What is it like to be a Muslim in India?

The answer to the question “What is it like to be a Muslim in India?” could threaten the integrity and future of our country

It’s, arguably, one of the saddest indictments of our country that today we increasingly ask the question “What is it like to be a Muslim in India?” The answer ought to be no different to being a Hindu, Christian, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi or atheist. But it is. Ziya Us Salam’s new book, Being Muslim in Hindu India: A Critical View, explains in distressing detail why that is so.

Indian Muslim students wearing burqas leave Mahatma Gandhi Memorial college after they were denied entry into the campus in Udupi, Karnataka state, India, February. 24, 2022. (AP Photo/Aijaz Rahi)

Let me start with the background but bear in mind the situation has got incalculably worse in the last decade. Muslims are 15% of the population but only 4.9% of state and central government employees, 4.6% of the paramilitary forces, 3.2% of IAS, IFS and IPS and, perhaps, as low as 1% of the Army. Since the Sachar Committee of 2006, we’ve known that in economic and social terms, they’re far worse off than the Scheduled Castes and Tribes.

Even in politics, where once their voice was heard, it’s diminishing and receding. In proportionate terms, they should have 74 seats in the Lok Sabha. They have 27. In not one of our 28 states do we have a Muslim chief minister; in 15, there’s no Muslim minister; in 10, just one, usually in charge of minority affairs.

Actually, no party has turned its back on them as squarely as the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Neither in 2014 nor 2019 did it have a Muslim Lok Sabha MP. Today, it doesn’t even have a Muslim Rajya Sabha MP. In Karnataka and UP, with 14% and 19% Muslim populations respectively, it doesn’t have a single Muslim MLA. In Gujarat, it hasn’t fielded a Muslim candidate in any election, Lok Sabha or Vidhan Sabha, since 1998. In fact, this April, KS Eshwarappa, a former deputy chief minister of Karnataka, boasted that the BJP doesn’t need Muslim votes.

What makes the situation worse is what’s said of Muslims by ruling party leaders and their close supporters. They’re called “Babar ki aulad”, taunted with abba jaan and repeatedly told to go to Pakistan. When there are calls for their genocide, few, if any, BJP voices speak out in condemnation. When accused of rioting, their homes are demolished even before their guilt is established. They’re also regularly accused of love jihad and murdered for alleged cattle smuggling.

Let me cite an example from Ziya’s book of what happened to a Muslim man in Jharkhand in June 2019. It may be invidious to single out one incident but it’s illustrative of many others. “The rampaging mob… tied him to a lamp post and beat him with anything that was on hand, from iron rods to batons, tyres and belts. The man bled from his head, hands and face. His legs were swollen, many of the bones were broken and his hands were bleeding. He could barely stand… His crime? He was a Muslim in new India.”

Even something as essential as their identity is denied to Muslims. Mohan Bhagwat, the RSS Sarsanghchalak, says “Every Indian is a Hindu”. Not just Muslims even Sikhs would not accept that. But he’s gone further. “All those who are in Bharat today are related to Hindu culture, Hindu ancestors and Hindu land, nothing other than these.”

I think I’ve said enough to explain why the answer to the question “What is it like to be a Muslim in India?” could threaten the integrity and future of our country. I’d say it’s pretty obvious. But think for a moment what that answer means for our Muslim brothers and sisters. For the rest of us, it’s an arms-length analytical concern. For them, it’s their very existence. We speak of the problem, hopefully with deep concern. They live it and fear it can only get worse.

Karan Thapar is the author of Devil’s Advocate: The Untold Story. The views expressed are personal