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Maladies
of Interpreting Minorities
The
latest Punjab and Haryana High Court judgment is an instance of not
only apathetic judicial reality of India but also of the utter
apathy of the Sikh organizations, particularly the ruling Akali Dal
and the SGPC, towards a major attack on the Sikh interests. That
this was an attack about which the Akali Dal and the SGPC were
warned well in advance makes the state of affairs all the more
deplorable.
As
the cover story inthis edition of the WSN states, this newspaper had
in May this year made it clear that the Indian government was well
on its way towards snatching the minority status of the Sikhs. What
is more interesting is the hidden agenda behind the move. The Indian
Government actually wants to be seen as a minority-loving regime. So
what does it do? The strategy is as simple as any Mullah Nasiruddin
tale.
The
government will bring in a legislation making the "state" a unit for
determining minority. Sikhs will cry off in Punjab, Muslims will be
angry in Kashmir. Christians will be enraged in Manipur, Nagaland.
And since the Parliament in any case will have the power to
determine anyone a minority in any state, these communities will go
beseeching the Center and the obliging regime will accommodate the
minorities.
But
even before the government made its final move, others had read the
signs. As pointed out by the WSN in this edition, the Reserve Bank
of India has already implemented the strategy. Poor Sikhs in Punjab
are no more eligible for loans from nationalised banks because RBI
no more considers Sikhs a minority in this state. Ditto for Muslims
in Kashmir. That the Punjab and Haryana High Court has favoured a
similar but narrow reading of the issue has now raised the hackles
of the Punjab Government.
Add
to this the sheer inefficency of the law officers of Parkash Singh
Badal. Since the SGPC run institutions carry out an all-India test
for admissions, how can someone even argue that a minority can be
determined on the basis of one state’s demography? Will one stop
being a minority by merely shifting a couple of hundred yards from
Zirakpur in Punjab to Panchkula in Haryana? The High Court has
failed to apply its mind on the issue and the law officers of Punjab
have failed to underline the fact in the court.
That the media advisor to the Punjab Government, the voluble
Harcharan Bains, tried to underline the “national implications” of
the judgement also shows the mind of the Akali Dal led Government.
It is now depending upon the Centre to bail it out of a situation
because it will create similar problems for the rulers at the
Center. So the approach is not Sikh specific but rather a hope that
Sikhs will be saved because others will be in trouble too.
Did
no one inform the Punjab Government that each and every branch of
each and every bank has received the circular of the RBI and that it
was being implemented? Was it no one’s duty to point out that it was
not for the High Court, or for that matter any court, to determine
who is a minority when the National Commission for Minorities had
already notified five minorities in the country, something clearly
enunciated in the logo of the NCM for the legally challenged?
19 December, 2007
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