This is the second part of the series I am writing on my interaction with some citizens in Gujarat in September this year. We had met during a late night 'chai session' near Lal Darwaja in Ahmedabad. The interaction was highly enriching.
The hyped controversy on the functioning of the Election Commission had reached another level of climax following a report in 'propaganda express'. Hence - we did talk about issues such as the SIR and that way several of them asked me if "deletion" of voters in West Bengal led to the defeat of Mamata Banerjee in the West Bengal polls.
The issues are certainly not so simple.
During deliberations, it came to light that Telangana. Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Maharashtra, Bihar and Assam were from Muslim perspective vis-a-vis the crucial Lok Sabha seats.
It is estimated that 87 Lok Sabha constituencies and 137 parliamentary seats with 20 per cent and 15 per cent Muslims respectively are spread across mainly these states. Just to cite examples - one can Murshidabad in West Bengal and Dhubri, Nagaon and Haliakandi regions in Assam. There were also discussions on 'how true' it could be that four to five crore Bangladeshis had infiltrated into Assam and West Bengal and also moved across India including Jharkhand and Bihar by the year 2000-2001.
There were also discussions on how L K Advani's Rath Yatra had caused an outpouring of both militant and religious sentiments among Hindus.
One retired official in his early sixties said -- "Rath Yatra changed the course of Indian politics and history. Of course the Supreme Court verdict came much later but polarisation had made inroads in 1990 itself. Respected Advani ji used to talk about Lok Shakti and Raj Shakti .. but the common Hindus were slowly getting convinced that the elitists in India always showed disrespect to nationalism and the Hindu cultural heritage".
I checked later that Advani himself had written once - “The awesome tidal wave of nationalism unleashed by the yatra unnerved the pseudo-secularists and Jai Shri Ram became more than a traditional greeting....”.
But a critical phase of our discussions revolved around the fact that 'the clause of logical discrepancy' of Form 7 was being used abundantly to target Muslim voters.
One argument from those who believed that the 'abuse' of authorities vis-a-vis SIR was a reality maintained that mere 'deletion' of five-six per cent of Muslim voters in parliamentary seats with 30 or more percentage of Muslim voters could easily ensure defeat of non-BJP candidates.
In 2026, they could be Congress leaders in Assam and the TMC nominees in West Bengal.
In other words, the refrain was that the electoral strength of the Muslim voters could be reduced if the SIR exercise is done meticulously.
But not everyone agreed to this allegation.
Those who believed in the efficacy of the poll panel would counter that the SIR is only a corrective process to get rid off duplicate or outdated entries and also add genuine voters.
India being a vast country, there are individuals who have Voter I Cards in two or more places. Moreover, the electoral rolls often showed names of those who died or have opted for voter cards in other places - far off from their own states.
But it is also true, the SIR has been mired in controversy since it was first started before 2025 assembly polls in Bihar.
However, there was a general appreciation of the fact that only 4.5 per cent of Muslim population is reflected in the number of MPs from across India. This is not up to the 'satisfaction' as nearly 15-18 percent of India’s population is Muslims.
Out of 543 sitting MPs, there are only 24 Muslim members in the present Lok Sabha for which polls were held in 2024.
In 2019 -- when BJP won 303 MPs; a total of 27 Muslim MPs were elected to the 17th Lok Sabha. This accounted for 4.42% to 5% of the Lok Sabha's total strength, which remained significantly lower than the Muslim community's population.
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| Advani's Rath Yatra |
Were the Muslims fighting a losing battle?
This is something I have tried to argue more often.
The ‘numbers’ did not favour Muslims. The overwhelming Hindu population means in the game of numbers that is votes, ultimately all political forces would have to fall back upon Hindu voters.
I was proved right yet again. In the run up to the 2019 polls, political parties like Congress, the CPI(M) and even Mamata Banerjee had tried to win over Hindus.
I often give the reference to my interaction with Mohammad Qayoom in Godhra who during the height of 2002 mayhem had said:
“It is in the interest of minorities that there is peace and harmony. All communal disturbances in the country have only harmed Muslims more than anyone else”.
Muslims should learn to live as younger brothers, as they put it.
Theoretically of course, the Indian constitution and the secular character of the nation, most importantly the majority Hindus, would always cherish the Muslims brethren to stand on equal footing.
Still it goes without saying that they should shun the confrontationist line which only provides ‘oxygen’ to the Hindu fundamentalist forces.
In 2010, I therefore had reasons to feel fairly satisfied when post-Ayodhya verdict by the Allahabad High Court there was no violence.
Even a large number of Muslims including the oldest plaintiff in the Babri case Hashim Ansari was going pro-active for direct parleys with Hindu leaders to end the country’s bitter communal feud.
The confrontation attitude Muslims have taken up at the instance of self-proclaimed secularists and their own religious (communal) leaders like Shahi Imam of Delhi Jama Masjid --- that they often perhaps fight only a losing battle.
ends
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