It's no longer wise to look upon other gods as 'strangers'

Pre-occupation with religious conversions is fuelling the ills of Indian society.

By Christopher Joseph
New Delhi:  In a country like India, whose politics and society espouse the principles of secularism and equality, people changing their religion should not be a cause of fear and violence. They should also not be a matter of discussion in parliament and the media.

In a country where half the world's illiterate live, where half its people have no toilets, where 1,360 people die of tuberculosis each day and where every minute one person commits suicide, one would expect the media and politicians to concentrate on battling poverty, illiteracy and improving health rather than on discouraging conversions.

The question is, why are Indians obsessed with faith, religion and conversions rather than with their own emaciated bodies, lack of food, sick relatives and the dirty water they drink?

In the past few months, the Indian media has been filled with stories of forced conversions of Hindus to Islam, Christians to Hinduism, and of young Muslims seducing Hindu women into marriage in order to convert them to swell Islamic numbers in the country.

There were editorials, opinion pieces and television discussions on the issue, with minority leaders expressing fears that Hindu hardliners are gaining in strength following Prime Minister Narendra Modi's election victory three months ago.

Religion is -- and always has been -- a politically linked phenomenon across the globe. Ever since the commandment “You shall have no strange gods before me” was etched on a tablet, politicians have used it to keep the rank and file together.

The primary struggle was to keep strange gods out of communities. People who worshipped "strange gods" were different. They also ate strange food and spoke strange languages. The hatred toward people with strange gods was the cumulative end result of a community's disapproval and ridicule.

It was common and natural to disrespect the gods of others. Images of deities were ridiculed and attacked with the pure political goal of destroying other people’s faith in their gods, and consolidating their own community’s power.

But the world is always changing. Exploration and migration saw people of different faiths discover new lands where more strange gods ruled the roost.

In South Asia, the struggle to overcome strange gods and keep others at bay began when Turkic Muslims crossed the Indus River and plundered Hindu temples in the thirteenth century. Muslim attempts to subjugate a people worshipping other gods continued for 320 years, spanning five dynasties and numerous bloody wars.

Local communities did their best to resist aggressors seeking to expand their kingdoms. Often haplessly, they attempted to protect their cows, their mud gods, their women and children. Resisting conversion became an attempt to protect their communities and the dignity of their women and children.

By the fifteenth century an individual who converted was considered a traitor by his community and therefore deserved to die.

By that time, Vasco da Gama had found India. The Portuguese came, the Dutch came and the British came. Their “East India” companies were welcomed. But their attempts to convert people were resisted.

The majority of those who accepted the "foreign" god of the company owners were people on the fringes of Indian society, those who were un-touchable, cast out of their communities. They had nothing to protect them and their faith, deaths or alienation meant nothing to mainstream Indians.

The world kept on changing. Colonialism gave way to independence and democracy. India became a nation of Hindus, Muslims and Christians and political parties began to patronize religious communities calling them "our people".

Christians, however, became largely political orphans simply because they lacked enough numbers to be a force to be reckoned with in elections.

In their attempts to create a heady mix of politics and religion, politicians covertly and overtly played up stories about "strange" gods of people of rival religions, and propagated fairytales telling how the ancestors of these people desecrated images of their gods, raped mothers and sisters and plundered their own communities.

The message of hate was simple: given a chance, they will again attack us, dominate, displace and de-value us. Hence, hate them and keep them away.

In this climate of hate, Christians became a community which betrays, who worship a "foreign" god, who supported colonial subjugators and who continue to have leaders who reside outside the country. They are a community that cannot be trusted; that should be hated.

Shrewd politicians blame colonialism and invasion as the root cause of poverty, illiteracy and ill health in India. Casting out people with "strange gods" is projected as the only lasting solution to all the ills of a nation.

Many digest this kind of political talk and intimidation without question. The majority of Indians -- especially the some 700 million who live in villages -- have no way of questioning rhetoric, influencing decisions, or even making their voices heard.

India’s media, especially the English language part, has no interest in village issues unless stories make its English-speaking audience laugh or cry. The main interest is pandering to the economic and political interests of its city audience.

Fear of faith is a politically cultivated evergreen, fertilized by poverty, illiteracy and engineered social disabilities. It occasionally blossoms into bloody violence, but at all times adds spice to political life.

India's poverty and social divisions are a political necessity, and religion has become a tool to sustain it.

Religious leaders — Hindus, Christians and Muslims et all — if they wish to end this religious exploitation should stand up and assert, together and individually, that there are no strange gods in their land. They should help their people appreciate and respect the gods of their neighbors.

They should work for a new commandment: “We shall have no strange gods…all gods are familiar to us.”

Christopher Joseph is a ucanews.com correspondent based in New Delhi.

Source: ucanews.com