The Big Story: Orphaned communities

Equal rights for men and women. That's what the Indian state declared last week when the Bombay High court confirmed that Muslim women have the right to enter the sanctum sanctorum of the Haji Ali Dargah in Mumbai. Even then, this is a tiny victory. The Bombay High Court stayed its own order for six weeks, allowing the dargah time to appeal. Besides, the ruling does not open entry for women into many other dargahs and mosques across the country that still restrict female devotees. Seeing women pray in the Friday congregational namaaz – a core part of community-building aspect of Islam – is a rare sight in India. Islam’s message of community it seems is only reserved for its men. Women are invisible members of society, little seen, never heard.

Despite the struggles of Muslim women, the Indian state has adopted a hands-off approach. India was founded on the loftiest principles of equality. Yet, the large chunk of the law that is applied to Muslims – the Muslim Personal Law (Shariat) Application Act of 1937 – has not even been codified.

This isn’t an argument for reform or a uniform civil code ­– all of which liable to stir up hornet’s nests. It’s a simple writing down of Muslim law. What is now known as “Muslim law” in India is a massive hodgepodge of judgements, right from the time of the British Raj, created by interpreting ancient law books. Now, when Muslims fight a case in courts, without a codified set of laws, judges either go back to these precedents or look at one of the thousands of Muslim jurists in history who have had an opinion that could be applied to the present case. Given how subjective this process is, the Indian law system in the case of Muslim Personal Law is only a little more scientific than deciding things via a vigorous game of “Eenie meenie miney mo”.

Interestingly, a mirror of this situation exists in Pakistan and Bangladesh. In both countries, Hindu law hasn’t been codified leaving Hindu women at the mercies of an ancient law code. In Bangladesh, for example, a Hindu man can marry as many women as he wants as per tradition Hindu law. Nehru’s modern code – inspired by Western laws – implemented for Indian Hindus in the 1950s does not apply to Hindu Bengalis in Bangladesh.

The British Raj had a very clear policy of non-interference in the personal religion and faith of its subjects. This is because they were “subjects” not “citizens”. The colonial state couldn’t be bothered about reforming a society in which it had no stake. Given that it was seen as an outsider, any attempts at reform would also have sparked immense disenchantment.

While the three successor states of the Raj have abandoned this policy of non-interference for their majority communities, reforming their laws, they have retained it for their minority communities. Remember, in India this consensus applies across parties. The Bharatiya Janata Party, for example, used the issue of a uniform civil code in the 1980s to polarise and spark violence, but now that it has come to power, it has done little to reform Muslim personal law.

Trapped between the binary of majority and minority in India, some of the Raj’s subjects are yet to become equal citizens.

The Big Scroll

  1. Haji Ali verdict: Despite legal victory, some Muslim women say they won't enter the sanctum.
  2. Despite Haji Ali verdict, Ayyappa Dharma Sena hopeful of keeping women away from Sabarimala.
  3. If Muslim women want to reform personal law, why isn't the Indian state listening to them?

Political Picks

  1. In the Business Line, Monu Rajan interviews one the leaders of the Gujarat Dalit movement, Jignesh Mevani.
  2. The Maharashtra government is now making efforts to distance itself a call made by its own animal husbandry department to raise an anti-beef police.
  3. Mamata Banerjee has made it clear that she wants to drop the “West” in West Bengal. She has asked the Modi Government to call it Bānglā in Bengali, Bengal in English and Bangāl in Hindi.
  4. In Open magazine, Kumar Anshuman interviews Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav.

Punditry

  1. Islam does not discriminate in allowing entry to places of worship. Yet, the Bombay High Court judgment upholding Muslim women’s right to enter the Haji Ali Dargah was constrained to invoke the Constitution, says Syeda Hameed in the Indian Express.
  2. In the Telegraph, Sankarshan Thakur explains the predicament of Kashmir chief minister Mehbooba Mufti as South Kashmir enters a phase of near-total revolt.
  3. In the Hindustan Times, Faizan Mustafa questions the Haji Ali verdict: Can we permit Sati, polygamy if they are essential practices?

Giggle

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Indianise, nationalise, spiritualise: Rohini Mohan explains how the RSS education project is in expansion mode with the Bharatiya Janata Part controlling the Union government.

One such teacher, 36-year-old Deepshika (name changed), who teaches in a Saraswati Bal Mandir school in Janakpuri in Delhi, said she didn’t have much of a salary, but “in a world where children are learning garbage from their smartphones, we need to reintroduce them to their cultural values”.

She enjoyed the heated debate on saffronisation in the media today. “The more these JNU-types call us stupid, the more determined I become,” she said, laughing.