'Muslim Unapologetics' have grounds for critiquing Left, liberals; but group must not project political goals as religious ones

At least since the protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) 2019 and National Register of Citizens (NRC) began in early December last year, a section of Muslim student activists have been actively promoting Muslim identity politics as a panacea for Indian Muslims. As in any mass movement, there are several groups within them. The two most prominent groups are the Islamists and the ‘Muslim Unapologetics’ — activists promoting Muslim identity politics on non-religious grounds, somewhat parallel to the Dalit and Adivasi movements in India and the Black Lives Matter Movement in the United States.

At a time when all the mainstream discourses are centred on either supporting or opposing the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Muslim Unapologetics have diversified the discourse and brought in larger questions that need to be addressed. With their questions stemming largely from the works of subaltern and decolonial thinkers and academics, the most distinctive feature of Muslim Unapologetics has turned out to be their scathing critique of the Left and the liberals. They have not only constantly demeaned their strategy, but have also alleged that the Left and the liberals are appropriating Muslim experiences and throttling Muslim voices.

The most oft-repeated criticism against the Left and the liberals in the past few months has been that their outrage against the arrest of Muslim activists is selective. For instance, it is alleged that though they protested vehemently against the arrest of Umar Khalid, a left-wing activist, they were silent when Sharjeel Imam — someone who disagrees with the Left and the liberals — was arrested.

This criticism is placed in the larger paradigm of the Good Muslim-Bad Muslim debate. As Hilal Ahmad, an associate professor at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, puts it: “The good Muslims, we are told, would join the mainstream; while the bad Muslims would continue to raise sectarian demands and disrupt the progress of the nation. A number of different phrases are used interchangeably to describe good Muslims — secular Muslims, cultural Muslims, nationalist Muslims and so on — to counter the bad guys or communal Muslims, separatist Muslims, Pro-Pakistan elements and, more recently, the terrorist Muslims.”

It is indeed true that Muslims categorised as “bad” have been unjustly targeted for long. Irrespective of how regressive and communal someone’s views are, if they are targeted for no crime of theirs, people from across the spectrum should stand by them. The Good Muslim-Bad Muslim debate must be absolutely irrelevant here. But does that make the Good Muslim-Bad Muslim debate irrelevant elsewhere too? To understand this, let’s first take a brief look at the vision of a ‘good society’ held by the Left, the liberals, and the Muslim Unapologetics.

The Left’s vision of a good society is based primarily on the conception of achieving economic justice through the welfare state. Besides that, the issues of gender justice and a progressive society form the core of the Left’s agenda. Though their vision of economy diverges radically from the Left, liberals too have an agenda of developing a scientifically tempered and gender-just society.

The Muslim Unapologetics on the other hand, have a vision that has several key differences with the Left and the liberals. This is because their vision is based on subaltern and decolonial critique of dominant streams of thought, including that of the Left and the liberals. This is true especially for their visions of what a just society and a just polity would look like. This ideological difference must be wholeheartedly welcomed, discussed, and debated by all sides. Besides, it is perfectly natural for this ideological difference to spill into policy differences as well. The Muslim Unapologetics, for example, will focus on policies leading to a more equitable representation of various social groups. The Left, on the other hand, will focus more on policies leading to a more equitable distribution of wealth in society. The difference in policy orientations too should be a topic of healthy discussions and debates.

What is unfortunate, however, is that the Muslim Unapologetics have brutally compromised with the Islamists as far as the public discourse on Muslim identity politics is concerned. In their internal discussions, they decide their goals based on the academic works of subaltern historiographers and decolonial thinkers and academics like Paul Brass. But when it comes to going public, they do not attempt to clarify the difference between their identity politics and Islamism. Quite often, they themselves speak in the language and tone of Islamists and by talking of issues like Palestine, which are entirely disconnected from the socio-political concerns of Indian Muslims, even assist the Islamists in turning the entire discourse of Muslim identity politics from political to religious.

Though there are several key variations among different Islamist groups, their discourse is based primarily on the works of several 20th century theologian-philosophers like Abul A’la Maududi. Despite having several key differences with the traditional conservative ulemas, these theologian-philosophers have built much of their theories upon a conservative understanding of Islam, especially when it comes to gender issues and interfaith relations. And no matter how hard the Muslim Unapologetics try to use works of decolonial thinkers to justify it, the regressive views of conventional Muslim ulemas and most Islamists on a host of issues can’t be justified by any standard of morality.

Therefore this attitude of leaving the entire public discourse of Muslim identity politics to Islamists brings the Muslim Unapologetics in direct conflict with the fundamental aims of the Left and the liberals. This is because the conservative Muslims and the Islamists have always stood as hindrances in the spreading of the progressive agenda of the Left and the liberals among the Muslims masses. By standing by, and even seconding the Islamists and conservative Muslims, the Muslim Unapologetics are also serving as an obstruction to the fundamental goals of the Left and the liberals.

The Muslim Unapologetics might argue that several aspects of the Left’s and the liberal’s critique of Muslim conservatives are a result of their colonial bias. For example, it can be argued that the Islamic punishment of lashing is considered as barbaric only because of a deeply embedded colonial morality. Instead, the punishment of imprisonment given in the modern world is more barbaric as it completely wipes out several years from an individual’s life, and has the potential to cause even long term psychological damages. On the contrary, the Islamic punishment of lashing causes only physical pain which heals in a much shorter time. There could be several other issues too where, owing to the origin of their thought in the works of decolonial thinkers, the Muslim Unapologetics might disagree with the Left and the liberals. If it is so, they ought to publicly and vocally explain their standpoint instead of keeping silent and letting the Islamists speak on their behalf. Or worse, by beginning to speak the language and tone of Islamists themselves.

All political struggles are inevitably based on social realities. A social reality of the Indian subcontinent is that the masses are generally swayed by emotional appeals based on religion. Thus by portraying a political struggle as a religious one, the Muslim Unapologetics might gain some advantage in the short term. But they must realise that in the long term, they are contributing to making the Muslim masses regressive and thus even more incapable of dealing with the challenges of the 21st century. Moreover, they are condemning the Muslim masses to an ideology that, in the past hundred years, has done nothing except showing them hollow dreams of a Muslim revival.

Therein lies the significance of the Good Muslim-Bad Muslim debate. Though this debate has been used to unjustly target those labelled as ‘bad’ Muslims, something that must be protested against by people across the ideological spectrum, it is a very significant debate in the larger social context. More than anyone else, the debate is needed by Muslims themselves. The increasing political irrelevance of Muslims calls not just for an examination of external factors responsible for this state of affairs, but also a deep introspection of the community. This necessitates a constructive engagement with the Good Muslim-Bad Muslim debate.

By refusing such an engagement and by intermingling the political with the religious, the Muslim Unapologetics are not only pushing the Muslim community to further marginalisation but are also doing a disservice to their own goals. This is because they are mobilising the masses based on a discourse that is not theirs. History offers numerous examples of how political projects ultimately failed in their objectives when leaders ‘used’ religion to mobilise masses for political purposes. Instead of projecting their political goals as religious ones, the Muslim Unapologetics ought to educate the masses and help them differentiate between the religious and the political. Failure to do so will be a tragic long-term loss.

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Iqbal Salahkar