Manufacturing
Hysteria: On
Census-Inspired 'Nationalism'
By D.Jayaraj
and S.Subramanian
11 September, 2004
Madras Institute for Development Studies
It
only remains to hope that the damage can be undone. In a matter of such
extreme (and misplaced) sensitivity as is routinely evoked by statistics
on the growth of population by religious groups, it is amazing that
the Census of India should have gone out of its way to present a wrong
picture by including the Jammu and Kashmir population figures for 2001
when that state was excluded from the Census count of 1991. When the
necessary correction is made, the spectre of a Hindu majority being
swamped by a Muslim minority looms (or should loom) less menacingly
on the horizon of `nationalists' of a certain persuasion.
Between 1991 and
2001, the share of Hindus in the national population has declined from
82 per cent to 80.96 per cent (and not 80.5 per cent as reported by
the Census); the proportion of Muslims has risen from 12.12 per cent
to 12.90 per cent (and not 13.4 per cent as reported by the Census);
and the proportion of Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains and those
of `other religions and persuasions' has risen from 5.88 per cent to
6.14 per cent (and these groups must therefore, presumably, share a
part of the blame for edging the Hindus out of the picture by all of
1.04 percentage points). Further, in comparing rates of growth of the
population over the decadal periods 1981-91 and 1991-2001, the state
of Assam (where no census was conducted in 1981) should also be removed
from the picture across the board. With this correction, it emerges
that the rate of growth of the Hindu population has declined from 22.77
per cent over 1981-91 to 20.02 per cent over 1991-2001 (in contrast
to the decline from 25.1 per cent to 20.4 per cent as reported in the
Census); and the corresponding rates of growth of the Muslim population
have been 32.86 per cent and 29.33 per cent respectively (compatible
with a decline rather than an increase as reported by the Census).
This ought to comfort
the `nationalists', but will not, for one is here dealing with a mentality
that is never so unhappy as when it cannot manufacture `anti-national'
threats with which to hysterically whip itself into action.
There is a much
larger picture that deserves our attention here. There is little in
the Census (or other official data sources) to provoke a reaction that
is either sanguine or sanguinary. Yet, the recently vanquished authors
of the cheerful `India Shining' campaign continue to be optimistic about
all the depressing information which the Census and allied sources of
socio-economic data contain within their covers, while apparently being
prepared to be blood-thirsty over wrongly recorded statistics on a matter
which, to begin with, is of inconsequential significance in any reasoned
appraisal of the state of the nation. The media - or a substantial enough
section of it - must take a large part of the responsibility for this
state of affairs. For the alacrity with which the misleading statistics
in the recent Census publication has been seized upon, and broadcast,
and hammered home, serves as a remarkable contrast to the equanimity
with which incalculably more pressing issues thrown up by the Census
and other data sources have been ignored.
In this connection,
it is not incompatible with a proper concern for one's country to occasionally
delve into the Census and other official sources of data, whose contents
should be a cause for serious worry about the sex ratio and the reasons
for its secular decline (to what extent [if any] could it be due to
reduced pregnancy waste and to what extent to sex-selective abortion?)
Nationalists should not feel apologetic about submitting official statistics
on poverty to serious scrutiny, or about analyzing data which suggest
that this country has in recent times been transformed into a `Republic
of Hunger', to employ Utsa Patnaik's appellation. Nor is there any dearth
of information on the levels and distribution of illfare occasioned
by the pathetic state of infrastructure development in the matter of
potable water, sanitation, energy for fuel, electricity, roads, schools,
public health centers. Is the unemployment situation such as to warrant
complaisance - any more, that is, than what is afforded by neglect of
the agricultural sector, rural indebtedness, farmer suicides, the incidence
of child labour, the prevalence of wasting and stunting among children,
and a host of related phenomena which the Census and other sources should
reveal to the interested reader?
Is it not more
urgent for nationalists, even if not for `nationalists', to display
some concern for the changing age structure of the Indian population,
to take some heart from improved longevity, to worry about social security
provisioning for a graying population? Is there a case for looking at
Census data with a view to studying the patterns of urbanization and
migration which obtain and the implications these have for livelihoods
and security? The point, one hopes, needs no further labouring.
To return to the
source of the present hysteria: what if the Census data were correct?
Would that constitute any remote justification for the vulgar fuss it
has unleashed when there is so much to worry about that does not even
get a look in? Is it necessary to state all over again that fertility
is an increasing function of deprivation, and that lowering its level
calls for curing the condition of generalized poverty rather than punishing
the victim? Does it need reiteration that group-related data - whether
the partitioning of the population is on the basis of age or gender
or sector of residence or caste or religion - serve as a basis for identifying
which groups are lagging behind, and by how much, so that targeted corrective
assistance may be provided to the affected groups? How often must it
be put out that socio-economically relevant classificatory schema are
a means to integration, not divisiveness?
The unhappy fact
is that illicit dramatizations of misrepresented statistics today are
compatible with demands for ethnic cleansing tomorrow. Intellectually,
morally, and politically, this sort of manufactured hysteria and diversionary
violence must be strongly and uncompromisingly resisted. While expressing
solidarity with them, we also call upon the overwhelming majority of
persons and institutions who think thus, to rebut the nonsense that
is being sought to be thrust upon the country in the name of love for
it.
-------------------
A relevant reference
- Abusing Demography, D.Jayaraj and S.Subramanian, Review article, Economic
and Political Weekly, March 20-26, 2004, vol XXXIX No 12, pp 1227-1236.