Modi govt doesn't want to collect caste data in next national census; hence it has started a campaign saying a caste census will divide Indian society
On November 11, while campaigning in Maharashtra, Prime Minister Narendra Modi gave a strange slogan 'Ek rahenge toh safe rahenge! (We will be safe if we are united)'.
First, let us look at the language in the slogan, which Modi made the entire attendees repeat several times at a public meeting. ‘Ek’ is a Hindi word for unity. Safe is an English word, whose meaning we know.
The language question
Why was he using ‘safe’ in Maharashtra? Obviously because of the spread of English language in rural areas in that state. If it were to be Uttar Pradesh, he would not have used an English word in a slogan, that too in public meetings.
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He and his party oppose English language getting introduced in government schools. However, they remain silent when top corporate schools, run by Hindutva supporters, do their high-end business by selling English language to the rich.
But the very same Prime Minister uses an English word in a slogan in a deep rural public meeting because it has to be understood by the people.
The real objective
Let us look at the aim of the slogan.
Earlier, a similar slogan was given by Yogi Adityanath – Batenge toh katenge! This slogan was approved by the RSS. Now Modi uses it with mixed language.
The media has interpreted Modi’s slogan as communal as it is perceived to be against Muslims. But this slogan is aimed at opposing Rahul Gandhi’s campaign of caste census and removal of the 50 percent reservation cap validated by the Supreme Court.
The BJP right, from the 2014 elections, started mobilising the Other Backward Classes in a clever way to garner votes. Since the RSS/BJP accepted caste mobilisation from then, as they brought in Modi, an OBC from Gujarat, as the prime ministerial candidate, they started playing the caste game very cleverly like in a chess.
Caste connections
In states where the Shudra upper layer community like Yadavs in Uttar Pradesh were rulers for some time, they mobilised the lower OBCs dissatisfied with the ruling caste leadership. They managed to win a majority of MP seats and power in that state twice.
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In Telangana, where the Reddys and Velamas who happen to be the Shudra are ruling castes, in the 2024 election the BJP focused on Kapus and Mudirajus, with a slogan Easari BC mukhya mantri (Now, a BC chief minister).
It is known that the Reddys are with the Congress and the Velamas are with the BRS in Telangana. Among the Dalits, since the Malas are with the Congress, they specifically focused on Madigas.
Just before the 2024 general elections, to garner Madiga votes, Modi himself addressed a special Madiga public meeting.
Sub-caste factors
It was at this meeting that he promised to help the Madigas to overcome the legal hurdle in the Supreme Court. Hence, the Union government proposed before a Supreme Court seven-judge bench that sub-caste demands for divisions in reservation was not unconstitutional.
Finally, the court upheld the sub-caste categorisation for reservation as constitutionally valid.
The RSS/BJP forces do not think that all such divisive politics are dangerous. They project their caste-based divisions as nationalist.
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But to implement that judgment, per the Supreme Court ruling, objective and verifiable data about each sub-caste across India is a must. This sub-caste reservation judgement is applicable to all sub-castes that ask for justifiable share in the reservation pool — SC/ST/OBCs.
Hence, the implementation of the Supreme Court judgment is not possible without having national caste census data collected by a constitutional body — the Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India.
Caste census against unity?
The Modi government does not want to collect caste data in the forthcoming national census. Now, both the Supreme Court judgment and the Modi government have created a new headache for state governments as several sub-castes are asking for the implementation of the SC ruling and the Centre is not willing to collect credible caste data.
It is in this context they have started the campaign that a caste census will divide Indian society.
As the Congress, particularly Rahul Gandhi, is campaigning about the caste census as an X- ray of the society’s socio-economic profile, the upper castes, particularly Brahmins, Banias, Ksatriyas, Kayasthas and Khatris, are opposing caste details.
The RSS/BJP’s interests are enmeshed with these five castes, more so in North India.
New slogan, new tactic
In order to overcome this problem, the BJP has started a campaign ‘Ek rahenge toh safe rahenge’. Of course, since the 2024 elections, Modi and Amit Shah have started a drive to retain the OBC vote share by saying that if the Congress takes power, OBC reservations will be reduced and Muslim reservation will be increased.
Now, they have started openly saying if the Congress comes to power, everything will be given to Muslims. They are openly saying that SC/ST/OBCs will lose every benefit if the Congress comes to power in Maharashtra.
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They want to draw a clear line between Indian Muslims and the rest of the population because the Muslims are aligned to the Congress for quite a long time in terms of vote.
The Muslim viewpoint
The Indian Muslim community for a long time did not accept reservation ideology as they went on denying the existence of caste among them.
But over a period, they too realised that caste and poverty and educational backwardness among them are interrelated.
It was the Congress-headed UPA government that constituted the Sachar Committee. Once that report was out, the Muslims realised that their educational backwardness is a serious problem. Their backwardness is also related to their communal cocoon.
The RSS and Muslim conservatives competed for religious conservative politics. In the process, national development suffered. Now it has become a competitive contest for reservations. The Muslims are willing to accept caste census as well.
The Muslim divide
The Shudra upper castes which thought that using reservation was below their social status now want to get into the reservation system. The ideology of reservations has become the central issue in national politics. Hence castes like Reddys and Marathas are not averse to caste census.
The socioeconomic census that includes caste census will bring out the real status of each caste including that of the castes that exist among Indian Muslims.
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There are upper castes among Muslims who benefitted from Mughal and post-Mughal feudalism and conservative Islamism. For example, the poor lower caste Muslims were pushed into backward Madarsa Urdu medium education whereas the rich upper caste Muslims got English medium education from pre-Independence days. This cordon among Muslims also must be broken.
Caste census is needed
The RSS/BJP combine is playing a new gimmick by cleverly giving the Ek rahenge toh safe rahenge slogan in the context of a national demand for caste census and fare distribution of welfare schemes and also reservation benefits in education and employment.
Only a caste census and expanding the welfare net to the most deserving will expand the Indian middle class that would sustain the modern developmental process.(The Federal seeks to present views and opinions from all sides of the spectrum. The information, ideas or opinions in the article are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Federal.)
