re there any takeaways for Muslims from the Narendra Modi government?

We should never let things ride, good governance comes from critical analysis and democracy survives because of journalists. 

Thomas Jefferson made a strong statement about the role of the media in a democracy when he noted, “If it were left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.” Describing the role of the press, George A. Krimsky, the former head of news for the Associated Press’ World Services and co-author of Hold the Press, writes, “In the wake of America’s successful revolution, it was decided there should indeed be government, but only if it were accountable to the people. The people, in turn, could only hold the government accountable if they knew what it was doing and could intercede as necessary, using their ballot, for example. This role of public ‘watchdog’ was thus assumed by a citizen press, and as a consequence, the government in the United States has been kept out of the news business.”

This author M Reyaz has done it right, we need more of this. It is time to hold the leadership and Mr. Modi accountable.

Mike Ghouse
www.MikeGhouse.net


Are there any takeaways for Muslims from the Narendra Modi government?

 Image for representational purposes only. RNA Research & Archives

Courtesy - DNA Analysis

As someone who has been very vocal in criticising the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) – I have been critical of the previous UPA government’s policies too – and Narendra Modi, I was particularly restrained (self-censorship, you may call it) since May 16, when the BJP, under Modi, won a convincing mandate to rule the country for next five years. In the last two weeks, I have been thinking of writing a ‘reconciliatory’ piece and urge the Muslim leadership to not make the ‘historical mistake’ and try to engage with the new government in power for the betterment of the community. 

As I sit to write this article, I am afraid there are not many positive takeaways from the new government, and if these are the signs of things to come, the situation really appears to be glum. 

As the new government takes shape, there are reports from Karnataka of how right-wing Hindu organisations are demanding a ban on the morning calls for prayer, and another group demanding a total ban on loudspeakers in mosques in Maharashtra. There were also reports of vandalism by jubilant mobs celebrating Modi’s victory in Bijapur. These were all small news and hence did not really catch the attention of the national media. 

But in the light of the chauvinistic government at the helm, at a time when you see the top-rung of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP), including Sadhvi Rithambara, an accused in the Babri Masjid demolition case, and Indresh Kumar, alleged to be a co-conspirator in the Samjhauta train blast case, seated along with other seers and spiritual leaders during Modi’s inauguration, such news cannot be ignored. 

Modi’s gesture of inviting leaders of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries, particularly Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, was seen by many as an overture to reach out to Muslims, like his political mentor LK Advani who visited Jinnah’s grave to project himself as more inclusive, much to ire of the RSS. Sociologist Dipankar Gupta tweeted on May 26, “SAARC leaders were called to legitimise, and give cover to the invitation to Pakistan and send comforting, positive signals to Indian Muslims.”


In fact, in the first message issued by the new prime minister immediately after taking oath, he talked of “a strong, developed and inclusive India that actively engages with the global community to strengthen the cause of world peace and development”. But that is the most we heard in a cabinet that has the full imprint of the RSS. 

One of the first controversies surrounding the new government is the statement made by Minister of State Jitendra Singh on Jammu and Kashmir and Article 370. The BJP had given a ticket to veterinary surgeon Sanjeev Kumar Balyan, who was accused of participating in the mahapanchayat and giving a provocative speech that led to the Muzaffarnagar riots last year. He has now been made a minister and already the theory that he was framed has begun circulating, like so many others in the past. 

This is not the end, senior police officers accused of being involved in extrajudicial killings and false implications of Muslim youth are being reinstated in Rajasthan and Gujarat already as former Intelligence Bureau (IB) chief Ajit Doval is slated to be National Security Advisor (NSA) to Modi. 

The most surprising was Modi’s choice of Dr Najma Heptullah as the minority affairs minister. To be fair, Heptullah is a doctorate in cardiac anatomy from the University of Denver, and thus educationally most qualified among the cabinet ministers. But that is not why she has been appointed minister, or else she would have been given a meatier portfolio. She is the grand-niece of Maulana Abul Kalam Azad and was in the Congress and the Rajya Sabha for a long time. She has always been a political nobody whom the Congress kept in the Upper House, where she later became deputy speaker.

In 2004, when several people were hoping for a comeback of the NDA government, she switched sides apparently after differences with Sonia Gandhi. She had said she had been “humiliated” by the Congress leadership that has “moved away from the ideology of Nehru, Azad, Patel and Gandhi”. One wonders if the party she chose follows their ideology, according to her. Heptullah has been made a minister to reward her decade of loyalty to the party, clearly overlooking two other more vocal Muslim faces, Shahnawaz Hussain, who lost the election, and Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi. 

In 2006, the then UPA government formed a new ministry of minority affairs that has been assigned the responsibility of implementing minority welfare schemes. Clearly, Heptullah got this portfolio because of her name and because she belongs to a ‘minority’ community. However, immediately after assuming charge, in her first statement as a minister, she says Muslims are numerically too large to be called a minority, a line often taken by the RSS and its associates, though the Constitution too declares Muslims a minority. 

According to the 2001 census (data of religion-based census of 2011 not yet out), Muslims comprise 13.4% of the total population while Hindus are over 80%, and the remaining communities together form just about 6% of India’s population. Compare this to the Tamils in Sri Lanka, where 11.2% of the total population are Sri Lankan Tamils while another 4.2% are Tamils of Indian origin. 74.9% of the people are Sinhalese while the rest comprise other smaller communities including Moors, Malays, etc. Thus, roughly 15.7% of the Sri Lankan population is a minority, for which not only Tamils but even the current PM expressed his concern and urged President Mahinda Rajapaksa to implement the autonomy in spirit. In Bangladesh, with 8.2% of the population, Hindus are the second biggest community, and the third largest in the world after India and Nepal.

Our PM’s heart bleeds for minorities in India’s neighbouring countries so much that he has announced they will get asylum to protect them from persecution. Yet, despite the riots and despite the 2006 Sachar committee report clearly stating that the lot of Muslims is worse than even the Dalits, their representation as a minority is in question.

Heptullah also said on her first day as minister that reservations were not the solution. One may argue on whether communities as a whole deserve reservations, or only the backward amongst them are in need, but what is interesting is that reservation is seen as appeasement only in context of Muslims, not for SC-STs, or OBCs or Kashmiri migrants or when Jats are included in the list of OBCs. 

Another concern has been that several scholarships programmes meant for minority students already appear to be facing a financial crunch, and there are fears they may be stopped altogether. Heptullah also said the PM’s 15 point programme need a revisit. Certainly they do, but in if she attempts to abolish it altogether in an attempt to create a “level playing field”, it will only result in the marginalisation of the minorities, the pet agenda of the RSS.

Now that the new government is here, one hopes that in the 100 days’ programme the ministry of minority affairs would lay out plans to bring the minorities at par with the rest of the population, and only then can there be a truly level playing field. 

M Reyaz is a Delhi-based journalist.He tweets at @journalistreyaz.

Can Muslim Indian become Prime Minister of India?

http://mikeghouseforindia.blogspot.com/2012/05/can-muslim-indian-become-prime-minister.html

 “Can a Muslim Indian become Prime Minister of India?” The answer is "no" at this time. However, there were three presidents and a vice president since independence.  This essay explores the possibilities. 

Patriotism of Indian Muslims is no different than others, there is nothing less or more about it. Even to think about it is dumb. No one should ask if one loves his or her mother, it is between them and it is none of anyone's business. Muslims are the sons and daughters of the soil as everyone else.

However, the time for an Indian Muslim to become a Prime Minister has not come yet and there are reasons for it.  I am writing this piece particularly to address the questions from non-Indians,  and like all humans,  I defend my country with my heart, mind, and soul. We have flaws, but we are a great nation and we are going to fix it. 

Muslims have gotten behind,  far behind, even behind the Dalits who 'were' not allowed to prosper or even get an education in our society.  Part of it is their own fault, and part of it is the bias in the system.  Dr. Shariff has identified those issues in the Sachar Report; indeed, there are areas where Muslims don’t even have a primary school, let alone electricity, their poverty prevents them from having their own regular school just as it used to happen with the Dalits.  

Fortunately, Dalits have had reservations and incentives to uplift themselves, which Muslims don’t have.  A man living in such areas simply cannot think of anything but getting his or her kid to a school, and unfortunately, the home-based schools do not prepare the child to join the labor force in the market.

The society at large represented by the Government has failed him. It is in the interests of all Indians to pull up those in ditches and bring them up on to a level playing field, and then they can compete, as has happened with the Dalit community. The more we invest in human development – that is investing in making every Indian a productive citizen, which will add him to the consumer market, which in turn will increase production of goods and services which requires employees. Thus, the cycle gets activated and everyone will see the prosperity.

My prosperity hinges on the prosperity of people around me; I will get richer when other people get better financially. Remember Bill Gates? If he was insecure or jealous that his employees are becoming millionaires, he would not have become a billionaire. If more Muslims get the education, India is the beneficiary and every Indian will benefit from the resulting prosperity. It is the patriotic thing to uplift a fellow Indian instead of finding faults. Muslims who are employed are more productive than fellow Indians simply because they are determined to prove, they have to be 150% good to be equal to a 100% Hindu for instance.

Until Muslims are uplifted onto a level playing field, the scope of their interest would remain limited. They cannot think of anything else other than taking care of the bare necessities and getting out of the hole.

Maslow's hierarchy of needs is a theory in psychology proposed by Abraham Maslow in his 1943 paper "A Theory of Human Motivation" in Psychological Review. His theories parallel many other theories of human developmental psychology, some of which focus on describing the stages of growth in humans. Maslow used the terms "physiological", "safety", "belongingness" and "love", "esteem", "self-actualization", and "self-transcendence" to describe the pattern that human motivations generally move through.

It is in the interest of society at large to see everyone on the same plane, we are all Indians, one India, and one community.  The more Indians we can get out of poverty, the more consumers we will add in the marketplace, who will drive the economic engine of producing and manufacturing things and thus creating jobs.  It will have a Multiplier effect, and then prosperity will reach everyone and when it does, it becomes sustainable. Deprive the 15% of the population their basic rights and access to education, employment, loans, jobs, housing and other necessities of life, you have a langda nation. Inequalities continue to create greater imbalance and everyone will lose at the end. 

Once we are out of the ditch, an Indian Muslim would be able to represent the interests of Indians at large without any guilt of ignoring the community.   When that time comes, you can compete with any Indian, regardless of the religion, language or state, and win the hearts and minds of people at large. A Muslim who will bring prosperity for all Indians will become the Prime Minister of India.  It will happen soon and India will shine and that is when sab ka vikas occurs. This is not understood by the right wing politicians in India and we have to work on having them see these values.

Prosperity is contagious and multiplies for the benefit of all.

Mike Ghouse 

Can an Indian American become President of the United States?

An excellent distinction was drawn by a friend, "being successful in America and being successful in politics are two different things."

However, the pessimist assertion that one has to belong to Abrahamic faiths to be politically successful is flawed. It may have to do with two of the successful 2nd generation Indians who chose to be Christians, Bobby Jindal, and Nikki Haley. It is short of making sense with so much anti-Mormon, anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim rhetoric around. Both Jindal and Haley are in the list of possible vice-Presidential candidates, if they would get elected, they stand a chance to become the President of the United States. Hypothetically the Vice President is considered the possible president.

The first generation immigrants (Hindus are a minority in the US like Muslims in India) are still not a part of the society, our interests are narrower, reflective of our own groups, once we become universal in our approach, and put America first, and then we will have universal acceptability from most segments of the American society.

The immigrant Indians, be it Hindu, Muslim, Christian or Sikh, have India's interests first over America's (Remember our behavior after Pokhran?) interests, the Arabs have their own interests over American Interest, and the Jews have Israel's interests first over American interests. Why should the majority of Americans who have American interests in their hearts elect someone whose loyalty to America comes second? Most of us are guilty of dual loyalty. 

A comment was made that a Muslim or a Sikh can be president of India, a Christian can be the defense minister, and would that happen in America? The commentator expressed a doubt if a Hindu or Buddhist will be elected President of the United States.

The story is different with India, where Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, Jains, Buddhists and others have fought together for Independence; they have given their blood to earn the freedom. India is theirs, no one has an advantage over the other and thanks God for that. India is indeed an open society, we do have our share of bigots like all other nations, but still, it is not as blatant with the general population as it is with a few. 

Who gets to be the President or Prime Minister of India is not an issue, although the right-wing (insecure) politicians have made an issue from time to time.

A few among the Indian Americans are still prejudiced and totally bigoted. They have no qualms showing their blatant prejudice, they want to deny the full rights of citizenship to Dalits, Muslims and Sikhs in India whereas they enjoy the freedom and liberty given to each one of us regardless of our nationalities. I run a group called Dallas Indians with some 1800 Indians, with barely 50 Muslim members, a few bigots (about 10) have made repulsive and disgusting comments in it about other Indians.  

 as they believe, don't do unto us in America, what we do to fellow Indians back home. Some of the most bigoted Indians are 

The American story is different, we are all new here, and our numbers have become significant in the last 20 years and we have ways to go.

However, America is an open society, a true land of opportunity, and has done well giving a Catholic, and an African American a break. Despite a few bigots in the Republican Party, Romney will be the nominee; in fact, those bigots are back peddling now.

Jindal and Haley are Americans first, they will go against India if they have to, you and I don’t have the balls to do that. We are too worried of being branded “drohi” by fellow “Desh drohi’s”. To put it bluntly, our loyalties are yet to be tested.

The day, we the Indian Americans demonstrate America first, no one will stop us from becoming the President of the United States.

Dr. Mike Ghouse is a community consultant, social scientist, thinker, writer, news maker, Interfaith Wedding officiant, and a speaker on Pluralism, Interfaith, Islam, politics, terrorism, human rights, India, Israel-Palestine, motivation, and foreign policy. He is committed to building cohesive societies and offers pluralistic solutions on issues of the day. Visit him (63 links) at www.MikeGhouse.net and www.TheGhousediary.com for his exclusive writings.