The Phantom of the Opera

Re Article

Zafar,
I for one am in favor of the uniform civil code. What’s right for one Indian is right for others. The current debate was sparked by a Christian who felt the same way.

Regards,

Faruk

Common law for every one - just like the rest of the world. Not based on any religion.

If it is religious based law - then their is no end. Emotions get involved and further bifurcations begin - like the Sunni zakat Law - the Shia zakat law - etc - etc - as in Pakistan.

Pakistani Law, which is now quasi-religious in many areas, is unjust and cruel not only to the non-Muslims but also to the Muslims.

Dear Zafar,

(Like your handle, btw)

Point by point:-

a) Your interaction with flesh & blood Indians needs to appreciate that Togadia & ilk are probably as relevant to the man on the street Indian as are a vast variety of Muslim clergy. Sure, there will be bloodbaths and there will be aberrations. Those are under no circumstances ``pogroms`` as the message from Nashqbandi tries to portray.

b) If you cannot see the Hindu-Muslim etc bhai bhai slogans anymore, it is because the vast unwashed hordes have got quite tired of shouting it on behalf of their ``phantom leaders``. It is my take that more and more are simply practising co-existence (call it integration if you must) as the rooftops go increasingly deep blue (from previous green/saffron).

c) A step by step attempt has got us nowhere in 56 years, probably made matters worse. The only people who benefit from such time-pass are the phantoms you choose to evangelise.

d) In non-Mughal India, most of South, East, North, Cental, and West India, royalty India, upper-middle class India, government service India, Armed Forces India, infotech India, electoral India, media India, taxi & auto-rickshaw driver India, milkman and dhobi India, Dharavi and Salt Lake India, Hamdard Roohafza India, Railway India, porters for Amarnath India, daily-wager India, farm labourer India, bangle-maker India, banker India, and a variety of other Indias, Muslims are as well integrated as anybody else.

e) In some remnants of relics thrownback to Mughal India, there is a solid resistance to any sort of integration, we keep hearing bleats about Qaum Khatre Mein hai, and your resistance, or rather your batting on behalf of those who are against a UCC, is relevant only and only there. Deobandi, Barelvi, all these are not representative of India anymore, are they? They are there, they have their role (whatever it is) but they do not become the benchmark?

As I have said before, Zafar Anjum, let my people go.

regards/Veeresh

re: Zafar Anjum

A well encompassing article.

Uniformity of a legal codex is fraught with problems and these problems are always present in a multicultural society. I would agree with you in the sense that a better option would be harmonize the Muslim family laws within the Indian civil code itself and from that, to gradually move towards legal intergration. The concept of seperate but equal laws always end up being more unequal and this code, if taken in its rightful intention can adress those injustices. On the other hand, intergrating Muslim rights and laws within the gambit of a uniformal legal code will not solve the concerns of inequalities and the denial of legal rights and protections.

Even more pressng than the issue of legal intergration within one law is the need to seek a more benign economic intergration for the Muslims in the Indian society. As long as the Muslims resist joining the Indian economic mainstream on the basis of having their own political and cultural niches in the Indian society, they will need the logic of seperate but equal laws. The example of Candian Quebecois is quite telling in this regard. A minority that wants political equality by creating a seperate (legal) electorate for itself makes it problematic for itself to fully intergrate in the economic life of its nation. The tragedy of the Muslims of India, historically, has been that they have equated political apartheid on the basis of an economic agrument, without realizing that economic reality and criteria for progress does not account for a seperate but equal status quo.

The best means to uniformalize the Indian legal code would be for the Muslims to intergrate themselves fully into the Indian economic life and to use their influence in the Indian economic rubric as a lever to influence the protection of their legal and political rights and to use their economic influence to safe guard their minority status. Muslims minority status in India will always be under threat, politically, as long as the Muslims lack economic influence in India to articulate their political rights and ensure those rights. Politics and laws are the extension of economics by other means and the Muslims have to understand this maxim and its implications.

Ciao

Zafar Anjum:

A concise but all-encompassing coverage indeed!

If the populace can be enacted into unity & uniformity then a lot many enforcers ( in & out of uniform) be out on the street--jobless & perkless.

The divorce principal is in vogue today and masculinists ( those women seeking equality with men--feminists, to my uneducated mind, is the wrong label for it) are crying hoarse that sometimes peacful separation is far better than a traumatic coexistence. No one can ever dispute such insightful observation--I don`t. Some of them even go further and say that a union should never ever have happened to begin with & should not be encouraged to happen anymore.
Granted, but the question remains that what to do with the egg which is now an omlette.

In simple and even simplistic parlance the whole exercise is not as noble as pretended. Ceasing & desisting from certain policies & practices can achieve more for harmony than piling up act upon acts.

As Shaw quipped:`` Motion, my dear, is not necessarily action``.

Dear Mr. Malik,

Thanks for your comments. Please be sure that I am not writing on behalf of the phantoms.

My article is based on my interactions with flesh and blood people. Nowhere in my article I have said that I am against a uniform civil code (``... why deny this to those of us who choose to stay in India?). It is a complex issue. My humble suggestion is to start a step by step reform in the personal laws. I guess this will pave the way for the UCC. After all, some headway is better than no headway.

[``...and if you won`t respond, never mind, I shall understand``--Well, you are a genius.]

Best regards,

Zafar

In other countries Veeresh babu they do not get slaughtered in government/state led pogroms simply for being Muslims and nor are they told that either you become like us or you can go to the graveyard or to pakistan...

..therefore i`d imagine they feel very threatened for their identity and wish to preserve it and separate family law is one aspect of this...allahu alam.

Dear Zafar Anjum,

Do Indians living in other free and democratic and multi-society countries insist on and get separate laws for themselves?

To the best of my knowledge, all Indians of all religions accept the common civil code of their adopted countries.

Then why deny this to those of us who choose to stay in India? Please speak for yourself when you respond, not on behalf of phantoms.

yours sincerely, and if you won`t respond, never mind, I shall understand.

Veeresh Malik