The Most Neglected Minority of India
by Sudipto Das
The word ‘minority’ is a major word in Indian politics. It’s used as strong ammunition to topple or establish governments. Not alone the politicians, the media also enjoy a special satisfaction to use this word in different forms to establish their responsibility towards the society. So the question is who or what is a minority. In India the most acceptable and popular explanation of minority is the Muslim population. Everyone forgets that the Persis, Buddhists, Jains, Zorastrians, Bahais and even the Christians are more logical candidates to be represented as minority. Well, they are indeed minority in official sense, but whenever you bump across this term in any news channel or newspaper it’s very likely that they are referring to the Muslims.
The very fact that the politicians and the media refer to the large Muslim population as minority is derogatory to the Muslims. The so-called secularism ceases to exist when a so-called secular party claims to be the brethren of the so-called minorities, the Muslims. I deny accepting that Muslims are minority in India. They are ‘major’ as much as any one else in India is in the socio-cultural ethos of Indianness.
Well, so who’s the minority? What does minority mean? The dictionary gives many meanings. But only the Kashmiri Pandits in Kashmir know what’s minority, The Hindus in Bangladesh and Pakistan know what’s minority and the educated middle class in India know what is minority. At least the Kashmiri Pandits have some consolation that the media writes vociferously about their plights and different governments at least claim to work for a solution for their plights.
But who writes about the plights of educated middle class? They constitute the majority of the tax-payers. They are the only class who has to keep aside a part of their income to enrich the nation’s fund, which is supposed to be used for betterment activities, which in turn is supposed to benefit them. Well, nothing is free in this world, so they have agreed to live with the fact that they have to pay for the road they use, the civic amenities they use etc etc. They don’t mind. They have never raised a voice against this. They have never asked whether their taxes are utilized properly. Even they have never objected to the fact that only they have to bear the cost of any development in the country whereas the vast majority is exempted on the ground of being economically weaker. They never take it otherwise. They truly believe in the well being of the countrymen.
It’s the middle class who, more than the politicians sympathize with the plights of the millions of financially challenged people and try, whatever possible within their limited capabilities, to do something for them. It’s the middle class who create organizations like CRY, donate handsomely for the victims of earthquakes or drought, help the family of the lady who works in their home and do many other small things voluntarily. They try their best to do something for the society.
The middle class also does one more thing, which perhaps not all in India do. They dream for a better India. Also they want to grow in life. But no one ever thought of their aspirations. No political party ever represented them. Nobody ever asked them about their likes and dislikes. The ‘upper’ class doesn’t have to bother about anything, and the ‘lower’ class has the whole political people to supposedly bother for them. But, stuck in the middle, who do the educated middle class have to bother for them apart from themselves alone? They are the greatest taboo in Indian politics. Anyone trying to do something for them is termed as pro-rich and non-populist. Everyone speaks of uplifting the lower class and stagnating them in the middle-class. Can’t the middle class also have an aspiration to move up?
Of late they were very happy reaping the benefits of the recent economic reforms. They have indeed moved up in the economic ladder. At the same time they have also resulted in enhancing the economy of the people around them. Starting from the people who drive auto-rickshaws to the old lady who sells flowers from door to door in Gurgaon, Bangalore, Noida, Pune, Hyderabad, Bombay and many other places have been benefited by the sudden increase in spending capacity of the middle class. They felt good that they and also the people around them were really moving towards a better life.
But then they find that the majority of the political world is envying them. All the so-called non-populist reforms, which had actually created hopes for them after a very long time, are vindicated. They are indeed feeling helpless. But they can’t say anything or affect any change because they are a minority. Their number of votes will merely do any change to the total electoral poll count. They have to be just mute spectators to what’s happening around him and accept whatever the ‘majority’ (of the political class) thrust upon them.
The only capital of the middle class is their education. This education refrain them from staying in darkness. They know what is good and what is bad. They like good people around them. They want to be governed by good educated, cultured and decent people. They feel satisfied if they see that their hard earned money is spent properly in creating good world-class infrastructure across the country. It’s only they who really understand the importance of good foreign policies. It’s they who appreciate India’s slow and steady race towards becoming a global player. But what if they don’t see all these? Nothing. Yes, they are indeed a minority, a very unconventional and lone minority in the middle of an alienated, ignorant and adversely manipulated crowd.
(Sudipto’s blog is at http://sudiptounplugged.blogspot.com/).
Comments
10 Responses to “The Most Neglected Minority of India”
Superb Piece,
should be forwarded to any every one.
good one!
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The Future Mantra
a very good article!
thanks.
Well said Sudipto! We, the Educated Middle class is the most neglected ‘minority’ in india. Though I doubt whether we are really a minority in India?
But before lamenting the polital class & media for their apathy towards us, let us do an introspection!
1. Yes we are the only people whom the Govts squezes to get our taxes! We are heavily taxed compared to most of developed countries! and most of the others get away. the traders, small business men (though they are really not small!), labourers, and all of the unregulated sections of working class..
The upper class has their own ways of evading tax. they cook up balance sheets, or just dont pay and one day get excemptions.. no body asks them.
But did we ever ask or push our Govts or our representatives for any benefits to us? answer is NO. because we dont care of politics. its a Big BAD thing for us. and We never Vote!
then how can we ask for benefits!
As educated middle class, we reaped many benefits from govt and other fellow indians. We got our education which is some way funded by Taxes others pay. we cant argue others pay taxes at all. atleast they pay sales tax in some way!
Govts and the political class who form the govt doesnt do anything for us since we dont push them. they go populist for lower income class, because they come in trucks full and vote!
they do for upper class because they directly finance the parties to run the show!
And we had one government that did a lot for middle class!..
The NDA govt: 1998-2004!
they built roads, brought business, introduced policies which increased our living standards.
BJP led NDA is the first party in india that tried to contest an election with a positive slogan, a positive approach, they wanted to give us a dream! ” India Shining”.
But what did the middle class give BJP back??
when congress said “akhir aam admi ko kya mila?,” all out positive thought, dream of better india went to sleep and we again went back to our old crying nagging attitude. or we just didn vote!
and the result we see:
UPA govt se aam aadmi ko bahut kuch mila:
1. Gareebi
2. Be rozgari
3. Terror
4. American overview of our defence
5. Sky rocketting prices
and god knows what!
And hope this will be the election when we the middle class, finally hear our wake up call, think about our Nation, think about our welfare and VOTE!
VOTE agaisnt Terror
VOTE against dynastic Politics
VOTE agaisnt Vote Bank politics
VOTE agaisnt appeasement politics
VOTE
Hey Sudipto, Bhesh !!! Great article, but the BJP is a party of the middle class, financed by the middle class, so I hope they do their bit for the middle class, as there were no schemes targetting the improvement of conditions for the ubiquitos middle class …
Hari & Nikhil,
Thanks for your comments.
Well, I didn’t say explicitly in my article that the bottom line of everything is that we, the middle class people, should all come out (if not in trucks) and vote and vote for BJP!!
The only way we can change things is to vote for a better party. I agree with the people who started this forum that we’re not saying that BJP “doodh se dhooli hui hai”, but BJP is no doubt the better choice than anything else available at this point of time. So why not vote for them? The most important things for a country are infrastructure (BSP - Bijli, Sadak, Paani & I’d add one more i.e. communication), health care, nutrition, education and security. It’s not that NDA did exceedingly well in all these aspects during their term, but at least they had the guts to think in the right direction. We won’t have ever had the Golden Quadrilaterals without BJP. We won’t have had so much progress in telecom without them. So that’s it - we should all come out and vote!!
Hey Suipto, Thanks for the Flash reply. A rejoinder to my earlier post. What the middle class need is :
Decrease price of aviation tubine fuel, this will help decrease air ticket prices
1) Better facilities for secondary education with a strong scientifically - tempered syllabus with good teachers (currently in short supply).
2) Childhood Malnutrition is a major problem in India & we are global leaders in this field. Not only children of poor families but also the lower middle class are affected equally.
3)Waiver of most of the surcharges & taxes on petroleum products,. These account for 2/3rd of the present price of fuel.
4) Assurance on National security as terrorist victims are invariably middle class individuals.
5) The Economy: Decisive measures to strengthen the economy to prevent job cuts, sustain recruitment of fresh graduates.
6) Come up with a comprehensive Healthcare Insurance Plan as Healthcare costs prove to be the cause of princes turning paupers overnight.
7)Better Urban Planning, give funds to cover potholes in roads, provide safe drinking water.
Hi Sudipto, agree with you 100%.
hope to read more articles from you..
Cheers!!!
Hari,
That was really a good summary of things that we can expect from the party we vote - in this case BJP. I;m sure BJP is also thinking in those lines.
Regards,
Sudipto