RELIGIOUS EXTREMISM IN INDIA

Submitted By-

DIVYA BASAN - 16010324322

BBA LLB

Section- D

Symbiosis Law School, Hyderabad

Symbiosis International University, PUNE

In

MARCH 2018

Under the Guidance of

Sukhvinder Singh Dari

 CERTIFICATE
The Project entitled, “Religious extremism in India” submitted to the Symbiosis Law School,
Hyderabad as part of internal assessment is based on my original work carried out under the
guidance of Prof. Sukhvinder Dari. The research work has not been submitted elsewhere for
award of any degree.

The material borrowed from other sources and incorporated in the thesis has been duly
acknowledged.

I understand that I could be held responsible and accountable for plagiarism, if any, detected
later on.

Signature of the candidates

DIVYA BASAN – 16010324322

 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Before we get into thick of things, we would like to add a few words of appreciation for the
people who have been a part of this project right from its inception. The writing of this project
has been one of the significant academic challenges we have faced and without the support,
patience and guidance of the people involved, this task would not have been completed. It is to
them we owe my deepest gratitude.

It gives us immense pleasure in presenting this project report on “Religious extremism in

India””.The success of this project is a result of sheer hard work, and determination put in by me
with the help of my project guide. We hereby take this opportunity to add a special note of
thanks for my Professor, Dr Sukhvinder Dari who undertook to act as my mentor despite their
many other academic and professional commitments. Their wisdom, knowledge, and
commitment to the highest standards inspired and motivated me. Without their insight, support
and energy, this project wouldn’t have started and neither would have reached fruitfulness.

We also feel heartiest sense of obligation to my library sir & ma’am, and other staff members,
who helped me in collection of data and resource material and also in its processing as well as in
drafting manuscript. The project is detailed to all those people, who helped me while doing this
project
 INDEX
SL NO TOPIC PAGE NO

1 INTRODUCTION 5

2 RESEARCH OUESTIONS 6

3 HYPOTHESIS 7

4 RULE AGAINST BIAS 8

5 RULE OF FAIR HEARING 12

6 NATURAL JUSTICE AND CONSTITUITON OF INDIA 15

7 CONCLUSION 16

8 BIBLIOGRAPHY 18
 RELIGIOUS EXTREMISM

ABSTRACT

It is of no surprise that ever since India’s liberation, various governments have tried to project
and outline the image of India as that of a secular nation or a progressive secular nation rather,
that upholds equal rights for all religious minorities. The fact remains that this projection deems
to be incomplete and rather today, we are broiled with deep rooted fanatics that proclaim to be
the self-appointed religious leaders who spin the vicious cycle of violence to promote their own
personal and largely political agendas. It would be rather unfair to point fingers and bring such
extremism under the garb of one religion. Infact, extremist as they claim, are a part of every
religion. Through the course of this article, the author aims to analyzesuch deem rooted cause
for extremism and explore as to how it has been spun via different religions respectively.
Further, this article also deems to challenge the conventional norms and violent views of
religious extremism. The author via the present article aims to establish that there exists a nexus
between religion and politics wherein the agenda remains to batter secularism and democracy.

Through the

INTRODUCTION

The phrase "religious extremism" describes faith-based actions that are deliberate attempts to
cause harm to other people. It includes violent religious movements, routine asceticism that is
extreme enough to cause a vicious cycle that spurs violence and creates hostility in the nation.
Religious tolerance, multiculturalism and equality are the particular targets of extremists. This
idea stems from the fact that their own religion provides guidance that trumps any secular law or
any concept of human rights.

Further, every country spews movements that breed the occasional extremist and the horrifying
spectres of oppression and violent coercion. India as a nation does not stand alone when it comes
to religious violence. However, the growing intolerance with respect to religion poses a threating
situation that needs to be tackled with extreme sensitivity. During the independence era, it was
urged that India be a nation that is devoid of any religion. It should be a nation that promotes
inclusivity and violence on the basis of any religion would remain intolerable. Strengthening,
this very notion, various governments have tried to establish an image wherein, India stands
devoid of any intolerance with respect to religion and considers secularism as its primary
strength and importance. In other words, with respect to India, the declining strength of religion
in the face of secularization means there are fewer middle-ground religionists to rein in
extremists.

However, despite such ideologies of its origin, India witnessed various events that accounted to
religious extremism starting from the period of Independence. Its growing intensity culminated
in the 1980s and 1990s and further toppled in Gujarat 2002, Orissa, 2008 and Muzaffarnagar
riots in 2013. Some of the incidents though considered to be the darkest chapter in the history of
Independent India such as he 1984 riots remains uninvestigated wherein the political leaders
enjoy full leverage and escape the liability of law. It is imperative to understand that often
instrumentalized for political gains, communal violence draws and exacerbates a climate of
discrimination against India’s religious minorities with far reaching social, cultural and political
dimensions. Sometimes such discriminations extends to the majoritarian population as well.

The author of the current article firmly believes that a finger cannot be pointed at a specific
religion and just because such a religion belongs to the majoritarian population and self
proclaimed leaders exist in every religion that spur violence and hatred. Their authority often
remains unquestionable and ignored by the general population. Thus it is imperative to question
such authorities.

The aim of the author via the present research paper is to analyse what attributes to religious
extremisim and further draw a parallel between growing political scenario and religion in India
respectively. By virtue of this, the two research questions are as follows;

RESEARCH QUESTIONS

1) What are the causes that attribute to religious extremism?

2) Is there a nexus between Religion and Politics pertaining to religious extremism in India?

ANALYSIS

Pertaining to the first research question, The author of the article has broadly narrowed down the
causes into two namely;

(a) Personal cause

(b) Social cause.
PERSONAL CAUSE.

1) RADICALISMS AND FUNDAMENTALISM.

The idea or notion to engage in violence originating from religion has its first fundamental roots
via personal attributes. Views that are largely aligned and varied with self proclaimed leaders of
religion who claim to know the know-how of religion and brain wash people into thinking that
questioning their authority would amount to going against the religion and thereby, disrespecting
it plays an imperative role in development of such form of extremism in the minds of people.
Thus, influence of radicalists who use the platform of social media and various other portals to
brain wash the general public of the notion and use religion as a card to sprew the cycle of hatred
ultimately contributes to extremism in India.
2) BROKEN FAMILIES
It is of no surprise that the factor of broken families play an imperative role in religious
extremism as well. In the modern globalized world, people migrate and move faster than
communal ties solidify. Therefore, the pace and some of the negative effects of globalisation can
produce disaffected individuals with fewer reasons to behave well towards others around them.

3) PERSONAL CIRCUMSTANCES

Personal circumstances and personal psychology place a large role. So large, that the literature
on what causes extremism is wild with speculation, but has not yet produced any formulaic or
practical predictions about which individuals in particular will turn into extremists. It is
important to note that "other reasons" and "something personal" is perhaps the most important
factor to take into account. It means admitting that it is difficult to guess why Humans go down
any one bad instead of any other. Some theorize that religions are uniquely placed to encourage
people into violence; others argue that religions are uniquely placed to stop radicalization.

SOCIAL CAUSES

1) REACTIONS TO MULTICULTURALISM
Religion is often used as a collective political and racial identity regardless of whether people
agree with the actual tenets of a religion. To be a proper member of an ethnic group in many
cases means adopting a certain religion. Or the opposite - some people join a symbolic
opposition religion to signal rebellion and dissatisfaction with their own community. Studies
have found that many people join a religion not because they agree with its theological
arguments, but because religion endows "people with an enhanced sense of solidarity to advance
collective, often political intentions". Migration is often a trigger for adopting a religion.

This works in two ways, together called "cultural transition and defence" by sociologist Steve
Bruce:

(1) Once removed from a community that they come to miss, some adopt a religion common in
that community as a way of boosting their identification with it, regardless of whether they have
started believing in the tenets of the faith.

(2) When faced with immigration, some take up more extreme forms of what they perceive to be
the 'proper' religion of their own culture.

“The very fact of being challenged means that those who do choose to believe will often do so
with an intensity and enthusiasm which would have surprised those of early periods who simply
took their faith for granted. As we see in the efforts of the Methodists or the Scottish Free
Church evangelicals, the challenge to evangelize can inspire a powerful movement, but what is
gained in individual intensity is lost in background affirmation. Becoming religious is attended
by more dramatic behaviour consequences, but fewer people do it. There are now more zealots
but fewer believers.”
"Religion in the Modern World: From Cathedrals to Cults" by Steve Bruce (1996)

2) SECULARISATION

The move of much of the developed world to a non-religious outlook has seen nation-states and
institutions embrace technology, science and evidence-based logic instead of revelation. Those
with a fundamentalist bent have clung to religion all the more tightly. As there are far fewer
middle-ground religionists who can reign them in, extremist groups are growing in
power within most established religions, as well as forming brand new movements of their own.
They find themselves in frequent battles with those of the world who do not share their views on
life. Fundamentalists, and many other religious folk, raise many elements of human behaviour to
matters of eternal life-or-death, and, consider some areas of life completely taboo, and consider
some symbols so sacred that they will not tolerate any criticism of them. The slip into extremism
is natural.

3) POOR GOVERNANCE

In those places of the world where government forces are fighting wars against irregular
enemies, there is a frequent refrain from military analysts: A side-effect of harming members of
communities is that survivors sometimes become radicalized even if they were previously
tolerant because the effect on their families and loved ones. For instance, consider the USA's
infamous air-based "shock and awe" technique involves the widespread (targeted) use of using
long-distance missiles. But critics have spoken out loudly about the negative psychological effect
of those who live near such attacks - many of those signing up for extremist Islamic movements
have cited air strikes as the reason that they personally chose to embrace violent ideology.

4) NEGATIVE REACTION TO A DOMINANT CULTURE AND MODERNISM

On the personal scale: There have been violent extremists who have emerged from stable
families that are not poor, who were undergoing good education in the West, who simply seem to
have taken a morbid dislike of their surrounding culture. This aspect largely revolves around
various circumstances and situations that hamper the narrative of peace and insinuate violence
against their very own people.

On the subcultural scale: There are communities of believers who use religious texts to
convince each other that increasingly antagonistic methods are warranted, because they perceive
themselves as living in an unworthy, hostile or decadent culture. If the local culture is against
them and little they do sways public opinion, it is all the more likely that they'll no longer
attempt a friendly approach.
On the cultural scale: It is a very common refrain amongst strict traditional religionists that
they perceive the majority of the West to be marching down a liberal route that they simply
condemn and abhor. From individual rights to equality and tolerance, and the moving of religion
to the private sphere rather than the public, some cultures hate it all.

With the advent of understanding the causes the promulgate religious extremism, it is imperative
to identify such extremists notions in India and acertain whether there politics and violence thus
incurred go in tandem or not. The author would be dealing with the second research question
with an aim to establish a form of link between politics that thereby insinuate religious
extremism.

Now, while India’s Constitution is ideally regarded as a progressive pillar that establishes
secularism as a strong principle against discrimination, there have been numerous instances
wherein such principles have been undermined by abusing various political measures and hatred
has been spread via religion. Nevertheless, the provisions in the Indian constitution have
guaranteed the right of country’s diverse population to hold their religious freedoms respectively.

Overall it is safe to say that constitutional provisions and laws in place provide a framework to
protect the rights of religious minorities and address communal violence. However,
optimizalition of these policies through legislation is limited. Often, for various votebank
politics, the people in power abuse this right and spin hatred. This has been evident in numerous
instances wherein violnence emerged via religious tolerance for political and personal agendas.

The recent events amounting to lynching of various citizens over cow slaughter if an issue that is
often misued and misrepresented by the politicians in the country to divide and promote their
vote bank tactics. Rather than offering a palpable solution, often people seem divided over
religion to spread hatred and promote propaganda. The erupting violence in the Muzzaffarnagar
riots is once such instance of political failure that insinuated violence via extremism.

There can be named various instances wherein, religious extremism was used as a pawn and
played via politics. One such incident that continues to remain the darkest chapter in the history
of independent India is that of 1984 riots wherein a minority pollution ie the Sikhs were targeted
after the assassination of the then prime minister, Indira Gandhi. This was done in the name of
religion and was often sidelined by the media because it targeted a minority population. Various
other incidents that mark the same intensity have occurred and the reason behind such stems
from political power play and failure to take into cognizance rationality by promoting hatred via
religion instead.