It’s not the beef stupid

Beef ban, along with the ‘uniform civil code’ and ‘Vande Mataram’, is an issue that is representative of something much bigger, playing on the majoritarian urges.

It’s the season of the cow, again, or rather the ‘holy cow’. Gau rakshaks (cow protectors) and Dharam rakshaks (guards of virtue) are blooming in their full glory. If the election of Narendra Modi provided a fillip to the self-avowed cow protectors, the appointment of Yogi Adityanath, as the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, has brought them into the mainstream of political thought. When pork sandwich relishing Jinnah got an Islamic state for himself and his statues (you would be a fool to believe Pakistan was for Muslims only), he sold his home in Aurangzeb road (now Dr APJ Abdul Kalam Road), Delhi, to Ram Krishna Dalmia, a Marwari business magnate of the time. Dalmia, before occupying the house, did two things; firstly, he ordered the house to be cleansed with the holy Gangajal; secondly, he took down the green and white banner of the Muslim league and replaced it with an anti-cow slaughter banner. And hence began the grinding fight, in independent India, to save ‘Gau-mata’ (cow mother) from the clutches of beef eating barbarians and ‘anti-nationals’. Dominance of Nehruvian consensus Beef ban, along with the ‘Uniform Civil code’ and ‘Vande Mataram’, is an issue that is representative of something much bigger, playing on the majoritarian urges. The electoral victories of the BJP have initiated a widespread societal discussion on these issues. The Nehruvian consensus ensured that generations of Indians, including my father and grandfather, didn’t debate the precept of leaving the minorities to their own devices, especially on the aforementioned issues. When the Hindu Code Bills were passed in the 1950’s to reform Hindu personal laws, there were calls to reform the personal laws of the minorities also (Muslims, basically). The argument advanced to reform the minority personal laws came not only from Hindu Mahasabha and Jan Sangh, but also from progressive sections of the Congress. Nehru, while vehemently arguing for reforming the Hindu personal laws, argued against reforming minority personal laws, no matter how regressive they were. This non-interference in minority matters became an important pillar of the Nehruvian consensus. retrospect, Nehru erred by showing compassion when he should have provided dignity to the minorities. He left them to the whims of regressive minority bodies such as the All India Muslim Personal Law Board. The findings of the Sachar conmmittee stand as a testament to the existing socio-economic backwardness of the Muslims, proving non-intervention, in the garb of compassion, only worsened the status of the common Muslim, who was already hurting by the abrupt departure of the landed and educated Muslim class to Pakistan. The current generation isn’t comfortable with this consensus. How could it be? The median age of the country is 29. That means 50 per cent of the country was born in a post-socialist and post, de facto, one-party rule. Given the Congress party was the protector of the consensus, its undoing at the hustings and a less than remarkable leadership have opened the door for the development of a new social contract, which practically abandons the Nehruvian consensus. This new social contract is being wrought out, even as I write this piece. Why doesn’t the Nehruvian consensus find a place in this contract? A good part of the current crop of Indians is at odds with this non-interference. Especially, the young, those just getting their political bearings but old enough to vote, don’t get this benevolence on matters such as an exemption to sing the Vande Mataram, non-interference of the state in personal laws. These young people aren’t dyed in the saffron wool, Hindutva warriors, these are apolitical, yet politically aware, young citizens. Unanswered questions This assertion might be dismissed as an aberration. But BJP+’s tally of 325, in the UP election, is a proof that something major is afoot, of which the centrists or leftists aren’t in sync with. (Just to put this in perspective. Even in the wake of Indira Gandhi’s assassination in 1985, the Congress party was able to secure only 269 seats, and this was when Uttarakhand was a part of Uttar Pradesh, meaning not only BJP’s tally is higher but also its strike rate.) BJP’s victories have initiated discussions, with renewed vigor and focus, on issues such as the beef ban and the Uniform Civil Code- issues that were earlier repressed than addressed. These discussions are bringing to the fore uncomfortable questions such as: If a Muslim were to sing the Vande Mataram, is he committing heresy? If yes, then does fealty to the religion trump loyalty toward the country, for a Muslim citizen? Cows are sacred to the Hindus, can’t the Muslims forgo eating beef to show solidarity with their Hindus brothers?

These are just some questions that are being thrown up presently, answers to which are anything but straightforward. While the BJP has taken the lead in gauging the public mood and accordingly shaped its spin machine, the Opposition still hasn’t internalized the systemic shifts in the Indian polity. In fact, much of the Opposition acts like an armchair liberal or Marxist unwilling to let go of Oxford/Cambridge affectation; the chances are he/she hasn’t left his Lutyens ivory tower. Further, utterances of Congress leaders, such as Digvijaya Singh who refer Osama Bin Laden as ‘Osamaji’ and question the martyrdom of police officers slain in terrorist encounters, without evidence, leaves a bad taste with this new crop of voters, who construe this as rank appeasement. At this moment in India history when the social contract is being renegotiated, the centrist and center left Opposition forces haven’t been able to gauge the public mood. They are still sticking to the old assertions such as: Yajnavalkya, a Hindu sage, consumed beef; therefore Hindutva forces should shut out their opposition to beef consumption. Arguments like these still miss the point that the current majoritarian assertiveness is based on an emotional undercurrent, which is undergirded by identity politics. While the ‘logical’ opposition might be appealing to the mind, the ‘emotional’ heart would have none of it. The heart wants what it wants, and for now, it wants no beef consumption. The ‘logical’ opposition must formulate a message that is suffused with liberal and secular thought but ‘illogical’ enough to be embraced by the heart. If a pan India party such as the Indian National Congress has to stay relevant (for India’s sake we need a dogged Opposition, given we cannot afford another Congress party kind off rule of the 70’s and 80’s in which the Opposition was more like a prop), it must, or rather should, come to terms with the existential churn buffeting the socio-economic life of India; and recalibrate its strategy suited for a post-Nehruvian consensus world. After all, it’s not about the beef ban stupid. PS: I love my butter chicken and chicken tikka six days of the week. But on Tuesdays, I forswear any tamsik bhojan (non-veg food) and recite Hanuman chalisa from memory (yes, meat eaters can also be Bhakts though not of Modi). I am sure that I am no aberration in that my dietary habits don’t preclude me from commenting on Hindutva’s holy cow. Atal Bihari Vajpayee loved his fish, but that didn’t stop him from making ‘piously’ provocative speech to karsewaks a day before the Babri Masjid demolition.