Need to understand difference between communalism and fascism

Today i bring to you a thoughtful article By Soroor Ahmed, TwoCircles.net

A few days after Eid-ul-Fitr, which fell on August 9 in India, rediff.com did a story claiming that a top Muslim cleric somewhat linked with Deoband met the Gujarat chief minister and BJP’s prime ministerial candidate, Narendra Modi, in the month of Ramazan. The story did not disclose the name of the Muslim leader.

Two months later just on eve of Eid-ul-Azha Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Hind chief Mehmood Madani, while speaking at a conference on the demand of reservations for Muslims in Jaipur, attacked the Congress accusing it of stoking communal fears in order to gain Muslim votes. He also blamed some regional parties for adopting the same policy and said that they are spreading fears about Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi unnecessarily in order to gain votes.

That was not enough. He was approached by a number of journalists to whom he told the Congress cannot scare Muslims to get votes from them. They will have to win votes on the basis of performance and promise.

Mahmood Madani is more of a politician
 than a religious leader.

“I can say with confidence that the Congress government in Rajasthan has killed Muslims in cold blood,” he was quoted as saying. He directly held Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot responsible for it and urged Muslims not to be afraid of BJP.

His remarks were widely welcomed by BJP leaders, for example, Meenakshi Lekhi and Prakash Jawadkar.

Whether the rediff.com story was right or not the two quick developments have made it clear that some Muslim ulema––if not the non-ulema––have developed a soft corner for the BJP, especially the Gujarat Chief Minister. A couple of years back Maulana Ghulam Vastanvi too expressed somewhat similar view, which created storm.

A year later on the eve of Gujarat Assembly election he changed his stand only to be strongly criticized by the same BJP, which had earlier praised him to the sky.

But Madani’s case is even more curious. Just a couple of days after his Jaipur remarks came a statement from him that he did not say that Congress is fanning fears about Narendra Modi to secure Muslim votes. But then Madani has made flip-flop in the past too.

There is absolutely no problem in holding a particular view and expressing it. But there should be consistency––be it the case of Vastanvi or Madani or anyone else.

What they fail to understand is the difference between communalism and fascism. Any political party or individual––be it Hindu, Muslim, Sikh Christian––can be communal. In fact the word communal does not mean what we understand in India. In English communal means something social. It is in India that it suggests something negative and hatred for other community, which is no doubt wrong.

Communal riots––as we define––can take place anywhere in India or any other country. Minorities are targeted in Muslim and Christian countries too and the perpetrators deserve strongest condemnation for the crime as their counterparts deserve in India.

Yes, we can hold the state governments of UP, Rajasthan, Assam or anywhere else responsible for the communal violence. But the problem arises when the state openly becomes a party as, according to all the media reports, it happened in Gujarat in 2002. It is here that communalists’ acquire fascist tendency. This is much more dangerous.

During Emergency the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was accused of acquiring fascist tendency. She lost the election in 1977 and later realized her mistakes. Incidentally, when the Congress was strong––and had acquired somewhat fascist tendency––Madani’s family was strongly with it. Be it the horrendous riots of 1980s (Moradabad, Meerut, Aligarh etc) or the heydays of movement against Babri Masjid Jamiat’s proclivity towards the Congress is a known fact.

It was only when the Congress party became weak and more open to criticism that Madani, a former Rajya Sabha MP, has started criticizing it. It would be exaggeration to blame only the Congress for raking up the ghost of Gujarat of 2002. People remotely associated with it––not only Muslims––often raise 2002 and 1984 as they were somewhat different.

Madani may have certain political and personal compulsions. But he must not drag the community into it.

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Soroor Ahmed is a Patna-based freelance journalist. He writes on political, social, national and international issues. His past columns here http://twocircles.net/Columnists/soroor_ahmed.html