Engage With The Community
As the nation celebrated its 69th Republic Day, an unseemly spectacle was playing out in various states – an outfit called Karni Sena was holding the state and people to ransom over the film Padmavat. A group formed in 2006 to fight “for the rights of Rajputs”, was attacking schoolchildren, public properties, and theatres, because “it thought the Rajputs had been portrayed unfairly in the film”.
There were charges that various state governments failed to – or refused to – clamp down on this fringe group. There were demands as to why PM Modi didn’t comment on the issue.
Earlier, last year in the state of Gujarat, the agitation of Patidars spiralled out of control. The erstwhile dominant caste of Gujarat failed aggrieved so as to demand reservations in jobs and education. While the government of the day failed to meet their demands, the group, under the leadership of a young leader, aggressively campaigned against the state government and the BJP, and the agitation continues till date. What is interesting that many observers felt that the quota demand had more to do with the lack of jobs and opportunities in the state, rather than the backwardness of the said community.
A commonly heard refrain in India is that hardly any member of the minority has joined outfits like the Al Qaeda. Yet, the fact remains that many misguided youth of the community, from various states, were tempted to join other terror outfits including the IS.
In all these instances, the role of the Union government, and even the Prime Minister, has been questioned. It has been asked if the Centre, or the PM, or the state governments could have played role of chief arbiters. It has been said, for instance, that while the BJP is committed to a strong state, wanton violation of the state authority raises questions about its governance.
Public order is non-negotiable. The values enshrined in the Constitution are supreme and must be enforced. Yet, the fact remains that governance becomes seamless if there is a continuum between the government and society. The fact that the government managers failed to talk to community leaders, say, on Padmavat, is a sad commentary on its abilities.
This also brings into focus what sociologists call endogenous responses. Many Rajput leading lights (writer Anuja Chauhan to name one) have expressed on the social media that they found nothing objectionable at all in Padmavat. Imagine a scenario where a group of community leaders had taken the Karni Sena goons head on, the whole discourse would have taken a new turn.
In the present controversy, however, whether it’s General V K Singh, a minister in the Modi Government, or Digvijay Singh, a leading member of the Opposition Congress, they sought to willy-nilly justify the Karni Sena protests, and act as not any different from Karni Sena leaders.
Community is an inseparable part of the nation building process. If a section of Patidar leaders would have argued that the quota demand is nothing but gimmick, the discourse would have shifted to education and employment opportunities.
If minority community leaders had carried a sustained campaign against fissiparous tendencies, many such attempts would have been nipped in the bud.
As society progresses, and there’s a gradual shrinking of the government, there’s a concomitant increase in the responsibilities of the community. The least then that the government can do to engage with the responsible and responsive community leaders so as to ensure that the fringe doesn’t get to occupy the centrestage.
