New gods for old
Jayalalithaa's anti-conversion law causes political polarisation. Not since Meenakshipuram has the issue so gripped Tamil society.
Arun Ram
November 18, 2002 | UPDATED 15:22 IST
A +A -
Some 15 km from Tenkasi, a little town in south Tamil Nadu, a muddy road winds into green obscurity. A few hundred metres down, Meenakshipuram suddenly emerges. The first structure that greets you is a mosque - green, white and grey. And then, a group of Muslims - dark faces with greying beards. Converts, as some people call them.
"Yes, I converted to Islam," says Sheik Madar Sahib, 61, who was Chelliah, a Dalit Hindu, till February 19, 1981. "And I am proud of my decision. No law can stop such a conversion. Go and ask your prime minister if I am right."
Atal Bihari Vajpayee should know better. For he was among those who descended on Meenakshipuram in 1981 to woo back the 150 families that had shunned Hinduism to embrace Islam. Religious conversion came right into national consciousness.
Two decades on, it has only got renewed vigour. As the controversy over the Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Forcible Conversion of Religion Act, Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa's brainchild, continues, Meenakshipuram showcases a lesson: conversion is mostly a form of protest, sometimes a solution, rarely forced and virtually irreversible.
"Forcible?" Madar Sahib frowns, the scar - a mark of faith and five-times-a-day namaz - on his wrinkled forehead protruding. "Aamaam (yes), I was forced... forced by the upper-caste Hindus to run away from a system that treated me like a street dog."
The tales of woe of the likes of Madar Sahib are long and harrowing. In the late 1970s, 20-year-old Karuppusamy was beaten black and blue for wearing chappals. He became Abdul. Around the same time, a young boy, Bharathan, was served tea in a coconut shell, while upper-caste boys used glass tumblers.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa
Bharathan selected a name for himself - Umar Abdullah. But he could not convert: "We did not belong to Meenakshipuram and my parents insisted that I should remain a Hindu. Had I not been dependent on them, I would have converted."
Jayalalithaa, however, tries to be clear. "See," she told a delegation of minority leaders that called on her before the bill was introduced in the state Assembly, "this legislation is not aimed at any particular religion. It applies to everyone. It will only deal with forcible conversions. So why do you worry?"
Why such a law now? The Justice Venugopal inquiry commission was set up after the Meenakshipuram conversions. In 1986, it recommended a law that banned forcible conversion. M.G. Ramachandran, chief minister then, nodded in approval but shelved the decision. Now, Jayalalithaa, MGR's heir, has given it a new life.
"Jayalalithaa is playing to the Sangh Parivar galleries," says M.H. Jawahirullah, president of the Tamil Nadu Muslim Munnetra Kazhagam. "This law could be misused to torture the minorities." Adds Bishop Devasagayam, head of the Anglican Church of South India: "Within three days of this Act coming into force, a church has been burnt down at Madipakkam in Chennai. A complaint was filed against a pastor for an alleged conversion that happened years ago."
The protest got a major thrust when almost all major minorities' organisations, Dalit groups and political parties, barring the BJP and the AIADMK, participated in a demonstration in Chennai on October 24. Addressing the meeting, DMK leader M. Karunanidhi roared, "Conversions like that in Meenakshipuram happen because Dalits are being tortured by upper-caste Hindus. Why do they still practise the two-tumbler system (where Dalits are served tea in separate tumblers or coconut shells)?"
COMMON CAUSE: Karunanidhi (centre) with the leaders of various minority and opposition groups at the Chennai demonstration against the anti-conversion law
Hindu groups organised a counter meeting at Marina beach on October 31, the day the bill was passed by the Assembly. The star speaker was Kanchi Shankaracharya Jayendra Saraswathi. "Why this hue and cry over the Act?" he asked. "Conversion by conviction is not wrong, but conversion by force or allurement is definitely an of fence."
The Shankaracharya was, however, evasive on atrocities against Dalits. "Every section of Hindu is assigned a job according to their qualification." When INDIA TODAY asked who fixed the qualification, the pontiff turned aggressive: "We fix it."
And that is what drives Dalits to conversion. Says Abdul Rahim, who was part of the mass conversion in Meenakshipuram: "All we needed was self-respect. There was no force from Muslims. Nor were there any inducements."
This is fiercely refuted by K.S. Anantharamaseshan, who led the reconversion efforts in Meenakshipuram with the help of the Arya Samaj. "Money changed hands. And that was the only purpose for conversions. We reasoned with the families and won at least 30 of them back," he says.
The "Official Report of the Director of SC/ST, Government of India, on the Meenakshipuram Conversions" reads otherwise: "The converted Harijans categorically said that it was they who approached the Muslims first... They went to Tirunelveli and approached the Muslim leaders to allow them to join Islam; their elders have been thinking of converting to Islam for the past 20 years. The converts contributed Rs 41,000 for their conversion ceremony."
MEMORIES OF MEENAKSHIPURAM
SPIRITUAL DEFENCE: Shankaracharya Jayendra Saraswathi addressing the anti-conversion meet
SHEIK MADAR SAHIB (above right) converted to Islam in 1981. His was among 150 Dalit Hindu families that embraced a faith they saw as more egalitarian. Twenty years on, despite only a marginal change in economic status, Madar feels his dignity is better protected.
Have conversions proved a solution to oppression? Yes and no. If it was self-respect the Dalits sought, they have got it to a degree. Says Mohammed Mustafa Khan, who is 90 and converted at 69: "Upper-caste people, even children, used to call me derogatory names. Now, as a Muslim, I am addressed as thatha (grandpa). That's all I want."
Yet conversions have not significantly changed economic conditions in Meenakshipuram. Landless labourers remain just that. Some converts have found jobs in the Gulf region, thanks to "friendly Muslims". And Chelliah the farm labourer has become Madar Sahib the bunk shop owner. Bishop Devasagayam points out, "The government withdraws all concessions and benefits to the SCs and STs the moment they convert. This nullifies the gain."
But does conversion to Christianity truly enable one to climb the social ladder? "It is a fact that a Hindu Dalit, after conversion, ends up being a Dalit Christian," says Bharathan. Bishop Devasagayam admits, "This is an unfortunate influence of Hinduism on minority religions. But note the difference. In Christianity, discrimination is an aberration and a practice against the spirit of the religion, while in Hinduism, it is the theory and practice."
Anantharamaseshan finds this insulting to a versatile religion, "There was discrimination in Hinduism. But lower-caste youth nowadays are not fools. They know their rights and demand them. Times have changed. The only thing that triggers conversion is inducement."
Inducement is one term the Act stresses on. This has raised the question of whether education or medicare provided by a church can be considered an inducement. Notes Father Peter A. Abir, deputy secretary of the Tamil Nadu Catholic Bishop's Council: "If providing education is an inducement, many political leaders, including Jayalalithaa, who studied in convent schools should have been converted to Christianity. This Government has introduced the temple meal scheme. Is it an inducement?"
Jayalalithaa is unmoved by these questions. Already BJP President M. Venkaiah Naidu has suggested that other state governments think of similar laws. The idea that the lady is moving closer to the BJP, while Karunanidhi drifts away, is only gaining ground.
Meanwhile, unmindful of the greater political alignments, Meenakshipuram is at peace with itself. Madar Sahib sells "Noor Biriyani Masala" for Rs 2 a sachet to Azaruddin and "Lakshmi Agarbathi" to Duppiah. Mohammed Ismail, who converted at the age of eight, teaches Arabic at the Meenakshipuram madarsa.
The muddy track winds back onto the main road. Bare-chested children play near a dilapidated mandapam and a defunct school built by the Arya Samaj in 1981 as a memory of a re-conversion that never happened.
Jayalalithaa's anti-conversion law causes political polarisation. Not since Meenakshipuram has the issue so gripped Tamil society.
Arun Ram
November 18, 2002 | UPDATED 15:22 IST
A +A -
Some 15 km from Tenkasi, a little town in south Tamil Nadu, a muddy road winds into green obscurity. A few hundred metres down, Meenakshipuram suddenly emerges. The first structure that greets you is a mosque - green, white and grey. And then, a group of Muslims - dark faces with greying beards. Converts, as some people call them.
"Yes, I converted to Islam," says Sheik Madar Sahib, 61, who was Chelliah, a Dalit Hindu, till February 19, 1981. "And I am proud of my decision. No law can stop such a conversion. Go and ask your prime minister if I am right."
Atal Bihari Vajpayee should know better. For he was among those who descended on Meenakshipuram in 1981 to woo back the 150 families that had shunned Hinduism to embrace Islam. Religious conversion came right into national consciousness.
Two decades on, it has only got renewed vigour. As the controversy over the Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Forcible Conversion of Religion Act, Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa's brainchild, continues, Meenakshipuram showcases a lesson: conversion is mostly a form of protest, sometimes a solution, rarely forced and virtually irreversible.
"Forcible?" Madar Sahib frowns, the scar - a mark of faith and five-times-a-day namaz - on his wrinkled forehead protruding. "Aamaam (yes), I was forced... forced by the upper-caste Hindus to run away from a system that treated me like a street dog."
The tales of woe of the likes of Madar Sahib are long and harrowing. In the late 1970s, 20-year-old Karuppusamy was beaten black and blue for wearing chappals. He became Abdul. Around the same time, a young boy, Bharathan, was served tea in a coconut shell, while upper-caste boys used glass tumblers.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa
Bharathan selected a name for himself - Umar Abdullah. But he could not convert: "We did not belong to Meenakshipuram and my parents insisted that I should remain a Hindu. Had I not been dependent on them, I would have converted."
Jayalalithaa, however, tries to be clear. "See," she told a delegation of minority leaders that called on her before the bill was introduced in the state Assembly, "this legislation is not aimed at any particular religion. It applies to everyone. It will only deal with forcible conversions. So why do you worry?"
Why such a law now? The Justice Venugopal inquiry commission was set up after the Meenakshipuram conversions. In 1986, it recommended a law that banned forcible conversion. M.G. Ramachandran, chief minister then, nodded in approval but shelved the decision. Now, Jayalalithaa, MGR's heir, has given it a new life.
"Jayalalithaa is playing to the Sangh Parivar galleries," says M.H. Jawahirullah, president of the Tamil Nadu Muslim Munnetra Kazhagam. "This law could be misused to torture the minorities." Adds Bishop Devasagayam, head of the Anglican Church of South India: "Within three days of this Act coming into force, a church has been burnt down at Madipakkam in Chennai. A complaint was filed against a pastor for an alleged conversion that happened years ago."
The protest got a major thrust when almost all major minorities' organisations, Dalit groups and political parties, barring the BJP and the AIADMK, participated in a demonstration in Chennai on October 24. Addressing the meeting, DMK leader M. Karunanidhi roared, "Conversions like that in Meenakshipuram happen because Dalits are being tortured by upper-caste Hindus. Why do they still practise the two-tumbler system (where Dalits are served tea in separate tumblers or coconut shells)?"
COMMON CAUSE: Karunanidhi (centre) with the leaders of various minority and opposition groups at the Chennai demonstration against the anti-conversion law
Hindu groups organised a counter meeting at Marina beach on October 31, the day the bill was passed by the Assembly. The star speaker was Kanchi Shankaracharya Jayendra Saraswathi. "Why this hue and cry over the Act?" he asked. "Conversion by conviction is not wrong, but conversion by force or allurement is definitely an of fence."
The Shankaracharya was, however, evasive on atrocities against Dalits. "Every section of Hindu is assigned a job according to their qualification." When INDIA TODAY asked who fixed the qualification, the pontiff turned aggressive: "We fix it."
And that is what drives Dalits to conversion. Says Abdul Rahim, who was part of the mass conversion in Meenakshipuram: "All we needed was self-respect. There was no force from Muslims. Nor were there any inducements."
This is fiercely refuted by K.S. Anantharamaseshan, who led the reconversion efforts in Meenakshipuram with the help of the Arya Samaj. "Money changed hands. And that was the only purpose for conversions. We reasoned with the families and won at least 30 of them back," he says.
The "Official Report of the Director of SC/ST, Government of India, on the Meenakshipuram Conversions" reads otherwise: "The converted Harijans categorically said that it was they who approached the Muslims first... They went to Tirunelveli and approached the Muslim leaders to allow them to join Islam; their elders have been thinking of converting to Islam for the past 20 years. The converts contributed Rs 41,000 for their conversion ceremony."
MEMORIES OF MEENAKSHIPURAM
SPIRITUAL DEFENCE: Shankaracharya Jayendra Saraswathi addressing the anti-conversion meet
SHEIK MADAR SAHIB (above right) converted to Islam in 1981. His was among 150 Dalit Hindu families that embraced a faith they saw as more egalitarian. Twenty years on, despite only a marginal change in economic status, Madar feels his dignity is better protected.
Have conversions proved a solution to oppression? Yes and no. If it was self-respect the Dalits sought, they have got it to a degree. Says Mohammed Mustafa Khan, who is 90 and converted at 69: "Upper-caste people, even children, used to call me derogatory names. Now, as a Muslim, I am addressed as thatha (grandpa). That's all I want."
Yet conversions have not significantly changed economic conditions in Meenakshipuram. Landless labourers remain just that. Some converts have found jobs in the Gulf region, thanks to "friendly Muslims". And Chelliah the farm labourer has become Madar Sahib the bunk shop owner. Bishop Devasagayam points out, "The government withdraws all concessions and benefits to the SCs and STs the moment they convert. This nullifies the gain."
But does conversion to Christianity truly enable one to climb the social ladder? "It is a fact that a Hindu Dalit, after conversion, ends up being a Dalit Christian," says Bharathan. Bishop Devasagayam admits, "This is an unfortunate influence of Hinduism on minority religions. But note the difference. In Christianity, discrimination is an aberration and a practice against the spirit of the religion, while in Hinduism, it is the theory and practice."
Anantharamaseshan finds this insulting to a versatile religion, "There was discrimination in Hinduism. But lower-caste youth nowadays are not fools. They know their rights and demand them. Times have changed. The only thing that triggers conversion is inducement."
Inducement is one term the Act stresses on. This has raised the question of whether education or medicare provided by a church can be considered an inducement. Notes Father Peter A. Abir, deputy secretary of the Tamil Nadu Catholic Bishop's Council: "If providing education is an inducement, many political leaders, including Jayalalithaa, who studied in convent schools should have been converted to Christianity. This Government has introduced the temple meal scheme. Is it an inducement?"
Jayalalithaa is unmoved by these questions. Already BJP President M. Venkaiah Naidu has suggested that other state governments think of similar laws. The idea that the lady is moving closer to the BJP, while Karunanidhi drifts away, is only gaining ground.
Meanwhile, unmindful of the greater political alignments, Meenakshipuram is at peace with itself. Madar Sahib sells "Noor Biriyani Masala" for Rs 2 a sachet to Azaruddin and "Lakshmi Agarbathi" to Duppiah. Mohammed Ismail, who converted at the age of eight, teaches Arabic at the Meenakshipuram madarsa.
The muddy track winds back onto the main road. Bare-chested children play near a dilapidated mandapam and a defunct school built by the Arya Samaj in 1981 as a memory of a re-conversion that never happened.
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