Minority Report

Reading through a news article couple of days back I felt really silly rather than surprised or shocked. This article talks about the current Government planning to post only Muslim Officers in Muslim dominated areas.

Before writing my view on a decision like this let me first paste few lines that I gathered from the net:

The preamble of the constitution defines India as a sovereign, socialist, secular, democratic republic.

In India (80.5%) are Hindu. Other religious groups include Muslims (13.4%), Christians (2.3%), Sikhs (1.9%), Buddhists (0.8%), Jains (0.4%), Jews, Zoroastrians, Bahá'ís and others. Tribals constitute 8.1% of the population.

Well the above two lines is what India is or at least what it is supposed to be on paper. This is a question that I have been asking many for the last so many years: "how can a country that is socialist also have various divisions based on caste and perks for a specific community. From my understanding socialist means equality and when there is equality then there can be no division in terms of caste or any such thing.

Anyways getting back to the issue, this decision/plan of the Government will be no surprise for someone who goes through the paper daily. Over the last few years since the UPA government has come into power there have been many such incidents targeted on the upbringing of minorities. No problem with that, the only problem is that in this current Government’s dictionary the word to the right of minority has always been Muslims. If you look at statistics the majority amongst the minorities in India are Muslims. Still the Government just want to concentrate on this majority. By statistics the Christian population in India is only about 10% of that of Muslims. But have we ever heard of anything for them, when they are one of the real minority.

Right from the Sachar committee to other benefits or programs that the UPA have introduced, they have all been targeted at Muslims. One need not have to be a scholar to understand the simple reason behind this “VOTE BANK”.

From whatever you have read here so far you might think that I am Anti Muslim or one of those guys who hate minorities. But please stand corrected, I am not anything that I have said in the previous sentence. All I am is a peace loving citizen who wants the country to be free from any divide or inequality. Am also a keen follower of politics, which is why it irritates me when the Government, which is supposed to be a role model for the aspiring politicians plays few games for the benefit of the vote bank. Guess one should be reminded that, we were all taught in the school that every person in this country is equal and that no caste or religion is superior to another.

So this kind of a strategy by the Government will only make more and more communities realize that being separate is rewarding and, at the minimum, it protects their temples and educational institutions; and to be among the majority means loss of religious and cultural freedom.
RJ
follow these links:
http://www.rediff.com/news/2006/dec/11sachar.htm?zcc=rl

http://www.newindpress.com/column/News.asp?Topic=-97&Title=S%2EGurumurthy&ID=IEM20080414220910&nDate=4/15/2008&Sub=&Cat=&