Nation, Reason and Religion: Punjab's Role in the Partition of India Author(s): Ayesha Jalal Source: Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 33, No. 32 (Aug. 8-14, 1998), pp. 2183-2190 Published by: Economic and Political Weekly Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4407076 . Accessed: 29/06/2011 13:52 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at . http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=epw. 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This has entailed denzigratinzgthe exclusive affinities of religion as communal' in an imagined hierarchy of collectivities crowned by the ideal of a 'nation' unsullied by narrowminded bigotry. By implying that religious affiliations are, if not necessarily bigoted, then certainly less worthy than identifications with the 'nation', Indian nationalism comes dangerously close to trampling over its owfn coat-tails. The cultural roots of Indian nationalism owed far nmore to religious ideals, reinterpreted and reconfigured in imaginative fashion, than has been acknowledged. Continued recourse to the colonial privileging of religious distinctions thwarted many well-meaning attemnpts at accommodating differences within a broad framework of Indian nationalism. So long as the dominant discourse among Indians was tainted by notions of religious majoritarianism and minoritarianism there could be no hard andfast separation between 'nationalism' and 'communualism'. Farfron being an irritating side-show, the inversiotn of the all-India majority and minority equation in Punjab was at the centre-stage of the struggle between nationalism aind imperialism. "LET it not be forgotten', the Bengali the inherent materiality of both western informed cultural identity in the face of radical M N Roy had written in 1926. "that modernity and British rule. While giving a modernity underwritten by the fact of Punjab is the centre of the Hindu-Moslem more respectability to religious sentiments British sovereignty. Continued recourse conflicts that radiatefrom there to all other and symbols than they have tended to to the colonial privileging of religious parts of India".1 The second half of the enjoy in the past, Chatterjee does so by distinctions thwarted many well-meaning 1920s saw social and political currents in invoking a dichotomy between an auto- attempts at accommodating differences Punjab receding from the ideal of an nomous inner spiritual and a dominated within a broad framework of Indian inclusionary nationalism towards an outer material domain.3 This is an inge- nationalism. So long as the dominant dis- apparentlyunbending kind of exclusionary nious way of skirting around the problem course among Indians was tainted by communitarianism. This had encouraged of dismantling the binary opposition notions of religious majoritarianism and at least one historian to depict the decade between 'secularnationalism'and religious minoritarianism there could be no hard as a "prelude to partition"2. Yet Punjab communalism on which so much of the and fast separation between 'nationalism' in this period can just as easily be seen ideological edifice of the post-colonial and 'communalism'. Far from being an as providing alternative visions of Indian nation-state has rested. irritating side-show, the inversion of the nationalisms which seriously challenged Engrossed with the construction of the all-India majorityand minorityequation in the notion of one nation and undivided nationalist hegemony, Chatterjee glosses Punjabwas at the centre-stage of the strug- sovereignty propagated by the Congress. over the unresolved tensions and continued gle between nationalism and imperialism. The pre-eminent view of Indian nationa- contestations that marked the terrain of REGIONAL,RELIGIOUS OR NATIONAL lism has been that of an inclusionary. both and region religion. Although RIGHTS? accommodative, consensual and popular conceding that "the real difficulty was anti-colonial struggle. This has entailed with Islam in India" which gave "rise to The land of the five-rivers was the locus denigrating the exclusive affinities of alternative hegemonic efforts than the one of some of the more interesting ideas on religion as 'communal' in an imagined based on the evocation of a classical Hindu how the rights of religious communities hierarchyof collectivities crowned by the past", he stops short of considering the might be reconciled with the imperatives ideal of a 'nation' unsullied by narrow- substance of these alternatives.4 Such an of Indian unity. In 1924 the solution to minded bigotry. By implying thatreligious investigation of the cultural roots of the problem of contested sovereignty in affiliations are, if not necessarily bigoted. nationalismleaves unexamined the myriad Punjab proposed by Lala Lajpat Rai, the then certainly less worthy than identi- subaltern contestations of an emerging pre-eminent Hindu nationalist of that fications with the 'nation'. Indian nationa- mainstream nationalism which like its region, was to partitionthe provincein order lism comes dangerously close to trampling adversary,colonialism, may well have only to make the principleof majorityrule effec- over its own coat tails. The cultural roots achieved dominance without hegemony. tive. This might in turn open the way to of Indian nationalism owed far more to To name this dominance hegemony is a possible federationof autonomousHindu religious ideals. reinterpreted and re- to confuse the claims of one strand of and Muslim states in Bengal. Rai's pro- configured in imaginative fashion, than nationalist discourse with its ability to posal for a division of the two mainMuslim- has been acknowledged. According to ensure cultural, not to mention, political dominated provinces was not a prelude to Partha Chatterjee, who takes the cultural acquiescence. It also underplays the a partition of India: it was a laboured fragment represented by certain Bengali exclusionary aspect of this nationalism attempt to forestall such an eventuality. Hindu middle class intellectuals to which only succeeded in eliciting a stronger A partitioned Punjab and Bengal were to illuminate the consciousness of the Indian reaction from its skeptics and critics. This remain part of an undivided India under nation as a whole, religion provided the was particularlytrue of the IndianMuslims Hindu majority rule. spiritualstores for resisting and negotiating engaged in redefining their religiously Championing the regional rights ol Economic and Political Weekly August 8. 1998 2183 Punjabi Hindus, Rai drew comfort from beginning a-civil society, having received minorityas thecriteria for the distribution the fact of a Hindu majority at the all-India from the Quran a set of simple legal of nationalrights. It wasthis contradictory centre guaranteeing their national rights. principles which, like the 12 tables of the logic which gave religionthe handlethat Religion was the premise of both the Romans, carried...great potentialities of it came to enjoy in the politics of late regional and national rights of the Hindu expansion and development by inter- colonial India.As regioninteracted with community in Punjab.And yet LajpatRai, pretation". The principle of 'ijtihad' or an emerging conception of the nation, proclaimed himself to be an opponent of independent judgment allowed Muslims variouslyappropriated by the votariesof mixing religion with politics. His recipe to constantly adjust to the imperatives of themajoritarian community, those reduced for settling the problem of difference social change without abandoning the to minoritystatus by virtueof theirreligious through division was anathema to many Islamic path. Contrary to the view of the affiliation had reasonable grounds for Punjabi Muslims. But they were equally religious scholars,Iqbal believed thatsince apprehension.Emphatic assertions of an averse to the ideas of Mohamed Ali, an the institution of the 'khalifa' had ceased inclusionary nationalism based on the Islamic universalist venturing forth as an to exist the right of 'ijtihad' should be separationof thespiritual from the material, Indian nationalist, who held that the only vested in an elected Muslim assembly the religious from the political and the religious requirementof