National Security
Sub: Contemplated 12% reservation for Muslims in Telangana– My submission.
Dt: 16/12/16
From:
Dr T.H.Chowdary
Director : Center for Telecom Management & Studies
Chairman : Pragna Bharati, Andhra Pradesh
Convenor: Bharatiya Dharma rakshana Samakhya
Fellow: Tata Consultancy Services
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To
The Chairman
BC Commission
Government of Telangana
Hyderabad
(Kind Attn: Sri B S Ramulu garu)
Sir,
Sub: Contemplated 12% reservation for Muslims in Telangana– My submission.
I am submitting herewith papers explaining in detail why Muslims, either as a minority or as a religious community, should not be given any reservations for admission to educational institutions or for recruitment to jobs in the government ( and its corporations) of Telangana. The papers annexed give detailed reasons in support of my objections to any reservation for Muslims on the basis of their religion and the false claim of their backwardness for people whose religion is Islam. The main reasons are:
· The Muslim community was the ruler community for 600 years in Telangana until 17 Sept 1947 and also in several parts of the entire country. The ruled, subjected, exploited and discriminated Hindu community could not impose backwardness upon the ruler community.
· Did Muslims become backward only after Sept. 1947 and in what respects.
· Islam is claimed to be a religion and a culture and history superior to every other religion and in particular, what has come to be known a s Hinduism that is , Sanatan Dharma. Will the Muslim community admit that they are backward religiously, culturally, civilisationally, intellectually and socially also?
Maulana Mohammed Ali whom Mahatma Gandhi fraternised and the two together led the Khilafat movement ( 1919-22) for the glory of the Sultan of Turkey and Islam’s Chalipha after the Khilafat movement had been given up due to the Turks deposing the Sultan cum Caliph and expelling him from Turkey , said this of Mahatma Gandhi:
“However pure Mr. Gandhi’s character may be, he must appear to be from the point of view of religion inferior to any Musalaman, even though he be without character”.
The Statement created a great stir. Many did not believe that Mr. Mohamed Ali, who testified to so much veneration for Mr. Gandhi was capable of entertaining such ungenerous and contemptuous sentiments about him. When Mr. Mohamed Ali was speaking in a meeting held at Amina Baug Park in Lucknow, he was asked whether the sentiments attributed to him were true. Mr. Mohamed Ali without any hesitation or compunction replied.
Yes! According to my religion and creed, I do hold an adulterous and a fallen gentleman to be better than Mr. Gandhi”
· The reasons for Muslims economic backwardness, that is poverty and low presence in government jobs are self imposed. These are:
|
|
Muslims |
Hindus |
|
Polygamy |
2.5 |
1.7 |
|
Large family size |
5.2 |
4.8 |
|
High fertility |
3.1 |
2.4 |
and preference for madrasa and not any modern education; love for Urdu medium schools; when even English medium educated are not getting jobs; low female participation in work outside home and community ‘s neighbourhood.
· In Telangana, until liberation from the Nizam -Razakar rule on 17 Sept 1947, the 12% Muslim population had 90% of the jobs in government. Urdu as a medium of instruction and administration and court language to the exclusion of Telugu, Marathi and Kannada in these respects . Was it because of “forwardness” or despite backwardness ?
· In Telangana, the WAKF meant for the welfare and development of Muslims has over 77,000 acres of land . That asset may be used in a demonstrable and effective manner to advance Muslims in respect of modern education, and economic well-being.
· If the community itself does not help itself adequately or bring about reforms that are necessary to make Muslims achieve prosperity and employability like others, why should B.C Hindus be asked to diminish the benefits ( 4% already in Telangana) that are due to them because of historic backwardness imposed on sections ( SCs STs and some BCs) among them.
· The Supreme Court has set a limit on the percentage of reservations. Why should Constitution be amended to favour Muslims ? And deprive Hindus.
· The makers of the Constitution of the Republic of India considered reservations and separate electorate for Muslims thoroughly and in great detail and concluded that this poisonous provision introduced by the colonial British led to the evil consequence of two-nation theory, partition of the country and ethnic cleansing of Hindus from their millennia long home lands in what are now Pakistan and Bangladesh . They therefore did away with foreign imperial rule -provided separate electorate, weighted representation in legislatures and reservations for Muslims ( for admission to educational institutions and government jobs eg. 16% in Madras Province) .
· A secular India cannot have any state policy on the basis of religion of a person or a group of persons.
3. It is strange that the demand for reservations for Muslims is being advocated more stridently, insistently and for a long period by some regional parties and some all India parties which claim to be secular . Their stridency and insistence appear to be more intense than that of Muslims themselves. This indicates that for imagined electoral gains the country’s and nation’s long term interests are being jeopardised.
4. The poisonous provisions like separate electorate and reservations for Muslims which led to the vivisection of the country and seemingly permanent separatism of Muslims under the label of minority after Independence should not be implemented in Telangana, especially in Bangaru Telangana a great vision held so dear by so many who have sacrificed so much to get the separate Telangana state the need of which is integrating national development for all people as the Supreme Court observed in the context of Sachar Report.
5. The suggestion of the Sudhir Committee for an Equal Opportunities Committee is non-useful. Such a Commission which was constituted in the UK in was subsequently wound up and merged with that country’s Human Rights Commission. We have enough Commissions at national & state levels: Human Rights, Minorities , Women, SCs/ STs.... They can address ( and are addressing) the issue of equal opportunities as well.
6. There should neither 4% or 12% or any other percent reservations for Muslims treating them as a separate people because their religion is Islam is subversive of secularism, disintegrative of ht e nation and revival of the two-nation theory and Pakistaniat mentality.
7. Sent herewith are :
i. A - The Affidavit
ii. B - Detailed submissions
iii. C - Historic background
iv. D - Special issue of the journal, “Secularism Combat” of April 2007 which gives
a detailed analysis of the Sachar Committee Report
v. E - A copy of the IPF Monograph-1 with the title, “Deceptive Equality -
Deconstructing the Equal Opportunity Commission” written by Prof. Rakesh
Sinha in the year 2009 for India Policy Foundation, New Delhi .
vi. F- Telugu Pamphlet
With Regards,
Yours Sincerely,
(Dr T.H.Chowdary)
B-Detailed Submission
Dt: 16/12/16
To
The Chairman
BC Commission
Government of Telangana
Hyderabad
(Kind Attn: Sri B S Ramulu garu)
Sir,
Sub: Contemplated 12% reservation for Muslims in Telangna– My submission.
It is astounding that a community, namely the Muslims who ruled several parts of India for several centuries and Telangana from the middle of the 14th to the middle of the 20th century, for 600 years are claiming to be backward and a democratically elected government in the state with over 85% Hindus who were the ruled by a 12% Muslims minority is contemplating to concede such a claim and grant them reservations for admission to educational institutions, recruitment for government jobs and so on.
2. It is equally astounding that an oppressed community the Hindus could make a 600 year long ruler community backward within 50 to 70 years in Telangana unless the non-backwardness before 1947 of the Muslim community was due to exploitation of the community that was ruled, namely Hindus and appropriation of their wealth and tax revenues from them for the well -being and “forwardness” of that community. It may be recalled that the 10% to 12% Muslim community in Telangana had 90% of the jobs for centuries and had imposed their language Urdu on the Telugus. With their record of such rule by the community which was ended only by military action of the Government of India, it is audacious to claim that they are backward.
Yet another astounding phenomenon is that regional and ‘secular” parties are more vigorously asserting the backwardness of Muslims and advocating 12% reservations for Muslims than Muslims themselves.
3. The SC and ST among the Hindus (85% population of Telangana) were the ones who were for ages, the oppressed and the deprived and the discriminated people . They were so in other parts of India also . The historic guilt of the Hindus in regard to a section of their people was openly acknowledged and the Constitution of India, after due deliberation provided for reservations to them, for 10 years in the first instance and since then being extended from time to time as they still not got upto to a fairly good forward level.
The Constituent Assembly discussed reservations for Muslims which the British government provided from the Montagu - Chelmsford reforms since the second decade of the 20th century. In the Central Legislature in Delhi for 25% of undivided India’s Muslim population there was 33 and 1/3 rd representation and in the legislatures of Muslim minority provinces Muslims were likewise given 50% more representation than their population warranted. In Madras Presidency, the Muslims had 16% reservation for admission in educational institutions and for jobs in government . Such more than due representation by way of reservation has not improved their “backwardness” as they assert now too. Is this backwardness due to the imposition or discrimination by Hindus.
4. Among Hindus, almost all castes in Telangana (as elsewhere in India) excepting Reddys, Kammas, Velamas and Brahmins are claiming to be backward . The Kapus who are not classified as BCs are agitating in the neighbouring state to be included in the BC category. Among Hindus there are backward , more backward and most backward castes claiming as such and in some states like Bihar, the BCs (like in Telangana) are classified into ABCDE groups. Are all Muslims including the richest and nobles among them ( Skaikhs, Moguls, Pathans) to be considered backward because of their religion. Islam is claimed to be superior to all other religion in every respect. How can Moslems as followers of Islam claim as a class or community to be backward?
5. Muslims in Pakistan and Bangladesh and Afghanistan etc., are not ruled by any non-Muslim majority; they are not better off than Muslims in India. Is any Middle East Muslim country more forward than any European non-Muslim country? Turkey had the Ottoman Empire stretching from the Atlantic to Afghanistan. Were the Muslims in Turkey and Turkey- ruled imperial possessions forward and equal to the Europe’s Christians? Just as imperial European nations fattened themselves by exploitations of the people in countries conquered by them and thereby attained superior economic well being, the Muslims in India had after conquering the Hindus, exploited and expropriated the wealth of the ruled Hindus through various taxes and impositions like zezia in some parts and for some time. The wealth of the Hindus was expropriated for the wellbeing and richness of the ruling Muslim class. In Telangana, the Wakf has 77,000 acres of land. All this was snatched from the defeated Hindu community for the enjoyment and benefit and wellbeing of Muslims. While India has done away with the Princes and their privy purses and had also done away with zamindirs and Agraharams, the Muslims are still left with the loot of Hindu properties converted into Wakf.
6. In Telangana until Sept 1947 Muslims were the ruling class. That 12% population appropriated for itself 90% of government jobs including in law and order, armed forces etc. Were they then forward or backward ?
7. The question of reservation for Muslims was extensively debated in the Constituent Assembly of India. Some Muslim League members and even nationalist Muslims (the latter under advice of Abul Kalam Azad) did want to continue the British –given separate electorate and reservations for Muslims in independent republican India. But wise counsels prevailed (What some of the enlightened Muslim members of the Constituent Assembly said is given in annexure)
8. After extensive debate and discussion reservations and separate electorate for Muslims granted by the British were done away with as these pernicious arrangements led to, the two-nation theory and division of this country on religion- basis with the attendant ethnic cleansing of almost all Hindu- Sikh population ( 18% in pre Aug 1947 west Pakistan is reduced to 2% and in Bangladesh, from 35% to 7%). The calamity that befell the Hindus in those two Muslim -ruled Islamic states cannot be forgotten.
9. Some people claim the backwardness of Muslims is “historic burden”. It is totally false. The genocide and exploitative and discriminatory rule of foreign Muslims settled in India, collaborated by the converted by different means, and the fact of destruction of thousands of temples is the historic memory the Hindus are carrying. The exploited Afro- Americans who were taken as slaves and were liberated afterwards are asking for reparations. Hindus are not asking for reparation from the Muslims, the ex-ruler community resident in India.
10. It is unfortunate that neither the Sachar Committee for India nor the Sudhir Committee for Telangana has gone into the basic question of Muslims backwardness. The Sudhir Committee’s observation that the growth of Muslim population has come down is misleading. The rate of growth of population of every community has come down but the difference in the relative growth of Hindu and Muslim population persists. The table below gives the figures:
11. The rate of Muslim population growth is still significantly higher at about 50% more than that of Hindus. Therefore, the proportion of Hindus in the total population has been coming down and that of Muslims is increasing as given in the tables below
Growth Rates of Hindu & Muslim Population in India
|
Decade ending |
1981-1991 |
1991-2001 |
2001-2011 |
|
Hindu |
23% |
20% |
16.8% |
|
Muslim |
34.5% |
36% |
24.6% |
Population Growth in Telangana (like velocity)
|
|
1991-2001 |
2001-2011 |
|
Telangana as a whole |
1.78% |
1.27% |
|
Hindus |
1.64% |
1.17% |
|
Muslims |
1.99% (21.34% more than Hindus) |
1.47% (25% more than Hindus ) |
Decline in Growth Rate ( like acceleration/deceleration)
|
In Telangana decline in growth rate |
2001-11 |
|
Hindu growth declined by |
0.47% |
|
Muslims growth declined by |
0.52% |
Note: Muslim population growth was 21.34% & 25.0% more than Hindus in the decades ending 2001 & 2011 respectively although the rate of decline in Muslim growth is more than that of Hindus.
Polygamy, Family Size And Fertility In India
|
|
Muslims |
Hindus |
|
Polygamy |
2.5 |
1.7 |
|
Large family size |
5.2 |
4.8 |
|
High fertility |
3.1 |
2.4 |
12. Globally, Muslims have the highest fertility rate, an average of 3.1 children per woman —well above replacement level (2.1) due to young age of Muslims (median age of 23) compared to other religious groups. Christians are second, at 2.7 children per woman. Hindu fertility (2.4) is similar to the global average (2.5).
13. The same disparity appears also in the fertility of Muslim and Hindu women. The fertility of Muslim women is higher than that of Hindu women. These facts show that the large family size of Muslims is one of the important factors for their economic standing. It is axiomatic that a large family, especially among the poor and the lower middle class will continue to become poorer as more an more children are born.
Fertility Rate ( all India)
|
Year |
2001 |
2010 |
2050 |
|
Hindu |
|
2.5 |
1.9* |
|
Muslim |
4.1 |
3.2 |
2.1 |
*Below replacement level of 211
14. Another characteristic of the Muslim community is their indifference, if not aversion to modern education especially for their women. When even the English medium, educated young are not getting jobs, how will Urdu medium people get jobs? Urdu is the official language in Pakistan, not in India, not in, Bangladesh even. The insistence for more and more Urdu medium schools is Muslims deliberate courting of the diminution of chances for their employment.
15. The madrasa education tenaciously courted by the leadership as well as the laity is yet another reason for the lower position of Muslims in the modern economy. Muslim women’s participation in the work force outside the home and in the neighbourhood is yet another reason for the lower economic well -being of Muslims .
16. The general aversion to modern education is exemplified by a popular fatwa which warns to the effect, “the education in schools and colleges is contrary and antagonistic to Islamic deeds Islamic characteristic and Islamic culture . If the Muslim child remains deprived of and weak in Islamic education (which they get from madrasas) they will certainly be affected by the noxious education of schools and colleges and antagonistic atmosphere and society with the result that they will become averse to Islamic belief and characteristics”. (IPF monogprah-1 Q page-37)
17. Another fact is till 1971 Muslims qualified in technical education conveniently got visas for Pakistan . Quite a number of them are working in the Gulf countries (Sachar Committee and ) Sudhir Committee seem to be thinking that there is deliberate discrimination against Muslims even in matters of recruitment of government jobs. This is another false hood. The UPSC had two Muslims as Chairmen. Both of them had denied any discrimination or bias against Muslim candidates. There were more than a dozen Muslims as Members of the UPSC over the years. ( page 36 IPF Mongprah-1)
18. Due to various political compulsions among Hindus, Muslim employees are treated very lightly in respect of performance of duties in the government jobs is evident from the fact of Muslim officials being let off for the Friday prayers for hours together and declaring Prophet Mohammed birthday as a national holiday .
as nowhere else in any Muslim country
19. In conclusion I submit that :
· A 600 year long Muslim community could not be kept backward within a matter of 50 to 70 years by those who were ruled by them.
· The backwardness may be in regard to economic well being but this is entirely due to a self- inflicted religious, social and cultural belief system. Would any Muslim accept that their community is culturally and spiritually and religiously backward compared to Hindus or Christians.
· They are “backward” only in terms of economic indices like per capita income, and govt jobs which give some authority and prestige. The economic well being of a person or community depends upon their partaking of modern education, observance of family planning and aspiration and exertion for good performance in a competitive economy and in education system.
· Reservations given to Muslims for decades by the British rulers had not resulted in their economic forwardness.
· The Muslim First programs for 10 years under the UPA government and the creation of Muslim majority districts and 14 point minority development programs earlier have not put an end to the reassertion of backwardness .
· “Backwardness” solely in economic terms as between Muslims and non Muslims is all over the world including countries which are members of the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC).
· The Muslim community should indulge in self -criticism and inquiry into the reasons for their economic backwardness which appears to be an outcome of their religious belief, cultural and life style.
· Muslims in Islamic countries despite their lower economic well -being compared to that of the people in any non –Islamic countries for eg: Europe do not consider that they are backward
20. It is our submission that no reservations for Muslims as an Islamic community should be given. This is subversive of Constitution and disintegrative of the nation as such reservations and separate electorate were before 1947.
21. Finally, it is necessary that we have a Truth and Reconciliation Commission just as in South Africa and later in Peru. The former invader foreign rulers and their native converted community who over a period of 600 years despoiled this country and their places of worship, imposed zezia, took away the lands and properties of the defeated Hindus and constituted them into wakf, imposed foreign languages like Persian as the official language and Urdu over 90% of the Hindus in Telangana have to acknowledge the guilt and repent for it and not go on inventing grievance after grievance just as before1947 to finally say that “we are not Indians, we are a separate nation” .
22. A special issue of the journal Secularism Combat containing a critique regarding of the Sachar Committee report and a Monograph brought out by the India Policy Foundation by Prof Rakesh Sarma in 2009 are appended herewith for further study by the BC Commission of Telangana examining the issue of reservation for Muslims on the basis of their religion prepared by the Sudhir Committee.
END
C - Historical Background
Dt: 16/12/16
To
The Chairman
BC Commission
Government of Telangana
Hyderabad
(Kind Attn: Sri B S Ramulu garu)
Sir,
Sub: Contemplated 12% reservation for Muslims in Telangna– My submission.
Muslim’s Backwardness – Historic Background
In 1871 the (British) Government of India appointed the William Wilson Hunter Commission to establish the backwardness of Muslims in East Bengal in comparison to the Hindus . The imputation was that the Hindus were dominating and depriving the Muslims. This report ultimately led to the division of Bengal into Muslim majority East Bengal as a separate province in October 1905. The division of Bengal on the religious basis was resisted and agitated against by Bengal Hindus and a few Bengali nationalist Muslims and the Indian National congress in other provision also. The division was undone after 5 years in 1911. That Vandemataram and Swadeshi movement was historic.
2. In 1937 in the Hindu majority provinces and in the Muslim majority North West Frontier Province (NWFP) Indian National Congress (INC) formed the ministries . Within one year, the Muslim League charged that these Congress ministries were Hindu Raj and they were discriminating against Muslims and suppressing them . In 1938 the Muslim League‘s leader Raja Syedd Mohammed Mehdi produced one report charging the Congress government as Hindu Raj oppressing the Muslims .
3. In 1939 there was another Muslim League report known as the Pirpur Commission Report. This added some more imaginary suppression of Muslims by the Hindu Congress governments.
4. The then President of the Congress, Dr Rajendra Prasad proposed that the truth of these two reports should be gone into by a Commission headed by Js Sir Maurice Guwyer of the Federal Court ( the predecessor of Supreme Court of India) . This offer was turned down by Md. Ali Jinnah the President of the Muslim League. Obviously, the Raja Sayyed Md. Mehdis and Pirpur Reports were not founded on truth .
5. In the year 2005 the UPA government directed by Sonia Maino Gandhi appointed the Js. Sachar High Level Committee. This committee built upon all the previous three reports - The Hunter Cosmism of 1871; The Raja Sayed Md. Mehdi Committee of 1938 and the Pirpur Committee report o f1939 . Very subtly it concluded that Muslims in what remains as India are subjected to deliberate discrimination and that is why they are backward. It identified 92 Muslim intense population districts . UPA government launched the “Muslim First” (not SC or ST first) programs of accelerated development for Muslims in these districts. The carving out of Muslim majority areas into separate districts begun under the community rule in Kerala 1957-60 ( Malappuram out of Malabar) was followed by the division of Gurgaon district in Haryana to carve out the Muslim majority Mewat district. Here in Telangana the old city of Hyderabad with overwhelming Muslim majority population was given the separate Quli Qutubsha Development Authority.
6. Thus Muslims are being confirmed as a distinct sect of people separate from the rest of Indians. It was precisely the policy of the imperial colonial British rulers of India and this led ultimately to the propounding of the two-nation theory and the division of India to carve out Muslim majority States of Pakistan and later by separation from it, Bangladesh .
7. Md. Ali Jinnah’s and the Muslims League’s stand was that Muslims are not Indians that they are a separate nation by dint of their religion and there is nothing common between Muslims and Hindus ( Christians too but these are People of the Book and could live as dhimmis in an Islamic state) .
8. While writing the Constriction of India the separate electorate for Muslims and the weighted representation ( 50% more than what their population justified ) in the Muslim minority, Hindu majority provinces and in the Central Legislation was discussed. A few Muslim members pleaded for the continuance of separate electorates and reservations, separate sharia courts. The Minorities Committee of the Constituent Assembly where this was intensely debated rejected this as a disintegrative measure introduced by the imperial power and should not be continued in Secular Democratic Republic of India. Just to mention the type of opinions here are :
· Tajamul Hussain warned against the institutionalisation of the minority for Muslims or any other religious community. He said, “We Muslims do not want any concession, we do not want safe guards, we are not weak. This concession would do more harm than good to the Muslims ...... I appeal to all the minorities to join the majority in creating a secular state.......I say that reservation would be suicidal to the minority”.
· Tajamul Hussian opposed the comparison the Muslims with STs and SCs because, “ unlike the SC we are not week, we are not uneducated, we are not uncultured and we can always support ourselves. ... the times have changed. Adjust yourself .... I ask the majority not to thrust reservation on the Muslims . ... for god’s sake do not give us reservations . .. do not make us the minority community, make us equal partner. There will be no majority or minority community in India. (Page -48)
· Dr H C Mukherjee, a Christian and Vice President of the Constituent Assembly emphatically cautioned the nation that ,”if our idea is to have a secular state, it follows inevitably that we cannot afford to recognise minorities based upon religion”.
· Begum Aizaz Rasul, a former Muslim League leader in the UP Assembly came out very strongly and spiritedly against reservations and separate electorate.
· Another Muslim member of the Constituent Assembly Z H Larri said, “ I am not one of those who believe that all the supposed or imagined grievances of a minority must be met. They must be reasonable. Their interests can be looked after so long as they are consistent with the national interest. The moment there is antagonism or conflict between the interest of the minority and the interest of the nation , the minority must go to the wall.(page 22,23 of the monograph)
· The Muslim scholar Md. Waheeduddin Khan observed that , “the major part of discrimination and atrocities that Muslims are facing in this country are in actual fact the consequence of their own backwardness which they misguidedly wish to blame on others (Hindus ).
· Sri S Nagappa an SC Member of the Constituent Assembly justifying the reservations for SCs and STs and rejecting them for Muslims denied the Muslims attempt to appropriate the exceptional reservation for STs and SCs by reminding them that they were not subject to any historical discrimination since (page 48) . He said: “ you (Muslims) are the invaders, immigrants and do not have as much interest as we have been in this country and we are the people that produce the whole nation’s wealth of this country either by agricultural labour or industrial labour”.
9. In 1950, in the wake of the expulsion of millions of Hindus from East Pakistan, under threat of Sardar Patel that a portion of East Pakistan will be liberated and created as a safe zone for East Pakistan‘s Hindus, the then Prime Minister Liaqat Ali Khan came running to India. There was the Nehru-Liaqat Ali Pact in which among others, the pact envisaged the provision of reservation for Muslims in government jobs and even in the defence services. When Nehru brought it for ratification by the Cabinet, Sri N V.Gadgil, Minister for Works and Housing vehemently objected to this provisos . There was very heated argument wherein Nehru said that he was the Prime Minister and he agreed for this provision in the pact with Liaqat Ali Khan and therefore the Cabinet must ratify. Gadgil suggested that cabinet might as well be dismissed. The meeting was postponed and the next day Sardar Patel’s draft of the pact omitting reservations for Muslims was put forward and ratified by the cabinet.
10. In the undivided Madras province during the British rule, 16% of government jobs were resurveyed for Muslims. Has it done any good to Muslims ? Muslims in Tamilnadu and Andhra and in Malabar and north Canara districts of Kerala and Karnataka are also asking reservations for Muslims . If the weighted reservations and representations for decades before 1947 could not do any good for Muslims, would they do any good now?
11. In the four decades ending 2001 the total population of India grew by 134%; while that of the Muslim has grown by 194%; (page 26). The observation of the Sudheer Committee that the Muslim growth rate declined more than that of Hindus growth decline during the period of 2001-11 is totally misleading.
12. In Telangana the average number of members in a Hindu family is 4.8 and in a Muslim family it is 5.2. Obviously the Muslim fertility rate as well as their population growth are 20% to 50 % more than that of Hindus. In India Muslim population is now about 170 mln. It is not going to stabilise until it goes upto 350 mln, at the current rates of relative population increase.
13. The status of the Brahmins in many states is abysmal. In Andhra Pradesh, 44% of Brahmins in the 5 to 18 age group dropped out of school at the primary level. According to a study by J Radhakrishnan ( page 45)
14. That is why recently in Andhra Pradesh the government constituted Andhra Pradesh State Brahmin welfare corporation. There is already a Andhra Pradesh/Telangana State Minority (that is Muslims ) Finance Corporation to specially cater to Muslims .
15. Js. Ahmadi of the Supreme Court in the nine - Judge case of Bommai vs. Union of India a.1994s.c.1918 explained, “ since it was felt that separate electorates for minorities were responsible for communal and separatist tendency, the Advisory Committee (for the Constituent Assembly) resolved that the system of reservations for minorities excluding SC/ST should be done away with “. –page 45/46
16. That there is no discrimination against Muslims in the selection for government jobs either by the UPSC or the state PSCs is attested by the fact two Muslims became the Chairman of the UPSC – A.R Kidwai 1973-79 and J M Quraishi 1998 -2001. There have been more than dozen Muslims who became the members of the Commission. They uniformly rejected the theory of discrimination in recruitment or promotion directed only against Muslims. The Muslim members of the UPSC largely supported the theory of Muslims lag in education . Muslims hold visible and top positions in the railways such as Md. Shafi of the Railway Recruitment Board, Chairman of the Election Commission of India, (CEC), even Director General of the Intelligence Bureau, Home Minister of India, Foreign Minister of India , Chief Justices of the Supermen Court and High Courts; Chiefs of Indian Air Force etc.
17. On 10th Jan 1937 Jawaharlal Nehru issued a press statement : “ in what way the interest of Muslim peasants are different from those of the Hindu peasants or those of Muslim labourers, artisans, merchants, landlords, manufacturers is different from those of their Hindu counter -parts.
18. A division bench of Js T.S Thakur and Js Siddharth Mrudul too questioned the rationale of the Sachar Committee which held that Muslims are being discriminated so they are backward. They observed “ poverty is a common enemy ( page 60), it doe s not come to one community in particular. It should fight against poverty rather than saying that you would fight against poverty for one community only. This is where rot lies. You are saying that more money needs to be spent for one minority community. Should it not cut across the caste and religion?”
As the Sachar Committee (and now the Sudheer Committee) say that facilities are available to other communities ? Does it mean that drinking water facilities are available to the majority community and no person from it lives in slums? Under the Constitution can any welfare state say that it would focus on a particular area (Muslim First 92 Sachar districts) because the minority community resides there. Can it say that it would spend more money in that area? ( this is what precisely the UPA - I & II governments did during their rule 2004-14)
19. At the time of partition altogether “ 10,427 Muslim officers and other ranks opted for India. Whereas only 2,987 non-Muslim officers and other ranks opted for Pakistan . .... most of the non-Muslims who had opted for Pakistan have returned to India leaving only about 200 non-Muslims in Pakistan most of them Christians and Anglo -Indians. Indeed, goodly number of Muslims who had opted for Pakistan have also come back to India. ... 18,000 Muslim Railway men who had originally opted for Pakistan, finally changed their decision and elected to serve in Indian dominion.
20. The term minority has not been defined in eh Constitution. But generally that is the term used for Muslims . There are minority commission in States where Muslims are in minority but none where Hindus are a minority as in J&K.
21. When there are National and State Human Rights Commissions, Minority Commissions, Women’s Commissions, SCs & STs Commissions , why should there be yet another by the name Equal Opportunities Commission as suggested by Sudhir Committee. A Racial Equal Opportunities Committee was one’s constituted in the U.K and it has been abandoned sometime there after entrusting its functions to the Human Rights Commission. Minorities are also humans and therefore their interest like equal opportunities could be looked after by the Human Rights Commissions.
It appears that the demand for reservations for Muslims is the first of a series are strident Muslim demands as before 1947 in India and elsewhere in the world. For eg. the following would be of interest:
Dr. Kalin Siddiqui founding President of the British Muslim Parliament speaking at the sixth Conference of European Muslims ( 18-19 April 1992) said : “ when we men walk down in the street, we are just a face in the crowd. But when a woman wears the hijab, she is carrying the flag of Islam. She is making a statement that, “this European civilisation is unacceptable to us , that it is a decease , a pestilence on mankind “. (source : Woman in Islam by Sri Ram Swarup, a Voice of India publication, New Delhi, Year 2000)
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