Communalism feeds on itself

Our intention was not to offend anyone's religious sensibilities, but to give a voice to a writer who had been silenced by a death threat. Reading from another one of his books would have been meaningless. The Satanic Verses was the cause of the trouble, so The Satanic Verses it would have to be. We did not choose passages that have been construed as blasphemous by Muslim opponents of the book – this would have been pointless, as these passages have overshadowed the rest of the content of the novel, which concerns the relationship between faith and doubt, and contains much that has nothing to do with religion whatsoever. We wanted to demystify the book. It is, after all, just a book. Not a bomb. Not a knife or a gun. Just a book... I refute absolutely the accusation of Asaduddin Owaisi, the Hyderabad MP who has accused me of "Islam-bashing under the guise of liberalism". I stand on my public record as a defender of the human rights of Muslims, notably my work for Moazzam Begg and other British Muslims detained without trial in Guantánamo Bay., To Mr Owaisi, and others who feel that the notion of "freedom of speech" is just a tool of secular western interests, a license to insult them, I say that the contrary is true. Freedom of speech is the sole guarantee of their right to be heard in our complex and plural global culture. It is the only way of asserting our common life across borders of race, class and religion. Just as I reach out my hand to Salman Rushdie, I do so to Mr Owaisi, and to Maulana Abul Qasim Nomani, whose seminary is, after all, called the "House of Knowledge", in the hope that, as fellow believers in the vital importance of words, we can resolve our differences – or at least come to understand them correctly – through speech and writing, instead of violence and intimidation... Read more

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jan/22/i-quoted-satanic-verses-suport-rushdie

UPDATE: Petition for lifting the ban on the Satanic Verses

We the undersigned support the right of all artists and writers to freedom of expression and we strongly urge the government to reconsider the 23-year-old ban of the Satanic Verses. The Satanic Verses has not incited violence anywhere; others have used the novel's existence to incite violence to suit their political ends. Within India, in the 23 years since the ban, we have witnessed an erosion of respect for freedom of expression, as artists like MF Husain, Chandramuhun Srimantula, Jatin Das, and Balbir Krishan have been intimidated, and works of writers like Rohinton Mistry and AK Ramanujan have been withdrawn because of threats by groups claiming to be offended.

India is one of the very few countries in the world where the ban stands, placing us alongside Egypt, Pakistan, Iran, Malaysia, Liberia and Papua New Guinea, among others. We submit with respect that there is a democratic need to review and re-examine the circumstances that led to the original ban of the Verses in 1988, which have changed greatly over time. Read/sign the petition: http://www.change.org/petitions/prime-minister-india-reconsider-the-ban-on-salman-rushdies-the-satanic-verses

Extracted from a comment by Venky Vembu, in First Post: 

The vice-chancellor of the Deoband seminary, Maulana Abul Qasim Nomani, had asked the government to disallow Rushdie from coming to India. But when it became clear that Rushdie did not need a visa, and could therefore come unimpeded, other forms of intimidation were rustled up. The Mumbai-based Raza Academy, which claims to have a following among Sunni Muslims, offered a reward of Rs 1 lakh to anyone who would hurl a slipper on Rushdie’s face during his Jaipur visit. In all this, the passive role of the government – at both the central and the state level – and its buckling to cynical political blackmail shows up the slimy cowardice of the soft state.

Rather than confront this naked incitement of manufactured Muslim rage over a non-issue (as Omar Abdullah himself described it), the government has caved in – and sneakily persuaded the organisers of the literary festival to withdraw Rushdie’s name from the bill of listings. Initially, the government appeared to take the stand that it would not yield to the maulvis’ pressure– & since in any case Rushdie did not need additional documentation to enable him to travel, the government said, it “had no intention to stop him.” But behind the scenes, political leaders in Rajasthan from across the political spectrum (including the Congress and the BJP) were working actively to sabotage Rushdie’s visit


State Congress leaders demanded that Rushdie, who had “insulted Islam”, should be disallowed from coming to the festival. Similarly, the minority cell in the BJP’s Rajasthan unit asked the Congress-led state government not to allow Rushdie to enter Jaipur. “We will make sure he is not allowed to enter the city,” BJP leader Munnawar Khan said. “We will not let such an author, who hurt our religious sentiments by presenting wrong facts about Prophet Mohammad, enter the city.”

The near-unanimity of political parties on this issue – and the fact that even the BJP had, presumably with an eye on the Uttar Pradesh election, gone soft on it – evidently emboldened the state government into sneakily “persuading” the festival organisers to delist Rushdie. The Central and the state governments are probably now preening over their political sagacity: they have pandered to Muslim sensibilities without openly disallowing Rushdie from coming. And, given the curious political circumstances, no party – not even the BJP – wants to make political capital out of it. In its calculation, it’s a win-win proposition. But in fact, with the effective silencing of Rushdie, a self-confessed “arguer with the world”, the Indian state has taken another giant stride on the slippery slope to creeping illiberalism. In the same manner in which the government did not confront the campaign of intimidation against MF Husain when he was targeted by the force of right-wing illiberalism, and in tune with the same censorship instinct that now extends to its targeting of social media platforms, the Indian “soft state” has exposed its rank moral cowardice.. Read the full post: http://www.firstpost.com/politics/silencing-rushdie-the-slimy-cowardice-of-the-soft-state-184272.html

BJP minority cell opposes Rushdie's proposed visit to Jaipur: Rajasthan BJP's minority cell has asked the Congress-led state government not to allow him to enter the city. The unit is drawing up a strategy to protest the proposed visit of the author. We will make sure that he is not allowed to enter the city, General Secretary of the Cell Munnawar Khan said. “We will not let such an author, who hurt our religious sentiments by presenting wrong facts about prophet Mohammad, enter the city,” Khan said. Other Muslim organisations, including Jamiat Ulma-E-Rajasthan, have also objected to the proposed visit of the author. http://www.indianexpress.com/news/bjp-minority-cell-opposes-rushdies-proposed-visit-to-jaipur/898464/

Dilip's Note: The Indian governing elite's mode of dealing with communalism should by now be clear: it refuses to implement the rule of law in matters of violence, intimidation, life and death, but is willing to make symbolic concessions that feed the communalists' appetite for 'hurt sentiments'. Thus in Gopalgarh, Rajasthan, the administration failed to protect citizens in September 2011 in an incident that cost nine lives: http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article2604598.ece

Now as if in mock recompense, the same adminstration panders to rank communalists in their drummed up fury against Rushdie. (Interested commentators might also investigate the current Union Law Minister's position on this controversy when it erupted in 1988, and his stance on the hounding of Jamia's then Pro-VC Mushirul Hasan because of his opposition to the ban on Satanic Verses). Our government panders to every type of hooliganism, and trusts us to seek refuge in symbols. 

Here's some information that makes my point: Until 1984, official (GOI) representations of Bhagat Singh were in popular iconic form, clean shaven with moustache hat, and revolver. Then Operation Blue Star (to clear the Golden Temple of terrorists) and the events of October-November 1984 took place. Indira Gandhi was assassinated, and thousands of Sikh citizens of Delhi were brutally murdered. The criminal justice system failed to work. On 23 March 1985, GOI advertisements reminding us of the greatness of the man showed Bhagat Singh wearing a turban & beard, along with Sukhdev and Rajguru wearing some version of Nehru cap. (The change was too obvious not to notice). At the time Delhi police were refusing to register FIR's on dozens of cases of killings of Sikhs in India's capital and the High Court had refused to entertain PUDR's plea that it order the police to perform their functions.

But on March 23, our babus, instead of implementing our Constitution, suddenly discovered that Bhagat Singh was a Sikh! It was so nice of them to remember. Now of course, we are all in the know as to the link between secular justice and iconography..

This institutionalised hypocrisy cuts across political divisions, is rooted in the state structure rather than in parties, and is common (in various permutations & combinations) to all political leadership. Indian secularism has been reduced to a mutual back-scratching  game of communalists - you tolerate my bullshit, I tolerate yours. The central point: of strict implementation of law and criminal justice, of preventing violence and intimidation in the name of hurt sentiment, is avoided by everyone. This cycle of intimidation will continue until public opinion is able to insist upon the fair and even-handed administration of criminal justice.
We are faced with a revival of the culture of the Inquisition. The Inquisition was the name given to so-called "fight against heretics" launched by the Roman Catholic Church in the 12th century. It started the practice of using torture to extract confessions from suspected heretics. Cardinal Saint Roberto Bellarmine (1542-1621) was the Inquisitor who presided over the trial that condemned Giordano Bruno to be burnt at the stake for heresy in 1600; and who in 1616 ordered Galileo to abandon the Copernican doctrine of the mobility of the Earth and the immobility of the Sun. For those who need reminding that the Inquisition is still with us, here's the epitaph on Cardinal Bellarmine's tomb: "With force I have subdued the brains of the proud"

Damn hurt sentiment. Long live blasphemy! - Dilip

Also see: http://www.firstpost.com/politics/muslim-politics-and-rushdie-why-2012-is-not-1988-178331.html

Nilanjana Roy: Listening to Rushdie: The real question is, why the Deobandis, who rarely come to literary festivals, should want to stop others from listening to Rushdie’s views. When the The Satanic Verses comes up in debate, it is rarely the book that is discussed. As with many other kinds of forgotten history, the version of the Verses we talk about is moth-eaten, fragmentary, the complexity of a novel about migration, magic, angels and devils, the certainties of religion and madness reduced to the simplistic idea that this is a blasphemous book.. In the two decades since The Satanic Verses was banned, it has become increasingly hard to discuss the idea Rushdie puts forward in his work, which is the idea that doubt is necessary and valuable. But in that time, India has also moved closer to accepting, blindly and without much fuss, a worryingly widespread belief. This is the belief that at worst, questioning any faith or religion is in itself a kind of blasphemy — and at best, it’s an esoteric activity that the majority can safely ignore.

In 2007, Rushdie spoke at Jaipur, to a packed audience. He touched upon the silences in the official histories of Kashmir, on meeting some of the men responsible for the Gujarat riots, on growing up among “extremely practicing but incredibly open-minded Muslims” in his family. He spoke about authors and books, writing and reading, and all the other things you hope to hear from writers. In 2012, I don’t know what he would want to speak about: literature, free speech, fables, memoir writing, perhaps. But I do know that, like so many other readers, I want to hear what he has to say, and it would be a great loss if the manufactured controversy around his visit silenced his voice, yet again.

http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/nilanjana-s-roy-listening-to-rushdie/461970/

Rushdie's invitation stands: Will Salman Rushdie attend the Jaipur Literature Festival that begins this Friday, despite security concerns?  Organizers issued this statement today. "Salman Rushdie will not be in India on 20th January due to a change in his schedule. The festival stands by his invitation to Mr Rushdie." Sources say that those coordinating Mr Rushdie's travel are reluctant to share details, given the recent protests against the author. Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot met Home Minister P Chidambaram in Delhi today.  Mr Gehlot said that the protests against Mr Rushdie's visit in his state cannot be ignored - nor can the opinions of those organizing them. He also stressed that though Mr Rushdie's visit will trigger special focus on law and order and security, the author cannot be stopped from visiting the country since he has the status of a Person of Indian Origin.

Organizers of the festival denied reports that Mr Rushdie has been privately requested to skip the event.  They said the invitation to the writer stands. Mr Rushdie's book 'The Satanic Verses' is considered by many Muslims to be blasphemous. The controversy over Mr Rushdie's visit arose after Islamic seminary Darul-uloom Deoband, which is based in Uttar Pradesh, said that the Man Booker prize winner should not be allowed to enter India. The author had tweeted then that he didn't need a visa to come to India because he has a Person of Indian Origin card. Mr Rushdie has in the past attended the same literary festival in Jaipur without incident. 

http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/will-salman-rushdie-attend-jaipur-literary-fest-167693?pfrom=home-otherstories&cp

See also: 
Academic research on Rushdie's literary work sabotaged by Deoband Ulema

http://dilipsimeon.blogspot.in/2012/04/academic-research-on-rushdies-literary.html

Communalism in Modern India: a Theoretical Examination (1986)
http://dilipsimeon.blogspot.in/2012/08/communalism-in-modern-india-theoretical.html