Patricia Mukhim
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) never made any bones about wanting to pass the Citizenship Amendment Bill (CAB). The Bill was proposed in the Lok Sabha in July 2016 and was finally passed on January 8, 2019. According to the Bill illegal migrants belonging to the Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi or Christian religious communities from Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Pakistan would not be imprisoned or deported but would be eligible for Indian citizenship. Moreover, these citizens gain permanent citizenship after six years of residency in India instead of 11 years – as laid down in the Citizenship Act (1955). For the BJP this is an electoral ploy to consolidate the Hindu vote bank because Christians, Parsis, Sikh, Buddhist et al put together are a negligible number in the above-mentioned Muslim countries.
After the Bill was passed by the Lok Sabha the North Eastern states as a whole and Assam in particular protested vehemently. There have been debates and write-ups galore in the region about why the CAB should be opposed. Some groups from Assam staged a naked protest in front of Parliament in the January cold. Pressure groups across the region under the banner of the North East Students’ Organisation (NESO) have rallied together to protest the Bill which is seen as a dangerous ploy to populate the North Eastern states with Hindu immigrants from Bangladesh because Hindu immigrants from that country would naturally choose to settle in this region, for the same reason- kinship and linguistic ties. The argument is that Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists etc., from Afghanistan or Pakistan would choose to settle in northern India because of their cultural and linguistic affinities with people there.
According to Wikipedia, Bangladesh is the third largest Hindu nation in the world after India and Nepal. According to an estimate from the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) there were 17 million Hindus in Bangladesh as of 2015. History is a cruel divider of nations and peoples. In 1905 Bengal was divided into East and West Bengal. East Bengal had a Muslim majority population while West Bengal was largely Hindu. The British peddled a lie that the Partition of Bengal would improve administrative efficiency. East Bengal was tagged to Assam to form the Eastern Bengal and Assam province. Dhaka became the capital of Eastern Bengal and Assam. Chittagong, Dhaka Divisions, Rajshahi Division (excluding Darjeeling) and Malda District were separated from Bengal and transferred to the new province. Hill Tripura came under Eastern Bengal and Assam province.
There was a huge reaction mainly from the Hindus against the separation of Bengal. Leaders of the Congress Party launched massive agitations to end the Partition which was termed as the Policy of Divide and Rule. On Partition Day – October 16, 1905, the people of Bengal observed a day of mourning. The Partition of Bengal resulted in a major political crisis and triggered agitations and boycott of British goods. In 1911 the two Bengals were reunited but the Bengali Muslims remained antagonistic to the idea. It was in 1947 during the Partition of India that East Bengal was ceded to Pakistan because it had a Muslim majority population. This Divide and Rule Policy of the British has left India with a thousand cuts which this country is still trying to resolve and with Pakistan being the one inflicting the cuts every single day.
There is a feeling today among a section of Hindus, particularly those in the BJP that if Pakistan was partitioned from India because it had a majority Muslim population then India with a Hindu majority population should legitimately be a Hindu nation. But the architects of India’s Constitution, despite their many frailties, understood the huge racial and religious diversities of this country and sought to make it a secular nation. India is stronger today because it is inclusive and tolerant. It’s a different matter that today political parties cash in on the politics of communal hatred and bigotry.
Coming back to Meghalaya and the North Eastern states, since the BJP never even tried to hide its intent about passing the CAB, why did the regional political parties agree to align with it? In Meghalaya the NPP-led MDA government is a coalition comprising the NPP, UDP, PDF, HSPDP and BJP. Before the formation of the Government, Himanta Biswa Sarma, the Convenor of the BJP-led North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA), made a big splash and it appeared as if the BJP with two MLAs was the kingpin of the Alliance. There was no protest from any of the pressure groups back then. What were we thinking? Were we sleepwalking and hoping that the BJP would change its stripes?
While blazing the election trail prior to May 2014, Narendra Modi had spoken of “Vikas” (development) everywhere. The country’s economic growth under the UPA –II had slowed down considerably and there was a general sense that Modi would inject new blood into a moribund economy and that he would tackle corruption with new fervour. A disillusioned electorate saw in Modi a charismatic leader who would take the country to new heights and restore India to its rightful place in the comity of nations. Indeed in the first two years Modi scored many political points but the RSS with its agenda of reviving Hindu pride has taken control of the Government. The BJP without the RSS is incapable of winning elections. Modi knows this, hence his attempts to placate the fringe which is now mainstreamed.
We in the state and region too should have known that the RSS’s Hindutva agenda would subsume all claims and intentions of good governance. But the worst point in the BJP’s political trajectory was when it appointed a temple priest Yogi Adityanath as the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh. After this religion and politics got completely enmeshed and there was no looking back. Cow vigilantism resulted in lynching of people suspected to be keeping beef or consuming it. The refrigerator which is a private domain became open to the public scrutiny of the cow vigilantes who were essentially linked to the BJP-RSS. Uttar Pradesh is now a state where law and order have reached their nadir with police officials being attacked and killed for investigating crimes relating to cow vigilantes. Hindu pride is now being primed as a badge of honour to be worn with pride. So much so, Rahul Gandhi the Congress President too had to follow in the BJP footsteps and go temple hopping during the election campaign in Gujarat Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chattisgarh and even declare that he is a not just a Hindu, but a ‘janeu-dhari’ Hindu (one who wears the sacred thread),” just to win votes. For the Gandhi scion it was a case of, “if you cannot beat them, join them.”
So what does the MDA Government intend to do at this critical juncture? Does it dare to snap ties with the BJP-led NDA Government? Can it drop two of the BJP MLAs from the alliance? Or will Sanbor Shullai and AL Hek both resign their MLA seats and contest from some other party? That would have been the ultimate form of protest from Meghalaya. And these MLAs knowing very well that the agenda of the BJP is to pass the CAB come what may, should have the moral courage to resign from the Party. The CAB may not pass muster in the Rajya Sabha but when elections arrive after a few weeks, the BJP will go to its Hindu constituents and say, “We have tried our utmost to pass the CAB which would have made several million Hindus from Islamic countries, genuine citizens of India but the enemies of Hinduism have put paid to this Bill. Give us one more chance to prove our commitment to make India a nation where Hindis are safe and secure.” That precisely is the BJP ploy. Did we not know it? Of course we did! So why did we sleepwalk and believe that we were safe sleeping with the enemy? Nay, making a pact with the devil himself? Any answers?