophobia
14:49 is also very political in nature, you know, because because they want to, on the other
14:55 on the other hand, you know, the Hindutva politics want to consolidate the Hindu votes
15:00 because they see they have this understanding that their votes are scattered. Yeah, they
15:05 are not consolidated. Yeah. So more you whip up Islamophobia, more consolidation it takes
15:11 place. And some of the studies also had shown that, you know, riots and Hindutva violence
15:19 and all these things, you know, and whipping up Islamophobia leads to consolidation.
15:24 So that's why this kind of language and this kind of rhetoric.
15:27 Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. So it's it's it's it's a very strategic polarization process.
15:32 What about constitutionally? Is it OK to kind of do this?
15:37 Islamophobia constitutionally is an offense. Exactly. That's what I was saying.
15:41 Even conversely, hate speech is an offense. Exactly. Right. So anything anything which
15:46 demeans or, you know, sort of attacks any religion to gain votes is an offense. Right.
15:54 Not only just in the People's Representation Act or Model Code of Conduct, but otherwise
15:59 also in common ordinary law, it's an offense. There are a lot of sections which are there
16:05 which can be used. Right. So but but still so we we we see I think we need more strong
16:11 election commission also to have to have a better environment where at least those who
16:17 are on the margins, particularly Muslims, can exercise their choice. Right.
16:21 And even better media, I suppose. Yeah. Media must help in creating this condition.
16:27 You know, in this, what you just said, you know, basically underrepresentation is making
16:31 them invisible electorally, politically. You know, have you also sort of seen in the last,
16:39 particularly in the last two, five, last decade, let's say, you know, in the last two terms,
16:44 a kind of invisibilization in general life, in society, in cultural life, in academia,
16:52 in, you know, in say, say, programs that used to happen earlier are not happening anymore.
16:57 Or at least it's discouraged. Yeah, I think, you know, I mean, this hate
17:03 speech, it cuts deep into the society. Right. And it cuts, it goes into all the levels because
17:10 it, you know, hate speech attunes your behavior towards hate. Right. That's the idea of hate
17:16 speech. So, behaviorally, you know, one starts, you know, shifting and changing and start
17:24 using a lot of instruments of hate. So, one of the major instruments of hate is discrimination.
17:31 You know, you start discriminating. And this discrimination comes in jobs, right? I mean,
17:38 to begin with, lots of studies are there. You know, Muslims are hired last and fired
17:46 first in organized sector. In simple things like finding a flat in Bombay,
17:52 you know, in Mumbai. Or even Delhi now.
17:55 Delhi, in various, Ahmedabad maybe, you know, I mean, those kind of things.
17:58 Scholars have called it as sort of penalty punishments. Right. So, they get certain kind
18:05 of punishment because they are Muslims, therefore, they get those punishment. Otherwise, in the
18:10 ordinary circumstances, it would not have happened.
18:12 So, they are starting with that disadvantage. So, both in the formal economic sector, right,
18:18 you have this whole idea of hiring last and firing first. That happened, you know, why
18:24 this hiring last and firing first? Because that was an eye opener during COVID period.
18:28 Right. Because there was a lot of rush and a lot of data is also available. Right. Informal,
18:35 you know, I mean, this whole question of taking away their jobs, biryani, for example.
18:41 Yeah, yeah, the biryani is like forever.
18:45 So, this whole lynching and violence, particularly to the Muslims who are doing their work in
18:54 the informal sector. Right. So, both formal and informal sector, there is a sort of a
19:00 threat, security threat. And then you come down to, I mean, in academia, universities,
19:08 I would like to mention about this university and I've been talking about this also that,
19:14 you know, over this last couple of years, in Delhi University, we've had around more
19:22 than 5000 appointments. But, you know, I mean, still the figure is not out. But some of us
19:30 were keen on trying to understand that how many Muslims are being appointed. So, actually,
19:36 we could not find much, you know, not even 2% of the Muslims were appointed. In fact,
19:41 in my college, you know, some of the Muslims who were teaching having degrees from abroad,
19:47 from US, you know, they were chucked out. Right. We were so shocked that, you know,
19:51 somebody who's done from IIT Delhi and having his degree from US, how can he be chucked
19:57 out and he has taught for almost seven, eight years, how can he be chucked out just because
20:01 he's a Muslim and is not conforming to certain kind of mainstreaming that is what is being
20:07 called as. So, discrimination runs deep because hate brings in this kind of discrimination.
20:13 You know, it does seem a very sorry state in that. But, you know, don't this, what the
20:18 other side says about for 75 years now, you know, since independence, that, you know,
20:24 every government has only seen them to appease, isn't it? I mean, there is some truth to that.
20:29 Yeah, appeasement, I would always say in terms of very, very symbolic, right, not real appeasement,
20:38 you know, there is very, very symbolic appeasement, something like, you know, if you make a Dalit
20:44 president, that doesn't mean, you know, that the condition of Dalits are improving. If
20:49 you make a tribal president, doesn't mean that the tribal's condition is improving.
20:52 Exactly. That is a charge that the appeasement has been so symbolic and no government has
20:57 really gone deep and understood, you know, the problems and, you know, and that is why
21:01 there are a lot of… So, therefore, you pick up any committee reports, you know, start,
21:05 wise, I mean, starting from Satcher Committee report. I mean, there are lots of, before
21:09 that also there are a lot of committee reports, but Satcher Committee, post-Satcher Committee,
21:14 these are two very important committees which talked about Muslim situations and their discrimination
21:19 also. Oxfam, Oxfam has, I think, last year, 23, came out with this whole report on discrimination
21:27 on women, Muslims and tribals, right. So, Muslims' discrimination was an eye-opener,
21:33 you know, because nothing was done post-Satcher Committee suggestions, right, nothing was
21:40 done. So, therefore, this something, you know, I think, I think it boils down to reservation
21:47 and that is the reason why the Hindutva politics wants to restrict the reservation because
21:53 the next question comes that if all these situations are so bad since independence and
21:59 it is not improving, rather it is going from bad to worse, so what is the solution? So,
22:05 the immediate solution, because, you know, we compare, you know, the immediate solution,
22:09 if women who were in the margins getting reservation, if Dalits, they were in the margins getting
22:13 reservation, tribals, they are in the margins getting reservation, so why can't you give
22:18 reservation to Muslims, right? So, the real question about reservation is that whether
22:25 you consider the whole Muslim community as backward or a very large section of Muslim
22:30 community as backward, that is the question, right. At the moment, the question of reservation,
22:36 I think, is moving around this particular… And also what is keeping them backward for
22:40 such a long time, I think that is another important… You want to move on to the federalism
22:45 Yeah, actually I had another question because you have written so much about federalism
22:49 and also, you know, secularism. Now, that has become a very strange situation and we
22:55 face it and everybody else faces it. The moment you say you are secular, now people kind of
23:00 like want to distance themselves from you, like, you know, and we have had several examples…
23:04 It is a bad word, almost a bad word. It is just a bad word now, like, you know, people
23:08 then jump at you saying, "No, it was not there before, it came later". So, what is
23:14 going on in terms of, you know, originally we were found, we were not a Hindu country,
23:19 let's say Hindu Rashtra. So, they have not given a blueprint, blueprint of Hindu Rashtra.
23:25 What is it going to have? Like, for example, like as a woman, will I have any rights in
23:30 that sense or what happens to secularism and then of course federalism which, you know,
23:36 civil parties do form kind of a backbone in terms of, you know, getting diversity and
23:40 multiple voices. Now, there is this huge thing to one nation, one election, one language
23:45 and everything about this oneness. And so, what is going on? Like, what is happening
23:51 here? I mean, such a beautiful word secular. Now,
23:55 it is like they say secular. Yeah, secular, you know, it has now become
24:03 an opprobrium. Now, almost, yeah.
24:06 So, secularism and federalism, you know, these are two major principles, even the Supreme
24:13 Court has called it as the basic structure of our constitution.
24:16 And I wanted to also differentiate, you know, a lot of people and this we have been facing
24:20 as even journalists. A lot of people will tell you that the secularism that you are
24:24 talking about is the French model, where is there is, state has no religion. And the other
24:29 thing they say which is the BJP's ideological whatever on the website, if you see, they
24:34 say Sarvdharam something, you know, like all religions are equal. Now, that is an important
24:40 question to answer that actually in the constitution of India, the Supreme Court, which secularism
24:44 is this in India? So, India has, you know, as you all know,
24:50 this is the fact that it is very difficult now to remove secularism. You know, earlier
24:57 there might have been some sort of a plan to just expunge the word secularism from the
25:03 preamble and but secularism has its, not ramifications, but it has its anchor in a lot of articles
25:11 in the constitution. So, it is not so easy to, whether you have that word secular in
25:18 the preamble or not, is not the question. The question is basically about minority rights,
25:25 which is enshrined in the constitution, which is basically one of the most important, one
25:30 of the fundamental rights, you can say. So, that is there. Now, our constitution doesn't
25:36 spell out exactly that what people should do and state should do. But it does talk about
25:43 that state should not have any religion. And state must have, you know, I'll use my teacher's
25:55 phrase is, the state must have a principled distance from all religion.
26:01 Exactly. And the principle of that distance must be
26:06 based on a lot of political values. You know, that's the idea of Indian secularism. It is
26:12 not complete separation of politics. That's very well put, actually.
26:16 Yeah, actually. But there is a distance. Yeah, so there is a distance.
26:19 Seems like there is no distance now. And a state is not becoming, right, a state
26:22 is not becoming a religious state. So, then, of course, that state would become a theocratic
26:28 state. Right.
26:30 So therefore, I think people understand, you know, secular, the word secular as a normative
26:39 value has its relevance in all of us in our day to day practices, you know, because secular
26:46 means mundane, earthly. Yeah. So day to day activities, what we do together,
26:52 you know, it's like we are hanging out together. Yeah, we are hanging out together, having
26:56 a party or whatever. Right. So it distances slightly itself from spirituality. So secular
27:01 means that. Right. And therefore, the processes of secularization that takes place. So secular
27:08 is an ideal condition. Secularization is the process by which, you know, these political
27:14 institutions need to work upon. And political parties, of course, they are very, very important,
27:19 you know, tools for interest articulation. So they work towards secularization process.
27:26 But because of the fact that, you know, in the ideological spectrum, a conservative,
27:33 we have to understand that right now the political party that is ruling the country is a conservative
27:41 political party. Right. So the conservative is attacking both right, both the left and
27:48 the centre. So therefore, their attack is left liberal. Liberal largely you will find
27:53 at the centre level. Right. Left is slightly, you know, I mean, left or the centre. So therefore,
28:01 this attack on left liberal by conservative, right, is about attacking secularism also
28:09 because left and liberal, right, they distance themselves from conservatism in terms of their
28:15 spiritual attainments. So that's the reason why. So therefore, this word secular, you
28:26 know, in their understanding, the first attack should be there on secularism. So once secularism
28:31 is defeated. It has become a big thing in all of these wars now. So they have managed.
28:36 It is the inability of the left liberal to counter their attack.
28:40 How do you counter this kind of attack though?
28:43 It is again by, you know, by creating institutions, right. And one of the major institutions,
28:50 you know, if you read Lipchart, Aaron Lipchart, you know, if we start having consociational
28:55 democracy, because it all boils down to how we practice democracy. So we need to have
29:02 more of associations. So secular associations, if we have more of that, right, more of, you
29:09 know, cultural, secular associations and they keep on interacting with each other. So that
29:14 is the way how they can counter. Which of course, you know.
29:18 It's not happening.
29:19 It's not happening. The associations building, you know, because people are scared. They
29:25 are not forming associations. They are not, you know, for example, in my society, I thought
29:30 that I should form an association which would promote all sorts of cultural activities.
29:37 There's so many kids around, they can come, let's have a reading group, this club, that
29:42 club, but then there is a problem. There is a problem and one will have to struggle. Of
29:47 course, one will have to struggle, one will have to act at times very subtly to promote
29:51 the association.
29:52 So like for example, Mujra. Now, Mujra is not a bad thing. But the way that it's used,
30:00 like the Tawaiyaf's contribution and, you know, there was this film, The Last Song or
30:06 the other songs, which addresses this thing also that how erasure takes place, you know.
30:12 So Mujra becomes a bad word, which it shouldn't have been because it's, you know, it's one
30:17 of the art forms. But even in those forms, like if you talk about cultural whatever,
30:21 I think culture, we always kind of like dismiss like one of the side things, but actually
30:26 it's one of the biggest.
30:27 Yeah, very misogynistic.
30:28 Yeah, it is.
30:29 So, I mean, of course, so patriarchy, misogyny, I think these will play, you know, the moment
30:37 when you attack liberal ideas, the moment when you attack left ideas, you know, so this
30:43 will come to play.
30:44 And mutton and machhli also become a little bit like.
30:47 But you're right.
30:48 Politics of veg and non-veg.
30:49 But the only way.
30:50 Can I respond to the federal issue?
30:53 Yeah.
30:54 Because federal is now we are talking a lot on asymmetrical federalism.
30:58 Yeah.
30:59 Right. And what it means is that, you know, the state boundaries should not restrict the
31:04 politics. So because diversity is not restricted within the state boundaries, diversity cuts
31:10 across state boundaries. And therefore, you know, if we have to have a better democracy,
31:16 democracy would mean what? Accommodation of diversity or, you know, holding together,
31:22 you know, taking together this whole diversity. So therefore, we have to move beyond states.
31:27 Yeah.
31:28 And the moment when we move beyond the states, we encounter, you know, these language, maybe
31:37 literature, you know, I mean, the literature of a region. So the region becomes more important,
31:45 not the state. Right. So I think for me, you know, I'm working on this asymmetrical federalism
31:53 is one of the solutions to have better accommodation of diversity. Right. And this, of course,
32:01 political party would need to understand that they cannot restrict themselves in one state
32:05 as a regional party. They'll have to move beyond, you know.
32:08 We've tried, but it seems like it's very, very difficult to kind of move beyond that.
32:16 It's high time political parties should engage academia and then.
32:20 Absolutely Tanviji, I think they should really consult you more often and you know, to get
32:26 and I know, I think we are running out of time now and we have to conclude this, but
32:31 please don't give up on your society and you know, getting people together to do.
32:34 One last question. Like don't give up, but you know, we went to Kashmir. Now that's,
32:41 that is the Muslim majority state, the only state in India. Now it cuts into, I mean,
32:46 ties into this federalism question as well. So they are, they did delimitation over there,
32:52 bifurcated it, all kinds of, made it a union territory, let's say. So this federalism
32:58 question that we talk about now, there is one state like, I mean, Kashmir is a laboratory
33:04 experiment in a way that they don't want, I mean, I don't know what it is. So that's
33:09 what I want to ask you in terms of the federalism debate or the question, how does that figure
33:15 in?
33:16 I think, you know, you'll have to get into the history of Kashmir. Because, because there
33:21 is, there is a history of Kashmir and, and the, again, the question is of accommodation,
33:30 you know, the question is of how, because the idea of secessionism comes in a lot of
33:38 time. The idea of belonging comes a lot of time.
33:42 I think that is the question now.
33:44 Yeah, no, still you never know. You never know because, you know, I mean, there are
33:50 a lot of theories which says that if you, if you suppress any movement, you know, too
33:55 much, it will wreck us sometime later, right? It doesn't, the problem is not solved, right?
34:00 So the best way of solving conflicts is to integrate, you know, a lot of things.
34:04 Yeah, they say integration is the switch.
34:06 Otherwise it always in some form or the other.
34:08 So we are, what are we like environment, you know, we have to leave good environment for
34:13 our kids. Similarly, we need to leave good solutions to our kids rather than make those
34:19 kids, you know, later on fight. So anyway, so Kashmir is a very typical example. I, there
34:25 are two very typical examples which fits in this whole idea of asymmetrical federalism,
34:31 which means that, you know, they need to be treated differently. Lots of, you know, lots
34:38 of states, Goa, for instance. I had been to Goa, so I interacted with a lot of, I mean,
34:43 that project is also there. So within my asymmetrical federalism, so Goa, Kashmir, Northeast, lot
34:50 of places, Nagaland, for example. How do you respond to a question when Nagas say that
34:54 we will have a separate constitution, we'll have a separate flag and we don't belong to
34:58 India. You know, I mean, they say it openly. So how do you respond to that? Right. So,
35:03 so therefore, our constitution makers, they had Article 371, 370. We should have worked
35:11 on these articles properly and rather than just simply rejecting them.
35:16 But weren't they, they also say that these were temporary provisions. Article 370, for
35:20 instance, was a temporary, but then the constituent assembly was not there.
35:24 So that was at the time of constituent assembly and the backdrop of partition and all those,
35:29 you know, ideas were there. So, so I think we should not always pick up the debates in
35:36 the manner in which it took place at the time of constituent assembly. Of course, you know,
35:42 but there are a lot of good debates. You know, federalism because the constituent assembly
35:49 makers, they wanted a very strong centre. Right. Therefore, we do not have the kind
35:55 of, you know, the idea of federalism. So India is not a federal country as such, you know,
36:01 it's a union of states. It doesn't talk about federal. But the idea that yes, because it's
36:07 so diverse, and we need to share the sovereignty. So, sovereignty should not be just located
36:14 at one point. So therefore, so, so sharing of sovereignty and also giving some regions
36:23 autonomy in terms of deciding about their own policies and their own laws. Right. So
36:30 sharing and so and some sort of independence, you know, in terms of autonomy, that was the
36:37 idea of federalism. But the backdrop of partition and the backdrop of violence that occurred,
36:44 you know, and of course, we should not forget, you know, that during party, I mean, just
36:51 just before the independence, right, the kind of contestation which was there between Muslim
36:59 League, Hindu Mahasabha, you know, I mean, we simply do not read that how they were fighting,
37:05 we always focus on Gandhi and Nehru and Congress, but we have never focused on like how they
37:11 were fighting with each other. You know, I mean, it's not just only Muslim League, or
37:15 not just only Hindu Sabha. Right. But both of them were fighting and, and very interestingly
37:21 with this, I may end, you know, the Urdu media. Yeah. In the absence of now since you've brought
37:28 this whole concept of secularism, in the absence of any Urdu word of secular, you know, they
37:35 started writing La Mazhab. Mazhab is religion, La is no religion. So probably most of the
37:42 Muslims, you know, the backward Muslims, I mean, most of the Muslims, they thought that
37:46 in independent India, they would have no religion. Yeah, this is what a lot of people who have
37:52 studied from Oxford and all. Yeah, it's, it's very interesting. I mean, I can, I can
37:58 give you the source, you know, where all these things are. So, so they were so terrified
38:04 and Muslim League picked on it that look, they are, I mean, I mean, I mean, it is right,
38:08 secular, of course, means that they'll take your religion. Right. But it wasn't like that.
38:13 So, so look at the way how things were happening at that point of time. So there was a lot
38:17 of chaos and confusion. So, but the fact that India became a country, which is quite, I
38:26 mean, centrist, strong at the centre and therefore, there is more possibility of India becoming
38:34 authoritarian given, given just a little bit of a space, it becomes authoritarian. Yeah.
38:38 Right. So look at, look at the, look at the executive, you know, you can see the functioning
38:43 executive since independent, the moment it gets a little bit of a space, it becomes authoritarian
38:48 because the constitution provides them. There are so many articles which talks about all
38:53 India services, governor, for example, so many, so many institutions which are there
38:58 in the constitution, which helps them to become so strong. I mean, there, there, there, there
39:02 is an overlap of functions. So executive takes over a lot of judiciary function, takes over
39:07 a lot of legislative functions, you know, and becomes authoritarian. So therefore, I
39:11 mean, we should not be surprised to see. And 370 is one example of that. And 370. So one
39:16 should not be surprised if the present government, we are seeing it as quite an authoritarian
39:20 government. Thank you very much, Anvirji. That was very interesting. Thank you so much
39:24 for having me. Thank you very much. Thank you very much for watching.
39:26 Thank you.
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