The Fool's Secularism

The word ‘routine’ is not a very adored term. It has often been substituted for anything that is ordinary or mundane. Routines are regular procedures and practices that are almost performed as second nature. If you look up the net there are even sites with help to get out of routines and make life more exciting. Take a look here or here for samples. If you’re bored with routines I hope they help. There’s even a ‘Brainy quotes’ page which is a collection of famous people ridiculing routines.

Reality is a bit different though. In reality routines form the backbone of our lives. Traffic rules are routine but imagine one fine day we said, dump those rules. You can imagine the chaos. Which shoe do you wear first? The left or the right? Check next time, you’ve probably been doing it all your life (wearing the left or right first) without the slightest thought to it. Most of us marvel at Army marches. We are amazed how their legs and arms move in such synchronised manner. To them, that’s routine. For us, it’s a wonder. They have been trained for it and they practice it every day. It is in that sense that Secularism is a routine. Being a backbone of our lives, secularism needs to be maintained and practiced. Soldiers don’t fight big battles with their marching skills. Do they? At best that routine organises them for the battle. In much similar fashion secularism by itself does not win any battles. But many of our fraudulent politicians have been selling this product (in a fake form). Take a look at some of the chief perpetrators of pseudo-secularism:

Remember, these are only some samples. The top row consists of the prime permanent criers of “Secularism is in danger” a la “Islam khatre me hai”. The bottom row consists of the Macaulay Family members who are the prime movers of this fakery in the media. A long time ago I wrote the post “Excessive secularism is as dangerous as religious fundamentalism”. In that I quoted the renowned Mark Tully: “Excessive secularism, which feeds the fire of people who like to present India as a country that does not respect its majority, is just as dangerous as religious fundamentalism”. This is the outcome of fake secularism practiced by all the parties that are now up in arms against Narendra Modi. One Congress member has gone as far as threatening to kill Modi and there has already been an attempt once in Patna.

Sharad Pawar who had met Modi recently in Ahmedabad was probably rebuffed and now he calls Modi “deranged”. This Pawar is the same guy who said “wipe ink, vote twice”. Mulayam Yadav says “We will not let BJP succeed in making Modi PM”. The churlish Nitish Kumar in an interview asked Arnab Goswami “how is Modi going to handle relations with Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka”? You know, as if the current govt is on a bed of roses with these countries and this is a prime concern for voters. But the Pak and BD reference is more to suck up to his Muslim voters and not out of any serious concern. Pawar in a rally added “country cannot be handed over to Modi”. What is that supposed to mean? Is the country some farmland to be scammed and given to Modi? The people and their votes will decide who will get what. But let’s look at the latest moron who wants to challenge Modi. Here’s a Johny-cum-lately called Rashid Alvi who wrote to his Bossini Sonia Gandhi:

If the pic is not legible you can read it here. Now, go through the letter very carefully. All that Alvi claims is that he wants to protect pluralism and secularism and STOP MODI. There is nothing on one single issue of Varanasi that he wants to represent. That’s the poison that these guys want people to drink: Fake Secularism. They call Modi all kinds of names which are then repeated like a box of parrots by Rajdeep, Sagarika, Arnab, Barkha and all the channels 24X7. The names they call don’t even have any relevance to anything Modi may have said or done which would have made some sense at least. The only objective of these so-called secularists is to somehow stop Modi by hook or crook. And the more they scream the more they endear Modi to the public. Is the media far behind. Here’s the Category5Moron who is permanently on a Muslim trip whenever there is an election involving Modi:

From the December 2012 elections of Gujarat to now, all that Sagarika has been doing is whipping up Muslim hatred for Modi. And these aren’t reflex responses by the Muslims she meets; she provokes them with questions spiteful of Modi. Secularism demands that people be seen as one nation under one roof. Politicians may act divisively but why should media morons act divisively? And when rapped for such illegitimate behaviour all that these fools can do is cry abuse. In the context of such fake secularism what Modi says resonates with people. He says whenever the Congress and its clones are asked any question they wear a “Burqa of secularism”. The Congress scams are unbelievable in terms of money and the sheer nonchalance with which the party protects its corrupt ones. A summary of its Himalayan corruption looks like this:

Perhaps the fear of Modi is that he will seriously set up SITs and fast-track courts to prosecute the corrupt filth. And this must be done if this country has to send a clear message of intolerance of corruption and the corrupt. Sonia Gandhi, who the media treats as if she is the new Mother Teresa, behaves like she has no taint on her from all these scams. Both Sonia and her “Balloon” son Rahul go around the country talking about corruption. With what face does the media let these two pass without a single question on their corruption and their giving tickets to corrupt members? Whenever the question comes up, like the Congress the media also points to only ONE member of BJP: BS Yedurappa. Whether Yedurappa is corrupt or not courts are yet to decide and in some cases he has been exonerated too. How the media finds equivalence has to be the biggest scam in India.

Secularism is a routine practice and not an issue on which any election should have ever been contested but the Sickulars and the corrupt media have brought it down to this level. I consider myself a secular person but except for the media discussions or election season it doesn’t cross my mind even once. People brush their teeth and have a bath every day. It makes them feel good, clean and freshened up. But that doesn’t guarantee them luck, job or food. Routine hygiene is a “maintenance” job for the body. Secularism is a maintenance job for a society. It need not get any premium. No one deserves to be rewarded for being secular; certainly not with a vote.

As an Amdavadi I know of the history of water problems in the city and state. Till 2005 or 2006 almost everyone in the city faced a water problem (especially those living outside the municipal limits). The bores would dry up and frequent drilling deeper would be done and so on. There were days when there was no water at all and people borrowed a couple of buckets from neighbouring societies which had some supply to get through the day. As it got worse, the only option was regular purchase from water-tankers. All that ended around 2005-06 when the Narmada waters flowed through the Sabarmati. There has never been a problem since then and most households have 24X7 water. Now nobody talks about water anymore. Nobody talks about good roads anymore; it has become part of routine life. No one ever knew when the autos had turned CNG. No one talks about it. No one talks of bus services. It has become routine. When basic facilities become routine then residents think of higher planes. Not having to struggle with these basic issues gives them the time to rise to other accomplishments. What the hell does all this have to do with secularism?   

It is in the absence of the very basic performance as a govt that many of the sickular political parties resort to the chest-beating of “secular, secular, secular”. Secularism is a prostituted word as Arun Shourie said and many people have been fooled with this nonsense for over four decades. In one of his books Bill Gates narrates an anecdote about MS Word software. I am quoting from memory and it is not the exact verbatim quote: “When we gave WORD, people said we want colours. We gave them colours. Then they said they wanted word-count. We gave them word-count. They said they wanted multiple languages; we gave them Chinese, Japanese and so on. They said they wanted spell-check. We gave them spell check. We can give people all the tools in Word they want but we simply can’t tell them how or what to write”.  

That’s right, one can be given all the tools in MSWord but the software can’t tell you what or how to write something. That is true for secularism too. Secularism is a tolerant way of living but it’s not a cure to disease, it’s not a cure to hunger. Secularism doesn’t eliminate backwardness or poverty. It cannot give anyone employment. The Congress and its clones have fooled the country long enough with their fake secularism as a solution to people’s problems. This is the fool’s secularism. Change is inevitable and no matter how much these parties and the media try to make the debate secularism vs communalism it is increasingly dawning upon people that this is a fake debate. Development and progress can be felt and seen. A country’s progress and power is driven by people’s aspirations not by the fool’s secularism. This election season people should listen to the real debates that will seek to meet their aspirations. I am not a big fan of the Shiv Sena but for once I have to agree with their hoarding.