Letters to the Editor: Prismatic thought: Secularism

Prismatic thought: Secularism

The people of India are not on the right path in terms of secularism. What is secularism? Freedom for all religions or equal political involvement with all religions. During the freedom struggle, the Indian National Congress and Muslim League were at loggerheads over religious issues. The national Congress tried to represent all of India and its communities. On the other hand, the Muslim League advocated for the cause of Muslims only. They alleged Congress to be biased towards Hindus, which Congress vehemently denied. The British, of course, had backed the Muslim League to weaken the freedom struggle by creating division among their own countrymen. Finally, the goal was scored as a result of Muhammad Ali Jinnah’s continued defiance of the Muslim League. India was divided into two countries at the dawn of independence.

Now the journey of secularism began in India, steered by the ruling Congress. With the division of the country, the Reserve Bank of India was also divided. According to the agreement, India had outstanding dues of 50 crore after payment of the first installment of 25 crore. This is a matter of irony: despite financial constraints and horrible communal violence, India paid the dues at the insistence of Mahatma Gandhi. Jawaharlal Nehru and his team were against it. This is done ostensibly to show the world and the Muslims of the Indian subcontinent the generosity of India in the name of religious tolerance. This legacy of Mahatma Gandhi or the Congress has been continuing. It reached such a stage that almost all Indian political parties, including the Left Front, started to preach appeasement politics for mainly Muslim minorities. The Hindu nationalist party “Jana Sangha” was in its nascent stage, unable to carve a niche in national politics then. The Muslims of India ultimately fell prey to vote-bank politics and remained comparatively downtrodden.

Recently, Bajrang Dal imparted arms training to its cadres for the protection of the Hindus in Assam. We are not governed by a church or temple like in ancient European church states. If only Hindus are protected in the same country, what about other religions? This has no merit at all. These people are directly deviating from the path of modern state policy or secularism. Military training for civilians may be necessary for a country. Even Israel is doing that. But it should be irrespective of community or religion to serve the nation unitedly. Now the right-wing nationalist politicians, also led by the BJP, aren’t efficiently poised to advocate secularism in equilibrium. After all, the true qualification of common subjects is key to successful democratic secularism.

Arup Saikia,

arupsaikia07@gmail.com.

Clash of examinations

It is requested that the following few lines be kindly published in the columns of your esteemed daily to get the solution to a problem faced by aspiring job aspirants. The dates of the examinations for the Judicial Assistant recruitment of Gauhati High Court and the Research Assistant in Planning Services under Transformation and Development Department conducted by APSC Examination get clashed for August 27, 2023, as per the date sheets issued quite recently. There is an urgent need to change the dates accordingly, as lots of students are appearing in both the recruitment examinations and will have to forgo one of them if the dates are not adjusted suitably.

I hope the authorities will look into the matter and take action immediately to save thousands of students from missing one of the examinations for which they have very painfully prepared.

Sanat Kumar Das,

Guwahati.