Historian Bipan Chandra, author of, the classic study on Indian nationalism,
Rise and Growth of Economic Nationalism in India, has been writing on communalism
in India for a long time. His essay, "Historians of Modern India and Communalism",
published in Communalism and the Writing of Indian History, is well-known as
the chief exposition of the 'false consciousness' school of intepretation. We publish below
a Factsheet  interview with Prof. Chandra.

On the nature of Muslim minorities and communal forces:

"First of all, I think that we should identify the particular nature of Muslim minorities in India
which is different from that of other religious minorities like the Sikhs and the Christians.
I don't think it is valid to speak of a majority community in India suppressing all minorities
since the Sikhs and Christians are not suppressed, while the Muslims undeniably are. This is
clearly seen in the issue of jobs. Earlier, during the sixties, discrimination was mainly evident
only in governmental jobs but we can now see it in the business sector also.

"Since we are no longer placed in a colonial situation, business opportunities have come to
acquire greater importance than administrative ones and we have to note the terrible
discrimination being practised against Muslims, particularly in North India.

"In such a situation communal forces inevitably do tend to come to the fore, but we must first
recognise them clearly I so that we know what we are dealing with. I think there is a tendency
among secular I parties, groups and individuals to see Hindu communalism as the main fascist
threat. Therefore, they are critical of the spectre of Hindu chauvinism. This is correct, but we
have to realise at the same time that Muslim communalism too has been quite powerful since the
fifties and that its existence makes the struggle against Hindu communal forces that much more
difficult. I feel that a struggle against Hindu communalism has to be accompanied by a struggle
against Muslim and Sikh communalism also. Communalism in India is essentially a middle-class
phenomenon, all those susceptible to middle-class ideologies fall prey to be communal feelings.
This category also includes segments of the urban populatlon, including even the workers.

"One of the characteristic features of communalism is that even though the Centre is secular,
the states' machineries are full of quasi-communal elements. These elements might not be
actively communal in ordinary circumstances but when it comes to a riot then all their
latent communal sentiments are aroused. A major political and administrative effort has to be
made to deal with such elements who are prevalent in the government.

On the nature of the IndIan right-wing, and Its role In communal uprisings:

"When speaking about right-wing support  of communal forces, we must dIstinguish between
the capitalist big bourgeoisie, which has been growing almost geometrically, and the kulak
capitalist farmer who is today politically more active and militant.

"The latter, which had once supported the Congress, is now asserting itself through its own
political forums like the Akali Dal and Telegu Desam; while Sharad Joshi is the most evident
manifestation of their heightened economic aspirations. I feel that the capitalist class has
by and large rallied behind Mrs. Gandhi but it is only when the entire middle-class
of a region has grown alienated from the Congress, as it has happened in Assam,
that communal forces find fertile ground and move in to exploit the situation.

"Our studies have indicated that the capitalist class has by and large never supported
communalism. At best, they might be described as national-chauvinist. But I will certainly
say that the sort of communalism we are experiencing today is not an expression of feudal
forces. It is in fact connected with more contemporary forces, such as the growth of the
petit- bourgeois classes.

"Assam is a classic example of what is happening in the country today. The petit-bourgeoisie
has lost faith in the Congress and the left has completely failed to win it over. The situation is
therefore in a total flux and not only the middle-class but even the peasantry is now feeling
threatened. To my mind, the uprisings are not communally directed so far, rather they are
against all those who are anti-movement, whether they are Bengali or Muslim. But they
could turn communal if for instance they spill over into Gauhati city and Muslims begin to
get killed.

"I cannot yet see a definite political pattern of extreme right-wing activity emerging. At the
most one can say. as in Assam, that the situation is in flux."

On the possibility of secular leadership emerging:

"Whatever discrimination one might see today against Muslims, I don't think that this
contravenes the basically secular character of our politics and polity. I think the nationalist
movement was secular. We should always see communal forces as the containment of a
move towards secularism.

"As I said earlier, communalism is essentially a middle-class phenomenon, and to that extent
it should be distinguished from communal riots. And again, the sporadic riot should also be
considered in a different light from communalism itself. I believe, for instance. that a genuinely
secular leadership will not find it hard to contain a communal riot.

Only simplistic Marxists would take the position that communalism is an instrument in the
hands of the ruling class. Communalism 15 a modern ideology serving certain modern social
interests. Just because religious issues are an integral part of communalism it 15 not enough
to describe it as a remnant of feudalism, or even to see communalism solely as a religious
issue. Such a view- point ignores the entire lesson of our history.

"One major mistake that has been systematically  made has been to assume that,
with the spread of education, communal biases will disappear. How can they disappear
when much of our education is itself communal ?

"We must realise that communalism is mainly a petit-bourgeois phenomenon, that those who
preach it are not our big bourgeosie so much as the rich kulak class, and that communal
expressions can often be seen mainly in people whom we would otherwise consider modern.
Until we recognise these things, we will never" really understand what we are fighting."
 

        "No Death Of Communal Organisations"
                                                --Des Raj Goyal

Des Raj Goyal, editor of Secular Democracy, has since long been a vehement critic of
religious revivalist organisations. His book, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, published after
the emergency, is one of the most comprehensive studies on the ideology and conduct of the
ASS. He was, interviewed in Delhi by Factsheet.

On the role of communalism in Indian society and politics:

"Communalism, as we see it today, is really a consequence of the freedom movement as it
developed when the past had to be glorified and had to be integrated into the national
mainstream. If today politics 15 based on exclusivist communal mobilisation or on a
contractual integration of various communities, then we have to consider that the freedom
movement itself has been responsible for this.

"I would like to see communalism as the manifestation of various primordial sentiments: take
for instance how neighbourhood groups, which at their extreme, lead to regionalism; kinship
groups lead to casteism; and religious groups lead to communal uprisings. This is bound to
happen in the absence of a vigorous scientific thrust in our society.

"Let us see how the present situation has come about. Right from the sixties there
has been a major swing towards the right. In the 1967 election it was the right which
asserted itself. Now, Mrs. Gandhi who had seemingly broken away from the right, after
1969 has never organised her party along secular lines. In the period following the Congress
split, she gave the call and the nation responded to her populism but no one was clear as to
how genuine social redistribution would take place under the new circumstances. For
example, the nationalised banks were supposed to be instruments of structured change,
but no one considered how they would prop up new sectors of development or how would
they redistribute capital in an egalitarian manner. We therefore had a situation where
increased bureaucratisation took place side by side with a capture of the state apparatus
by an individual and not by an organisation.
 

"Now all the other parties are modeling themselves on Mrs. Gandhi's party, bearing
top-heavy names and very little grassroot organisation. They are all urgently in
search of a mass-media other than print which will enable them to reach out to the 'masses',
without looking at social groups as other than consumers or voters. This is authoritarianism.
It is a necessary backdrop to our understanding of communalism.

"As a result there has been a smoothening of definitions. Even the Bharatiya Janata Party,
inspite of its basically communal motivation, is able to adopt a secular veneer. It faces no
threat from the democratic process, in fact it is using this to propagate its own position.

"If today, communal issues are somehow seen as more realistic by certain sections than
secular issues, there can be no other reason than that there is no force which is able to
articulate the secular needs of the society, whereas there is no dearth of communal
organisations".

On the RSS and allied organisations:

"For 50 years now the RSS has concentrated single-mindedly on developing a cadre
that is hardworking, devoted, fanatical and impervious to outside thinking, and
most of all, remarkably dynamic in implementing whatever plan is given to them.
This cadre has issued out into society under the concept of the powerhouse--- the
headquarters and the substation--- the shakha. There is no question of a political party
like the BJP using the RSS; it is exactly the other way round.

"Along with the BJP, and its work among Harijans and tribals, the RSS has received
feedback on the new requirements of the cadres. In the sixties and the early seventies,
there was a tactical organisational shift where the maximum concentration was on building
up student cadres--- the Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP)--- and trade union
cadres too--- the Bhartiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS). By the mid-seventies, this led to a
situation where the shakha become less important and consequently the inflow of school
children into the RSS was reduced. Therefore, from the late seventies, we can see another
campaign --- setting up of schools, kindergarten classes and even nurseries. This has been
seemingly spontaneous  and not according to any plan, but the names usually are the same:
Rashtriya Shiksha Samiti, Shishu Mandir, Geeta Shiksha Samiti and so on. In the Janata
movement, all these came together under the generic name of Vidya Bharati.

"Their latest organisation, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, has to be seen in the light of the
re-orientation that took place in their thinking during the Janata period. The V HP was
formed in 1964, and was supported by Gulzarilal Nanda, then home minister. The areas
they took up were in north-eastern India, Assam, Manipur etc, where they functioned in
collaboration with the Ramakrishna Mission. Their main effort was to Hinduise the tribal
areas and to integrate them into their areas of control.

"Today, one can see a dual role of the VHP- of injecting a communal orientation into political
negotiation, which they began doing after the Janata period when the RSS realised that
their davs in power, and of actual field work as they have been doing in Assam,would not last.

"In Assam, they were in collaboration with Marwari tea-garden owners. The marwaris, who
have always had to justify their presence in Assam have always been at the receiving end of
agitations, whether in the question of refineries, or the language issues etc. In 1978-79, there
was a new wave of agitation, but this time the Marwaris were not at the receiving end at all.
First it was anti-Bengali, which the RSS and the V HP have now successfully converted into
anti-Muslim fury. Since 90% of the refugees that have come from East Pakistan have been
Hindus, in 1978-79 the RSS gave a slogan distin- guishing refugees,that is the Hindus,from
the infiltrators who were obviously the Muslims. So now, after the election there, the
violence has turned anti-Muslim, and the entire atmosphere has been communalised,
which is exactly what the VHP always tries to do. This is, I think, a growing trend, and
we must watch it carefully".

On Communalism in the South:

" I think the RSS has grown tremendously in Kerala.   It has really thrived on the Muslim
League there and on the Moplahs, who were supposed to be anti-Hindu.

" When Mallapuram district was made a separate district in the Malabar, and it was
obviously a Muslim majority district, this was made much of as a 'gain' for Muslims
although it was purely administrative measure.  Then in Kerala, the RSS captured the
devasthanam movement (temple lands) of the Brahmins and the Nayars.  These have
been the ways the RSS has grown, particularly in Kerala.

"In Tamil Nadu, the attempts of the DMK towards an anti-BrahmIn caste mobilisation
came up against difficultIes when the Brahmins made common cause with other upper
castes. They have used issues like these, as also the fishermen's agitations in Kanyakumari,
the anti-Christian feeling there, and the Meenakshipuram conversions last year. In short,
wherever a communal situatIon has existed, the ASS has not been slow to take it up.

"They have had literally hundreds of conferences in the south-- 'Hindu Ekata sammelans'
as they would call them. They have had about 100 in Karnataka itself in the last few years.
The idea is to build small, almost autonomous organisation in every state, orient groups of
20-25 people properly and then leave them on theIr own".

On the possibility of a Muslim communal reaction:

"I certainly see a very assertive Muslim communalism emerging. Since the demand for a
separate state Is no longer possible, the demand has changed to one for reservations.
The problems are that the communal Muslim sectIon does not artIculate Muslim aspirations in
secular terms; all they really seek is a slIce of the national cake for themselves.

"Till 1960, the Jamaat-i-Islami was almost dormant. Now, although it is numerically strong,
it is a major component of Muslim communalism which exerts a very large influence on the
community. One of the consequences has been that organisations competing for a
following have been gIving more and more communal slogans, and thus the influence of
traditionally nationalist organisations like the Jamat-ul-Ulema has reduced .
 

"The rise of an organisation like the Ittehadul Muslimeen in Hyderabad is interesting in this
context.  This is an out-and-out fascist organisation. It began with the support of the Nizam,
and today glorifies the Adil Shahi dynasty. The classes who support it are either the old
Nawabs, a decadent feudal order who are on the point of becoming some kind of lumpen, or
poor Muslims who live in slums. The Ittehadul Muslimeen began the Mulkigeir-mulki
(sons of the soil versus foreigners) when Hyderabad was made part of Andhra Pradesh,
and today it has developed a complete hold on the old city through its programmes.
No one fights them as party. In 1978 they had an adjustment with the Congress (I), and
now they had an understanding with the Telegu Desam.

"There is no movement at all really among Muslims for a secular orientation. Rather is often
the other way round. When someone like Syed Shahabuddin, who is basically a secular
person, tries to reinstate himself within a communal thrust he is only leading Muslims into
a blind alley.

"After Assam, Muslims have begun coming together. Mrs. Gandhi's role really seems to be
that of a Hindu leader best prepared to extend protection to Muslims. She takes an organisation
like the VHP under her umbrella, not overtly but by always staying away from dealing a mortal
blow to communal forces It is in this way that she keeps it alive while publicly condemning it".
 

            "Secularism Here Is Really A Slogan"
                                                Mushirul Hasan

Mushirul Hasan, author of Nationalism And Communal Politics, has been one of the most
significant contributors to the new understanding of communal politics that took place mainly
among Muslim historians in the 19705. His book . highlighted the contradictory tensions
that operated among even conservative Muslim sections during the controversial Khilafat
period. It is within this framework that he analysed the role of the conservative Ulema and its
relationship with the new urbanised educated Muslim leadership as well as with the Hindu
nationalists led by Gandhi.

In the interview reproduced below, Hasan comments on contemporary Muslim problems.
We reproduce his opinions, for though it may be difficult to reconcile them with his own
writing on the pre-Independence period, they are nevertheless important in that they do
represent the thinking of a large section of the Muslim intelligentsia.

On the crisis among Muslims following an increasingly militant right-wing
Hindu activity in the country:

"I think that one must make a historical assessment of the present trends. In the
pre-1947 period communalism had no definite identifiable pattern, in the manner in which
you can see one today. The new pattern is, firstly, centered around the emergence of a
Muslim bourgeoisie, such as is being churned out every year by the Aligarh University,
and secondly, around the powerful trading or artisan Muslim communities such as those
in Ferozabad or Moradabad. The riots are usually against the increasing threat being felt
from either these two sections, or as in the case of Poona, against both.

"One factor which is important but which is, perhaps, not demonstrable, is the growing
confidence among Muslims in the past decade, a confidence linked to their economic
position which has improved quite considerably in certain areas. This is in sharp contrast
to the early days of our Independence. Where does this reflect itself ? On one level, in
educational activities. These may be the establishment of more and more Madarasas, or
a revival of educational interest in secular subjects which, I think, the contact with Arab
countrIes has partIcularly encouraged.

"On another level, this is reflected In much greater political participatIon than in the past,
and the impact of this has been felt too. The realisatlon that Muslims in India can also vote,
that they can decide upon their own future, has been an important one. They are,
therefore, no longer voting en bloc for the Congress (I), they do affiliate themselves with the
other political parties.

"The communal response to this is, therefore, from all those who feel threatened from
Hindus who feel that Muslims are doing too well. The crisis is of this nature, emerging from
those who do not permit Muslims their rightful share".

On whether he sees a likelihood of Muslim communal reaction as well:

"No, there has been no significant increase in Muslim communal reaction.  The
resurgence of Muslim fundamentalism is just talk which is entirely unsubstantiated.
There is no Muslim leadership, and I feel there isn't going to be one Shabuddin is
really peripheral.

"The Muslim leaders who have emerged, and who are in National politics, do play
a significant role, but not in the communal sense at all.  For instance, in Assansol and
Burdwan, Bihari immigrant workers in coal mines vote for the CPI (M). It is only
in areas like Murshidabad, which is overwhelmingly Muslim, that they vote for the
Congress (I).  Secular Muslim leadership has increased, whereas communal
leadership has been unable to make any headway at all.  For example, the UP
Muslim League, which is far more communal than its counterpart in Kerala,
has made no headway at all.

"The Jamaat-i-Islami certainly exists and every new riot gives it a new lease of
life.  But we should not overestimate its significance, because communal leadership
can never find sympathy with a majority of Muslims for the simple reason that they
are all too apprehensive of a massive upsurge of reaction.  In the 1960s, at least
the psychological option was there among Muslims that you could go to Pakistan.
Today that doesn't exist."
 

Given the undeniable discrimination in the question of government jobs and other
opportunities, does he not feel the possibility of neo-separatist movements at all ?

"The question of secularism is a complex thing. The unequal development that has taken
place among various sections in India often does not permit Western models to be applied
in the case of India. In any case, 'secularism' here is really a slogan, a constitutional
obligation. You can't impose secularism from above.

"Nevertheless I do believe that the demands of the national movement were secular.
It is for a variety of reasons that the unifying forces have not been successful in overcoming
caste, regionalistic and chauvinistic barriers.

"No, there is nothing like a neo-separatism in India. Pakistani historians like I.H.Qureshi
and Aziz Ahmed still cling on to the two-nation theory for obvious reasons,
because Pakistan has to justify itself. But I can tell you that no Indian historian
takes  separatist positions."

On whether the events of the last two years, including the riots, and the Assam
situation, will result in new theoretical positions:

" Well, we have to respond to reality, why certain things do happen, or why they don't,
are questions that may take years to answer. I feel that we may fall once more into the
same trap as we did when everything was ascribed to 'false consciousness.'

" For many years Muslim historians were reluctant to talk about the present.  Their
work was at best on the medieval period.  Today the thrust of the Aligarh school is
basically a negation of a lot of positions that were taken in the past list positions.
Golwanlkar and Savarkar do provide a foundation for Hindu communalism even today,
one that is reinforces by social reformism and movements like those of Dayanand
Saraswati and Vivekananda.  What was unfortunate was that there was no
alternative framework to this for many years, and it is this framework that is in
the process of being made today."