An Occasional Publication of the Ethics and Public Policy Center

April 2004Number 28

Muslims in Hindu Nationalist IndiaA Conversation with Asghar Ali Engineer and Paul R. Brass

At a seminar held at the Ethics and Public Policy Center onJanuary 20, 2004, two experts on religious conflict in SouthAsia discussed the possible impact of increasing religiousmilitancy—both Hindu and Muslim—on the Indian demo-cratic state. The speakers were the Indian scholar andactivist Asghar Ali Engineer Asghar Ali Engineer Asghar Ali Engineer Asghar Ali Engineer Asghar Ali Engineer and the American scholar ofIndian politics PPPPPaul R. Braul R. Braul R. Braul R. Braul R. Brassassassassass. Their remarks in the editedtranscript that follows lead to a lively discussion with otherparticipants. Moderator TTTTTimothimothimothimothimothy Samy Samy Samy Samy Samuel Shahuel Shahuel Shahuel Shahuel Shah is a fellow atthe Ethics and Public Policy Center specializing in South Asia.The seminar co-sponsor was INFEMIT, a network of ThirdWorld theologians and activists led by Vinay Samuel, and fund-ing was generously provided by Fieldstead and Company.

TTTTTimothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah: India, being a great and diverse country,is one of those places where no matter what the ques-tion, almost every answer is correct. Is India a country ofterrible poverty? Yes. Is India a country of enormous wealthand amazing economic growth and dynamism? Yes.

Is India the world’s largest democracy, with an as-tonishing record of political freedom and stability amidstgreat challenges? Yes. Is India a country in which seriousand disabling political and social inequities effectively dis-enfranchise whole segments of the population? Yes.

Does India have an impressive record of maintain-ing an essentially secular politics in a highly religioussociety? Yes. Has it seen the growth of powerful and ex-tremist forms of religious nationalism? Yes.

As these paradoxes characterize India as a whole,so they characterize Indian Islam in particular. Do India’sMuslims—numbering 122.6 million according to one es-timate—constitute the second largest Muslim populationin the world? Yes. Are they a large and distinguished pres-ence in Indian history, culture, and politics? Yes. Do Mus-lims enjoy more civil and political freedoms in India thanin many Muslim-majority countries? Yes.

But there are other questions that may demand other

answers. In the face of the growing political power ofHindu nationalism over the last twenty-five years, areMuslims an increasingly hard-pressed minority? Whatare their political options, given the increasingly limitedchoice between a dominant Hindu nationalist BJP, whichswept three of four major state elections in Decemberand seems poised to win national elections this spring,and a Congress Party in disarray?

The Gujarat violence of 2002 is but the starkest in-dicator of a precarious situation. And recent terroristbombings in Mumbai may suggest how a few IndianMuslims are responding to this precarious situation.Some reports suggest that the bombings were carriedout by something called the Gujarat Muslim RevengeForce. Yet while all this has been going on, Muslim-majority Kashmir has seen great progress towards peaceand stability.

As we attempt to find the elusive truth about thepolitical situation of India’s 130 million Muslims and whatit might mean for India’s secular democratic future, wehave outstanding help from our two speakers. The firstis Asghar Ali Engineer, who in over forty years of ex-haustive field work has investigated and documentednearly every communal riot in post-independence India.He has written about Indian Muslims and Indian com-munalism in countless articles and in forty-five books.Dr. Engineer is currently the director of two organiza-tions in Mumbai: the Centre for the Study of Society andSecularism, and the Institute of Islamic Studies.

ASGHAR ALI ENGINEER

Although communal violence has assumed a lot of significance in the last few years, the subject is

nothing new to post-independence India. We have beenexperiencing major communal riots since the first majorriot in Jamshedpur in 1961. (Pre-independence India alsosaw a lot of communal violence, but my own investiga-

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tions started with 1961.) In the 1960s we used to seearound one communal riot a day, so more than 300 riotsevery year.

The rioting increased in intensity in the 1980s; ma-jor communal riots occurred in Moradabad (1980),Biharsharif (1981), Baroda and Meerut (1982), Nelli,Assam, where 4,000 people were killed (1983), Bombayand Bhiwandi (1984), anti-Sikh riots in Delhi and otherplaces (1984), Ahmedabad (1985), Meerut again (1987),Bhagalpur (1989). In 1990 there were 300 riots whenL. K. Advani, then home minister and currently the deputyprime minister, rode his rath yatra (his travel chariot)across the country inciting Hindu activism. Riots occurredin Bombay in 1992 and 1993. Then came Gujarat 2002—not a communal riot but communal carnage, in whichmore than 2,000 people were most brutally killed.

So communal violence has been with us for a longtime, thanks in part to right-wing parties like the Jana

Sangh, which renameditself the BJP (BharatiyaJanata Party) in the1980s. The BJP officiallyadopted secularism asits policy but then be-came more violent. Inthe early 1980s the BJPput a question mark on

Indian secularism by calling it “pseudo-secularism,”meaning that Indian secularism is Western in origin andis based on the “appeasement” of Muslims. So it is notreal secularism but pseudo-secularism. The BJP alsoadopted a slogan that only Hindus can be truly secular;no other religious group can be truly secular.

And so a new debate started in Indian politics in theearly 1980s about minority appeasement. The BJP,through its propaganda, popularized this myth, andmiddle-class educated Hindus started repeating thecharge that Muslims are being appeased in India. Andwhat was the example given? That Muslims are allowedto marry four wives. It is a great privilege given to Mus-lims—as if Muslim women were not part of the Muslimcommunity. It is a privilege for Muslim men only.

The BJP kept on saying that Muslims are being ap-peased, even though the condition of Muslims is miser-able economically and educationally; they are on a parwith what we call “Dalits,” the low-caste Hindus. Manyindices even show that Muslims are falling below thescheduled castes, because scheduled castes have reser-vations through which their members can get jobs, andMuslims don’t have reservations. Nonetheless, the BJPwent on emphasizing that Muslims were being appeased,creating more and more anger in the minds of middle-class Hindus.

Then came the case of Shah Bano, a Muslim womanwho went to court to demand financial support from herex-husband. The Muslim leadership adopted a verywrong stance on that issue. Although Islamic shari’a isby no means rigid on this issue, these leaders made thecase that to give maintenance for more than threemonths is a sin, a violation of divine law. The Qu’rannowhere prescribes three months of iddat, the “waitingperiod” between pronunciation and finalization of di-vorce, as the periodof maintenance. Itonly says to makeprovision for Mus-lim divorcees, andthat is obligatory forpious Muslims. Butto advance its ownpolitical agenda, theMuslim leadershipused the slogan “Islam in danger” and brought Muslimmasses into the streets. This of course created moreanger in the minds of Hindus.

Rajiv Gandhi, who was prime minister at that time,was very wrongly advised to change the law, overturn-ing the Supreme Court judgment so that Muslim womenwould be governed by newly enacted legislation specificto the Muslim community. This action had a very ad-verse impact on the Hindu mind and gave the BJP proofof appeasement.

And then the BJP unearthed a new issue: Ram-janmabhoomi–Babri Masjid. As I said, when Mr. Advanitook his “chariot journey,” traveling in a rath mountedon a modern Toyota, 300 riots took place. He went aroundIndia and incited Hindus to rebuild the Ram-janmabhoomi (“Ram’s birthplace”) temple on the site ofthe Babri mosque. In all the riots from the 1980s onwards,one of the powerful causes was Ram-janmabhoomi–Babri Masjid.

The BJP rode to power on this Ram-janmabhoomirath. The party had never received more than 11 percentof the votes in parliamentary elections, but it got 29 per-cent in 1999. Yet it could not come to power on its own,a sign of the strength of Indian secularism. The Hindumasses are by and large peaceful and secular. They wantto live in peace and harmony, but occasionally they canbe incited, and communal violence takes place. So theBabri Masjid was demolished, and the BJP came to powerin an alliance with secular parties known as the IndianNational Democratic Alliance.

Most of the states were ruled by Congress Party gov-ernments and remained somewhat peaceful. Gujarat wasthe only state where the BJP was in power by itself, with-out an alliance. And because the BJP came to power there

“The BJP officially adopted

secularism as its policy but then

became more violent. . . . It also

adopted a slogan that only

Hindus can be truly secular.”

“The Hindu masses are by and

large peaceful and secular.

They want to live in peace and

harmony, but occasionally they

can be incited, and communal

violence takes place.”

3

Muslims in Hindu Nationalist Indiaby itself, the kind of carnage seen in 2002 became pos-sible. In a coalition government, they are constrainedby their secular partners. But in Gujarat, where they arein power by themselves, they can easily kill 2,000 Mus-lims. BJP leaders themselves described Gujarat as a labo-ratory for right-wing Hindu forces.

Before and after the violence in Gujarat, the mili-tant Hindu leaders K. S. Sudarshan of the RSS [RashtriyaSwayamsevak Sangh] and Bal Thackeray of Shiv Senapublicly said that Hitler was their model, and that only aperson like Hitler can solve the problems of India; other-wise these minorities will always remain too aggressiveand will prevent the Hindu rashtra [nation] from cominginto existence. Gujarat showed how such an approachcan work.

Feelings were so intensely provoked that highly edu-cated Hindus, if you talked to them, were justifying thatviolence. At the same time, many Hindus in Gujaratmaintained their sanity and opposed the carnage, butthey were helpless to stop the actions of those well-armed and fanatical mobs. Low-caste Hindus and tribalswere used to kill Muslims in Gujarat. Many people toldus during our investigations that Dalits were given 500rupees (around $12) and a bottle of liquor to kill oneMuslim. And tribals were told, “If you don’t kill Muslims,we will kill you.” So they went and killed Muslims. Gen-erally communal violence takes place in urban areas,but in Gujarat, more violence took place in rural areasbecause that is where the tribals were.

Why incite tribals? The BJP wanted to get tribal votes.In the Gujarat election, tribal votes that had always goneto Congress went to the BJP for the first time. The samething has occurred in subsequent elections; for example,in three state elections in December 2003 (MadhyaPradesh, Rajasthan, and Chhattisgarh), tribals mainly

voted for the BJP.Hindu nationalistscall tribals vanavasi,that is, “forest dwell-ers.” They are sys-tematically workingamong them, estab-lishing vanavasi ash-rams, apparently for

the tribals’ welfare but really intended to “Hinduize”tribals and give them Hindu identity. Unfortunately,these groups receive a lot of funds from NRIs (non-resident Indians) living in the United States.

In Gujarat we felt fascism knocking on the doorfor the first time. We had faith in Indian secularism. Wecontinue to have faith in Indian secularism. India is agreat country, a country of bewildering diversity. Butafter the carnage in Gujarat, BJP leaders started saying

publicly on TV that they will repeat the Gujarat “experi-ment” in other states. And what was this experiment?Kill 2,000 Muslims and then win the election with atwo-thirds majority. Shockingly, when Prime MinisterVajpayee was asked, “Will you repeat the Gujaratmodel?” instead of saying “No” he asked, “Would yourepeat Godhra?” [referring to the place where a traincarrying Hindu pilgrims was set afire by a Muslim mob;this precipated the Gujarat carnage]. In other words, ifyou repeat Godhra, we will repeat Gujarat. So, as I said,we feel that fascism is knocking on the door. If we don’treally work to strengthen secularism, it will be difficultto stop the tide of fascism.

Now the BJP is cleverly combining various policies.After talking of the “Gujarat model” in Himachal Pradeshlast year, the BJP lost badly. Congress won with a two-thirds majority even though 98 percent of the popula-tion in Himachal Pradesh is Hindu. This shows the ex-tent of diversity, and how different the situations are indifferent states in India. So now the BJP strategy is totalk of development on one hand and to use Hindutva[“Hindu-ness”] propaganda on the other, in order to carryboth the Hindu middle classes and the Hindu masses. Inthe December 2003 state elections, while they declared,“Now we will talk only of developmental issues,” theysimultaneously used Hindu nationalist organizations intheir campaigning. They set up new organizations suchas the Hindu Jagran Manch—the “Hindu AwakeningFront”—to carry out systematic Hindutva propaganda,not from the official BJP platform but in a parallel cam-paign. These other organizations delivered incitingspeeches and distributed leaflets full of hatred for Mus-lims and Christians along with the election card (show-ing the voting-booth location) in Hindi.

In Chhattisgarh, a tribal-majority state, the main is-sue was conversion to Christianity. Former Chhattisgarhchief minister Ajit Jogi, who was caught on camera ac-cepting a bribe for a mining license, was mainly respon-sible for the anti-Christian movement there. He claimedthat Christians are converting tribals to Christianity. Thisline proved very effective: tribals voted for the BJP, andthe BJP won the election.

So in every state the BJP studies the situation andchooses a strategy very cleverly. To say that they havestopped talking about Hindutva is a sheer illusion. Thehate propaganda will go on.

Let me finish by responding to two or three ques-tions raised in the invitation to this meeting. On the fu-ture of minorities, particularly Muslims: I would not saythat their future is in peril, for two reasons. One, India isimmensely diverse, and this diversity works against anycommunal propaganda. Two, the mood of the masseschanges. At one time they may vote for the BJP, but at

“Many people told us during our

investigations that Dalits were

given 500 rupees (around $12)

and a bottle of liquor to kill one

Muslim in Gujarat.”

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4

another time they may vote against the BJP. I’m sure de-mocracy will survive in India, because it is not possibleto homogenize Hindus, let alone the whole of India. Classdifferences are very sharp. The caste hierarchy is veryrigid, and this consciousness is increasing day by dayamong low-caste Hindus. That works against BJP prop-aganda. For example, their alliance with Dalits in UttarPradesh has broken down.

Because of India’s social structure, diversity, andchanging political needs, I don’t think the BJP can hopeto get reelected again and again. As long as secularismis maintained, there is a measure of safety for Muslimsand other minorities.

Also, the whole outlook of Muslims has changed.There was a time during the 1980s when they adoptedan aggressive posture, but since the demolition of BabriMasjid and the ensuing riots they have realized how di-sastrous this aggressive posture is. They have becomevery sober and sane and have realized that what theyneed is more education and better economic opportuni-ties. You will not find Muslim leaders making inflamma-tory statements anymore. Even the Hindu middle classeshave started saying that extremism is now among Hin-dus and no more among Muslims.

So the demolition of Babri Masjid was, in a way, awatershed for Muslims. It transformed their thinking.Sometimes something good comes out of evil. Of course,the Gujarat carnage disturbed Muslims very seriously, andMuslims do live under a sense of acute insecurity, awarethat anything can happen at any time. But the way theNational Commission of Human Rights in India took upthe Muslim cause, and the Supreme Court’s role in thefew judgments it delivered and in reprimanding theGujarat chief minister—these were signs of hope for theMuslim minority in India.

A second question posed for this seminar was whetherfascism would prevail in India. I think it’s very unlikely.The conditions are very different from Germany. I don’tthink it would be possible for any authoritarian, totalitar-ian, or fascistic party to establish fascism in India. The BJPhas realized, particularly since the violence betweenAssamese and Bihari Hindus last fall [in November 2003,Assamese students attacked Bihari settlers whom they sawas competition for prized railway jobs], that Hindus are adiverse community. This violence was highly embarrass-ing for the BJP; it shattered their dream of homogeneityamong Hindus. They have realized that homogeneity isimpossible in a country as diverse as India.

And the Muslim community in India is as diverse asthe Hindu community. There are not only Shiites andSunnis but also many other sects and different religiouscommunities among Muslims. And in addition to thisreligious diversity among Muslims, there is linguistic and

cultural diversity as well. This diversity, among Hindusand among Muslims, will ensure that India does not be-come a fascist state.

TTTTTimothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah: Thank you, Dr. Engineer. Next it’s mypleasure to introduce Paul Brass, emeritus professor ofpolitical science and international studies at the Univer-sity of Washington, Seattle. Dr. Brass is among the mostoutstanding scholars of Indian politics in the last gen-eration. He has published fourteen books— most recentlyThe Production of Hindu-Muslim Violence in Contempo-rary India—and numerous articles on comparative andSouth Asian politics, ethnic politics, and collective vio-lence. His work has been based on extensive field re-search in India during numerous visits since 1961.

PAUL R. BRASS

I want to give a brief condensation of some of the main themes in my latest book, which as Tim mentioned is

called The Production of Hindu-Muslim Violence in Con-temporary India. I used the term “production” with con-siderable deliberation, because, as you will see, that sum-marizes in a word my argument about Hindu-Muslimviolence in contemporary India.

There are very severe obstacles to the understand-ing of a subject like this. One is what I call blame dis-placement, a process by which attention is directed awayfrom the perpetrators of violence and other anti-socialactions onto generalized objects. Blame, instead of fall-ing on specific groups, organizations, and individuals thatare responsible, is displaced onto categories such as thegeneral public, the mass of the people, politicians in gen-eral, or the police in general.

Deeply implicated in this process of blame displace-ment, of diverting attention away from the obvious, aresocial scientists themselves. In their search for causes ofthe obvious, through various forms of misplaced causalanalysis and reasoning they may ignore the role of well-known leaders and groups whose purpose is to precipi-tate violent occasions.

I must reluctantly mention a book that I see as anegregious example of this: Ethnic Conflict and Civic Lifeby Ashutosh Varshney. It’s a book that completely freesorganizations in the Hindutva family from responsibilityfor the perpetration of riots, especially in the last ten orfifteen years. Among these organizations are the BJP, theVishwa Hindu Parishad, and the Bajrang Dal, an organi-zation devoted to the cult of violence.The Sangh Parivar,or the Hindutva family, is not the only set of organiza-tions that has produced riots in post-independence In-dia. Riots have been produced by Congress politicians,by politicians from many other parties, by various otherorganizations. But make no mistake about it: in the last

5

Muslims in Hindu Nationalist Indiaten or fifteen years, the main perpetrators of Hindu-Muslim violence are the members of the BJP, the RSS,and other organizations in the Hindutva family.

The production of violence is a process, not an event.It’s a process that takes place in specific localities, spe-cific cities and towns, but has also a much broader com-pass. It cannot be entirely explained by the particulardemographic, social, or other characteristics of theseplaces. Although it is a process that takes place in spe-cific localities, it occurs within a general frame. That frameis what I call the “communal discourse,” a term I prefer to“communal ideology.” By communal discourse I mean ahegemonic discourse that pervades contemporary Indiansociety, especially amongst Hindus. This discourse hasthree central elements that claim to define Hindu-Muslimrelations both past and present, elements that I call histori-cization, memorialization, and demonization.

The historicization in this communal discourse definesIndian history as a history of the relations between Hin-dus and Muslims going back for a thousand years or more.In this historical or pseudo-historical account, the Mus-lims are seen as invaders who came into India, conqueredthe indigenous Hindu population, and wreaked havoc onHindu institutions and temples. The history of India in thisparticular discourse is defined as a history of antagonismbetween two great communities, Hindus and Muslims. An-other element in the historicization is separatism, the idea

that throughout theirhistory, Hindus andMuslims have beenseparate. This is es-pecially true of theMuslims, who haveacted separately andultimately chose toseparate from Indiaitself at the time ofindependence. Their

separatism, it is asserted, led to the partition of the Indiansubcontinent and the ensuing violence.

The second aspect of this communal discourse iswhat I call memorialization: calling attention throughoutthe subcontinent to signs of this maleficent Muslim pres-ence. Among the figures, institutions, and objects thatthe memorializers point to are the many mosques, ofwhich the Babri Masjid was only one. I have sometimesthought, all right, let the Hindu militants have the spoton which the Babri Masjid was located to erect a templeto Ram. This might lead to a temporary resolution andget the BJP off the hook temporarily. They can say, “Here,this is settled.”

But there are similar mosques in every city and townin northern and western India. There are sites through-

out the subcontinent where Hindus and Muslims live injuxtaposition and where conflicts of this type happen allthe time. This ongoing situation will not be resolved sim-ply by a settling of the Babri Masjid issue.

A second aspect of this process of memorializationis the naming of localities or enclaves in cities and townswhere there are large Muslim populations “mini-Pakistans.” Anybody who talks to militant Hindus canbe directed to such areas. The visitor will be told, “Hereis the boundary between India and mini-Pakistan.”

Third, there are Muslim institutions throughout In-dia that exist as memorials, in the Hindu mind, of theatrocities and mischief that Muslims have perpetrated inIndia. One is the Aligarh Muslim University, probably themost famous Musliminstitution in India.This great universitywas founded in the latenineteenth century bythe Muslim leader SyedAhmed Khan. Today itis memorialized in theHindu mind for onething: as the so-calledarsenal for Pakistan, because there were people at theAligarh Muslim University who were advocates of the cre-ation of the state of Pakistan. Hindus continue to view itas a place where ideas of partition and disloyalty to theIndian state persist.

Another institution that has become similarly me-morialized (and for this the United States deserves ashare of the responsibility) is the Deobandi Institution.This institution is quite different from the Aligarh Mus-lim University; it is a center for Muslim education andpropagation of the Muslim faith. It has been character-ized by politicians in both the United States and Indiaas an Islamist breeding-ground, responsible for thespread of madrassahs throughout the subcontinent andinto Afghanistan and responsible for the creation of theTaliban.

The third element of this discourse is what I calldemonization: the portrayal of the Muslim population asprone to violence, as prolific, as Pakistan sympathizers,and as “cross-border terrorists,” a term used by militantHindus and other Indian nationalists in reference to theactions of militant Muslims, allegedly supported by Pak-istan, in the longstanding dispute over Kashmir betweenthe two countries. The blanket use of the latter term byIndian leaders has increased since September 11, allow-ing the Indian government to include its efforts to de-stroy the Muslim insurrectionary movements in Kash-mir as a legitimate part of the global war against terrorismled by the United States.

“Make no mistake about it: in the

last ten or fifteen years, the main

perpetrators of Hindu-Muslim

violence are the members of the

BJP, the RSS, and other organi-

zations in the Hindutva family.”

“Blame, instead of falling on

specific groups, organizations,

and individuals that are respon-

sible, is displaced onto categories

such as the general public,

politicians in general, or the

police in general.”

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6

A fourth aspect of the communal discourse is nota separable element but pervades it all: body symbol-ism. The conflict between Hindus and Muslims is pun-gently pictured as involving dismemberment and vivi-section of the Hindu body by Muslims. The partition ofIndia is considered a vivisection. Even Nehru, who didnot have an ounce of communalism in his body, usedterms such as this in his speech to the constituent as-sembly in 1947. These terms continue to be used. TheMuslim body, by contrast, is said to be “pampered.” Butthere’s another term that militant Hindus use for whatshould be done to Muslims, and this has been said tome personally by RSS people: they should be butchered.This is what has been done in Gujarat and other places.Hindus are described in bodily terms as having beenlethargic. They need to wake up, and they need to learnhow to kill, and they need to retaliate against Muslimbodies for all the injuries that have been inflicted uponthe Hindu body.

So this is my first point about the production ofHindu-Muslim violence in India: it is justified and partlyinstigated by a communal discourse that is pervasive inIndian society.

The second general point I want to make concernsan underlying set of assumptions about collective vio-lence that affects the understanding of Hindu-Muslimviolence. These assumptions are based on myths andfalsehoods about how violence of this type originatesand is carried out.

The myths and falsehoods can be summarized un-der three headings. First is the idea that collective vio-lence is a spontaneous occurrence, that Hindu-Muslimviolence flows from the Hindu-Muslim discourse that I’vejust talked about. Prejudices and hatreds exist in socie-ties, and all you need is a spark to light them for peopleto come out in the streets and kill one another sponta-neously. Second, there is the related notion that riots arecreated by mob fury, rather than by deliberate, plannedactions. Third is the view that these riots arise from masshatreds. The latest perpetration of this kind of myth againcomes from Ashutosh Varshney, who has invented a newterm for collective violence: “ethnic earthquakes.” Butthese things are not earthquakes; nor do they start likeconflagrations from a spark. What is happening is en-tirely mischaracterized by such metaphors.

I too use a metaphor, but it’s a metaphor of a theat-rical drama with three phases. When I say a drama, I’mnot trying to trivialize what happens in Hindu-Muslimviolence. My intention is to indicate elements that arelike a rather grizzly theatrical drama that can be identi-fied as part of the process by which Hindu-Muslim vio-lence is produced.

Like the production of a drama, riot production in-

volves three phases. The first is preparation and rehearsal.In cities and towns in India where there are large Muslimpopulations living side by side with Hindu populations,there is an ongoing process intended to keep tensionsalive. Riots do notjust happen from aspark. They are notearthquakes. Theyare prepared. Nowthis doesn’t meanthat a particular riotis planned from be-ginning to end, al-though sometimes itis. The perpetrators of collective violence are working allthe time to maintain communal animosities—drawing at-tention to the elopement of a Muslim boy with a Hindugirl and calling it a kidnapping, or seeing a cow dead onthe side of the street and then spreading the word that acow has been poisoned, which implies that a Muslim haspoisoned the cow. News of this sort spreads throughoutthe riot network of the Sangh Parivar.

The second stage is activation and enactment, justas in the production of a play. There are specific circum-stances under which activation occurs. Those circum-stances, as I’ll point out in a minute, are political. Whenthe time comes for a riot, the instigators will go and re-cruit in specific localities and pay people to carry out actsof violence. When it is time to produce the violence, thesignal is given, certain actions take place, and a riot isproduced.

The third phase, one I have particularly emphasized,is the critical phase: explanation and interpretation. Youexplain how the violence happened. You interpret it as acommunal conflagration—for example, as a virus thatarose in some place and spread to other areas, or as anearthquake. All sorts of explanations can be given todraw attention away from what actually occurred. Thisthird stage is thoroughly infused with blame displace-ment, to such an extent that the actual circumstances,the actual participants, the actual producers of riots, areforgotten. Virtually nothing happens to them, and theyrarely go to jail. If they do go to jail, they’re soon released.The best evidence of this is what has been going on inGujarat recently, where the perpetrators have been letoff the hook.

There are many cities and towns in India where ri-ots occur from time to time, perhaps every five years.And in these places where riots appear to be endemicthere are institutionalized riot systems. This system con-stitutes a veritable division of labor. There are scouts andinformants who report incidents such as a “poisonedcow” or a “kidnapping”; rumor mongers who magnify or

“The myths can be summarized

under three headings: that collec-

tive violence is a spontaneous

occurrence . . . that riots are

created by mob fury . . . and that

they arise from mass hatreds.”

7

Muslims in Hindu Nationalist Indiamanufacture rumors; propagandists who create mes-sages to be conveyed to the press and the public; ver-nacular journalists who publish these messages in theform of news; poster plasterers; recruiters who bring outcrowds—often of students from local colleges and ofcriminals from the slums—to burn, loot, and kill.

But it’s not just hoodlums who are doing this. Politi-cians too are part of the riot system; they either pacify thecrowds or enflame them, depending upon whether the timeis right for a riot or not. Politicians and lawyers protect therioters and get them out of jail if they’re arrested, and law-yers defend the criminals who have committed acts of vio-lence. A Hindu lawyer may defend a Muslim criminal whohas been paid to go out and kill a Hindu.

Also implicated are the media, which publicize falsereports and rumors that incite violence, and assign blameto the victims or to mob fury. And finally, manufacturersof weapons continue to produce bombs and small arms

in the neighborhoods of these cities and towns, eventhough the police know well where they are located.

So when do riots happen? The political contexts forlarge-scale riots are mass mobilizations and elections,especially when both occur at the same time, and the at-titudes and actions of the state and local administration.

The second general context for riot production isthe presence of a Muslim population of a substantial size.

Third, there has to be a political space for large-scaleriots to occur—for example, the change in the politicalconfiguration that in the last ten or fifteen years has beenprovided by the decline of Congress and other secularparties. But how do you explain the occurrence of riotsat one particular site and not another? It has to do withthe political configuration at the local level: the balancebetween political parties, and a calculation as to whethera riot will produce Hindu consolidation that will give aclear majority to parties like the BJP in the next election.

DISCUSSIONTTTTTimothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah: Thank you, Dr. Brass.Now we’d like to hear questions andcomments from others. [All partici-pants will be identified at the end.]

Jonah Blank:Jonah Blank:Jonah Blank:Jonah Blank:Jonah Blank: I’d like to make a briefcomment on Ashutosh Varshney’sbook for those in the audience whomay not have read it. In my opinion,Professor Varshney does not arguefor civic engagement as being an all-determinative factor, and he cer-tainly doesn’t argue for a SamuelHuntington essentialist argument,that Hindus and Muslims are fatedto fight against each other; nor doeshe try to downplay the importanceof political involvement and manipu-lation in these things. So one canaccept or reject Professor Varshney’sargument, but I think it’s importantat least to recognize that he is notarguing a Sam Huntington line.

I think that as scholars both Pro-fessor Engineer and Professor Brasstake serious issue, as I do, with theHuntington view of the clash of civi-lizations. It’s very important to make

that criticism here in Washington,because Varshney’s view, frankly, isnot really determinative in policy-making circles, while Huntington’sview is. We really need scholars tobe challenging this thesis if in factthey disagree with it.

On a policy-making level also, itpains me greatly that the UnitedStates government, of which I’m apart, has been utterly silent aboutone of the great tragedies of India inrecent years, the Gujarat killings. Ithink that as citizens we should bedirecting criticism at our own gov-ernment officials to urge them tospeak out more, and as scholars weshould be challenging the intellec-tual basis that sees Hindus and Mus-lims as being inherently at war witheach other.

Paul R. Brass:Paul R. Brass:Paul R. Brass:Paul R. Brass:Paul R. Brass: Well, as for AshutoshVarshney, I’ll be glad to send you afuller statement of my disagree-ments with him that has been circu-lating as an e-mail. But as for SamuelHuntington—what can you do about

him, for heaven’s sake? It’s anotherexample of the deplorable state ofthe political science profession thatthey swarm around Sam Hunting-ton—his hypotheses appear in everyother book, if not nine out of tenbooks.

My preference is normally not totake on the false arguments of par-ticular people but to produce my ownindependent evaluation and work.That’s what I’ve tried to do all my life.

K. M. Rao:K. M. Rao:K. M. Rao:K. M. Rao:K. M. Rao: Dr. Engineer, initially youspoke about appeasement of Mus-lims in India, and you mentioned oneexample. But I see it as a fact thatgovernment policy under CongressParty rule was appeasement of Mus-lims—and it continues to be so.

The government of Karnatakagets 700 million rupees in tax rev-enue from the temples of Karnataka,and out of that they use 500 millionrupees for Muslim mosques andmadrassahs and 100 million forHindu temples, and something like120 million for churches. When you

Center Conversations

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see that kind of unfairness—takingfrom the temples and using it formadrassahs—you can’t help feelingthat Hindus are being treated un-justly.

The other issue is the two billionrupees spent by the state on theMuslim hajj [pilgrimage to Mecca],whereas Hindu pilgrims actually paytaxes. I don’t see that as secularism;I see it as a total appeasement.

Regarding Gujarat: I constantlyhear that the riots were a plannedattack. I see this as a completelybiased opinion. It’s almost the samekind of theory as calling Septem-ber 11 a planned event so that theUnited States could go after Iraq.

Asghar Ali Engineer:Asghar Ali Engineer:Asghar Ali Engineer:Asghar Ali Engineer:Asghar Ali Engineer: The figuresyou are quoting about temples andmosques are being systematicallyspread by the RSS, and people haveneither the inclination nor the timeto verify them. I have gone throughall these statistics, and I collect allthese documents. It’s very doubtfulthat the figures you mentioned areauthentic. Two billion rupees for hajjsubsidy? Where did you get this fig-ure? It is 150 crores in India, whichwould come to thirty-three milliondollars. To say billions of rupees isunfair.

There is a reason why this subsidywas given. Pilgrims used to go on thehajj by ship. Then the ship was dis-continued, and suddenly pilgrims hadto travel to Saudi Arabia by air. Buthow many can afford airfare to go onthe hajj? Hardly 5 percent of Muslims.Air India was asked to provide theservice, but it has been shown thatthe Air India hajj fare is far higherthan the general fare available toSaudi Arabia from India. I always tellMuslims, please, don’t accept thissubsidy, because hajj is to be per-formed when you have the means todo it. When you take a subsidy, youinvite this kind of violent communalpropaganda. If chartered planes wereallowed, Muslims would pay much

less, and the government wouldn’thave to pay a subsidy. The issue re-quires some thinking on the part ofMuslim leaders also.

Now about Gujarat: nobody hasyet been able to demonstrate who isresponsible for the attack at Godhra.It has been about two years, and stillthe government has not been able toput anything forward in a court of lawproving that these Muslims wereinvolved.

But okay, let’s accept the allega-tion that a group of Muslims livingnear the railway station set afire thetrain carrying Hindu pilgrims. Canyou compare government involve-ment in carnage like that in Gujaratwith the involvement of a group ofcitizens at Godhra? Can these twothings be compared?

The RSS talks of building charac-ter but indulges in the highest degreeof violence. As Professor Brass pointsout, violence is a production, andthis production involves lies, propa-ganda. The RSS runs 32,000 schoolstoday. If you examine their textbooks,you will find it hard to believe thekind of hate propaganda that is be-ing taught. No governments are tak-ing action, including the Congress-led state governments.

India is now polarized betweenHindus and Muslims as never before.There has always been conflict, butnever such polarization.

Har Swarup Singh:Har Swarup Singh:Har Swarup Singh:Har Swarup Singh:Har Swarup Singh: I come from a“mini-Pakistan” in western UttarPradesh and the Uttaranchal district.First I must congratulate these twoscholars for a wonderful analysis.Now how do we proceed from here?It’s a given that the number of Mus-lims in India is too large to find anysolution to communal discord. Solet’s talk about the positive things.Let’s talk about Akbar the Great [atolerant sixteenth-century Mogulemperor] and not about Aurangzeb[an intolerant successor]. If some-body talks of Aurangzeb, let us talk

of more positive historical figures—great Urdu writers, for example.

Paul R. Brass:Paul R. Brass:Paul R. Brass:Paul R. Brass:Paul R. Brass: Well, yes, I agree thatthe history of India in the last onehundred years or so has moved inthe opposite direction, focusing onAurangzeb and not on Akbar, anddisplacing the Urdu language in theschools so Muslim students in northIndia finish their schooling withoutlearning to write Urdu, in the Persian-Arabic script. I think changing thehistory books, trying to teach a spiritof tolerance, focusing on heroes whocan be identified as secular or whoplayed a more positive role in Hindu-Muslim relations, providing somesupport for the Urdu language—allthese things are worthwhile.

But this business of idealizingheroes from the past is in itself a dan-gerous exercise, and that’s part of theproblem. It’s an aspect of national-ism everywhere, including the UnitedStates. It would be good to have amore balanced history, but you know,history is what we make of it.Aurangzeb may not have been thatbad and Akbar may not have beenthat good, and it will take historiansmany years to come up with revisedinterpretations. Moreover, in theUnited States a spirit of tolerance isimbibed in the schools, but it certainlydoesn’t solve all our problems.

WWWWWajahat Habibullah:ajahat Habibullah:ajahat Habibullah:ajahat Habibullah:ajahat Habibullah: I have a ques-tion for each of the speakers. For Dr.Engineer: As Muslims in India, Ithink we are all very much awarethat the root of the problem reallylies in the very bitter legacy of parti-tion. I’m an Indian Muslim myself,and you and I know that the Mus-lims in India believe that Pakistanwas a massive mistake, and thatthere’s not a lot of support for thatkind of concept anymore. How doyou see recent developments—forexample, the SAARC [South Asia As-sociation for Regional Cooperation]Conference earlier this month [Janu-

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Muslims in Hindu Nationalist Indiaary 2004] and the agreements thatwere made there? Do you feel thatthis bodes well for the future ofHindu-Muslim relations in India?

My question for Dr. Brass is this:You have presented a very graphicaccount of how these riots takeplace, how they are organized andhow they burst out in different partsof the country. But there are alsoother areas where this does not hap-pen, even though they have a verysubstantial Muslim population. TakeLucknow, for instance, a city that ispart of the same state as Aligarh andMeerut; it’s also the Prime Minister’sconstituency. It is a city where theUrdu language is a language of allthe communities, although earlier itwas identified with the Muslims.Why is it that riots don’t happen in acity like Lucknow but do happen ina city like Aligarh?

Asghar Ali Engineer:Asghar Ali Engineer:Asghar Ali Engineer:Asghar Ali Engineer:Asghar Ali Engineer: I think the de-velopments at the SAARC Confer-ence are extremely significant andwill have a great impact on Hindu-Muslim relations in India. Pakistanhas been a very sore point in Hindu-Muslim relations. Muslims are seenas Pakistanis.

Improvement of relations be-tween the two countries and people-to-people contact are very impor-tant. A number of Hindus who havegone to Pakistan have come backhighly impressed. They have told me,“The people of Pakistan are sofriendly, so hospitable.” Similarly,when Pakistani Muslims come to In-dia they go back highly impressed.All the time they are told one thingabout Hindus, but when they cometo India and experience the warmhospitality extended by Hindus theyare highly impressed.

I’m of the strong view that visasbetween South Asian countries

should be abolished, and that thereshould be free movement in the sub-continent. I would certainly con-gratulate our Prime Minister, whohas taken the initiative in improvingrelations with Pakistan and with SriLanka.

Paul R. Brass:Paul R. Brass:Paul R. Brass:Paul R. Brass:Paul R. Brass: I should be betterprepared to answer this questionabout Lucknow. Though I lived inLucknow, I never really analyzed itspolitical configuration, and I can’tgive a well-supported argumentabout why there are no riots there.I would have to check the politicalconfiguration. I’d have to look atthe electoral history and the elec-tion statistics to see whether thepolitical configuration is such thatit was unnecessary to produceriots in order to generate a Hinduconsolidation.

Of course, Lucknow is not free ofriots. There are Shia-Sunni riots thathave displaced Muslim antagonismtowards Hindus. In other words,there’s so much division amongstMuslims on a Shia-Sunni basis thatthey’re preoccupied. As for the gen-eral environment of Lucknow, its“genteel culture” is very striking andvery lovely, but I would not placemuch emphasis on that. My argu-ment is that political calculations,political organization, can surmountthis culture of gentility.

TTTTTimothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah: We have time for onemore question.

Sameera Daniels:Sameera Daniels:Sameera Daniels:Sameera Daniels:Sameera Daniels: Dr. Engineer, youmentioned earlier that the diversityof India was a sort of a check oncommunalism, but much of the evi-dence you presented suggests thatin fact it’s not. I think that’s also thecase here in the United States: ten-sions between communities, specifi-

cally between the Jewish and theMuslim communities, do provide akind of domestic security risk. Theycan inflame tensions.

Asghar Ali Engineer:Asghar Ali Engineer:Asghar Ali Engineer:Asghar Ali Engineer:Asghar Ali Engineer: In my opinion,diversity is a greater strength for de-mocracy. I always emphasize threed’s: democracy, diversity, and dia-logue. Diversity sustains democracy,and dialogue sustains diversity. Situ-ations can be inflamed by hostilepropaganda or particular events. Thetension between Jews and Muslimsin the United States will not turn intowidespread violence because thegovernment will not permit it to doso. In India, two things are different:first, there is constant hate propa-ganda, and second, the governmenteither remains indifferent to what ishappening on the street or gets in-volved on one side.

TTTTTimothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah:imothy Shah: I’m afraid we’re nowa bit past our time. I’d like to thankall of you and especially our distin-guished speakers. There are clearlycountervailing trends: reason foroptimism in the aftermath of theSAARC Conference, but less reasonfor optimism given the structure ofextremist Hindu nationalist ideology.It will clearly be a fascinating thingto watch in the coming years.

DISCUSSION PARTICIPANTSAsghar Ali EngineerAsghar Ali EngineerAsghar Ali EngineerAsghar Ali EngineerAsghar Ali Engineer, Centre for theStudy of Society and Secularism,Mumbai, India; Paul R. BrassPaul R. BrassPaul R. BrassPaul R. BrassPaul R. Brass, pro-fessor emeritus, University of Wash-ington, Seattle; TTTTTimothy Shahimothy Shahimothy Shahimothy Shahimothy Shah,Ethics and Public Policy Center;Jonah BlankJonah BlankJonah BlankJonah BlankJonah Blank, United States Senate;Sameera DanielsSameera DanielsSameera DanielsSameera DanielsSameera Daniels, Washington, D.C.;WWWWWajahat Habibullahajahat Habibullahajahat Habibullahajahat Habibullahajahat Habibullah, U.S. Instituteof Peace; K. M. RaoK. M. RaoK. M. RaoK. M. RaoK. M. Rao, NRI SecularForum; and Har Swarup SinghHar Swarup SinghHar Swarup SinghHar Swarup SinghHar Swarup Singh,retired diplomat.

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TTTTTHEHEHEHEHE C C C C CENTERENTERENTERENTERENTER ANDANDANDANDAND “C “C “C “C “CONVERSAONVERSAONVERSAONVERSAONVERSATIONSTIONSTIONSTIONSTIONS”””””

The Ethics and Public Policy Center was established in 1976 to clarify and reinforce thebond between the Judeo-Christian moral tradition and the public debate over domestic

and foreign policy issues. Its program includes research, writing, publication, and confer-ences. The Center affirms the political relevance of the great Western ethical imperatives—respect for the dignity of every person, individual freedom and responsibility, justice, the ruleof law, and limited government. It maintains that moral reasoning is an essential comple-ment to empirical calculation in the shaping of public policy.

“Center ConCenter ConCenter ConCenter ConCenter Conversationsversationsversationsversationsversations,” edited by senior editor Carol Griffith, are based on conferencesand seminars related to various projects. They cost $3 per copy, postpaid. Among the titles are:

14. Religion, Culture, and InternationalConflict After September 11Samuel P. Huntington

15. Islam: A PrimerRoy Mottahedeh and Jay Tolson

16. Religion and TerrorismBruce Hoffman and Jeffrey Goldberg

17. Hindu Nationalism vs. Islamic JihadCedric Prakash, Teesta Setalvad, KamalChenoy, Sumit Ganguly, Sunil Khilnani,and Jonah Blank

18. Iraq: Making Ethnic Peace after SaddamKanan Makiya and Patrick Clawson

19. The Genetic Revolution and AmericanDemocracyEric Cohen and William Kristol

20. War in Iraq: Is It Just?Christopher Hitchens, William Galston,and George Weigel

21. Just War and Jihad:Two Views of WarJames Turner Johnson andChristopher Hitchens

22. Political IslamGilles Kepel and Jeffrey Goldberg

23. The Rise of Global ChristianityPhilip Jenkins and David Brooks

24. Islam and the Prospects forDemocracyKhaled Abou El Fadl, Sohail Hashmi,Qamar-ul Huda, and Zainab Al-Suwaij

25. Evangelicals and IsraelGerald R. McDermott

26. Evangelicals, Islam, andHumanitarian AidLamin Sanneh

27. Why Genesis? Why Now?Leon R. Kass