Not by fatwas

As our report today based on the findings of the Sachar committee shows, as our columnist on this page argues, Indian Muslims are falling so fast behind in key modernisation processes that even those addicted to politically correct platitudes and vote-bank politics must wake up to the need for substantive remedial action. Many would say, looking at the data compiled by the Sachar committee, that Muslims in India must also be reservation beneficiaries. After all, if politicians argue that the creamy layer mustn8217;t apply to SCs/STs, then Muslims, whose education performance seem to be worse, might emerge as strong candidates for quotas. That is exactly when the whole problem will be politicised beyond repair. Predictable slogans for and against will come from predictable quarters, and quota demands for 8220;backwards8221; belonging to other non-Hindu religions will follow. Inevitably, the courts will get involved.

If the efforts of the Sachar committee, which thankfully gave up its inadvisable move on minority headcount in the Armed Forces, is to have any positive fallout, the government must first encourage the emergence of a Muslim vox populi unmediated by clerics. Government leaders meet clerics and assume they have met the community. As the many controversies over fatwas show, that8217;s not necessarily the case. Politics needs to be sensitised to real problems affecting the Muslim community and that can only happen if politicians start hearing real Muslim voices.

A good example of why clerical pronouncements are not good guides to policy is the madrassa. It is possible for madrassas to provide the basics of modern education and yet retain their essential character. But the clerics tend to look at the madrassa issue as part of their own prestige, which is not always coterminous with the community8217;s broader interests. Madrassa reform, as many Muslim scholars have argued, is sensible because it works on existing infrastructure. It can be time- and cost-effective 8212; provided the government is ready to politely ignore the usual lobbies that claim to speak for Indian Muslims.