Tag: religious minorities

Financial Inclusion: Reservation in Credit Markets Can Enhance Minority Welfare

There is empirical evidence to suggest that the 2009 directive by the Union government to commercial banks to increase the credit availability to religious minorities successfully reduced the consumption gap between non-minorities and minorities, without any adverse welfare effects on the latter group. 

In 2009, as part of a Government of India programme to improve the welfare of religious minorities, commercial banks were directed to increase credit to these groups. This article finds that the policy led to an increase in access to bank credit among religious minorities in the targeted areas. This in turn reduced the consumption gap between non-minorities and minorities, without any adverse welfare effects on the latter group.

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A large body of research shows that access to credit positively affects household welfare (Kaboski and Townsend 2013, Augusburg et al. 2015, Breza and Kinnan 2021). Yet, access to credit in India is not equal across households and individuals. In particular, discrimination against underrepresented minority groups limits their access to credit markets.

Affirmative action policies have become a major policy instrument to correct historical inequities in minorities’ access to public institutions, with existing research studying the impact of affirmative action in the spheres of political representation, higher education, and public employment (Pande 2003, Khanna 2020, Akhtari et al. 2024).

Against this backdrop, we examine affirmative action in credit markets by looking at the welfare effects of a directed credit programme in India, which aims to expand access to bank credit for religious minorities (Khan and Ritadhi 2023).

Directed credit policy for religious minorities

We focus on the Prime Minister’s New 15 Point Programme for Welfare of Minority Communities: a holistic set of policy objectives aimed towards improving the welfare of religious minorities – namely Muslims, Christians, Sikhs and Buddhist communities (Ministry of Minority Affairs, 2009).1

This included improved access to education, healthcare, and sanitation, as well as protection from targeted violence and discrimination. We study the directive to improve minorities’ access to bank credit. The specific guidelines, framed by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), directed commercial banks to increase credit to religious minorities in “minority-concentration” areas – that is, districts where the share of religious minorities exceeded 25% of the population (RBI, 2007).2

Intriguingly, no explicit targets were provided by the RBI regarding either the volume or the share of bank credit allocated to religious minorities. Instead, the RBI issued a number of soft nudges to banks to facilitate the implementation of the policy.

These included mandating lead banks in each district to assign an officer to look into the credit requirement of religious minorities, sensitising individual bank officers to the needs of minority communities, and requiring banks to file biannual reports on the actual volume of credit disbursed to these groups.

The Central Bank also repeatedly urged banks to collaborate with local self-help groups (SHG) to reach eligible minority borrowers, and also conduct information sessions in local communities to increase awareness regarding the directed credit policy.

Empirical strategy and data

We leverage the 25% minority share threshold to compare households’ credit access across minority-concentration and non-minority-concentration districts. Illustratively, our empirical analysis compares household credit access for a district where the minority population share was 23%, with a district where the minority population share was 27%.

If households across these two districts were highly comparable to one another, minority households in the district where the share of religious minorities was 23% can serve as a valid counterfactual for minority households in the district where the share of religious minorities was 27%.

The implicit assumption is that districts within a narrow neighbourhood above and below the 25% threshold would be highly comparable – the critical exception would be that districts with minority population shares exceeding the 25% threshold were eligible for the expansion in bank credit towards religious minorities.

We empirically confirm the comparability of households in these districts along key characteristics, and compare bank credit access for minority households located in districts with minority population shares between 25% and 31%, vis-à-vis minority households residing in districts with minority population shares between 19% and 25%. As Muslims account for 80% of religious minorities in India, our primarily analysis is restricted to Muslim households.3

We study the impact of the directed credit policy for religious minorities using household survey data from the All India Debt and Investment Survey (AIDIS), a nationally representative household survey conducted by the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO).

The survey provides information on household assets and liabilities, including loans from bank and non-bank financial institutions. We use the 2019 AIDIS, which allows us to evaluate the impact of the directed credit policy over the long term, in equilibrium.

Key findings

We find a causal 11 percentage point increase in bank credit access for religious minorities in minority-concentration areas. When considering that the average minority-concentration district in our sample had 1.6 million Muslim households, the results imply that the policy increased access to bank credit for an additional 0.18 million Muslim households.4

In terms of bank loan amounts, minority households in minority-concentration districts report an additional Rs 17,000 in bank credit. This equates to about 10% of annual household expenditures, pointing to a substantially large impact of the directed credit policy on minorities’ access to bank credit.

Farm loans accounted for about 40% of the increase in bank credit, with the remainder being comprised of household expenditure loans. Consistent with the increase in farm loans, we find minority households in minority-concentration areas report higher ownership of irrigated farmlands and farm machinery.

Notes: (i) The left panel shows the impact of the policy on whether a minority household has any outstanding bank loan, and the right panel shows the impact on amount of bank loans received by minority household. (ii) Observations to the right of the vertical line corresponds to districts eligible for the policy (minority population shares of 25-31%); those to the left of vertical line are districts ineligible for the policy (minority population shares of 19-25%).

A major critique of affirmative action policies is that they exclude eligible non-minority beneficiaries, or lead to a quality-fit trade-off due to inadequate information regarding minority preferences.5 We address the first by comparing bank credit access for religious non-minority households across minority and non-minority-concentration areas.

Reassuringly, overall access to bank credit, and the amount of bank credit received by non-minority households remain comparable across these districts. This alleviates concerns that the expansion in bank lending to religious minorities in minority-concentration areas came at the expense of non-minorities residing in these districts.

To address the second concern, we document comparable rates of delinquency for minority households across minority-concentration and non-minority-concentration areas. If minority borrowers were inherently riskier, or lenders had limited information for this set of borrowers, we would have expected increased bank loan delinquencies as a result of this policy. However, we find this not to be the case.

We observe that the expansion in bank lending to religious minorities was undertaken through two key channels: first, consistent with the directives from the central bank, commercial banks took advantage of bank-linked SHGs. While direct lending by commercial banks to minorities also increased, loans issued through bank-linked SHGs accounted for approximately 60% of the increase in the number of minority bank loans made in minority-concentration areas.6

As SHGs are considered to have superior information and monitoring capabilities, an expansion in lending through bank-linked SHGs also possibly explain the limited default of minority borrowers on bank loans.

Second, we find evidence of banks lowering collateral requirements for loans made to minority borrowers. As collateral is often used to secure loans in the presence of information asymmetries or high costs of monitoring, a relaxation in collateral requirements points to increased efforts undertaken by banks to acquire information about minority borrowers.

However, we find no evidence of a relaxation in bank lending rates for minority borrowers in minority-concentration areas. This rules out that the increase in bank credit for religious minorities emanated through the cross-subsidisation of non-minority borrowers.

We conclude our empirical analysis by evaluating how the directed credit policy affected overall minority welfare. We use households’ per capita monthly consumption as an aggregate measure of household welfare. We find minority households in minority-concentration districts to report an additional Rs. 441 in household per capita spending – 16% more than the per capita monthly household expenditures for minorities in non-minority-concentration areas.

There is no corresponding impact for non-minority households, which assuages concerns that the directed credit policy might have negatively affected welfare outcomes for non-minorities. As the consumption gap between religious minorities and non-minorities was 25%, the 16% increase in per capita monthly consumption for religious minorities suggests that the directed credit policy reduced the consumption gap between minorities and non-minorities by approximately 60%.

Note: Observations to the right of the vertical line corresponds to districts eligible for the policy (minority population shares of 25-31%); those to the left of vertical line are districts ineligible for the policy (minority population shares of 19-25%).

Conclusion

Our research examines the impact of a policy that nudged banks to expand lending in minority-concentration districts, where religious minorities comprised in excess of 25% of the district population.

We document large positive impacts on access to bank credit for Muslim households, leading to increased ownership of farm machinery, as well as higher levels of household consumption. Indeed, the consumption gap between Muslim and non-minority households was 60% lower in minority-concentration districts.

Importantly, improved access to bank credit did not result in greater bank loan delinquencies, alleviating concerns that the policy forced banks to lend to sub-optimal borrowers. There is also limited evidence that the policy resulted in a crowd-out of non-minorities from accessing bank loans in these districts.

Using population estimates from the 2001 Census, a third of India’s religious minorities, residing in 121 districts, stood to gain from the policy. However, an additional 24% of religious minorities in 2001 resided in the 240 districts, which had a minority population share ranging from 15% to 25%.

In light of the strong positive effects of the policy and limited negative drawbacks, there is a strong case for extending the policy to these set of districts, which would expand the overall eligibility of the policy to 60% of the nation’s minority population.

Notes:

  1. These groups were classified as religious minorities as per the Population Census of 2001. Subsequently, the Jain community too was included in this list.
  2. District minority population shares were computed using the 2001 Population Census. Using the 25% minority population share threshold, a total of 103 districts were classified as “minority-concentration’’ districts. The government subsequently added a further 18 districts to this list. We exclude this set of districts, as well as the district located in Punjab, Meghalaya, Mizoram Nagaland, and Jammu and Kashmir. The policy did not apply to these states as religious minorities constituted a majority in the population. The Union Territory of Lakshadweep is also excluded for the same reason.
  3. Our empirical findings are robust to the inclusion of other religious minorities.
  4. All empirical results are based on a sample that compares districts with a minority population share between 25% and 31%, to districts with a minority population share between 19% and 25%.
  5. For instance, it is possible that banks had private information on the quality of minority borrowers and were unwilling to lend to them previously, as such borrowers had limited repayment capabilities. In such a situation, a directed credit programme designed by policymakers would be sub-optimal, and it might be worthwhile to offer asset transfer programmes to first raise income flows of minority borrowers.
  6. The bank-linked SHG programme involves commercial banks directly lending to SHGs holding accounts. SHGs subsequently disburse the loan within the group to eligible members.

S.K. Ritadhi is an Assistant Professor of Economics at the Ashoka University. Muhammad Yasir Khan is an Assistant Professor at the University of Pittsburgh. 

This article first appeared on Ideas for India. Read the original here. 

What Would an X-Ray of India’s Compassion Reveal?

The politics of precarity and heightened socio-economic inequality erodes our compassion. The politics of prejudice and the treatment of minorities corrodes it.

Two recent incidents provide a rubric for us to evaluate our priorities and imaginations of India. The first is the extraordinary heroic effort in which 12 rat-hole miners rescued 41 daily wage workers who were trapped in the Silkyara tunnel in Uttarakhand for over 16 days. The second incident concerns a statement in the Parliament. On 21 September, Ramesh Bidhuri, a Member of Parliament (MP) of the BJP made derogatory communal slurs against Danish Ali of the BSP on the floor of the parliament. The comments received applause from some BJP MPs in the parliament.

The two incidents are seemingly unrelated. The thread that connects the two is the continued acceptance of precarity, indignity and discrimination faced by many in our society.

The Silkyara tunnel is part of the Union government’s much publicised Char Dham project to build roads connecting the four Hindu pilgrimage sites of Kedarnath, Badrinath, Gangotri, and Yamunotri. While building roads are required, what needs interrogation is the rush to complete projects by ignoring environmental concerns and safeguards that puts socio-economically poor workers at the fulcrum of life and death. And, when a sitting MP gets away with derogatory speech on the floor of Parliament, it deifies resentment, legitimises prejudice and creates precedents for disharmony.

Together, these incidents demonstrate the need to pay attention to how the constitutional promises of dignity, equality and fraternity are playing out in practice.

India stands at the cusp of a historically tenuous time. Its economic structures have systematically fortified a class of people and rendered the poor to lead a fractured existence in the penumbra of our gated lives.

The bottom half of India’s population holds a mere 3% of the national wealth. When seen from this economic axis, it is the poor that constitute the numerical majority.

Splicing India along a religious axis creates a majoritarian idiom which is different from the absolute numerical majority comprising the poor.

This majority is just one economic or health shock away from slipping into utter destitution. Inadequate social safety nets and the daily grind have trapped the poor in a Sisyphean cycle of precarity. Inter-generational mobility towards economic prosperity has been sluggish pointing to a continuance of deprivation along caste lines. The economically poor are over-represented by socially marginalised communities such as Dalits and Adivasis.

In parallel to this economic disrepair, a continuous injection of resentment incites decentralised and splintered acts of discrimination and violence targeting Muslims. The tacit sanction from the government of such acts makes the force of law indistinguishable from the law of force (Hansen 2021).

The collateral damage of such politics of precarity and politics of prejudice is a steady erosion and corrosion of compassion. Erosion is a gradual, structurally mediated physical process while corrosion is akin to a biochemically induced process with lasting and even irreversible implications. The politics of precarity and heightened socio-economic inequality erodes our compassion; the politics of prejudice and the treatment of minorities corrodes it. These raise the question: what would an X-Ray of India’s compassion reveal?

Also read: ‘Because He’s Muslim?’ Asks Wife of Uttarkashi Tunnel Rescuer Whose House Was Demolished

The eroding state

Over the last decade, we observe a steady reconfiguration of the citizen-state relationship. This is an inversion from the time between 2004 and 2013 when a set of rights-based legislations such as NREGA, NFSA, and the Forest Rights Act, were imagined as attempts to improve participatory democracy and the bargaining power of the marginalised.

Today, the state steadily abdicates its responsibility of enabling citizens’ rights. It puts the onus on the citizen, as if it is the citizen’s fault and not the state’s responsibility to honour rights. For instance, not being able to get pensions owing to biometric or other technical failures is now framed as a citizen’s fault instead of seeing it as a fault with the design and principles of governance. The patronising language of terming individuals as ‘beneficiaries’ instead of ‘rights-holders’ brands and repackages the government as a philanthropic institution doling out charity and further strips the citizen of her rights.

Aided by digital technologies, the implementation of the rights-based legislations have become excessively centralised leading to a flattening of federalism and routine violations of rights (Buddha, Dhorajiwala and Narayanan, 2021), (Chaudhuri, B 2020), (Drèze, Jean, Reetika Khera, and Anmol Somanchi, 2021). Such a digitalwashing of rights raise serious apprehensions of whether we are entering a new age of digital feudalism.

These are all recipes for diluting government accountability and transfer duties – and blame – from the government to the individual. Such a model of policy and governance atomises the poor, who are left with little promise in making their rights count. They are pushed to the periphery to live a shadowed existence. Being in constant precarity means that the poor have little or no claim making in politics.

Counter-majoritarian constitutionalism

Moreover, among other things, essential services like transportation, healthcare and education are undergoing unprecedented levels of compartmentalising along class – and caste – lines. In such segregated sensual experiences of India, spaces for cross-class, cross-caste intermingling are shrinking. These in turn have further ossified the affluent and widened the blind spots towards deprivation. As Jean Drèze and Amartya Sen write in their remarkable book, India: An Uncertain Glory, India is like ‘pockets of California in sub-Saharan Africa.’ Beyond the aphoristic quality of this phrase is the quotidian acceptance of this fact.

Rising economic inequality and segregation will naturally result in a ‘social production of indifference’ towards the poor (Gupta, 2012). When there is no meaningful interaction across class, caste and religion, the deprived sections become part of a physically proximate but emotionally distant landscape. A natural fallout of such a gradual process of emotional dissonance is a structural erosion of compassion.

Counterpoint to the structurally spawned apathy towards the poor is the regular mantras of prejudice towards religious minorities. (To be sure, historically marginalised communities such as Dalits and Adivasis are also targets of prejudice but in this article we focus on the communal dimension.)

The eminent scholar of jurisprudence Ronald Dworkin underscored the need to practise constitutionalism as a counter-majoritarian force for a healthy society. Reflecting on the American constitution in this regard, he wrote in Taking Rights Seriously (133): ”The constitution, and particularly the Bill of Rights, is designed to protect individual citizens and groups against certain decisions that a majority of citizens might want to make, even when the majority acts in what it takes to be the general or common interest. Such protection is rooted in the moral rights which individuals possess against the majority.”

Socio-economic policies as per the Directive Principles of State Policy of the Indian constitution should foster a more level playing field across caste and class lines.

Yet, despite our progressive constitution with built-in counter-majoritarian principles – both in fundamental rights and in institutional responsibilities – there are serious concerns. In contrast to constitutional values, the majoritarian nationalism espoused by Hindutva ideologues rests on retaining the cruel caste hierarchy and treating Muslims as evil.

Also read: The Many Dimensions of Majoritarianism Beyond Religious Discrimination

Discriminatory legalism

Majoritarianism represents a specific form of control and tyranny whose assertion in an electoral democracy is possible only when the elected government in power sets the tone and template for the everyday enactment of such tyranny. The success of such a project rests on a continuous injection of resentment maligning specific minority communities.

In his book How Fascism Works, Jason Stanely writes, “At the core of fascism is loyalty to tribe, ethnic identity, religion, tradition, or in a word, nation. But, in stark contrast to a version of nationalism with equality as its goal, fascist nationalism is a repudiation of the liberal democratic ideal; it is nationalism in the service of domination, with the goal of preserving, maintaining, or gaining a position at the top of a hierarchy of power and status”(97).

For the Hindutva variant of fascism, even a catastrophe like the COVID-19 pandemic was not spared. Puzzled by the evident lack of anger towards the regime during the lockdowns, Mohammad Sajjad provocatively posits if communal hatred has superseded food and livelihood insecurity amongst us. Emboldened by prejudicial speech from the top, the author notes that some television anchors during lockdowns referred to stranded Muslim pilgrims as ‘chhupey huey (hiding)’ while Hindus stuck in places like in the Vaishno Devi temple were termed as ‘phansey huey (stranded)’ (Sajjad 2022).

More recently, a fact-finding report by the Centre for Study of Society and Secularism on the violence that erupted in Nuh, Haryana, in August 2023 presents a chilling account of the ecosystem of hatred that has been created by Hindutva forces. In response to the violence, using bulldozers, the Haryana administration under the political patronage of the BJP, demolished 750 properties in Nuh alone, all belonging to Muslims. A Muslim shopkeeper whose shops were demolished said, ‘Our shops were targeted because we are Muslims. There is nothing more to the demolitions.’

Such an abuse of power in the name of law and order is what the political philosopher Jan Werner Muller refers to as ‘discriminatory legalism’ which translates to ‘for my friends everything, for others, the law.’ Such a targeted bulldozing of Muslim homes sends a strong message that the citizenship of Muslims weighs less than the citizenship of their caste Hindu neighbours. It is hardly surprising then that a remorseless Hindu policeman, Chetan Singh, will shoot and kill 3 Muslim men from a point-blank range on a train just because they are Muslims.

While the active perpetrators of violence are perhaps operating on the principle of Schadenfreude (deriving pleasure from others’ misery), it is hard to fathom the mindset of those on the fence, the bystanders. Surely, not everyone enjoys seeing destructive acts causing misery. Writing about the bystanders in Israel in the 1990s despite widespread awareness of the nature of crimes committed by Israel on Palestinian people, the criminologist and human rights activist Stanley Cohen referred to it as the sociology and culture of denial. He wrote ‘Why, when faced by knowledge of others’ suffering and pain – particularly the suffering and pain resulting from what are called “human rights violations” – does “reaction” so often take the form of denial, avoidance, passivity, indifference, rationalisation or collusion?’

Such a culture of denial continues in India and is a pathway to putrid perversion. Despite the Sangh Parivar’s clear avowal of treating Muslims with derision, from the standpoint of humanity, when so many Hindus remain bystanders to communalism and discrimination, it points to how compassion in us has been corroded. When tragedy and humanitarian crises experienced by one community, as in the genocide in Palestine, get celebrated by Hindutva groups, it is not just Islamophobia. It symbolises perverted pleasure. Islamophobia seems too mild and an inaccurate term. Islamoperversion or treating Muslims with derision might be more appropriate to describe the extent of corrosion of compassion for political gains.

In the backdrop of such continued denigration of Muslims, the government led frenzy and the loud celebration of many on the consecration of the Ram temple in Ayodhya speaks neither about nonviolent devotion nor about the government’s adherence to constitutional values. But instead, it shows how the corrosion of compassion has led to the removal of the veil of decency and respect.

Our moral core

In summary, an X-Ray of India’s compassion looks damaged.

As we embark on the Lok Sabha elections in 2024, we need to think hard about our priorities and imaginations of India. If we continue with the politics of precarity and prejudice, we will be vaccinating our society against compassion. This will result in a generation where mistrust, anxiety and prejudice would be the currency of life.

The choice is ours. Do we want an India with humanity and empathy, or do we want an India where our moral core is hollowed out leaving behind a residue of soulless automatons? In this context, the celebrated saviours, the rat-hole miners, have some important advice for us. After rescuing the trapped workers, the rat-hole miners – most of whom are Muslims and Dalits – were asked what they want, their response captures what the country really needs: ‘a pucca house for an elderly mother, village roads, love and human dignity that crosses religious and caste lines, life insurance and fair wages for all workers, and an assurance that such a collapse is not allowed to happen again.’

The views expressed are personal and do not reflect the views of the institutions I am part of.

Acknowledgements: Many thanks to Sayandeb Chowdhury for feedback on earlier drafts of this article.

Rajendran Narayanan teaches in Azim Premji University, Bangalore and is affiliated with LibTech India.

This article was originally published on the India Forum.

Majority of States, UTs Seek Power to Identify, Notify Minorities: Centre’s Affidavit in SC

The Union government’s affidavit was in response to a batch of petitions favouring the district as a unit for determining religious and linguistic minorities.

New Delhi: States and Union Territories (UTs) should be given the power to determine the linguistic and religious minorities in a particular region, the majority of state and UT governments argued, according to LiveLaw.

The view of the state and UT governments came to the fore in an affidavit filed by the Union government before the Supreme Court. The government’s affidavit was in response to a batch of petitions seeking district-wise identification and notification of religious and linguistic minorities.

According to the Union government, its affidavit is based on wide consultations held with the states, UTs and other stakeholders on the matter. The apex court had directed the Union government in May 2022 to carry out such deliberations.

Both Punjab and West Bengal held that state governments should have the right to identify and notify religious and linguistic minorities. For its part, Punjab highlighted that it had enacted ‘The Punjab State Commission for Minorities Act, 2012’.

“…in India, different communities are in majority or minority in different provinces/states…. Keeping in view the above as well as the peculiar geographical and social scenario of the state of Punjab, only the state government is in the position to better appreciate the interests, well-being and problems of different sections/communities residing in the state. It is important that the state continues to do so in order to provide protection to minorities and safeguard their interests,” the Punjab government argued, according to LiveLaw.

Similarly, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Uttarakhand, Assam, Manipur, and Sikkim have underlined that states and not the nation should be treated as a unit for identifying and notifying minorities.

On the other hand, Tamil Nadu’s contention is that the conferring of minority status cannot be merely limited to the population of a certain community in a particular state in relation to the overall state population but should also consider “actual or probable deprivation of the religious, cultural and educational rights and their socioeconomic status”.

In addition to favouring states having the power to determine the minority status, Manipur said any religious group which has less than 50% population in a particular state should be conferred with minority status.

Since the issue of reservation for minorities is part of the Concurrent List of the constitution, Mizoram said both state and Union governments should have the power to make laws on the matter.

Maharashtra and Haryana said the Union government can notify minorities. Uttar Pradesh said it has no objection to whatever the Union government decides on the matter. Similarly, UTs of Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman and Diu, Chandigarh, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh said they would fall in line with whatever the Union government proposes. Of all the states and UTs, Himachal Pradesh alone categorically stated that the nation should be treated as a unit for determining linguistic and religious minorities.

Meanwhile, Delhi said it has no objection if the Union government decides to declare Buddhists and Jains as minorities. It also proposed the introduction of a category called ‘migrated minority’ for Hindus in Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh where Hindus are not in majority.

The Union government said only 24 states/UTs have responded to the issue, and six states/UTs have not responded despite “several reminders”. Arunachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Lakshwadeep, Rajasthan, Telangana and Jharkhand did not yet send their responses on the matter.

Of the other stakeholders, the ministry of home affairs said it has no specific comments to make and said “the issue of the authority of the parliament or the state legislature to exclusively legislate on matters pertaining to minority communities is to be examined in consultation with the ministry of law and justice”.

Meanwhile, the ministry of education said, “As per the judgment of the Hon’ble SC in TMA Pai Foundation, the identification of minorities at the district level is not legal because linguistic or religious minority is determinable only by reference to demography of the state because it differs from place to place.”

For its part, the National Commission for Minority Educational Institutions said “identification of minorities at the district level is not legal because a linguistic or religious minority is determinable only by reference to the demography of the state because it differs from place to place”.

The petitioners in the case argued that the identification of minorities at the district level allows socially, economically, and politically non-dominant and numerically inferior communities to get the benefits and protections guaranteed under Articles 29 (protection of interests of minorities) and Article 30 (right of minorities to establish and administer educational institutions). The petitioners also challenged Section 2(c) of the National Commission for Minorities Act, 1992, which vests powers with the Union government to notify minorities.

Earlier, the Union government, in response to a petition filed by one Ashwini Upadhyay, had said Hindus in states where they are in a minority can be notified as minorities for the purposes of Articles 29 and 30 by the state government concerned. However, the Union government changed its stance and filed the latest affidavit in court.

The latest affidavit by the Union government is based on consultations held with various states and UTs to avoid “unintended complications in the future”. The apex court had earlier pulled up the Union government for changing its stance on multiple occasions and asked it to give a proper thought before finalising the affidavit.

In Standing By Missionaries of Charity, Naveen Patnaik Reaffirms His Secular Outlook

While the Union government is going after Mother Teresa’s organisation by cancelling its FCRA registration, the Odisha government has offered it money from the CM’s Relief Fund.

Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik, in his tweet on December 30, said that he instructed district collectors in the state to be in regular touch with organisations run by Missionaries of Charity (MOC) founded by Nobel laureate Mother Teresa, and ensure that no resident of their homes suffers especially from food insecurity and health-related distress. Funds from the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund can be used to alleviate their distress, he added.

Patnaik’s exemplary stand in providing funds from the CM’s Relief Fund is in sharp contrast with the decision taken by the Union home ministry on Christmas not to renew MOC’s Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA) registration, even though it was extended up to December 31 by the same ministry. While Patnaik took a concrete stand in favour of MOS, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee only expressed shock that on Christmas, the home ministry froze all of MOS’s bank accounts, leaving “22,000 patients and employees” of the organisation “without food and medicines”. She maintained that while the law is paramount, humanitarian efforts must not be compromised. Later, MOS clarified that its bank accounts have not been frozen by the Government of India and that it had advised its units not to operate bank accounts till the FCRA issue was sorted out.

The Odisha chief minister’s decision to reach out to MOS brings out his quiet approach in offering humanitarian and monetary services.

It is worthwhile to mention that the Utkal Sammilani, which spearheaded the struggle to establish the separate province of Odisha, was founded in 1903 by Utkal Gaurab Madhusudan Das, a legendary and well-regarded figure who converted to Christianity and went on to become president of the All India Christian Conference. He was firmly secular and never allowed issues of religion to be raised in the Sammilani, for he believed that any attempt to bring religion into a secular platform would divert it from its main goal of establishing the separate province. This historical backdrop is essential to understand the secular ethos of Odisha.

Also read: Naveen Patnaik’s BJD Is Now the Longest Surviving Regional Party in Odisha

As per the 2011 census, there are 11.6 lakh Christians in the state’s four crore population. They thus constitute around 2.7% of the population and have got the status of the largest minority, followed by Muslims who constitute 2.17%.

In the riots that took place in Kandhmal district in 2008, Christians became the victims of targeted violence by Hindutva groups after the killing of Swami Lakshmananda Saraswati by Maoists. Many of them lost their lives and several churches were burnt and vandalised. A nun was raped and many women were victims of molestation. That tragic riot claimed the lives of many Hindus and tribals of the district as well. It was a blot in the history of the state, which is known for its religious pluralism and secular ethos.

At the time, there was a coalition government of the Biju Janata Dal and BJP in power, headed by Patnaik as chief minister. On that occasion, he made the famous declaration that every drop of his blood remained secular. In 2009, he snapped ties with the BJP and contested elections alone, sweeping assembly polls by securing 103 out of 147 seats. The BJP was pushed to the margins, securing only six seats.

Now in 2021, when the BJP-led Union government headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has not renewed MOC’s FCRA registration, Patnaik has stood by the organisation. This unmistakably brings out Patnaik’s compassionate approach in dealing with the Christian minority.

The BJP, in its 2019 election manifesto, declared that it remained “committed to the empowerment and ‘development with dignity’ of all minorities (Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains and Parsis etc )”. It also blows its trumpet by repeating Modi’s “Sabka sath, sabka vikas aur sabka viswas” slogan. It is paradoxical that with such declarations about the empowerment and development of minorities, the Union has targeted the MOS by not renewing its FCRA on the basis of “adverse inputs”.

The recent attacks on Christians and churches in Karnataka and other states, particularly ones ruled by the BJP, exposes its hollow claim for the cause of minorities. There was not a single word of condemnation from the Union government on such attacks. In view of such assaults in contravention of the Constitution and the Indian Penal Code, the non-renewal of MOC’s FCRA registration affirms the continuing march of majoritarianism as the guiding force of the Modi regime.

Also read: As 2022 Begins, Make No Mistake That an Epistemic Shift Is Underway

In contrast to this, the BJD government, in spite of winning 113 seats in the state assembly in 2019, is guided by an inclusive approach towards public policies. Of course, the BJD has supported the passage of some of the Modi government’s Bills in both the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. However, it has followed an inclusive approach at the state level and set an example for the nation. For instance Patnaik, apart from sanctioning a special package for transforming the Puri Jagannath Temple complex to a global heritage project, sanctioned, on February 28, 2020, Rs 23 crore for development of many other shrines across the state. Rs 1 crore each has been earmarked for the development of ten temples, five churches, six mosques, one gurudwara and one Punjabi mutt in the state.

Patnaik’s decision on the MOC affirm his commitment to religious pluralism and secularism, which are part of the basic structure of the Constitution. In doing so, he set a fine example of leadership at a time when the prime minister and other BJP leaders are silent on gruesome majoritarianism demonstrated by Hindutva leaders calling for arms, waging a war against Muslims and inciting genocide against them.

S.N. Sahu served as OSD and press secretary to former President of India, K.R. Narayanan.

What Keeps Society At Large From Making Employment Truly Inclusive?

A panel of researchers and industry experts discuss the non-inclusion of minority identities in global labour markets and the steps needed to implement inclusive employment programmes.

The inaugural edition of the xSDG UnConference was hosted by Belongg in collaboration with Dalberg, J-PAL South Asia, and Breakthrough India. It was held from August 18 – 31, 2021. Bringing together the global community of academics, development professionals, practitioners and people interested in themes of diversity and inclusion, each session at the UnConference offered diverse and nuanced insights on topics ranging from inclusive , education, urban planning and employment to various other aspects of an intersectional approach to sustainable development. Read the transcript from the previous session on building inclusivity in global cities here.

Livelihood and skill development programs run by the public and development sector actors aim to counter the growing problem of unemployment across the world. However, enrolment in and benefits from these programmes are not equally shared by all people. 

As an illustration, according to a United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) report, 78% of the total workforce in Nepal came from only five ethnic groups (while Nepal has 102 ethnic groups according to census data).

Gender, sexuality and disability are also bases for significantly varying outcomes. Until livelihoods and employment programmes directly tackle diversity issues, workforces will also struggle with a lack of diversity and millions of people within certain identities will continue to miss out on opportunities to improve their incomes and escape the poverty trap.

What is the existing data around identity-specific enrolment in livelihood and skill development programs? How can this be improved upon? What steps can the SDG ecosystem take to create truly inclusive livelihood and skill training programs globally? What sources of funding, including government sources, philanthropic capital and commercial financing, can help in scaling such models?

A five-member panel comprising Javaid Khan, an assistant professor at the University of Kashmir; Arman Ali, executive director at the National Centre for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People (NCPEDP); Papa Amadou Sarr, the delegate-general for entrepreneurship at the Office of the President of the Republic of Senegal; Maha Keramane, head of social business at BNP Paribas and Ann Hendrix-Jenkins, senior advisor at Tostan, took part in a session at the xSDG UnConference to tackle these questions.

The session was moderated by Afua Sarkodie, a partner with Dalberg Advisors.

The following is a transcript of the session. Questions and responses have been edited lightly for style and clarity.

Afua Sarkodie: Starting with a quick recap of the UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth is the SDG which aims to promote sustained and inclusive economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all. 

Achieving that goal requires a transformation of systems, from education to employment, to prepare, place and support people into decent productive employment. Thus, it requires policymakers, practitioners and employers to think about what the systemic barriers to employment are and how to address them?

Professor Khan, can you paint us a picture of how the exclusion of certain groups manifests when it comes to labour markets in employment?

Also read: Interview | Bhargavi Davar on a Value System for Inclusive Educational Spaces

Javaid Khan: Using exclusion and non-inclusion interchangeably, we see a great deal of ‘othering’ in the labour markets, as is also evident in socio-economic and political spaces across the globe. This is not a Global South phenomenon and is more pronounced in the Global North and Europe. 

The first non-inclusion is in terms of gender. In 2019, the global female labour force participation rate was 47% as opposed to 74% for men. This was more pronounced in North Africa and Arab states. Women have made inroads into the labour market due to their higher educational attainment than men, such as in the Caribbean and Latin America, however, when it comes to the mean differential, as far as their per-hour wages are concerned, women are earning 17% less than men. 

The second is in terms of age. In the labour market, 267 million young people between the ages of 15 and 24 are neither in educational or training institutions nor in the labour market. They are literally ‘missing’ men and women. 

When we are thinking about non-inclusion, we need to look beyond the hardcore evidence. Lived realities are never featured in the statistics. The global order is essentially asymmetrical in terms of power relations. Misogynist regimes across the globe are a function of majoritarian politics – they are there for “making the majority great”. These systemic non-inclusions feed into discriminations at all levels.

The fundamental problem with discrimination is that policymakers and academics alike think of it more as a perception than a lived reality. There’s no empirical strategy to quantify the amount of discrimination. Discrimination must not be thought of as a perception, because then there’s no empirical basis to contend for it.

In the Indian context, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes are the most disadvantaged sections. Then, we have religious minorities like Muslims. There is clear-cut evidence, both in terms of policy reports of the government and NGOs, that glass ceilings are existing in our system which do not allow people from marginalised groups to move into the labour market. 

Sarkodie: Ann, I would like to better understand what steps your organisation is taking to develop inclusive employment and entrepreneurship programs.

Ann Hendrix-Jenkins: From the perspective of community-led development, one of the most key aspects regards inclusion, including inclusive employment, is lived experience. Thus, representation matters as these experts can take their ideas and aspirations to the next level. The next best thing is proximate leaders – people who do not necessarily represent the lived experience of people but are allies.

For organisations that claim to work for inclusion, it’s important to look inside and see whether they are inclusive enough. If not, that disconnect inevitably speaks for the quality of their programs. 

Sarkodie: Arman, what are some of the lessons or successes from the work your organisation has been undertaking that you think others could learn from?

Arman Ali: I work for the National Centre for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People. When we started this organisation 25 years back, we believed that when you give economic independence to people with disabilities, you solve everything. However, when we started we discovered that people with disabilities were not being hired in private sector companies. In one of our surveys of the Super 100 companies in India in 1999, we found out that these companies hired less than 2% of people with disabilities in their workforce.

Also read: Interview | Nafisa Baboo on Making Our Educational Spaces Disability-Inclusive

In terms of education, less than 1% of the total population of people with disabilities were getting an education and within that 1%, only a few were getting meaningful employment. We figured out the bigger challenge was accessibility. If there are no accessible schools, you can not get decent employment. Thus, we shifted the focus of our organisation towards research-based advocacy. We act as a pressure group on the industry and the state. We started the ‘NCPEDP – Mindtree Hellen Keller Award’ to recognise employers actively employing people with disabilities. The award has gained such prestige that top-notch corporates are now taking part. 

Representative image. Photo: LCCR/Flickr CC BY NC 2.0

A major challenge we face is that most people with disabilities are in the unorganised, informal sectors as small entrepreneurs. There’s no incentive offered to them. As far as the public sector is concerned, we have a mandatory 4% reservation under the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act but implementation remains a challenge. Intersectionality, even in the context of disability becomes very important – women with disabilities are not even in these conversations. The pandemic has pushed us two decades behind where we have come from asking for a seat on the table to now asking people for basic amenities to support our everyday existence. 

Papa Amadou Sarr: In Senegal, we created the Rapid Entrepreneurship Delegation fund, formally launched in 2018, to support youth and women by giving them access to capital, financial training and all sorts of access to the market for them to be able to develop their businesses. This was an important milestone in structuring an organised pathway to foster employment and innovation in response to the issues faced by these two categories of the population.

In the past three years, I can say with confidence that we have been able to create an enabling environment for sustainable and inclusive business growth. Our mission is to actively work towards reducing gender inequalities in accessing funds and development. We also work in microcredit financing, supporting small and medium-sized enterprises. We have a special focus on the digital economy where we fund innovative start-ups in spaces like Artificial Intelligence.

Sarkodie: Finance is a key constraint that small women-led businesses face. We have discussed different dimensions of identity that serve as barriers to employment: gender, age, disability, religion and so forth. 

How do these different identity markers compound each other? To what extend are practitioners able to apply an intersectional lens? How do we design initiatives that are tailored and customised for these different lived realities?

Khan: Exclusion is a deliberate attempt of keeping certain people out. Exclusion might not necessarily be direct. The problem does not lie only in inclusion in the labour market but is deep-rooted. It is tied to indicators such as educational attainment, health and even the geographical and cultural context of people. 

The intersectional theory argues that there’s no single identity. Multiple overlapping identities are reinforcing each other. The current President of India comes from an excluded caste. I can bet that even today, if he as the President goes to a household that believes in casteism, he will be served in separate utensils. Does class mobility help with dismantling casteism? 

Let’s assume we have a determined government to push those reservations under positive affirmative action, as far as the labour market is concerned, do we have people with the required skill sets? We cannot be pushing for a particular solution if we don’t take into account the interconnectedness of problems. 

Hendrix-Jenkins: Gender-based analysis tools can be particularly useful. It starts with gender but can expand into other intersections. In terms of inclusion, we need to think of marginalised groups representing untapped potentials. We need to understand who they are and why they are marginalised; what are the underlying structural and systemic reasons. It also gives you a window into the spaces you are designing policies for.

Women working in the rice paddy fields. Credit: Trócaire/Justin Kernoghan/Flickr

Women working in the rice paddy fields. Photo: Trócaire/Justin Kernoghan/Flickr

Ali: Disability cuts across all spades of life; it’s a wide spectrum. However, intersections within this discourse are important to take note of. As mentioned previously, women, then say Dalit-women are the most vulnerable and face multiple layers of discrimination.

Also read: Can Global Cities Be Made Fair, Inclusive and Just?

Sarkodie: We all have heard the saying, “What matters get measured and what gets measured, matters.” When we’re thinking about the impact of inclusive employment programs and policies, what do we track and how do we see whether we’re achieving the outcomes that we’re aspiring to?

Maha Keramane: What we track first is job-readiness or employability. Is the person actually ready to go on a job? We try to measure employability and then the actual integration in the labour market. It has to be adapted with regards to the question of quality. Are there jobs that match your skillset and aspirations? Sometimes, it is also about fighting precariousness. How does one go from a precarious job to better employment? It can be about wages and even in terms of one’s self-confidence. Thus, it’s important to understand with precision who your beneficiaries are and what you are trying to achieve for them.

Sarkodie: How do we measure the impact taking into account both the numbers, as in how many women are entering the job market, but also in terms of experiences, such as quality of employment, dignity and so on?

Sarr: When we are making our budgets, we take into account how many young people and women will we reach out to. It helps us in setting our milestones so that we know how many we will be creating, how much money we fund, and what is the direct impact of it. However, there’s a spillover effect too. It’s not just the person we fund, but also the many people that one person trades with. It allows us to track both impact and progress.

Sarkodie: I think the global challenge of decent work for all is a defining one. Our identities are key determinants of access to productive and dignified employment opportunities across our communities. We cannot achieve SDG 8 if we fail at applying an inclusive, intersectional lens. If you could give just one piece of recommendation that you think will help the global community advance the inclusive employment agenda, what would it be?

Khan: Non-inclusion is both institutional and structural. We need to actually reach out to people and think together about what inclusion can do for us as a society. Then, we also need our institutions to function as they ought to.

Hendrix-Jenkins: Our programs must be led and populated by people with lived experiences of the community we intend to serve. For me, that’s the bottom line.

Keramane: We need to put the accent on the fact that non-inclusion in the labour market is not an isolated issue and must be located in its interconnections. Another thing we don’t focus enough on is what the richness of diversity brings to the table. Minorities must not be seen as a burden but as assets who bring richness and diversity along.

Ali: Any business that does not include people with disabilities or the marginalised will most likely cease to exist in the next 25 years. A reasonable accommodation is key for the way forward and without inclusion, one won’t survive in times to come.

Sarr: To begin with, targeting is the key. Think in terms of who are the people you wish to target and what your vision for them is.

Muda Tariq is an associate at Belongg Research Collective.

Pakistani Dissidents in the US Blame the Military for Country’s Multiple Crises

Prominent Pakistani dissidents, including former and current members of parliament, described Prime Minister Imran Khan as a “military puppet”.

Washington: Terming Prime Minister Imran Khan as a “military puppet,” prominent Pakistani dissidents, including former and current members of parliament, have blamed the powerful army for the country’s fragility, insecurity and inability to get along with its neighbours.

“Pakistan is under unannounced martial law,” Pashtun leader and former Senator Afrasiab Khattak told the fifth annual conference of South Asians Against Terrorism and for Human Rights (SAATH).

SAATH is a group of pro-democracy Pakistanis co-founded by former Pakistan ambassador the US Husain Haqqani and US-based columnist Dr Mohammad Taqi.

Previous annual conferences of SAATH have been held in London and Washington but this year participants met virtually, according to a statement.

The participants termed Prime Minister Khan as a military puppet.

Members of the group include politicians, journalists, bloggers, social media activists, and members of civil society, many of whom have been forced to live in exile in various countries.

Pakistan’s security services have tried to disrupt SAATH meetings in the past and banned its members living in Pakistan from travelling abroad, but this year, the virtual format enabled several prominent dissidents still in the country to participate, the statement said.

“This is the most dangerous martial law in Pakistan because it has vulgarised and distorted constitutional institutions,” Khattak said in his virtual address to the conference from Pakistan.

“The current military regime is delegitimising political institutions, going to the extent that intelligence agencies direct members of parliament when to attend sessions and when not to turn up to vote,” he said.

Haqqani noted that Prime Minister Khan had recently publicly blamed him and SAATH for weakening Pakistan’s international standing.

‘Pakistan’s international standing is being lost due to its policies of encouraging extremism and suppressing freedom, not due to the activism of those fighting for human rights,” he said.

Several speakers – including Rubina Greenwood of the World Sindhi Congress, Tahira Jabeen from Gilgit-Baltistan, Shahzad Irfan of the Seraiki Movement, and Rasool Mohammed of Pashtun Council of America – emphasised that various minorities in Pakistan were being oppressed and denied their rights.

Irfan said that military intervention in politics reinforced Punjab’s dominance and was a key factor in the oppression of national and religious minorities.

Greenwood said that the only way for Pakistan to win over the Sindhi and Baloch people would be to recognise that Pakistan is a multi-national state. She said that “Sindh is a historical entity that cannot be divided, or its identity denied”.

Jabeen called for ending “73 years of the political, constitutional, social, economic, geographical and cultural isolation of Gilgit Baltistan” and pitched for an autonomous setup.

Shia rights activist Jaffer Mirza lamented anti-Shia violence and blamed the authorities for legitimising anti-Shia politics through legislation, especially the Tahaffuz-e-Islam (Protection of Islam) Bill.

“The higher ranks of the Pakistan Army must realise that a truly elected government must be in place to bring Pakistan from the brink where the current regime has brought it,” said former ambassador, Kamran Shafi, who is also a retired military officer.

All that the COAS, General Bajwa, and ISI have to do is to step back from politicking and let politics be, Shafi said, adding that it was “the only way out of the morass our poor country finds itself in.

He said that even in the colonial era, the British Indian army was subject to civilian supremacy.

According to Taqi army rule had taken Pakistan from one disaster to another.

“The narrative of patriotism has been framed around the army and competing worldviews about Pakistan and those who do not fit the army’s parameters are ostracised as rebellious, treasonous, and even blasphemous,” he said.

Prominent speakers and participants in the conference included Pashtun women’s activist Gulalai Ismail, exiled journalist Taha Siddiqi and Tahir Gora, and human rights defender Marvi Sirmed.

(PTI)

Minority Educational Institutions Do Not Have Absolute Right of Appointments: SC

The apex court held that the state could introduce a regulatory regime and a mechanism to select teachers in the “national interest”.

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday said that government-aided minority educational institutions do not have absolute right in deciding the appointment of teachers and that the state can introduce a regulatory regime and a mechanism to select teachers in the “national interest” to ensure “excellence in educational institutions,” according to a report in The Hindu.

The judgment came in connection with a case that concerned the validity of the West Bengal Madrasah Service Commission Act 2008, which had constituted a commission to appoint teachers in madrasas.

Upholding the validity of the 2008 Act, the apex court held that the commission was made up of persons with knowledge of Islamic culture and theology and that the provisions of the Act were “specially designed” for madrasas. The court held that the Act was “not violative of the rights of the minority educational institutions on any count”.

The court held that minority institutions cannot ignore such a legal regime on the grounds that it is their fundamental right under Article 30 of the constitution to establish and administer their educational institutions.

Also read: Jamia and the Rationale Behind Special Rights for Minority Institutions

A bench comprising Justices Arun Mishra and U.U. Lalit, however, stressed that the regulatory law should strike a balance to achieve the dual objectives of ensuring the standard of excellence and preserving the right of the minorities to establish and administer their institutions.

Authoring the verdict, Justice Lalit wrote:

“When it comes to the right to appoint teachers, in terms of law laid down in the TMA Pai Foundation case, a regulation framed in the national interest must necessarily apply to all institutions regardless whether they are run by majority or minority as the essence of Article 30(1) is to ensure equal treatment between the majority and minority institutions.

An objection can certainly be raised if an unfavourable treatment is meted out to an educational institution established and administered by minority. But if ensuring of excellence in educational institutions is the underlying principle behind a regulatory regime and the mechanism of selection of teachers is so designed to achieve excellence in institutions, the matter may stand on a completely different footing.”

To achieve a balance between the twin objectives of ensuring excellence in education and preserving the right of minorities, the court said, it divides education into two categories – secular education and education “directly aimed at or dealing with preservation and protection of the heritage, culture, script and special characteristics of a religious or a linguistic minority.”

Also read: What Happens in Education in the Name of ‘Eminence’

On the latter, the court advocated that “maximum latitude” be given to the management to appoint teachers. The court also holds that only “teachers who believe in the religious ideology or in the special characteristics of the concerned minority would alone be able to imbibe in the students admitted in such educational institutions, what the minorities would like to preserve, profess and propagate.”

“However, when it comes to the second category, the governing criteria must be to see to it that the most conducive atmosphere is put in place where the institution achieves excellence and imparts best possible education. If the subjects in the curriculum are purely secular in character, that, is to say, subjects like Arithmetic, Algebra, Physics, Chemistry or Geography, the intent must be to impart education availing the best possible teachers,” the bench said.

Where the curriculum was “purely secular”, the intent must be to impart education by availing the best teachers.

Even Persecuted Muslims Coming to India From Islamic Nations Not Welcome: BJP’s Deodhar

The party’s national secretary contradicted the Centre’s stand that a refugee of any faith can apply for citizenship.

New Delhi: Even as protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) have spread across the country, the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government and its supporters have stuck to their position that the law, by granting citizenship to persecuted people, showcases the humane side of India.

When faced with the question of the conspicuous exclusion of Muslims from the religious communities that the law gives citizenship to, they have repeatedly said that while the Act only fast-tracks citizenship for the listed minorities, people of all faiths are still eligible to apply for Indian citizenship.

However, at least one BJP national secretary, Sunil Deodhar, doesn’t think so. The saffron party’s state-in-charge of Tripura and Andhra Pradesh, at a meeting in Anantapur on Sunday, said “that there will be no humanity shown towards Muslims coming illegally into India” even if they are “persecuted” in the three Islamic countries – Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan – that the CAA takes into account.

The Hindu reported Deodhar as saying that the BJP would not allow India to turn into a “dharmashala” (hospice) and that Muslims from Muslim-majority nations were not welcome, and that no citizenship would be offered to them.

Also read: The Bias Against Muslims in the CAA-NRC Fulfils a Promise the BJP Made in 1996

“It is the responsibility of those three nations to take care of their majority population as ‘partition’ of the country happened on the basis of religion. Only minorities in those countries subjected to persecution will be considered for citizenship, which was proposed by the first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, but never became a reality,” the party leader said.

However, while Deodhar seemed to refer to the Nehru-Liaquat Pact of 1950, he did not divulge its context and content. The pact was designed to avert another war between the two countries. Both countries agreed to allow partition refugees to dispose of their properties and pledged to treat minority communities with dignity by granting them their fundamental rights.

Deodhar further said that the Jan Sangh’s manifesto, and the BJP’s, had promised to bring the CAA, abrogate Article 370 and build a Ram Mandir in Ayodhya.

“Congress and the Communist parties always wanted citizenship given to persecuted minorities. But never made it happen, though the then Congress chief minister Tarun Gogoi of Assam had written to the then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh,” the BJP leader said.

Also read: ‘Pakistan, Tukde Tukde Gang’: BJP Leaders Refuse to Engage With Anti-CAA Protestors

While the Congress and other opposition parties have specifically objected to the exclusion of Muslims in the CAA, and not to the idea of providing citizenship for refugees, Deodhar still went on to slam Rahul Gandhi by equating his statements on the issue with that of Pakistani prime minister Imran Khan.

He also thanked Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Aditynath for trying to recover money from protestors who had allegedly destroyed public property. Given that the BJP has often branded the Congress as a “party of Muslims”, Deodhar, in that context, invoked the grand old party’s support to the Khilafat movement in the pre-independence era to say that such alliances with Muslims were in the “genes of Congress leaders”.

BJP MP’s Claim of Illegal Mosques False, Says Minorities Commission’s Fact-Finding Team

Most of the 54 allegedly illegal religious buildings associated with a particular minority community that Parvesh Verma had delineated were in fact, legal. Some were vacant, and none on encroached land.

The Delhi Minorities Commission has stated that there are “sufficient grounds to initiate legal proceedings” against West Delhi Bharatiya Janata Party MP Parvesh Verma, who it believes was responsible for triggering communal discord.

The panel made the statement on Thursday after a fact-finding committee formed by it found Verma’s claim regarding illegal mosques, graveyards, mazaars and madrasas springing up all over the constituency to be “false”.

The report, titled Religious Spaces in and around West Delhi: A Fact-Finding Report, was prepared by a five-member team led by social activist Owais Sultan. Based on the team’s findings, the Commission said Verma and others had made false claims and spread rumours to target a particular community and create communal disharmony in Delhi.

The Commission further said the fact-finding committee had recommended that a complaint be filed against Verma with the Lok Sabha’s Ethics Committee “as it is clearly found that he has violated his oath of office.”

Also read: BJP MP Questions Muslim Commitment to India, Development

The panel said none of the “masjids, mazaars, madrasas, or graveyards” that were named by Verma were found to be illegally built. Neither were they encroachments on government land, as claimed by him.

List of 54 ‘illegal’ properties

The BJP MP had on June 18 claimed that there was “mushrooming of mosques on government land” in Delhi, especially in his constituency.

Another BJP MP from Delhi and the party’s unit president, Manoj Tiwari, had also made a similar allegation about other areas of Delhi, the Commission said.

Since Verma had gone to the Lieutenant Governor on July 10 with a list of 54 properties and demanded an inquiry, the Commission decided to probe the matter at its own end as well.

‘Sense of fear in Muslims’

The Delhi Minorities Commission said these allegations had created a sense of fear in the Muslim community. With the list of allegedly unauthorised or illegally built mosques, madrasas and graveyards being made public by Verma and attracting print and electronic media’s attention, the Commission said there was a fear that these would create a sense of hatred towards Muslims in Delhi.

The Committee, which had submitted its report to Commission chairman Zafarul Islam Khan on July 30, was constituted to probe Verma’s allegations on June 24. The committee visited 58 mosques, three mazaars, three madrasas, three graveyards and one imambada.

Also read: How a Fixed Gaze at the Muslim ‘Other’ Helps Political Parties

It went to all the sites listed by Verma in five districts of Delhi, namely New Delhi, South West, West, North West and North.

In its report, the committee said two graveyards, two mosques and one madrasa were found to belong to the Delhi Waqf Board. One graveyard was allocated by the Delhi government’s Urban Development department in 2005 but was not in use since November 2017. Most of the graves were found to have been “vandalised and desecrated”.

Allotment awaited

Seven mosques were on land allotted either by the Delhi Development Authority, or the Delhi Urban Shelter Improvement Board, or a Gram Sabha. The boards of two of the mosques had applied for more land as the covered area exceeded the allotted land.

In another 23 mosques and the one imambada, the report said, “applications for allotment of land were submitted to the land owning authority by the committee of the respective masjids”. These had largely come up in resettlement colonies where a number of people were shifted from central Delhi. These applications were pending.

Six mosques and one madrasa had come up on “private land” which had been purchased from either the land owning authorities or a third party.

Also read: Why the Bharatiya Janata Party Is Not Truly Bharatiya

In the case of one mosque and one mazaar, the team found the cases to be sub-judice in the courts.

The report also “observed that two mazaars were illegally being converted into temples.”

It also noted that two madrasas had come up on rented land, eight of the mentioned places did not exist or were vacant plots, one mosque in Sultanpuri had been referred to twice in the list and a mosque built over 400 years ago – in 1617 and which comes under the Delhi Waqf Board,  was also named as one having come up on government land.

The report stated that most of the mosques, madrasas, mazaars and graveyards mentioned in the list by Verma “belong to the communities, families and individuals who were displaced or relocated in 1947 Partition, the 1976 Emergency and the 2004 Commonwealth Games”.

Proliferation of temples

The Commission said while Muslims were being targeted through such propaganda, “there is a proliferation of temples cropping up on pavements, inside the public parks, under a tree and even illegally occupying various roads.”

The Commission said religious structures exist even inside public spaces like police stations, municipal corporation offices, Archaeological Survey of India protected monuments and also in government offices like in Vikas Bhawan, where its own office is located.

The report said: “These places are supposed to remain neutral but are showcasing more and more majoritarian beliefs and culture whereby forcing others to internalise such practices. Though such practices have been called out by different authorities, they have met with tremendous resistance both from public and political class.”

The Commission said the team has recommended that “the Supreme Courts orders on removal or relocation or regularisation of unauthorised religious structures must be complied with at the earliest by the concerned authorities in Delhi.”

The Commission’s chairperson said he will submit the report to the Lieutenant Governor and other authorities.

Prohibitory Orders Imposed in Imphal Districts After Protests Against Citizenship Bill

Mobile internet services have also been suspended indefinitely.

Imphal: Authorities in Manipur have imposed prohibitory orders in Imphal East and Imphal West districts for an indefinite period, in view of the continued protests against the Citizenship Bill which is likely to be tabled in the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday.

The capital city of Imphal falls under both Imphal East and Imphal West districts.

The prohibitory orders under Section 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) in the two districts were imposed last night, officials said.

Mobile internet services have also been suspended indefinitely.

Security has been strengthened in the residences of MLAs and ministers, including that of Chief minister N Biren Singh, the officials said.

While roads were deserted in both the districts, police personnel were seen informing people through loudspeakers about the imposition of prohibitory orders and asking them to stay indoors.

Security forces have also set up barricades on major roads.

Markets, schools, colleges and offices were closed, the officials said.

The controversial Citizenship (Amendment) Bill is likely to be tabled in the Rajya Sabha later in the day.

The bill, being vehemently opposed in the Northeast, even by parties that are allies of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), was passed in Lok Sabha on January 8 and the Centre had said it will try to get the Rajya Sabha nod in this budget session.

The bill seeks to provide citizenship to religious minorities from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan after six years of residence in India, instead of 12 years, which is the norm currently, even if they do not possess any document.

The indigenous people of the region are apprehending that if the bill is enacted, it will endanger their lives and identity.

Meanwhile, the 36-hour shutdown called to protest the bill is continuing in Jiribam district, affecting normal life since 5 am on Monday.

The shutdown was called by the Peoples’ Alliance Manipur (PAM), a conglomerate of several organisations.