Gods and Criminals

By ChatGPT

Every year, millions of Indians leave the country in search of education, employment, safety, dignity, and opportunity. They settle in places as diverse as the USA, Canada, the Gulf nations, Europe, Australia, and even Africa. Wherever they go, Indians would expect acceptance above all else.

A Hindu engineer in Dubai hopes he will not be discriminated against on account of his religion. A Muslim doctor in Britain expects life with dignity. A Sikh businessman in Canada wishes to wear his turban without fear. A Christian nurse in Saudi Arabia hopes to pray to Jesus in her home.

In other words, Indians abroad desire pluralism.

Yet back home, many Indians are suspicious of the diversity that has been flourishing in the country for centuries. Modi’s India is suspicious of what it seeks from other countries.

This is not merely hypocrisy. It is dangerous myopia.

India never was a civilisation built on sameness as Modi Inc declares again and again. The India of history was noisy, layered, argumentative, multilingual, and spiritually diverse. Hinduism itself evolved not as a rigid monolith but as an ocean absorbing countless philosophies, rituals, local gods, tribal traditions, sceptics, saints, and Jews and Parsis and… anyone who wished to become part of India’s long civilisational conversation.

To deny this diversity in India is to deny India itself.

There is also a practical dimension that Modi Inc is refusing to acknowledge. India today has one of the largest diasporas in the world. More than 30 million people of Indian origin live outside the country. Their safety and dignity depend greatly on whether the world continues to value multicultural coexistence.

If nations begin to define citizenship narrowly through religion or ethnicity, Indians abroad may one day face the same exclusionary attitudes that Modi Inc is now promoting within India.

The logic of intolerance will never remain confined within borders.

When an Indian demands acceptance in another country while refusing acceptance to minorities at home, the contradiction is visible to the world – conspicuously so. Moral credibility matters anywhere, especially in international society. Just because Modi goes around the world hugging world leaders, those countries won’t accept Indians as part of themselves. What Modi does in India will make infinite difference to the millions of Indians who find livelihood and dignity abroad.

The kind of uniformity that Modi Inc wants in India may create temporary political excitement. But it weakens societies in the long run. Diversity, though messy and unwieldy, creates resilience. Even at home where there may be just four individuals. Any society where many faiths coexist learns negotiation, patience, and coexistence. The kind of society that Modi Inc has been striving to build up, founded on hatred of the other, will consume itself sooner than later.

Modi’s India can learn from history instead of rewriting it. Civilisations rarely collapse because they had too much diversity. They collapse because hatred becomes stronger than shared purpose.

Perhaps the deepest tragedy today is that religion, which once comforted the suffering and humbled the powerful, is increasingly being used as a weapon of identity. Temples are symbols of political mobilisation in Modi’s India instead of being guiding lights of spiritual quests.

Meanwhile, ordinary people continue struggling with unemployment, rising costs, failing healthcare, and uncertainty about the future. And Modi is asking the nation to make sacrifices!

Can we all live together? This is the question that Indians have to answer.

Some Statistics

A lot of India’s revenue is being expended on construction of temples. In 2021 alone, INR 6900 crore was spent on construction of temples and spiritual corridors. In my neighbourhood in Kerala, quite a few new temples came up recently. They were there earlier, but neglected and unwanted. But BJP has pumped in plenty of money to renovate them all and attract devotees.

Ever rising number of temples and deities. But…

According to the latest reports released by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), out of the 240 BJP MPs elected to the 2024 Lok Sabha, 94 (more than one-third) have declared criminal cases against themselves in their affidavits. Among them, 63 are facing serious cases such as murder, attempted murder, or crimes against women.

27 BJP members in the Rajya Sabha have declared criminal cases.

136 BJP ministers (out of a total of 336 – state and central) are facing criminal cases. Of these, 88 are accused of serious offences.

ADR reports indicate that among all sitting MPs and MLAs nationwide who face cases related to crimes against women, the BJP has the highest number of representatives.

So, the obvious question: Do temples and gods make India a better place?