When Jinnah refused to be bullied

The year 1927 is chiefly remembered today for black-flag demonstrations by the Congress against a commission led by a lawyer, Sir John Simon, which had come to India in the process of reviewing the controversial Government of India Act of 1919.

The latter, among other things, gave separate representation to all three kinds of Christians (Indian, Anglo-Indian and European) and established the principle of "diarchy", or division of power between communities. But it was a year of much excitement on various fronts.

The FICCI opened with 27 chambers of commerce and industry, forged by giants like G.D. Birla, Purshottamdas Thakurdas, Dinshaw Petit, Kasturbhai Lalbhai, M.C.T. Muttiah Chettiar.

Commercial radio went on the air on July 23 through the Indian Broadcasting Company's Mumbai service (typical of media, it folded up in 1930). One Indian, a Bengali naturally, Sharat Roy, reached the Arctic. Another, a South Indian naturally, Y. Subba Row discovered phosphocreatine at Harvard. (Don't ask me what it means.)

Madan Theatres became the first cinema chain with 85 halls and an American, Katherine Mayo, published "Mother India" which Gandhi famously dismissed as a drain inspector's report. In December, the three memorable patriots, Ashfaqullah, Ram Prasad Bismil and Rajendra Lahiri were hanged for their part in the Kakori conspiracy case.

One of the most significant events that year was the introduction, on February 1, of the Child Marriages Restraint Bill in the Legislative Assembly by Rai Sahib Haridas Sarda.

It sought to prohibit the marriage of girls below 12 and boys below 15. Social legislation was in the air: women were enfranchised in the Central Provinces, and given the right to stand for elections in Punjab, Mumbai, Chennai and Assam.

There was a predictable avalanche of protest from fundamentalists of all hues. The traditional Muslim leadership was in the forefront. Their call was familiar: Islam was in danger. A fatwa was signed by 74 leading ulema and 72,725 Muslims signed 707 petitions against the bill. But there was one Muslim leader in the assembly who was not going to be bullied by this extreme.

His name was Mohammad Ali Jinnah. Defending the Sarda Bill in the House, Jinnah said, "I cannot believe that there can be a divine sanction for such evil practices as are prevailing, and that we should, for a single minute, give our sanction to the continuance of these evil practices any longer. How can there be such a divine sanction to this cruel, horrible, disgraceful, inhuman practice that is prevailing in India?"

He understood the power of orthodoxy, and appreciated that they might have their reasons for what they were doing. But, matching their passion with his own, he asked, "But are we going to be dragged down by this section for whom we have respect, whose feelings we appreciate, whose sentiments we regard; are we to be dragged down and are we to be prevented in the march of progress? In the name of humanity, I ask you."

More, and this is important. "And if we are going to allow ourselves to be influenced by the public opinion that can be created in the name of religion, when we know that religion has nothing whatsoever to do with the matter - I think we must have the courage to say: 'No, we are not going to be frightened by that'".

Jinnah may have opted for separation, but he was never a fundamentalist. What he said some 75 years ago required conviction and courage, and remains relevant. Reform in a sense is as constant as form: changing mores will always attempt to alter jealously and zealously guarded tradition.

Indian Muslims faced such a conflict in the second half of the 1980s when a supreme court judgment giving relief to an ageing woman from Bhopal, Shah Bano, became the line behind which conservative forces within the Muslim community took a stand. They argued that the supreme court of India, and by extension parliament, had no right to interfere in any personal law of the Muslims.

This stand of the Indian conservatives had no particular religious merit. This is evident from the attitude of Muslim law to theft. The Holy Quran is very specific about theft. Verse 38 of Surah 5 (Al Maidah) says: "As to the thief, male or female, cut off his or her hands: a punishment by way of example, from Allah, for their crime; and Allah is Exalted in Power, full of Wisdom."

Such a relationship between crime and punishment was not unusual for its age. Thieves were crucified during the time of Christ and you could be hanged in Britain for stealing a sheep as late as in the 18th century.

But even the fact that this verse is from the Quran has not prevented Muslim jurisprudence from softening the punishment for theft. There is therefore no validity, as Jinnah implied, in taking a rigid line on social legislation like child marriage and alimony: the law moves with the spirit of the time and the Quran always reinforces the quality of mercy in its verses.

Fundamentalists who provoke passions with the cry that Islam is in danger when legislation is conceived to help women are merely anti-women. This is all the more reprehensible since Islam ended practices like the killing of the girl child and attempted to eliminate the enormous injustices done to women at the time when the Quran was revealed. Fundamentalists are a dangerous law unto themselves.

The Shah Bano case was a touchstone; and arguably the decline of the Congress began with the mistake made when the supreme court ruling was reversed under pressure from the fundamentalists, who used exactly the same tactics as had been used at the time of the Sarda Bill.

The man who spoke up for reform in the Shah Bano controversy was a star on the treasury benches when Rajiv Gandhi was prime minister: Arif Mohammad Khan. A voluble advocate on the fundamentalist side was Syed Shahabuddin. More than fifteen years after that decisive moment, Arif Khan has been driven away from the Congress and the fundamentalist Shahabuddin welcomed into it.

This is curious for at least two reasons. First, although Mrs Sonia Gandhi was not directly involved in politics, she did have a view on the Shah Bano case, and she was convinced that her husband was making a mistake by submitting to fundamentalists. Perhaps the answer is that she was an individual then and a politician now.

The irony is that compromise with extremists is poor politics as well. One of the slow but sure changes that is taking place in Indian politics is the maturing of the Muslim mood.

The sense of helplessness in the 1950s turned into severe insecurity as riots intensified in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. Gujarat has not become what it has overnight: for more than a decade till the end of the 80s, Ahmedabad was the scene of a daily haemorrhage of communal blood while Congress chief ministers looked helplessly away.

Little has been more savage than the Bhagalpur riots that erupted in the last days of Rajiv Gandhi's tenure; or more pernicious than the manner in which Moradabad and Meerut were handled by Congress governments in UP.

This insecurity was multiplied in the inflammatory wars let loose by fundamentalists in the Shah Bano controversy, and then answered by their counterparts in the Ram Janmabhoomi movement. The destruction of the Babri mosque at Ayodhya in 1992 and the subsequent riots constituted the nadir.

But that tragedy became a wake-up call against the dangers of political religiosity. Change is slow and therefore imperceptible except to those who are changing, or to a sympathetic and acute outsider.

Politicians who deposit their political fortunes in vote banks are neither sympathetic nor acute. But there was startling evidence of this change only recently, when Muslims in Uttar Pradesh laughed away a typical vote-bank tactic from Mulayam Singh Yadav, who offered them a break from work to say their prayers.

A decade ago such a gesture might have been welcomed; today, clerics lead the way in laughing it off.The one thing that I can say with certainty about the Muslim vote in the coming election is that there is an almost compulsive desire to reject any party that treats Muslims with patronizing promises.

The days when the Indian Muslim vote could be collected with beads and mirrors by the heroic conquistador are over. They have understood the power of democracy, and are enjoying it.

Their vote will split, coolly, unemotionally, and go to the claimant with the best exchange rate. It will vary not only from state to state, but also from region to region within a state.

In Andhra Pradesh for instance, the Muslims of Telangana could happily vote for separatists while Muslims of the coastal belt punch their machines for Chandrababu Naidu. In Uttar Pradesh, they will weigh the merits of candidates as much as parties, with their vote being split in four directions.

Mulayam Singh Yadav is still likely to get the maximum share, but he is not getting exclusive rights. A substantial section of Lucknow's Muslims will vote for Atal Behari Vajpayee.

The Muslims of Akbarpur will vote by and large for Mayawati. A similar percentage of Muslims in Amethi will vote for Rahul Gandhi.

Since 1952, the past - partition, or riots, or Ayodhya - has shaped the Muslim vote, for understandable reasons. This is the first time that a substantial number of Muslims will vote for the future. That is not change; that is sea-change.

The writer is editor-in-chief of Asian Age, New Delhi.

Deadlock over NFC award

HILAL-i-Pakistan writes that a high-level intervention is being planned to break the deadlock over a formula for distribution of financial resources among provinces for the sixth National Finance Commission award.

After the failure of the Quetta meeting of the NFC to evolve a consensus on distribution of the federal divisible pool, Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Jamali called for resolving the issue before the budget so that provinces might be allocated funds in accordance with the new award.

According to the daily, there are two factors behind the stalemate. First, the centre has offered 46 per cent of the divisible pool to provinces which demand 50 per cent. Secondly, three small provinces insist that the award should not be based solely on population factor and other indicators like revenue generation and backwardness should also be taken into account.

Now that the controversy is going to be resolved through a high-level intervention, says the daily, the reservations of small provinces must be addressed. The fifth NFC award imposed upon provinces exacerbated the sense of deprivation among the smaller ones and the practice must not be repeated.

Awami Awaz writes that members of the Sindh Assembly, at its recent session, lodged a strong protest against illegal water releases into the Chashma-Jhelum Link Canal and water shortage in Sindh. Legislators from the treasury as well as opposition benches took part in the debate on the issue.

Dr Hamida Khuhro informed the house that Punjab had been in practice of taking water from the flood canal for about a year. Population Welfare Minister Imtiaz Shaikh said that the chief minister had already taken notice of the matter and asked the provincial irrigation department to conduct an investigation. Opposition members alleged that the provincial government was not honestly pursuing Sindh's water case.

The daily comments that the Sindh government has been continuously talking about the water issue but people want to see results. It advises the Sindh government to take up the issue at the federal-level, and urges the federal authorities to sympathetically consider the point of view of the water-starved province.

Kawish points out that with the advent of summer, the unannounced loadshedding of electricity has increased in different parts of the province. To add insult to injury, the Hyderabad Electric Supply Company has continued the practice depriving entire villages of power due to non-payment of dues by some residents.

Moreover, consumers are complaining of inflated bills which, they allege, are being issued to cover line losses and power theft committed with the connivance of the Hesco staff.

As a result, the daily says, quarrels between the company staff and consumers have occurred at many places and both the sides have even lodged cases against each other in Shikarpur. The situation calls for an improvement in the working of Hesco, particularly an end to loadshedding.

Ibrat writes that the recent attack on a Karachi police station, claiming lives of five policemen, reveals government's failure to curb terrorism. The attack, it says, is a challenge for the government and argues that terrorism cannot be controlled by rhetoric.

The government should work with an iron resolve and evolve a fool-proof strategy to confront terrorism in cities and the rising crime rate in rural areas.