By Mukhtar Ahmad,
Whenever any community, sect, group or section gives a call for unity, it always implies unite against a common enemy. In the present scenario the call given by Muslim leaders / well-wishers is to unite themselves along with other secular people to defeat BJP in election of 2019. This may be acceptable to some extent as the present scenario of the country for Muslims is very grim. Lynching of their community members in one pretext or the other with connivance of the government has completely demoralised the community. Their mind is fully occupied to utilize the election of 2019 in do or die manner. But is this enough? The answer is no. For Muslims simply defeating BJP in this election may not result in ending of their miseries, or reducing the communal tensions. Surely the patronising of the government to the lumpen elements will go but the amount of hatred that has been filled to the mind of both communities will not end overnight. It is therefore, essential for Muslims to plan a strategy to reduce the communal tension in the society. Since Muslims are the major sufferers they must take the initiative in reaching out to their Hindu neighbours. Since the scheduled caste among Hindus are also the persecuted people in this regime, and therefore they may be approached first. Unfortunately Muslims have also more or less behaved in much the similar manner as upper caste Hindus in dealing with lower caste Hindus specially in UP and Bihar. It therefore requires lot of effort to bring the two communities together.
Similarly all opposition parties are working for alliances to face BJP united. The Political alliance may benefit the parties in opposition to secure power in 2019 and therefore their efforts are understandable. But simply winning the elections with different non cohesive alliance partners may not help them to work in unison to stem the rot that we are in. As the country is passing through worst form of communal polarization, a strong government is needed with full commitment to restore mutual bond of love and friendship among various communities. Unfortunately the present scenario in the country is totally biased towards winning elections in shortest possible time without working with different sections of society with long term planning to restore communal harmony. Another major issue that has been neglected by the present government is proper economic policy. It has totally surrendered to the policies of RSS and the corporate in all the fronts including economic. The form of the government after 2019 will decide the future in these two fronts.
For Muslims a long term policy of peaceful existence is essential. That must start now. Since we do not expect from any political Muslim leader or any political party to really work at grass root level as this has never been their priority. For them Muslims are vote bank that can be cashed at the time of elections. We in Aligarh mostly retired teachers of AMU have decided to take a lead in this direction. An organization with only few committed persons has been formed. It has started its work from Aligarh and will be moving the nearby cities and towns. In the first phase like minded Muslim and other non Muslim communities will be identified to form a group. We have decided to take the help of BAMSEF in reaching out to Scheduled caste and other most backward communities among Hindus. Our aim is to convince both the Muslim community and extremely backward non-Muslim communities of their plight and the necessity to work together. In the next phase we will be targeting the students of various schools and colleges towards the importance of secularism and moral values. The principals of these schools and colleges will be asked to address these issues regularly. Also few eminent speakers will be engaged by us to deliver lectures from time to time.It is long term solution which may not be visible in few years from now. But surely with concerted efforts this will be a major force in Indian political scene.
——
(Mukhtar Ahmad is former professor of Electrical Engineering AMU Aligarh.)