Communalism between 1920 and 1947 – Modern India – History DU Notes

THE RISE AND GROWTH OF COMUNALISM IN
INDIA BETWEEN 1920 AND 1947
The religious bigot considers me an infidel
And the infidel deems me to be Muslim!
-Muhammad Iqbal (1877-1938)

Communalism is the belief that people who follow the same religion have common secular interests,
that is, common political, economic, social, and cultural interests. Thus, such religion-based sociopolitical
communities are seen as the fundamental units of Indian society. (This was also how the
colonial state viewed Indian society.) These different communities are alleged to have their own
leaders. It is also understood that the secular interests of one religious community are dissimilar and
divergent from that of other communities. In the ultimate stage of communal ideology, the interests
of different communities are seen to be mutually incompatible, antagonistic and hostile. For some,
this represents the essentialist view of Indian society: Hindu-Muslim antagonism was thus
embedded in the historical logic of India. The proponents of the two-nation theory and of ‘Hindi,
Hindu, Hindustan’ belong to this group. However, there has been a historiographical shift from
essentialist to historicist beliefs. The construction of a ‘community’ cannot be dated before the
twentieth century. Gyanendra Pandey argues that communalism may be seen as a form of colonialist
knowledge. He believes that communalism and nationalism were part of the same discourse.
Communalism is a modern phenomenon. It emerged as the consequence of the emergence of modern
mass-based politics based on popular participation and mobilization. It is not uniquely Indian; it was
not an inevitable or inherent product of India’s peculiar historical and social development.
Communal consciousness arose as a result of the transformation of Indian society under the impact
of colonialism and the need to struggle against it.
Communal identities are often constructed around specifically religious (or ‘sacred’) symbols, such as
the issue of music before mosques, go korbani (‘cow slaughter’) or cow protection, the desecration of
idols, clashes over the observance of religious festivals, over ‘sacred space’ and ‘sacred time’. These
issues have often sparked off communal riots, and therefore, they have been assumed to be potent
symbols of communal identity. Sandra Freitag speaks of the construction of communal identity as
‘the process by which activists could isolate out of religious practice particular symbols and could
develop around these symbols an idiom, a specialized vocabulary, to express the vision of
community’. Gyanendra Pandey, however, points to the specifically colonial construction of riots
that such an approach unquestioningly accepts. Joya Chatterji cogently points out that most ‘sacred
symbols’ have generally emerged recently.
Voluntary communal organizations and propaganda by the print and publication media played an
important role in the rise and growth of communalism. Riots, rampant between 1920-47, provided
great scope for publicity and vilification. The politics of language and linguistic identity formed
another facet of the struggle for identities of communities bounded by religion. Perceptions of ‘self’
and ‘other’ that were already gaining ground were further strengthened. In the twentieth century,
with the expansion of the area of conflict especially post-1937, power struggles linked up with
struggles for identity. With the development of communal identities, conflicts were frozen and used
as propaganda to perpetuate the idea of communalism.
In the Marxist perspective, represented by Bipan Chandra and others, communalism was one of the
by-products of the colonial character of the Indian economy, of colonial underdevelopment. The
economic stagnation under colonial rule led to widespread unemployment. As a result there was
uneven economic development and intense competition for jobs, especially in the field of
government employment. Group identities such as caste, province, and religion were used to
enhance competitive capacity. The main appeal and social base of communalism lay among the
middle classes; in fact, it is seen as the logic of middle class nationalism. Stagnant agriculture
restricted opportunities in the countryside, and rural youth too competed for jobs. This widened the
social base of communalism to cover the rural upper strata of peasants and landlords. In this
framework communalism represented the ‘false consciousness’ of a section of the middle classes, who
were searching for short-term solutions to larger economic problems. Communalism often distorted
social tension and class conflict between exploiters and the exploited belonging to different religions
as communal conflict. It developed as a weapon of economically and politically reactionary social
classes and political forces. British rule and its policy of ‘divide and rule’ supported communalism
and used it to counter and weaken the growing national movement. The pronounced Hindu tinge in
much of nationalist thought and propaganda in the beginning of the twentieth century also
contributed to the growth of communalism.
The Marxist analysis highlights the uneven development of the middle classes, competition for jobs,
and communalization of the class structure. C.A. Bayly in his work on the pre-history of
communalism in north India argues for the slow decline of the Muslim service gentry of the qasbah
and the rise of the Hindu mercantile community of the ganj. On the other hand, Paul Brass and
Francis Robinson have shown how it was the threat of becoming backward, rather than
backwardness itself, which encouraged Muslims in UP to organize separately. Such writings have
nuanced the issue of uneven economic development and it is clear that there was no uniform decline
of the Muslim community. However uneven development continues to be a valid analytical tool.
Similarly the argument that class antagonism became communalized over a period of time and that
this was accentuated by the strategies of mobilization has also been qualified. Communalism was
understood to have radiated out from urban centers to the countryside. As Partha Chatterjee points
out while communalism as an ideology was imported into the countryside, ‘the very nature of
peasant consciousness…is religious.’ Religion to a peasant community provides ‘an ontology, an
epistemology… and a practical code of ethics.’ Such a community is more tolerant of insider
exploitation than outsider exploitation: in Bengal, Chatterjee posits, Muslim rent-receivers were
considered part of the peasant community whereas Hindu zamindars and talukdars were not.
Rafiuddin Ahmed in his study of the Bengal Muslims too argues for a complex record for the
evolution of Hindu-Muslim identities and relations in the countryside. He emphasizes the role of
revivalism and the process of ‘Ashrafisation’ that led to a neglect of popular syncretic culture.
In the nationalist perspective, the role of British policy in encouraging communalism is emphasized.
It is argued that the institutionalization of differences by colonial legislation allowed communities to
live in isolation. Muslim separatism and the fear of decline in position of Muslim elites are also
underscored. The nationalist perspective has been critiqued for downplaying the role of Hindu
communalism or majoritarianism, which is emphasized in the communitarian view.
The roots of communalism, both Hindu and Muslim, can be traced to the end of the nineteenth
century. In 1880s, Sir Syed Ahmed Khan counter posed communalism to the national movement
initiated by the foundation of the Indian National Congress in 1885. In 1907 the All India Muslim
League was founded as a loyalist, communal, and conservative political organization. In the face of
growing perception of the threat posed by a Hindu majority, the League raised the slogan of
separate Muslim interests, demanded separate electorates and safeguards for Muslims in
government services. Simultaneously, Hindu communalism was also being born. It found expression
in the anti-cow slaughter propaganda of the 1890s and the Hindi-Urdu controversy. The All India
Hindu Mahasabha was founded in 1915. The introduction of separate electorates in the Morley-
Minto Reforms of 1907 by the colonial state institutionalized communal differences. The system of
reservation of seats and weightage in legislatures, government services, educational institutions, etc.
also had the same consequences.
The Lucknow Pact of 1916 accepted separate electorates and the system of weightage and
reservation of seats for the minorities in the legislatures. Implicit was the Congress recognition of
communal politics. The years of the Khilafat- Non-Cooperation agitation (1920-22) marked a brief
phase of Hindu-Muslim unity. There was a resurgence of communalism post-1922. The League once
again became active; the Hindu Mahasabha was revived in 1923. Sangathan and shuddhi movements
among Hindus and tanzeem and tabligh movements among Muslims, for communal consolidation and
religious conversion emerged forcefully. The formation of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)
in 1925 was another landmark in communal politics. The Congress efforts to negotiate with Hindu,
Muslim, and Sikh communal leaders in the form of the Indian National Pact (1923), the C.R. Das
Pact (1923), and the Nehru Report (1928) proved a complete failure. By negotiating with communal
leaders, the Congress legitimized their politics and made them respectable. Likewise, Gandhi’s
‘Ram-Rahim’ approach and his initiative in the form of fasts did not improve deteriorating communal
relations.
However, despite the intensified activities of communal groups during the1920s, communalism was
not yet pervasive. Its social base remained narrow. The Communal Award (1932) and the elections
of 1937 altered this significantly. The Government of India Act of 1935 extended the franchise to
the upper stratum of peasants and granted provincial autonomy. The devolution of power enlarged
the scene of provincial politics to the national arena, and presented hitherto absent problems of
power sharing. The stakes of power were significantly raised in this scenario, since with the notion
of an All India Federation, center-state relations became important for the first time. The political
discourse post-1935 focused on this relationship. Conceptions of the nation-state, unitary
nationalism, and majority-minority communities now had to be addressed.
Anil Seal and Ayesha Jalal point out that separate electorates had shielded Muslim politicians from
appealing to a wide electorate. Prior to 1937, there was no perceived Congress threat. After 1937
communalism acquired a popular base. As a consequence of the growth of the national movement
and especially the Civil Disobedience movement (1930-34), the Congress emerged as the dominant
political force in the elections of 1937. In the United Provinces, Bihar, Bengal and the Punjab,
threatened by the Congress and the Left, various dominant groups – landlords and zamindars,
merchants and moneylenders – shifted their allegiance to communal forces. Communalism also
became, after 1937, the only political recourse of colonial authorities and their policy of divide and
rule. This was further accentuated by the outbreak of World War II and the subsequent resignation
of the Congress ministries in 1939. The League was recognized as the sole spokesman for Muslims
and given the power to veto any political settlement.
Farzana Shaikh argues that the evolution of ‘Muslim politics’ and ultimately the demand for
Pakistan were driven by a long history of ideas that saw the Muslims as an exclusive political entity
separate from others. She underlines the significance of the ideological dichotomies between Islam
and western liberalism that provide radically different images of society. According to Shaikh, an
awareness of the ideal of Muslim brotherhood, a belief in the superiority of Muslim culture, and
recognition of the belief that Muslims ought to live under Muslim governments provided the
ideological basis for ‘Muslim separatism’.
The United Provinces formed the heartland of Muslim culture – representative of high culture, adab,
and learning. Aligarh was an important educational center. UP also proved to be a breeding ground
for communalism. The League gained its earliest foothold in UP and the demand for Pakistan was
strongest here. The Hindi-Urdu controversy, anti-cow slaughter movement, and the role of the
Arya Samaj had contributed to the decline of the Urdu culture of elites. While the initial discourse of
the Arya Samaj had targeted sanatan dharma, over time the discourse came to center on Hindu
identity and community. Though not intended to be combative, the assertion of identity proved
divisive. The Hindi movement of the late nineteenth century was associated with a degree of
revivalism. It has been pointed out that the adoption of Hindustani in Devnagari may have helped
resolve the conflict of cultural identities in the early twentieth century. All these factors combined to
produce a sense of anxiety among the Muslims. Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, who began as a modernizer
and reformer of Islam later adopted a conservative stance due to social reasons of anxiety.
In the elections of 1937, the League was soundly defeated. In UP, the group was made to dissolve its
identity and join the Congress coalition, causing much social resentment.
William Gould, Gyanaendra Pandey and Mushirul Hasan have drawn attention to the preoccupation
of political groups with Hindu religiosity, which increased Muslim insecurity. A new approach to
resolve the communal impasse and draw Muslims into the Congress fold was pursued by the
Congress between 1937-39 in the form of the Muslim Mass Contact program. K.M. Ashraf was
placed at its helm. Newly mobilized groups like the Ahrars, the Khudai Khidmatgars, and the
Socialists spearheaded the program in NWFP and the Punjab. It had a significant impact upon
various groups in UP, Delhi, Bihar and Bengal. However, the failure of mass contact was evident in
the limited nature of Congress mobilization. Local Congress leaders showed limited enthusiasm;
they were interested in Muslim mass contact only up to the point that it did not upset their own
support base. The right wing within the Congress, in alliance with the Hindu Mahasabha proved to
be its strongest opponent. The Mass Contact campaign was Congress’s last serious attempt to
mobilize Muslims in a joint struggle against colonialism.
Colonial policies played an important role in the growth of communalism in the Punjab. The
province was acquired only in 1849, and was the largest recruiting ground for the British Indian
Army. David Gilmartin and Ian Talbot have explored the links between landlords, religious shrines
(dargahs), Sufi pirs and custodians (sajjda nashins) that helped the colonial state to consolidate its
power. The kinship group (biraderi), the Sufi religious network, and the relationship between the
landlord and his tenant clients formed the three traditional channels for mobilizing political support
in the Punjab countryside.
While religion was important in Punjab politics, the major factor was the rural-urban divide. The
sturdy peasant community was provided protection from urban moneylenders and merchants by the
Punjab Land Alienation Act (1901). The 1919 Montagu-Chalmsford Reforms completed the
institutionalization of the division between the province’s rural and urban communities. Rural elites,
cutting across communities, were organized into the Punjab Unionist Party in 1923 by the efforts of
Chhotu Ram and Fazl-i-Husain. This development was peculiar to the Punjab. Muslim landlords
dominated provincial politics post-1919, and unlike the UP Muslims, they were not insecure of their
power base. There was a phenomenal growth of the Muslim League in Punjab between 1937-47,
taking over the support base of its rival, the Unionist Party. This was made possible by winning
over the support of the landlords and pirs who controlled the socio-political networks of power and
had earlier supported the Unionists. Communalism in the Punjab was also shaped by the presence of
three religious communities: Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs. From the early twentieth century, Punjab
witnessed a movement for Sikh revivalism – eg: the Singh Sabhas – and assertion of an identity
autonomous of Hindu affiliations. The Punjab was also the stronghold of the Arya Samaj movement.
In Bengal, it is argued that communal conflicts were not typical of the region. Violence was
allegedly imported from the Hindustani-speaking belt. This is an exaggeration. Late nineteenth
century Bengal witnessed the spirit of Hindu and Muslim revivalism, represented in works like
Bankimchandra’s Anandmath, and movements like Wahabi and Farazi. As discussed earlier, Partha
Chatterjee has pointed to the religious consciousness of the peasantry. The focus in most works has
been on the growth of Muslim separatism. The issue of ‘music before mosques’ became especially
explosive from the 1920s. The Praja (or tenants) movement gathered force. C.R. Das’s death in
1925, widespread Hindu-Muslim riots in 1926-27, and the 1928 amendment to the Bengal Tenancy
Act further radicalized the situation. The All Bengal Praja Samiti was formed in 1929 (known as the
Krishak Praja Party from 1936) and emerged as a major player in Bengal politics. It formed a
coalition ministry with the Muslim League in 1937, but failed to enact radical reforms. The failure
of Fazlul Huq’s KPP led to a sudden shift in popular support to the Muslim League, under the
energetic leadership of Suhrawardy, which swept the 1946 elections. Suranjan Das traces the growth
of communal identities and politics in Bengal over a period of time. He argues for a progressive
development of communalism from 1930s, to 1946 (the Great Calcutta Killing), to 1947 (Partition of
Bengal).
Joya Chatterji, on the other hand, has emphasized the growth of Hindu communalism in bhadralok
politics after the Communal Award (1932). She explores the reorientation of bhadralok politics from
nationalism to communalism. The bhadralok movement had a narrow social base and was shunned
by the Muslims of Bengal. The self-image of the bhadralok as a cultured and enlightened class, heir
to the ‘Bengal Renaissance’, and standard bearer of progress and modernity, in the 1930s-40s,
served to justify the demand that Hindus should continue to dominate Bengal, and eventually that
Bengal be partitioned. This self-perception promoted a powerful sense of cultural superiority over
the Muslims of Bengal, who were numerically superior. Under Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyaya, there
was an attempt to forge a greater Hindu political community by reaching out to lower caste Hindus
and tribes. After the Communal Award and Poona Pact, sangathan and shuddhi took on a new
significance. The Hindu Mahasabha became very active from the 1930s. This culminated in an
organized and well- supported campaign among Hindus for the partition of Bengal in 1946-47.
Though Partition is generally believed to have been a consequence of Muslim separatism, in Bengal,
Hindus evolved a parallel separatism of their own.
Revisionist writings have emphasized the alternative choice of linguistic identity available to
Bengalis. Such arguments are relevant in the analysis of the United Bengal Plan put forth by Sarat
Chandra Bose in 1947. However, by then violence had probably polarized the religious communities
too far.
The political developments of 1937-47 led to further polarization between communities, and by
1947, Partition was accepted by the Congress. The Lahore Resolution of 1940 in nationalist
accounts is portrayed as the call for Pakistan. Ayesha Jalal has contested this perception. She argues
that the resolution called for autonomous zones in the northwest and the east. According to her,
Jinnah did not want Partition. He wished to safeguard the interests of the Muslims in the minority
provinces of UP and Bihar by using the strong position of the Muslims in the majority provinces of
Bengal and Bihar. This could only be achieved by emphasizing the fear of Hindu domination and
raising the cry of ‘Islam in danger’. In the general elections of 1946-47 the Congress did extremely
well in the Hindu constituencies, but it failed to substantiate its claims to represent the Muslims of
India. The Muslim League attracted the majority of the Muslim votes at the center and the
provinces. However, communalism intensified in the 1940s, and restricted the choices for national
leaders. The call for Direct Action by the League in 1946 was the final seal.
Ayesha Jalal aims at exploring and interpreting the historical processes through which the
relationship between the Muslim individual and community of Islam was reconfigured in colonial
South Asia. She reconceptualizes the formation of religiously informed identities by using a
communitarian model. She problematizes the relationship between colonialism and assertions of
cultural differences in a context where there were competing definitions of identity and multiple
claims to nationhood. Jalal repudiates the opposition between ‘communalism’ and ‘nationalism’ that
dominates South Asian historiography. For her, ‘the pejorative connotations of ‘communalism’
implies that all assertions of cultural difference in the face of a rational and inclusionary nationalism
are bigoted and therefore illegitimate’. She questions the validity of the notion of ‘Muslim
separatism’ at a time when the idea of an Indian nation was itself in the process of being forged,
negotiated and contested. The nationalist narratives authored by Hindus and Muslims of different
regions and classes displayed considerable variety and evoked multiple visions of nationhood. In her
opinion, what has been branded ‘separatism’ may well represent exclusion on the part of that variant
of the nationalist discourse that rose to apposition of dominance. Jalal argues that Indian Muslims in
certain regions displayed a healthy skepticism of an inclusionary nationalism unable to shed the
premises of its religious majoritarianism.
In traditional nationalist accounts, the blame for the growth of communalism is firmly placed on
‘Muslim separatism’ and Jinnah and the League. Jalal has attempted to question and revise this
position. The emergence of communalism may probably be located in the varied attempts at
imagining different visions of the larger national community, and the discrepancies between these
visions. Stepping away from purely historical concerns, perhaps the significance of twentieth
century communalism lies in its legacy for post-colonial India, which appears at regular intervals in
contemporary Indian society and politics – be it the case of Ramjanmabhoomi/Ayodhya or
communal violence in Gujrat. The unsettled relationship between ‘nationalism’ and ‘communalism’,
‘self’ and ‘other’ continues.