Religion is an identity. One more identity along with many others. It is
an identity we live with every day - for
MOST of us, it decides how we eat, dress, pray, marry, live and exit strategy.
And this is an identity that is far more longer and deeper than our identity as
a citizen of a sovereign country. You like it or not, whether this is ideal or
not, this is how we live, atleast as of now. Whether this identity is deeper
than our identity as a citizen is very much debatable and varies from person to
person. “Idea of India” cannot be something a bunch of people who called themselves
“founding fathers” defined in 1947.
So, my question is, in a country that celebrates diversity and wishes to
uphold it (I think) - why should we have to hesitate/scoff at proclaiming this
identity – who decided to attach a taboo to religion? When I say, I am an IT
professional or a mother or a Dhoni fan, nobody tells me, “Hey, but you are an Indian first and we are all equal”. So why is mention
of religion and caste frowned upon, when it is a reality we live with every day
– isn’t it presumptuous to think people identifying with a religion and caste
can only be regressive and divisive? The real problem is about hypocrisy and
demonizing/wishing away something so much, that it became the elephant in the
room. Ordinary people and harmless citizens are made to feel bad when they
identify with a religion and caste – whereas it is totally NORMAL/REVOLUTIONARY
to put up an elevated pedestal with loudspeakers talking about others’ religion
and caste. Me identifying with my religion and caste destroys the “idea of
India”, but NOT people addressing hundreds and thousands of others about every
caste and religion but their own or about all castes and religion put together.
Real change should be about calling out this bluff, and not about imposing
taboos on religion and caste for the average man and expecting people to change
who they are or what they know about their identity. When we expect people to
be ashamed of their religion as identity, we have already conceded that there
can be no Unity in Diversity, unless there is an intermediate sameness factor. The
idea of India is simply too fuzzy/complex, but stronger and deeper than what
people can imagine or hope to achieve with forced ideals like secularism. And Indians
shouldn’t be expected to dumb down to fit into SOME people’s unidimensional theories and logic boxes.
So, what really happened? If I were to write a hilarious satire – the
script would go like this - somewhere, a
group of people who had a large identity crisis with respect to religion, called
themselves free thinkers and liberals, but couldn't stand how much the
religious/believers were at peace with their religious identity. So, what they tried to do was force their identity crisis on us,
believers. They
defined that religion must be personal, meaning if you really must have
anything to do with it, no one needs to know. But in India, we don’t live like
that – expressing is second nature, we are not known for our subtlety - it is
who we are. Archimedes shouted Eureka once and the world can’t stop talking
about it, Eureka is a way of life in India. We marvel at everything, we
celebrate everything, we fight, we are passionate, we can bow down to
everything, we laugh together, we cry together - really our culture is one big
song and dance. Telling us suddenly to be ashamed/downplay who we are, is sort
of like caging us back again. Only a deeply joyless Western ideal/ism can
define such rules for us.
"Why I am a Hindu"- I don’t have any such
identity crisis. I am a Hindu and I can be one, without having to be Indian at
the same time, and I can be Indian without being restricted by the fact that I
am a Hindu. I don’t have a problem with my identity and I don’t expect anyone
to have problems with me proclaiming this identity. And this is the same of any
religion - Christianity, Islam, Sikhism, Parsi, Jainism etc. and should be the
same of any caste, language as well. There will always be some ups and downs in
society and inequalities, but that won’t be levelled out by parroting
hypocritical narratives that don’t mean much in everyday, practical life. It is
the same sham as some liberals/feminists thumping their chests and imagining that
women's rights and progress happened because of some people on the streets and
placards. You may push and push and push a woman to go out and work, but it
will never happen until there are jobs that don’t need brute strength and
working in harsh conditions. The growth of technology and digitalization made sure
physical strength and skills that were unique to men were irrelevant and we
needed the kind of skills which both men and women could provide equally.
Society evolves by discovery - of self and of needs and opportunities around
us, by inventions and innovations and not by ideologies and theories. Most
importantly, it evolves by active contribution.
Coming back to my favourite - religion :) - Expecting citizens to push back
their religious identity as a necessary condition for the country's unity is
well, it will just be an expectation, far removed from reality, it will be a
sham and subversion of how people genuinely feel and how they live. When every
other identity is valid and legitimate and considered healthy for a nation, why
not religion and caste? A society must be able to extract the best of
diversity, not judge which differences are needed and which should be done away
with. India is still a very religious country. Most people atleast. AND we must
be very proud of that. If not, we must ACCEPT this. As normal and healthy.