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ShareLooking at the current state of affairs in Pakistan, it seems that the country is on its way to self-destruction. It may pull along, in this tattered and bruised condition for some years, but surely in its current state lies several lessons for all of us who are involved with being a "nation". Pakistan took the route that was soon after taken by Israel -- religious identity as its founding principle.
The Indian subcontinent -- whether or not the idea of India was a colonial construct -- was ripped apart and the scars have still not completely healed. Indian Muslims even today bear the brunt of what their co-religionists did. But religious identity is, of course, not a strong foundation to take the weight of a nation. It may give you temporary solace after a struggle but it cannot build institutions.
Pakistan's problems of course go deeper and wider than that now. Its obsession with India has not allowed it to tackle problems within its own society. Nor has the obsession allowed it to be realistic, or even real. All the demons it is fighting today have come out of its desire to trump, better or bleed India. Its insistence on acquiring Kashmir has led it to foster terrorists and the awful consequences of that have now been felt around the world.
But as we watch Pakistan imploding with horror, we might also take some relief that for us some bogeys seem to have died with the night.
The results of the last few elections in India have shown that narrow religious or caste sectarianism is losing its appeal. The electoral losses being suffered by the Bharatiya Janata Party mean many things but paramount among those is the fact that Hindutva by itself is no longer a winner. The people of India are unconvinced and most likely, they want more.
There will always be people who want to be known by their religious identity and people for whom protecting this identity leads them to feel threatened, insecure and hostile towards the perceived enemy. Adolf Hitler used old Christian antipathy towards Jews to bamboozle the average insecure German and took it to its deadliest conclusion. A Holocaust-like situation can never be repeated -- that is a promise the world made to itself. But morality and sentiment aside, no society will be able to survive on hatred because it is inimical to human progress.
The threat of religious fundamentalism has passed for now in India, it seems. True, these things are cyclical and it may emerge at any time, in any form. But the form invented by the Sangh Parivar and articulated by the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh, the Bharatiya Janata Party, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and the Bajrang Dal seems to have run its course. The fact that the BJP had six years in power and managed to do nothing more than rewrite history textbooks has often been credited to the fact that its coalition allies would not allow any more. The deeper answer lies in the fact that it could not form a government without allies --even at the height of its success, the BJP's message had limited appeal. (I leave the events of Gujarat 2002 out of this reckoning because they speak to a different strain in our psyche.)
There is no cause for Hindutva-followers to start spitting fire and invective -- they will only sound as sad as an aging Bal Thackeray blaming Maharashtrians for the Shiv Sena's electoral losses. Yes, all Maharashtrians do not subscribe to either Bal Thackeray or Raj Thackeray just as all Hindus do not subscribe to the BJP.
In India, at least, we do not have to be limited in our thinking by our religious belief, upbringing or traditions. So more and more as we watch Pakistan and say to ourselves "there but for the Grace of God...", we have to give thanks to our founding fathers who withstood the threat of religious identity and opted for another kind of nation. The Indian voter has not only fully understood this but also endorsed it. Life across the border is testament to the mistakes of others and how much we can learn from them.
