If statues could talk, the tallest in the world might have offered PM Modi a lesson in secularism

Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel would have asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to revisit his ideas on secularism and a secular state articulated in the Constituent Assembly, writes S.N. Sahu.

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PRIME Minister Narendra Modi, while speaking yesterday on the occasion of the National Unity Day marking the birthday of independent India's first home minister 'Sardar' Vallabhbhai Patel, made a preposterous claim that "one nation, one election" and a "secular civil code" would be brought in following Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel's spirit of unity.

It may be mentioned that the birthday of Sardar Patel, falling on October 31, has been celebrated by the Modi regime as National Unity Day from 2014 onwards. This year's celebrations mark the beginning of the 150th birth anniversary of Patel who after the independence of India and the division of the subcontinent on the basis of religion completed the daunting task of unifying India by integrating more than five hundred Princely States into the Indian Union peacefully and without bloodshed.

Patel never talked of 'one nation, one election'

Patel, universally acclaimed for unifying India in the face of the dismemberment of our country along religious lines, never conceived of the idea of 'one nation one election' and even a secular civil code for the purpose of sustaining the unity of people professing diverse faiths and speaking numerous languages.

Therefore, what Modi said on the occasion of the National Unity Day that his pet themes of 'one nation, one election' and a 'secular' civil code would be in harmony with the spirit of unity conjured up by Patel is far from the truth.

Unification of the Hindu kingdom of Travancore

The then President of India K.R. Narayanan, while unveiling the statue of Sardar Patel in front of the Central Hall of the old Parliament building on August 14, 1998, recalled the intransigent attitude adopted by rulers of Travancore and said, "When the dewan [Prime Minister] of Travancore, Sir C.P. Ramaswamy Iyer, held out the argument that no one could negotiate a merger of the State with India as Travancore was ruled 'in the name and on behalf of the tutelary deity, Sri Padmanabhaswamy', the Sardar snapped with a twinkle in his eye 'Is that so? Then please tell me how could Travancore's rulers allow Lord Padmanabhaswamy to become subservient to the British Crown?'"

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That account, giving the details of Travancore rulers equating a Hindu deity with their kingdom, resonates in Modi's statement, made at the time of the consecration of Ram Temple in Ayodhya: dev se desh; Ram se rashtra (from God to country, and from Ram to nation).

What Modi said directly contradicted Sardar Patel who, among other makers of the Indian Constitution, upheld secularism in the Constituent Assembly to sustain the unity of India and safeguard the secular credentials of our country without spoiling it by communal venom and polarised narratives.

Patel upheld secularism and the secular State in the Constituent Assembly

Modi, who talked about the secular civil code, should be mindful that Sardar Patel never envisioned such a code and very firmly flagged secularism as the foundation of India.

Sadly, Modi indeed mocked secularism in his address to Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) party workers after he won the Lok Sabha polls in the 2019 election and described the secularism advocated by Opposition political parties as "fake" and derisively said that they hesitated to invoke the principle after he won the 2014 election for the Lok Sabha with absolute majority.

Such a statement was an affront to the vision of Patel who, as head of the advisory committee of the Constituent Assembly on fundamental rights, minorities, tribals and excluded areas, moved its report in the assembly and said on May 25, 1949, "In the changed conditions of this country, it is in the interest of all to lay down real and genuine foundations of a secular State."

Proceeding further, he asserted, "Nothing is better for the minorities than to trust the good sense and sense of fairness of the majority, and to place confidence in them."

He then sensitively remarked, "So also it is for us who happen to be in a majority to think about what the minorities feel, and how we in their position would feel if we were treated in the manner in which they are treated."

In the ten years of the Modi regime, fear and insecurity have been gripping minorities on account of the ruthless majoritarianism being pushed by the BJP, especially through the violent targeting of the life and liberty of Muslims on the basis of their faith, the food they eat and the dresses they put on.

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The lynching of many Muslims in the name of beef and even the fearsome killings of many of them inside a train just because of their faith has shaken the foundations of a secular State which Sardar Patel stated was required to fulfill the interests of all.

Six months later, on October 14, 1949, Patel yet again said in the Constituent Assembly, "I made it clear that this Constitution of India, of free India, of a secular State, will not hereafter be disfigured by any provision on a communal basis."

Tragically, "this Constitution of India, of free India, of a secular State" has been disfigured, among others, by Prime Minister Modi's anti-Muslim statements articulated while campaigning for his party during the 2024 Lok Sabha elections and open call for their genocide and social and economic boycott by BJP leaders and leaders of other Hindutva organisations.

How do such remarks and activities serve the cause of unity of India which was so arduously forged by Sardar Patel?

It is instructive to recall the words of Sardar Patel, uttered in the Constituent Assembly again on October 14, 1949. He, while stating that there were "immense difficulties of a secular Slate being governed peacefully in such conditions" urged caution by saying, "do not add to our difficulties by creating internal difficulties in which there will be disputes between the communities."

Those words are replaying in the India of the twenty-first century when the secular State is getting compromised by those operating the State apparatus. In a calculated manner, they exacerbate and trigger difficulties among different communities and cause communal conflagration in society.

Had Sardar Patel been alive, he would have been deeply pained to see BJP leaders, including Prime Minister Modi, trying to bulldoze his vision while attempting to appropriate his legacy.

He would have asked Modi to revisit his statements on secularism and the secular State made in the Constituent Assembly and urged him to safeguard that vision for defending the idea of India and not destroy it by spreading communal venom.