DMK Government Stand On CAA Is Hypocrisy Raised To The Power of 'N'

The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK)-run Tamil Nadu government has told the Supreme Court that the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), 2019, is against Tamils and the country’s secular character.

In an affidavit, the Tamil Nadu government told the court that religion has been introduced as a basis for the grant of citizenship, “which destroys the basic fabric of secularism.” It has also complained that it is discriminatory against Tamils, who have suffered in Sri Lanka.

This is rich.

Three points need making, one on Tamils, and the other two about religion being the basis of citizenship.

First, with the brutal Sri Lankan civil war long over, there is little likelihood of more Tamils seeking refuge in India, and the ones already here have either been granted citizenship through naturalisation or some form of residential status.

Also, there is no logic in opposing religion as a basis for citizenship, and then seeking a linguistic basis for it. The Dravidian parties' belief in the Aryan-Dravidian racial theory is apparently less damaging to the secular fabric than helping those persecuted by Islamist dispensations.

Second, there is the big white lie: the CAA is meant to fast-track citizenship to minorities who were persecuted in three Muslim-majority countries in the neighbourhood – Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan.

It does not deny any Muslim illegal immigrant from seeking citizenship based on naturalisation.

The only favour done to the persecuted minorities, and only those who came in on or before 31 December 2014, is that they can be given citizenship in six years (as opposed to 11 years under naturalisation).

So, no, religion is not being introduced as a permanent feature of the citizenship law.

CAA is meant to deal with the exceptional circumstances under which Hindus, and some other minorities, were forced to flee these Islamist countries due to religious persecution.

When the persecution is based on religion, the relief planned can also be on the basis of religion.

Third, and this is the hypocrisy in the Tamil Nadu government’s stand. When many laws already on the statute book use religion as the basis, what is the logic in saying that only citizenship law must not discriminate on the basis of religion.  

Here is a sampler of legislation or initiatives which have religion as the basis.

The civil code is based on religion, with the Hindu code applicable only to Hindus, Sikhs, Jains and Buddhists.

Muslims have their own separate personal laws, and Christians and Parsis have their own marriage and divorce laws.

The Right to Education Act specifically excludes minority unaided institutions from its purview, including religious minorities. Majority institutions bear the brunt of this social cost.

Governments at the Centre and states have minority-specific ministries that exclude poor Hindus from their ambit.

On the other hand, Hindus do not get categorised as minorities in the states and Union territories where they are so: Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab, Nagaland, Mizoram, Lakshadweep, Manipur, Meghalaya and Arunachal Pradesh, not to speak of Ladakh.

And, apparently, keeping 43,491 Hindu temples in Tamil Nadu under state control and denying Hindu devotees the power to run their own religious and charitable institutions is somehow in keeping with the “basic fabric of secularism.”

Secularism has got a bad name in India precisely because it is used as a weapon to deny Hindus equal rights.

The Supreme Court should see through this double-speak and send the Tamil Nadu government’s affidavit to the right place: the shredder.

The DMK-run Tamil Nadu government lives in a parallel universe where religion is never the basis of law-making.