Counter Blog: Jamia prof reacts to Ashutosh's blog

A QUESTION OF IDENTITY: Protests at Jamia Millia Islamia after the encounter.

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(....Time has come to make sane majority voice powerful and loud enough to frighten tiny minority... Editor-in-Chief IBN-7, Ashutosh, wrote this blog on September 28 after the Jamia encounter. Following is a response from Aalam Anwar, Professor at Jamia Millia Islamia)

I am sad to see a piece by my friend, Ashutosh, on ‘Jamia Encounter’. Sad more, because when a person is a ‘public person’, his opinion matters and influences other minds.

Therefore I have to reply to his provocative journalistic piece. Certainly we have grown up together and it is also true that despite our differences in understanding the social phenomenon, we remain friend. The conflict of approach has not marred our close relationship. My response to your piece will not be based merely on what you have stated in your blog but also informal discussion that you had with me in the context of Jamia episode.

What you wrote smacks a kind of public sobriety posture that does not allow you to retain the same content, structure of languages, metaphor and rhetoric in the public domain that you articulated internally. A part of the problem of your piece lies in this dualism.

I share your anguish, frustration and helplessness that result from our failure to fight back the menace of terrorism. It is sad that you see our reaction to Jamia episode as ‘Muslim’ and not as ‘citizen’ and very quickly put me along with M J Akbar in the company of Maududi and Osama Bin Laden.

This is nothing but a worst kind of generalisation that does not hold any ground. I would not go as far as putting you and Togadia in the same box because I recognise the subtle differences between the two even while both share the broad spectrum of same discourse.

I do not claim myself as liberal Muslim, it is others that choose this label to brand a person like me. I was born in a Muslim family and hence having a Muslim identity. Beyond this there is nothing.

Ashu knows this well. Interestingly he also retains the right to decide when I act as Muslim and when I act as citizen. Since he happens to born with Hindu identity he never bothered to know whether his action amounts to ‘Hindu action’ or ‘Indian’ or ‘citizen’ action. Hindu, India and citizen are all synonymous for him. After all, religious minority in any society has to shoulder the burden of proving loyalty to the ‘majoritarian’ nation. It is this problematic that forces Ashu to consider Jamia Millia Islamia as ‘Muslim university’ and then classified the reaction of a group of Jamia teachers as ‘Muslim’, despite the fact a good number of teachers at JMI has ‘Hindu Identity’ and was at the forefront in articulating the response of a group of Jamia teachers.

Should Ashu then consider Banaras Hindu University as primarily a ‘Hindu University’ and would classify the response of a group of BHU teachers as ‘Hindu reaction’ if something similar happens in that university or its neighbourhood? Probably not.

Ashu has a priori understanding of ‘Indian citizen’ and anybody failing to adhere to his understanding of ‘citizen’ can simply be castigated as ‘community centered’. If he means by citizen as ‘law abiding citizen’ that in essence means internalizing the discourse of state, then I beg to differ. I think he was writing from this perspective.

He first identifies the root of global terrorism in the ‘Muslim mindset’, then felt very uncomfortable that there is hardly any Muslim including the liberal section within the community that is openly condemning this menace of terrorism or openly coming out to fight out this mayhem.

He further felt deeply hurt when he saw the ‘alternative version’ to ‘Jamia encounter’ and demand for impartial judicial inquiry and considered this as nothing but a defense of community.