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Husain and the myth of Hindu tolerance

L'affaire Maqbool Fida Husain has exposed, like no other incident in recent history, the oft-perpetuated myth of Hindu tolerance.

This myth is constantly reinforced, buttressed by the view that 85 per cent of the population have allowed the other 15 per cent to live as equal citizens, when contiguous nations -- which share a common culture but are governed by a different faith -- have not done so. Ergo, the proponents of the liberal Hinduism view carry on their canard.

If practised Hinduism really were as tolerant as it is claimed to be, there won't be a large section of the dispossessed, underprivileged who have today woken to their plight, who have realised that despite numbers favouring them they are little better than the dregs of society, and who have virtually disowned their Hindu antecedents seeking solace from other egalitarian faiths.

If Hinduism were really tolerant, it would not be so easy to lure away sections from it with just a wave of petrodollars.

If Hinduism were really tolerant, its proponents would not have, historically, displayed the meanness, the viciousness, the inhumanness they did to large sections of the populace, all in the name of some antiquated, calcified system of caste.

And, today, if there is talk of changing this, if there is talk of equality and such, it is not because of any enlightenment on the part of these votaries, but because the dispossessed have become the rulers by virtue of their numbers.

And Maqbool Fida Husain's fault was not that he painted Hindu deities in the nude twenty years ago and more while being a Muslim; his real fault was in doing this while belonging to a community that must number around 12 per cent of the population. Worse things have been said by others about Hinduism and their deities, but since these have come from those who have numbers on their side, valour was found in being discreet.

Ultimately, that is the truth about the so-called defenders of the Hindu faith. They will choose soft targets like Husain who are incapable of striking back, of putting it across to them. These defenders are nothing but overgrown high school bullies who believe that the only way to get what they want is by force.

As a believing Hindu, I resent these goondas of the Sangh Parivar appropriating to themselves the defence of a faith that needs no such lawless defenders. To me, the worst threat to Hindus and Hinduism comes from these blackguards who see nothing wrong in invading the privacy of one's home and threatening its inmates. Do these lumpen know anything about the faith they have set out to protect?

To me as a Hindu, Husain has done no wrong in his paintingSita Revisited, so will the Bajrang Dal and the other constituents of the lunatic fringe, the ugly excrescence on an otherwise beautiful face, punish me for holding this view?

Among the many inexplicable things about l'affaire Husain, I find, is that the government, both at the Centre and at the state-level, has done or said nothing. And yet, the facts are that in total violation of all civilised norms, a group of individuals have simply used muscle power to have an artist apologise for something he never intended to do in the first place.

At least Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses was banned by the government of the day, however retrograde that move may have been. That one step has been used ad nauseam, ad infinitum, by the so-called 'true secularists' -- as opposed to the pseudo-secularists -- to run down Islam, its adherents, and anybody who even hinted at the possibility that he may have, in fact, given offence to a religious community.

Today, the same things those 'true secularists' said about the Muslim's so-called intolerance have come home to roost.

Is it anybody's case that Husain is a closet Muslim fundamentalist, who is going around the country painting Hindu deities in the nude with the ultimate aim of setting of a civil war? To me, it seems likely that he has so absorbed the symbols of the land as his own, that he does not see anything wrong in using them in his art. Offence is the farthest from his mind, I am sure.

To me, Husain has not done the right thing by his apology. I would have felt much happier if he, instead of allowing his artistic freedom to be circumscribed by lumpen, had chosen to walk out of the country. After all, India has not done Husain proud, Husain has done India proud. And today, when the country of his origins, of his art, of his muse, has turned its back on him, what principle is he holding on to by suffering such humiliation where the chief of a film federation openly threatens that he will strip Husain in public if he does not apologise for Sita Revisited?

To me, Husain's is the silence of the lamb. And we are all guilty of condoning a fascist act by our refusal to condemn the Sangh Parivar's offshoot for taking the law into its own hands. Today it is Husain, tomorrow it could be you and me. Germans compromised their moral authority by not speaking out when the Jews were done in, and soon they were left with no voice. I would hate to see the same fate befall Hindus and India, by letting the Bajrang Dal and their cohorts have a free run.

If anybody was offended by Husain's painting -- and will someone please tell me how come a painting that has been around for 20 damn years was suddenly found offensive -- the right course in a civilised country, which is what I believe India is, would be the legal option. There are laws in this land that can tackle this, without summoning the hidden persuaders of the Bajrang Dal.

But laws and such are for tolerant, reasonable societies. Here, when the core of one's being has been nourished and fed on doses of intolerance, based on caste, language, colour of the skin and suchlike, no wonder the Bajrang Dal has actually found former liberals backing its action.

Saisuresh Sivaswamy