Hindutwa's Demographic
Worries
By Dr T T Sreekumar
09 October, 2004
Countercurrents.org
"To leave
error unrefuted is to encourage intellectual immorality
-Karl Marx
Organizer,
the RSS mouth piece, in an article in two parts written by CI Isaac,
a History Professor in Kerala (September 19 & 26, 2004) has claimed
that due to a conspiracy by minority communities, Hindus
in Kerala are fast becoming a minority. One does not know
where to begin the reply to an article replete with so many inaccuracies,
half truths, lies and bland statements. Nonetheless, in this reply I
attempt to do two things: 1. Examine his "data", "explanations"
and fallacious arguments and 2. Make bare the political mission of this
article in contemporary Kerala.
The article begins
by stating that Hindus are "getting to be a minority". Hindus
are "getting to be a minority"? Inaccurate figures on population
share of Hindus in Kerala are provided to represent their demographic
strength at the time "when India became a Republic" (which
was 26th January 1950)and present. Probably he is quoting the figure
from the 1951 census which gives the percentage figure for Hindu population
in Kerala as 61.58. Then he goes on to lament that it has come down
to 55% now. When? Today? I think by this the author meant
the figure from 2001 census, which gives the figure as 56.2 and not
55. At the all India level also, where the Kerala specific dynamisms
that he specifically labours to explain this decline subsequently are
virtually absent, a more or less similar pattern can be found for Hindu
population. But what he suitably conceals in this apocalyptical description
of the fall in the Hindu population is that comparative figures for
one of the villains of his story- Christians- also have shown the same
demographic tendency. In fact the comparable data is between 1961 and
2001 (and not 1951 as has been pointed out by experts on census data).
The percentage of Christians in Kerala has declined from 21.22 to 19.02
during the period. The only plausible explanation is that in communities
where literacy rates have been comparatively higher, we see a relative
decline in growth rate of population which accounts for the percentage
changes. It may be noted that the growth rate is lowest for Christians
followed by Hindus. In fact after "India became a Republic"
growth rate of Christian population in Kerala has been less than that
of other communities. And particularly after 1970, it is significantly
lower than Hindus and Muslims (60% of Hindu growth and less than 50
% of Muslim growth). This clearly points to the fallacy of using data
from demographic transition on major communities to establish their
relative socio-economic decline. Population decline is a major threat
only to the Adivasi population in Kerala. Poverty, depravation and loss
of rights over their own livelihood has affected the demographic transition
of Adivasis in Kerala negatively. Another interesting development is
the increase in the percentage of people declaring themselves as having
no religion. In Kerala it has increased from 0.4% in 1991 to 0.8% in
2001.
In fact the very
premise of CI Isaacs article that Hindus in terms of a numerical
decline face an exclusive socio-economic threat n Kerala is thus totally
unfounded. Apparently, CI Isaac has no inclination to explain the decline
in Hindu population on the basis of any sociological or anthropological
arguments. Instead, he seeks recourse to an unsubstantiated and unspecified
remark about "the handiwork of anti-national forces" Admittedly
he was not interested in using the space- i.e., pages of Organizer where
his article got published- "for a detailed analysis of this U-turn
in the demographic structure of Kerala". Airing unsubstantiated
accusations on an unspecified force appear to him a superior
method to discussing and analyzing facts. This decline in Hindu population
(which is only similar to such decline in Christian population as we
have seen), according to him, has led to a "defeat of the community
as a whole from the social, economic, cultural, political, etc. scenarios
of the land". What does he mean by defeat? How is this perceived
defeat related to the phenomenon of relative decline in population shares
which in Kerala, is in fact not unique to Hindus?
CI Isaac argues
that Hindus are only technically a majority in Kerala since they are
divided along caste lines and lacking the Hindu feeling.
The so called Hindu feeling is missing because Hinduism historically
has been a divider. Its ideology of caste is one of the craftiest tools
of oppression and domination that humanity has witnessed. Hindu unity
is not only impossible, but also ahistorical since lower castes under
its fold can only express themselves politically and establish their
social and ritual identity by challenging Hinduism and opposing its
ideology of caste. Thats what the Dalits in Kerala are doing now.
It is in the interest of the Ezhava community to join hands with Dalits
and fight Hindu ideology rather than go in for a politically and socially
degrading Hindu unification with upper castes.
CI Isaac is attempting
to exploit the historical situation of the failure of the communist
movement in Kerala (and elsewhere in India) to fully comprehend the
dynamics of caste/class politics. He is at pains to use the vexed relationship
between communist parties and Dalits in the state of Kerala to create
an impression that within Hindu fold they have a more peaceful and contented
existence. It is true that domination of Kerala Shoodras (who have historically
aligned with Nampoothiris, the upper caste Brahmins and considered as
upper caste by themselves as well as by the Caste hierarchy in Kerala,
being second only to Nampoothiris in most instances) in the communist
movement has caused a relative or near total absence of Dalits in their
leadership. Communist parties have not been able to come to terms with
this reality and live in a wishful world where everything is explained
away by the evasive category of class politics. But to accuse, as Isaac
does in his article, that the communist movement is responsible for
the low socio economic standard of Dalits in Kerala is not historically
or politically accurate. Their failures to address the question of Dalits
and Adivasis are legendary. No doubts about that. Their approach to
the Dalit question and the Adivasi question in Kerala has been at best
insensitive and at worst reactionary. But it is part of the larger Shoodra
politics in Kerala. Communist party has been high jacked by Shoodras
and from land reforms to Narendran commission, it could reflect only
Shoodra aspirations. But to hold communists responsible for the marginalization
of Dalit literature in Kerala etc, as has been attempted by Isaac, is
being acutely bereft of any understanding of the history of Kerala literature
and its evolution. Dalit themes were brought to the mainstream of Malayalam
literature by writers who had close relations with the communist movement.
If CI Isaac ever cared, as a history teacher, to look at the dramatic
shifts in literary narratives in Malayalam in 1930s and decided to be
honest with his own self, he would never have made this totally erroneous
statement. It was caste Hindus, the Thampurans (Lords) of the Sahithya
Parishads who always tried to belittle the contributions of Dalits.
Moreover, it was
in 1896 that the Ezhava Memorial was submitted to the Travancore Government
demanding job opportunities for Ezhavas, much before SNDP was formed!
And this was against what Ezhavas thought as a betrayal of the Shoodra
(Nairs) dominated Malayali Memorial in 1894 for job opportunities for
"Malayalis" which when practiced became job opportunities
only for Nairs! Secondly as commonly believed by some scholars there
wasnt much of a "conversion" from caste based politics
to class based politics. Historically, all lower castes belonged to
the have-nots in Kerala and Caste based movements were in that sense
already class based movements. The Kantian-Marxian concept of a class
for itself is a historically and theoretically untenable concept.
Communist party
emerged in Kerala in late 1930s. Immediately after that they had to
follow a collaborationist politics in support of the War which limited
their potential for organizing any major movement during that time.
At that time they were involved in "Grow more food campaign"
"increase production campaign" "defend motherland campaign"
anti-hoarding campaign etc., and many of their workers joined
the army and went to far away places such as Ireland to fight for the
British. At that time, the caste based movements of Dalits in Kerala
joined hands with the anti-imperialist struggle and this made a great
difference in the political scenario in Kerala.
Interestingly, in
the caste polarization of Hindus, CI Isaac sees a minority conspiracy.
What is his evidence? As a history teacher, he brings in the Abstention
movement as evidence to substantiate his conspiracy theory. This
I should say is the only ingenious part of his article. He actually
says events that have taken place in this state since the days
of the Nivarthana (abstention) agitation of 1932 to the fourteenth Lok
Sabha election of 2004 testify to his theory. But the events he
narrates other than the Abstention movement, have nothing to do with
anybodys conspiracy to polarize Hindus. But Abstention
movement was a polarizing force. Nonetheless, what he conveniently supresses
is the fact that the movement was the result of the intensification
of the polarization precipitated by caste Hindus themselves. By rejecting
proportional representation in Sree Moolam Praja Sabha (The Legislative
Assembly of Travancore), for minorities and non Shoodras, caste Hindus
reinforced a polarization that began immediately after the Malayali
memorial in 1894. Abstention movement was the culmination of a series
of caste struggles that challenged the upper caste domination in Travancore
society in the beginning decades of the 20th century. Or perhaps from
the time of the great Dalit leader Ayyankalis famous Villuvandi
Yaathra (travel in a bullock cart through public roads) in 1893
through forbidden roads defying the ban on Dalits access to public
roads. Mannathu Padmanabhan, the Nair leader who undertook a Padayaathra
in support of the Vaikkom Sathyagraha, (an agitation for lifting the
ban on access to Temple roads for Dalits in the shanty town of Vaikom
in 1920s) that attracted national attention through Gandhis involvement,
vehemently opposed proportional representation to non Shoodra Hindus,
Muslims and Christians in the Assembly. NSS supported the Vaikkom Sathyagraha
because the Skhethra Thyaga Samaram (Temple Avoidance Movement)
organized by Ezhavas in Travancore during c.1820 was a huge success.
This movement asked Ezhavas and other lower castes not to pay offerings
in Hindu temples. This had resulted in enormous loss of revenue to the
Temples. We want your money but we wont give you any political
power was the message of the upper caste Hindus to oppressed communities.
This attitude of denying political power to non-caste Hindus was what
precipitated the Abstention Movement. It was not a minority conspiracy.
It was a movement to assert the political identity of both minorities
as well as lower castes in Kerala.
CI Isaac uses information
from a Malayalam periodical editorial to drive home the point that minorities
are economically well off due to the fact that they form a significant
proportion of the NRKs in Kerala. This is indeed a known fact. Seeking
employment outside the state has traditionally a minority phenomenon
due to the historical fact that the major productive asset in the pre
independent Kerala, land, was virtually the monopoly of caste Hindus.
In the post independent period this tendency got reinforced when land
reforms failed to produce the desired economic impacts. Migration has
been thus the direct result of the social and economic situation of
the virtual monopoly of caste Hindus on the means of production in the
colonial agrarian economy in Kerala. The economic struggle and survival
strategies of minorities to escape from the rigidities of a social system
that economically oppressed them cannot be brought as a testimony to
their domination.
II
One of the clear
examples of distortion of historical facts and/or a conscious effort
to interpret them wrongly is seen in the desription of the impacts of
land reforms in Kerala. The article talks about annihilation of
Hindu land ownership through land reforms. Anyone who looks at
the tenurial relations in Kerala before land reforms will invariably
find that the vast majority of tenants were upper caste Nairs. If one
looks at T C Verghese's study which predates land reforms or reports
on agricultural conditions in the three regions of Kerala including
Tampy's report on impact on fragmentation of land holdings in Travancore
in the 1930s, it can easily be found that Shoodra castes/communities
dominated the land holding structure as immediate tenants to landlords.
The way land reforms were conceived that it was redistribution of land
to the tenants and freeing them from rental exploitation of landlords,
naturally benefited them.
The author keeps
making unsubstantiated assertions on the basis of unsubstantiated observations
which are further based on shaky statistics. After drawing an untenable
argument of an exclusive demographic and socio-economic
decline of Hindus he goes on to identify evidence for Christianization
and Islamization of Kerala society as perpetuating Hindu
defeat. The only evidences he give are an oblique reference to
inclusion of traditional minority art forms/folklore in School Youth
Festivals and an alleged exclusion of non Muslims in Arabic Youth Festivals.
I dont have factual information about the latter, but I can only
sympathize with the inferior aesthetic sensibility of a Malayali who
resents the inclusion of traditional art forms of minorities which are
culturally well integrated into the aesthetic domain of Kerala over
centuries and appreciated by art lovers across all castes and communities,
such as aravana muttu, oppana, maappila
pattu and maargam kali in School Youth Festival in
which many non minority children also participate. But if he considers
this as evidence of Christianization and Islamization, I dont
even have sympathies since it is part of a calculated attempt to subvert
the efforts to inculcate multiculturalism in the hearts of our children
as they grow up in a pluralistic political climate.
The most cynical
part of his article is where he talks about beef eating in Kerala. He
creates an imaginary Kerala where a conspiracy is going on to
force the younger generation of Hindus to become beef-eaters by
minorities. This is, he says, attempted in the name of friendship.
For him All these are indications of Hindu alienation and distancing
from its cultural domain. Prof. D. N. Jha, a historian from Delhi
University, in his well researched work, Holy Cow: Beef in Indian
Dietary Traditions talks about the larger scenario of beef eating
traditions in India. I dont feel the need to repeat all those
points here. But I am unable to comprehend the fact that CI Isaac, who
explains an (unsubstantiated) increased appetite for beef among Hindu
boys (sic) as being forced by their friends from minority communities,
is a history teacher by profession. I think before making such bland
statements about history of beef eating in Kerala, as a history teacher,
he should at least consult the Sree Moolam Praja Sabha Proceedings when
a private Bill to ban slaughter of Cows in Travancore was discussed
in 1930s.
He gives the statistics
of ownership of schools in Kerala to argue that minorities control
the education scene in Kerala. I dont have the data before me
to verify his facts which he quotes from a Kesari article,
a local RSS mouth piece. Even if this is true, the situation has not
been the result of any conspiracy by minorities, but a direct consequence
of their attempt to improve their living conditions. While the upper
castes in Kerala always resented attempts to provide education to lower
castes, minorities and their institutions have consistently supported
universal education particularly educational opportunities for Dalits
and girls. The fact is that the social and economic progress of the
minority communities and lower castes is somehow linked to the opening
up of new economic opportunities in the period 1850-1900 related to
the development of plantation agriculture and growth in spices trade.
One incident that T K Madhavan, a reformer and freedom fighter belonging
to the Ezhava community, mentions in his Memoir is indicative of the
mismatch between social status and economic progress that the community
had made: Alummootil Channar, an Ezhava who owned a car in the 1930s
was not allowed to travel in it through the roads near to any temple
where as his Nair driver can ride it anywhere. So when the car approached
a temple road, the owner had to get down and walk through some near
by bushes. Diffusion of education was seen by OBCs, Dalits and minorities
in Kerala as a major medium for attaining the social status that they
lacked. It is part of post colonial Kerala history that these communities
have struggled to consolidate and build on past achievements.
He argues that Hindu
share in the industry, agriculture and commerce is 28, 24 and 22 per
cent respectively where as the Muslim share is 30, 23 and
40 per cent and Christian share is 35, 40 and 36 per cent respectively
quoting a 2002 issue of Mathrubhoomi, a Malayalam daily. I havent
had an opportunity to verify this quote, but I can clearly say that
the way he has presented it makes it a kind of vague and bland statistics.
What does he mean by share here? Number of entrepreneurs? Share of total
revenue? Profits? Capital? Investment in stocks and shares? How was
it calculated? In a state where jobs were denied to minorities in the
Government sector for centuries, is it thoroughly unreasonable to find
their concentration in other sectors of economic activity? Ironically,
most of the facts that CI Isaac provides on closer examination
turn against his own assertions and inferences.
Although he uses
data and statistics giving an impression of adherence and dedication
to facts-a trendy factualism- his use of statistics is doing more disservice
to the discipline than most of the insulting clichés (like there
are lies, damned lies and statistics etc.) about it has ever done.
The most interesting example is on the statistics on Hindu population
projection: He says: Since Independence, for every decade, the
Hindu population in Kerala has been falling at the rate of more than
1 per cent. If this trend continues, within not less than three decades
Hindus will lose their majority status in the state. At present, technically
the Hindus are the majority community. If the rate of growth of
population of Hindus falls at 1 percent per decade, they will become
a minority in three decades! In a state where Christian
population is declining at a faster rate!! Is this how he teaches history
also? Forget statistics, historical demography is an expanding discipline
and I am wondering if he has ever heard of its fundamentals.
Organizer
and CI Isaac are trying to divert our attention from the fast crystallizing
pressure to implement Narendran Commission recommendations which directs
the Kerala Government to conduct a special recruitment drive among Dalits
and OBCs for filling reservation vacancies in the government sector.
The attempt to focus on Nair-Ezhava unity is a calculated move to divide
the emerging political coalition of Ezhavas, Muslims and Dalits in Kerala
on the issue of reservations in general and implementation of Narendran
Commission Report in particular. He thinks that the Ezhava dominated
SNDPs indifference to Narendran commission report based on their
belief that Ezhavas by and large have not been left out of the reservation
net can be used to forge an alliance of SNDP and NSS to weaken the pro-reservation
coalition. Positing the idea of an imminent Christianization and Islamization
of Kerala provides the much needed ideological basis for this political
operation. Further, it also tries to seek ideological capital for the
so called third front led by BJP in which a splinter group
from the Kerala Congress led by P C Thomas MP has already become a prominent
ally.
CI Isaac is not
just more of Joseph Pulikkunnel (a relatively better known
minority-baiter and Christian author in Kerala) that we know of. He
is an ideologue of a emerging Hindutva politics which wants to weaken
the cause of unification of other backward castes and communities (OBCs)
and Dalits in Kerala to serve the interests of caste Hindus and rich
Christians. But this attempt is going to be defeated since the OBCs
and Dalits are able to see through its treacherous politics and designs.