Lok Sabha Election 2019: Split opposition leaves Muslim voters in fix

Come elections and Muslims are back in the debate and on the drawing boards of political parties as well.

While the usual academic interest remains in knowing how the minority that dots the Indian landscape is going to behave during polls, the political parties fancy their chances on how to woo them in constituencies where they can make a difference between winning and losing.

Some political parties also try to polarise either the Muslims or the majority Hindu to help create a wedge and maximise their benefits. Sad as it seems, Muslims more often than not are used just as pawns on the board of political chess by most players of the electoral game.

In this a spiral game that gets repeated during every elections, Muslims are forced to bear the brunt of administration's apathy and thus remain at the bottom ebb of the Indian polity.

Generally, the Muslim vote becomes more significant in times when a particular state or constituency is not going through communal strife. Peaceful atmosphere helps both majority Hindus and Muslims to concentrate on real issues like corruption, employment, agriculture, infrastructure, education etc. instead of ghettoising themselves on narrow sectarian lines.

No big Muslim leader

The influence of Muslims began waning - socially, politically and economically since 1857 after the British government singled them out as the main threat to their colonial rule because of the popular uprising led by last Mughal King Bahadur Shah Zafar.

They, however, remained politically significant because of presence of political and intellectual stalwarts like Sir Syed, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Allama Iqbal, Muhammed Ali Jinnah, Ali brothers, Hasrat Mohani and many others. A big blow came after partition when the biggest name barring a few like Mauala Azad went to Pakistan. Various post independence riots followed by massacre like in Hashimpura, Nellie, Mumbai and Gujarat and the demolition of Babri Masjid in 1992 slowly and steadily led to the ghettoisation of Muslims cutting them from the socio-economic mainstream and education.

As a result, India today cannot boast of a single tall Muslim leader that can help channelize them towards a better life, tell them the power of their vote and use to help them rise above narrow sectarian lookout. This void has allowed every political party to make use of mediocre Muslim leaders that most often use religion as the power to influence votes and in process Muslims keep on getting a raw deal.

Muslims during NDA government

During the last 5 years, the Modi government has dabbled into various schemes and issues to strike a chord with the Muslims, like promoting Urdu language, improving the education standards of Madrasas, promoting Sufi mysticism and trying to bring a legislation on triple talaq. The cultural fountainhead of BJP, the RSS, has in its own manner tried to make inroads into the Muslim community through an organisation called the Muslim Rashtriya Manch under Sangh's Margdarshak Indresh Kumar that strives to promote assimilation.

However, most of the initiatives taken by the BJP/RSS combine failed to make much impact on the ground thanks to the poisonous utterances by some of their key leaders and the backlash of right-wing outfits like Hindu Yuva Vahini, Bajrang Dal and certain unknown vigilante outfits. Mob lynching, especially by cow vigilante groups that led to murders of several people like Akhlaq, Pehlu Khan and many others have also contributed to the alienation in a big way. The latest cases of Muslim bashing post Pulwama suicide bombing have also contributed to the distancing of Muslims from the BJP. The legislation on triple talaq that could have fetched BJP some genuine support from the community also failed to click as the legislation that failed to pass the test in Rajya Sabha criminalised the offence and also did not offer respite to divorced women in terms of maintenance allowance.

Lok Sabha 2019 elections

The ongoing elections are no different and the focus is back again on Muslims who constitute 14.23% of the total population in India. Unlike majority community, the impact of Muslims is on fewer seats depending on their share in population on a particular seat. 

As a consolidated vote bank, Muslims have the capacity to decide the government in very few states and Union Territories - Lakshadweep, which is overwhelmingly Muslim with 96.58% population, Jammu and Kashmir which is a Muslim majority state with 68.31% population and then in Assam (34.22%), West Bengal (27.01%), Kerala (26.56%), Uttar Pradesh (19.26%) and to some extent Bihar (16.87%).

In the rest of states and UTs, they have only a few pockets of influence and thus cannot make make much difference in the final outcome of the results unless the margin is very thin. 

In Uttar Pradesh, the most populous states, Muslims voters can play a decisive role in about a dozen odd seats and somewhat significant role on another 10 seats. Similarly, in West Bengal, Muslims have sway the results at least in 12 districts or about 18 Lok Sabha constituencies out of 42. Districts like Murshidabad, Madah, uttar Dinajpur and Dakshin Dinajpur, Birbhum, Koch Bihar south and north 24 Parganas have sizable Muslim population that can easily decide the result just on the basis of its strength. 

In Assam, Muslims can repeat the same feat in Lok Sabha constituencies falling in districts like Barpeta, Bongaigaon, Cachar, Darrang, Dhubri, Goalpara, Hailakandi, Kamrup, Karimganj, Kokrajhar, Morigaon, Nagaon and Nalbari. Kerala also has six such districts, including Wayanad from Congress president Rahul Gandhi is a candidate. Bihar also has at least seven such districts and Maharashtra and Karnataka have three and two of such districts respectively.

The political matrix

The matrix of ongoing elections has put a tough task of choice before the Muslims. In Uttar Pradesh for example, the SP-BSP-RLD Gathbandhan's failure to bring Congress into its fold has made the choice difficult for Muslims in several constituencies. A case in point is Saharanpur that has strong 41.95% Muslim presence. Both Congress and Gathbandhan have put up two strong Muslim candidates – Imran Masood and Fazlur Rehman against BJP's sitting MP, Raghav Lakhanpal. This has turned Saharanpur that could have easily gone into Gathbandhan's fold into tough contest that can swing either way.

Similarly, in Bihar's Begusarai – the fight between Gathbandhan (RJD's) Tanveer Hassan, BJP's Giriraj Singh and has again become a tough contest because of the entry of CPI's Kanhaiya Kumar. A better understanding between opposition parties ensuring a straight fight would have given Hassan a definite edge over Singh, claim Bihar observers.

The situation is no different in West Bengal, where TMC, Congress and Left parties are in a triangular contest on many seats. This same matrix is playing across scores of key seats in important states which can eventually decide the fate of elections and how intelligent Muslims voters prove themselves to be.