The Left and Right Of A Debate

A book written by a well-known journalist Rahul Pandita ‘Our Moon Has Blood Clots’ which I read last week, has impacted me deeply. Pandita has also published another popular work ‘Hello Bastar’ which introduces the reader to the naxal movement in Central India. Amidst the heated debate on intolerance in India, the book by Pandita on the plight of Kashimiri Pandits bears great significance. We all have read that lakhs of Pandits were persecuted and hounded out of their own homeland of centuries-Kashmir-by the majority Muslim population. This is perhaps the only case in the recent past where a large number of people have become internal refugees in their own country. The book by Rahul Pandita opens bare the trauma and the angst of a helpless people who have been largely shunned by the ‘secular’ politicians and media. It is only by their sheer grit, hard work and perseverance that many Pandits have found a new life and freedom in various climes across the world. But several thousand still live the life of a refugee in Delhi.

If I say that the on the night of January 19, 1990, Muslims in the Valley went into a mob frenzy and through hundreds of mosques across the State, threatened the ‘kafir’ Pandits to leave Kashmir or convert to Islam, with blood-curdling slogans like “We will turn Kashmir into Pakistan along with Kashmiri Pandit women, but without their men”, will I be called a right-winger? On the other hand, if I say that the lynching of a hapless Muslim man in Dadri for what he alleged to have eaten, must be condemned unequivocally, does that qualify me as a leftist? And whom do we call a centrist? A person who walks the tightrope to keep both sides happy, may be!?

In this melee of the left versus right, we seem to have forgotten that what is right is always right, whether left or right. Today I read a statement of P Chidambaram who conceded that banning of Satanic Verses was wrong. We understand the timing, don’t we? In the twilight of his career, one knows that he is not going to lose much by accepting the truth. When credibility was the measuring jar for politics anyway? I am also waiting for the day when some  secular leaders accept that the amendment to our constitution to deny justice to Ms Shah Bano was also wrong. Denying justice to fifty percent of the Muslim community still continues in the form of triple talaq and polygamy but if there is a murmur of protest, why it is brushed aside as ‘right-wing propaganda’? Many Muslim countries have banned these two tenets of Muslim Personal Law followed so religiously in India. But in the garb of upholding secularism, a section of the polity in India mollycoddles and cultivates the religious far right among the Muslims. Ironically, the Muslim religious leaders have no qualms in accepting criminalization of triple talaq and polygamy in Western Countries and the US. But here in India, when 70,000 Muslim women give a representation to the Prime Minister demanding equal rights as their men, mullahs and some politicians question the credentials of the petitioners. They smell a right-wing conspiracy, again.

Take the case of alleged sexual harassment in Madrasas as revealed by a female journalist and a male film maker in Kerala. I am sure you have noticed that Arnab is not shouting, ‘the nation wants to know’, Barkha Dutt is not conducting any panel discussion on the issue. But one statement from a right-wing political leader will send these media people into a frenzy.

If someone criticizes the demolition of Babri Masjid as a criminal act which led to the death of thousands of innocents in its aftermath, permanently driving a wedge between two communities, do we have to call that person an apologist for the left? Similarly, will the persons who are demanding an overhaul of the Madrasa system of education with a thorough investigation into sexual harassment angle be hauled over the coals as communal?

Being secular is essential for the growth of a healthy democracy but we cannot be selective in this. It is time we realized that what is right will always remain so, whether we paint it with hues of saffron or green.

PS: Curious to know the origin of these two words, I went to Wikipedia and here is what I found. Even though we understand the concepts broadly, the clear definitions below give a proper perspective.

Right-wing politics are political positions or activities that view some forms of social stratification or social inequality as either inevitable, natural, normal, or desirable, typically defending this position on the basis of natural law, economics or tradition. Hierarchy and inequality may be viewed as natural results of traditional social differences and/or from competition in market economies.

Left-wing politics are political positions or activities that accept or support social equality, often in opposition to social hierarchy and social inequality. They typically involve concern for those in society who are perceived as disadvantaged relative to others and a belief that there are unjustified inequalities that need to be reduced or abolished.

(It is also interesting to note that many leftists these days prefer to criticize capitalism in the cosy confines of a Ritz or a Taj or a Park Hyatt a la Arundhati Roy).