Comparing Muslim-Ness and Shia-Ness in 20Th Century India
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FRACTURED IDENTITIES: COMPARING MUSLIM-NESS AND SHIA-NESS IN 20TH CENTURY INDIA Aseem Hasnain Dissertation submitted to the faculty at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Sociology in the College of Arts and Science. Chapel Hill 2015 Approved By: Charles Kurzman Sandria Freitag Kenneth Andrews Andrew Perrin Neal Caren © 2015 Aseem Hasnain ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ii ABSTRACT Aseem Hasnain: Fractured Identities: Comparing Muslim-Ness And Shia-Ness In 20th Century India (Under the direction of Charles Kurzman) The key question that this dissertation asks is: how did a prominent Shia collective identity form and was sustained in Lucknow over the twentieth century, while a similar phenomenon failed to take place in Hyderabad, a comparable city in India. The period that I covered starts in 1904 and ends in 1998, spanning almost the whole of the twentieth century. I divided this period into three chapters, each of which focused on a specific repertoire of contention that was used in collective identity formation. The first chapter shows how public rituals, particularly their redefinition, can contextualize the formation or reinvention of collective identities. Chapter two focuses on protest campaigns to show their role in consolidating collective identities, and chapter three analyzes riots as a strategy for sustaining collective identities. However, the common thread that runs across the three chapters is the role of community based elites; elites connected with the state; their interactions and partnerships; and the role of the state, which together emphasized specific collective identities as salient in either city. My project contributes to scholarship in two broad ways. The first is by bringing together the role of the state and the elites in shaping group identities. I show that claims about new collective identities or revisions of older ones were presented not simply by community based elites or the state acting by themselves, but by the joint efforts of both. The second broad iii contribution is towards the scholarship on violence and collective identities. My project makes three specific contributions to this particular scholarship. First, and foremost, my project does not take group identities to be a given like existing scholarship does. My project, in contrast is oriented towards tracing the formation of collective identities- it shows how a general Muslim identity split into Shia and Sunni identities in Lucknow, and how various ethnic identities fused into a Muslim collectivity in Hyderabad. The second contribution is through grounding the analysis in historical explanation, an important approach used in historical sociology. Existing scholarship on inter-group violence focuses on contemporaneous processes—demographic and economic shifts, patterns of civic relations, and electoral contests—to explain patterns of intergroup violence. My project shows that historical processes are more salient, and that contemporaneous factors are often a continuation of historical patterns. The third contribution is about violence. While existing research sees riots as outcomes of competition, lack of collaboration, or perceptions of threat between already existing and established groups, my project takes an opposite view. My findings show that riots—communal in Hyderabad, and sectarian in Lucknow-- are strategic tools, instead, that are utilized in the larger projects of creating and sustaining distinct collective identities that are purported to be antagonistic to each other. iv For Ashti Irom Mithlesh & Ime Rosa Nishat, for ensuring that I understand peace and patience! v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS A big thank you to Charlie, my mentor, for everything; to Sandy for all the support; to Abhilasha, my friend, for being there in thick and thin; to my parents, Nishat and Nadeem, for freeing me from the usual burdens of life; to my second parents, Mithlesh and Anil, for standing by us when we most needed them; to Deepti, Samta, and Abhishek for doing what you did for us. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES……………………………………………………………………………….xii LIST OF FIGURES……………………………………………………………………………..xiii CHAPTER 1.INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………….1 Beginnings…………………………………………………………………………...……1 Literature Review: Collective Identity…………………………………………………….5 Collective Identity: State, elites and competition…………………………………8 Shia-Sunni Differences: A Brief History………………………………………………...16 The Relevance of Muharram…………………………………………………………….18 Sunni Participation in Muharram………………………………………………………...24 Methods…………………………………………………………………………………..25 Case Selection……………………………………………………………………………26 Fieldwork………………………………………………………………………………...29 CHAPTER 2. PURIFYING MUHARRAM, PURIFYING IDENTITIES: 1900-1919…………32 Introduction………………………………………………………………………………32 Muharram in Lucknow: A brief history………………………………………………….35 Lucknow: Sectarianism Inaugurated……………………………………………..………36 Colonial intervention: The Piggott Committee of Inquiry……………………………….41 The Rise of New Shia Elites and Organizations…………………………………………43 Polemics around Public Rituals………………………………………………………….53 vii Role of the state………………………………………………………………………….64 Role of Elites within the State…………………………………………………………...80 The Hyderabad Case……………………………………………………………………..84 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………….88 CHAPTER 3. PROTESTS AND COLLECTIVE IDENTITIES: 1920-1948…………………...91 Introduction………………………………………………………………………………91 Collective Identity………………………………………………………………………..92 The Khilafat Movement 1919-1924……………………………………………………...96 Hyderabad: Khilafat and the Beginnings of the Hindu-Muslim Chasm…………………98 Lucknow: Khilafat and the Ambivalence among the Shia……………………………..108 Communal Politics in Hyderabad: 1920-1941…………………………………………120 Muslim Sectarianism in Hyderabad……………………………………………………149 Muslim Sectarianism in Lucknow……………………………………………………...162 Communal Politics in Lucknow………………………………………………………...175 Hyderabad: Annexation and the wounded psyche……………………………………...179 Lucknow: Complicating the Two-Nation Theory………………………………………189 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………...192 CHAPTER 4. VIOLENCE AND COLLECTIVE IDENTITIES: 1949-1998………………….195 Introduction……………………………………………………………………………..195 Riots in the twentieth century…………………………………………………………..195 Intergroup Violence…………………………………………………………………….199 Riots in Independent India: 1949-1999…………………………………………………205 Hyderabad: 1949-1999……………………………………………………………..…...207 viii Phase 1: Emergent Violence- 1949-1976………………………………………207 Parliamentary Elections in Hyderabad…………………………………210 State Legislature Elections in Hyderabad………………………………218 Charminar………………………………………………………218 Yakutpura………………………………………………………220 Riots…………………………………………………………………….221 Phase 2: Peak Violence- 1977-1993……………………………………………226 Parliamentary Elections in Hyderabad …………………………………227 State legislature elections in Hyderabad………………………………..233 Charminar………………………………………………………233 Yakutpura……………………………………………………….234 Riots…………………………………………………………………….235 Phase 3: Decline in Violence- 1994-1999……………………………………...248 Parliamentary elections…………………………………………………248 State Legislature Elections in Hyderabad………………………………250 Charminar………………………………………………………250 Yakutpura………………………………………………………252 Riots…………………………………………………………………….253 Discussion………………………………………………………………………255 Lucknow: Riots, elections and identity politics- 1949-1999…………………………...260 Phase 1: Emergent Violence- 1949-1976………………………………………260 Parliamentary Elections in Lucknow…………………………………..261 State Legislature Elections in Lucknow………………………………..263 ix Lucknow City Central…………………………………………..264 Lucknow West………………………………………………….266 Lucknow Central………………………………………………..270 Riots…………………………………………………………………….271 Phase 2: Peak Violence- 1977-1993……………………………………………275 Parliamentary Elections in Lucknow…………………………………...276 State Legislature Elections in Lucknow………………………………..277 Lucknow City Central…………………………………………..277 Lucknow West………………………………………………….278 Riots…………………………………………………………………….280 Phase 3: Declining Violence- 1994-1999……………………………………....283 Parliamentary Elections in Lucknow…………………………………..284 State Legislature Elections in Lucknow………………………………..286 Lucknow City Central………………………………………….286 Lucknow West………………………………………………….287 Riots…………………………………………………………………….288 Discussion………………………………………………………………………291 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………...294 CHAPTER 5. CONCLUSION…………………………………………………………………297 Mapping Space, Managing Communities………………………………………………297 Overall Findings………………………………………………………………………...307 Future Research………………………………………………………………………...311 APPENDIX 1: SCHEDULE OF IN-DEPTH, OPEN ENDED QUESTIONS............................313 x REFERENCES…………………………………………………………………………………319 xi LIST OF TABLES Table 1. Parliamentary Elections in Hyderabad, 1952-1971…………...……………………210 2. State Elections, Charminar, 1957-1972……………………………...……………..218 3. State Elections, Yakutpura, 1957-1972………………………………...…………..220 4. Parliamentary Elections in Hyderabad, 1977-1991………………………...............227 5. State Elections, Charminar, 1978-1989………………………………….................233 6. State Elections, Yakutpura, 1978-1989………………………………….................234 7. Parliamentary Elections in Hyderabad, 1994-1999………………………...............248 8. State Elections, Charminar, 1994-1999…………………………………………….250 9. State Elections, Yakutpura, 1994-1999………………………………….................252 10. Parliamentary Elections in Lucknow, 1949-1976…………………………………..262 11. State Elections, Lucknow City Central, 1949-1976………………………...............264 12. State Elections, Lucknow West, 1949-1976………………………………………..266