Skip to main content

Emperor has no clothes: Modi's 'veiled' attack on dress as identity reveals stark bigotry

2011: Modi refusing to wear skullcap
By Ananda Maitreya*
"Jo aag laga rahe hain, TV pe unke jo drishya aa rahe hain, yeh aag lagaane vaale kaun hain, woh unke kapdon se hi pata chal jaata hai" (from the visuals on TV, those setting the fire can be identified by their clothes), Prime Minister Narendra Modi said at an election rally recently. No one was fooled regarding his reference to the clothes and the clothe-wearers he pointed to.
The incidents -- and the fire/violence -- that he was hinting at had begun at the Jamia Millia Islamia in Delhi, and yes, many of the marchers and protestors were Muslims. But to zero-in only on Muslims, to equate the Jamia protest only as Muslim protest, is to demonstrate a very blinkered view of things.
The protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), even from their beginning at Jamia, involved a wide variety of people and groups. To mark it as a Muslim-only protest, a Muslim-only issue, is a divisiveness ploy.
It suggests the failure to understand depths of resistance among wide cross-sections of Indian society against every step the Modi government has taken towards establishing its agenda of a nation that prioritizes Hindus, away from India's multi-layered reality.
As someone who boldly announced a new slogan after his re-election in 2019, “Sabka vishwas" (everyone’s trust), appended to his earlier lofty but deceptive utopian mantra, “Sabka saath, sabka vikaas" (everyone together, for everyone's development), Modi now stands increasingly exposed regarding his attitude and intentions with respect to minorities, especially Muslims.
To pick on articles of dress/clothing that putatively identify the Muslims is indeed a cheap trick, but one does not expect such a public remark from the prime minister of a multi-religion country like India. But, one must admit, this was not totally unexpected, either.
Modi presided over the worst violence against Muslims in Gujarat in 2002. And, there have been other extremely derogatory, stereotypical, even insulting references to Muslims by Modi and his party members in the recent past. Constantly invoked is the fear of being overwhelmed by Muslims who “bear too many children”.
Modi referred to Muslims as puppies, who accidentally came under a car, while recalling the riots against Muslim in Gujarat state in 2002. One of his chief ministers, Adityanath, too, is known to have made extremely vile remarks on Muslims.
It is a very cliched trope of global Islamophobia, where articles of Islamic dress, such as the headdress, hijab etc. have been targeted, even outlawed. We have seen official instances of such actions and laws in Europe (especially France) and several instances of such victimization in the United States, especially under Donald Trump.
India too has witnessed several contestations regarding headscarves, niqabs and burqas. The Shiv Sena requested a burqa ban this year. The Muslim Education Society in Kerala issued a notice to women not to attend educational institutions with any kind of face covering.
The pressures to conform to majoritarian mores are often huge, and various personal preferences, often in matters of dress or accessories, come in conflict with various government rules, often in the name of security and unity. Sikhs have been fighting a battle all over the world to have their own articles of faith, such as turban and kirpan, recognized for what they mean to them.
Given that Modi has very few things going for him currently -- what with dwindling political support across India, an economy he and his team are unable to grapple with and have led into a tailspin, a violent victimization of minorities, and his own party affiliates’ involvement in exploitation of women -- one wonders with moral authority (or any authority) he made the comment targeting the dress of Muslims?
Constantly invoked is the fear of being overwhelmed by Muslims who bear too many children
This casually exclusionary comment is also a chilling reminder of the “Muslim as the other” image that continues its hold on him. Despite all the lip-service he pays to Muslims, despite his trips to Saudi Arabia and other Muslim countries, deep down abides in him the idea of Muslims as inveterate outsiders and others.
They dress differently, for one. And that difference is not merely an aesthetic difference to him, as maybe in the case of Nagas, who might sport one kind of headgear and the Himachalis another -- both of which Modi is happy to don as needed in his political rallies.
Protest in support of attack on Jamia students
But a different approach in the case of Muslims only deepens and confirms their otherness for someone like Modi. It acts as a trigger. And as in his mind, so too in his public utterances, there is the discourse of “us” and “them.” He is unable to get beyond that.
Maulana Mohammad Ali Jauhar famously spoke of “belong[ing] to two circles of equal size, but which are not concentric. One is India, and the other is the Muslim world.” Such large-hearted, philosophically deep and complex ideas are beyond the ken of the Hindutva-wadis who wish for a flattened and unitary national and religious allegiance.
It was precisely against formulations as above that VD Savarkar (who inspired RSS) argued, when he differentiated inflexibly between allegiance to the “Fatherland (India),” and the “Holyland” as being different among Hindus and Muslims. It is enough to mark Muslims as fundamentally anti-national, as the “other” even though such distinctions are false, flawed, shallow and bigoted.
That they wear clothes that seem different from those of Hindus, therefore, does two things for those that follow Savarkar’s creed -- on one hand, the clothes mark the Muslims as different from Hindus; on the other hand, it confirms to the Hindutva-wadis that, because Muslims are different, because they have other allegiances, they dress differently.
Each line of argument reinforces the other, and the otherness of the Muslims. For them, the Hindutva-wadis, there is just one circle -- in which they travel endlessly.
---
*Writer, student of social movements, has been involved in struggles of the marginalized people, including Dalits and Adivasi

Comments

Anonymous said…
HAHAHAHAHAHHA HAAA YES EMPEROR HAS NO CLOTHES!!!!
HOW DID GUJARAT GET PROVOKED TO VENGEANCE ON MUSLIMS?
*MUSLIMS KILLED/LOCKED-&-BURNED A WHOLE TRAIN FULL OF HINDU BABIES AND CHILDREN AND WOMEN FIRST!*
Gujarat like all intiations are created by the JHANOONI (vitriolic) Muslims. MUSLIMS IN GUJARAT first BURNED a TRAIN FULL of HINDU Pilgrims returning from a pilgrimage - BABIES, CHILDREN, ... OLD MEN - WOMEN ... FIRST THE MULSIM GROUP WENT INSIDE THE STOPPED TRAIN, AND SELECTED AND REMOVED ALL MUSLIMS PASSENGERS, THEN LOCKED THE TRAINS AND SET IT ON FIRE ... THOSE WERE YOUR FAMILIES!!!!
Godhra train burning
February 27, 2002
Description
DescriptionThe Godhra Train Burning was an incident that occurred on the morning of 27 February 2002, in which 59 Hindu pilgrims and karsevaks returning from Ayodhya, were killed in a fire inside the Sabarmati Express train near the Godhra railway station in the Indian state of Gujarat.

TRENDING

Insider plot to kill Deendayal Upadhyay? What RSS pracharak Balraj Madhok said

By Shamsul Islam*  Balraj Madhok's died on May 2, 2016 ending an era of old guards of Hindutva politics. A senior RSS pracharak till his death was paid handsome tributes by the RSS leaders including PM Modi, himself a senior pracharak, for being a "stalwart leader of Jan Sangh. Balraj Madhok ji's ideological commitment was strong and clarity of thought immense. He was selflessly devoted to the nation and society. I had the good fortune of interacting with Balraj Madhok ji on many occasions". The RSS also issued a formal condolence message signed by the Supremo Mohan Bhagwat on behalf of all swayamsevaks, referring to his contribution of commitment to nation and society. He was a leading RSS pracharak on whom his organization relied for initiating prominent Hindutva projects. But today nobody in the RSS-BJP top hierarchy remembers/talks about Madhok as he was an insider chronicler of the immense degeneration which was spreading as an epidemic in the high echelons of th

Central pollution watchdog sees red in Union ministry labelling waste to energy green

By Chythenyen Devika Kulasekaran*  “Destructors”, “incinerators” and “waste-to-energy (WTE) incineration” all mean the same thing – indiscriminate burning of garbage! Having a history of about one and a half centuries, WTE incinerators have seen several reboots over the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries. 

First-of-its-kind? 'Eco-friendly, low cost' sewage treatment system installed in Gujarat

Counterview Desk Following the installation of the Unconventional Decentralized Multi-Stage Reactor (UDMSR) for sewage treatment, a note on what is claimed to be the  first-of-its-kind technology said, the treated sewage from this system “can be directly utilized for agricultural purposes”, even as proving to be a “saviour in the times of water crisis.”

A Hindu alternative to Valentine's Day? 'Shiv-Parvati was first love marriage in Universe'

By Rajiv Shah*   The other day, I was searching on Google a quote on Maha Shivratri which I wanted to send to someone, a confirmed Shiv Bhakt, quite close to me -- with an underlying message to act positively instead of being negative. On top of the search, I chanced upon an article in, imagine!, a Nashik Corporation site which offered me something very unusual. 

Indo-Bangla border: Farmers facing 'illegal obstacles' in harvesting, transporting yields

  Counterview Desk  In a representation to the chairperson, National Human Rights Commission, human rights defender Kirity Roy, who is secretary, Banglar Manabadhikar Suraksha Mancha (MASUM), has said that Border Security Force (BSF) personnel are creating "illegal obstacles" for farmers seeking to harvest their ripened yields and transport them to the market in village Jhaukuthi of Cooch Behar district.

'Flawed' argument: Gandhi had minimal role, naval mutinies alone led to Independence

Counterview Desk Reacting to a Counterview  story , "Rewiring history? Bose, not Gandhi, was real Father of Nation: British PM Attlee 'cited'" (January 26, 2016), an avid reader has forwarded  reaction  in the form of a  link , which carries the article "Did Atlee say Gandhi had minimal role in Independence? #FactCheck", published in the site satyagrahis.in. The satyagraha.in article seeks to debunk the view, reported in the Counterview story, taken by retired army officer GD Bakshi in his book, “Bose: An Indian Samurai”, which claims that Gandhiji had a minimal role to play in India's freedom struggle, and that it was Netaji who played the crucial role. We reproduce the satyagraha.in article here. Text: Nowadays it is said by many MK Gandhi critics that Clement Atlee made a statement in which he said Gandhi has ‘minimal’ role in India's independence and gave credit to naval mutinies and with this statement, they concluded the whole freedom struggle.

Wasteland, a colonial legacy, being used to 'give away' vast tracts to Ratnagiri refinery

By Fouziya Tehzeeb* William D’Souza, a 55-year old farmer from Kuthethur, Mangalore, was busy mixing cattle feed when we arrived at his doorsteps. Around 25 km from the bustling city of Mangalore, Kuthethur is a lush green village with thick vegetation. On the way to William’s house the idyllic view gets blocked by the flares and smoke arising from the Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Limited (MRPL).

CAA disregards India's inclusive plural ethos, 'betrays' ideals of freedom struggle: PUCL

Counterview Desk    "Outraged" at the move of the Central government to implement the Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019 (CAA 2019) weeks before the election, the top rights group, People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), has demanded that the law be repealed. 

Buddhist shrines were 'massively destroyed' by Brahmanical rulers: Historian DN Jha

Nalanda mahavihara By Our Representative Prominent historian DN Jha, an expert in India's ancient and medieval past, in his new book , "Against the Grain: Notes on Identity, Intolerance and History", in a sharp critique of "Hindutva ideologues", who look at the ancient period of Indian history as "a golden age marked by social harmony, devoid of any religious violence", has said, "Demolition and desecration of rival religious establishments, and the appropriation of their idols, was not uncommon in India before the advent of Islam".

Invincible, Modi 'taller' than BJP, RSS: An opportunity for Congress beyond 2024?

By NS Venkataraman*  With the announcement of poll schedule for the 2024 parliamentary election, there is palpable excitement and expectation amongst the countrymen  about the shape of things to happen in India after the  results of the election would be announced. There is also speculation abroad about the future course of developments in India.