Vajpayee-mas[1] or Christmas
A Public Interrogation
1. The
Brewing of the Public Controversy
As the Christians globally geared up to
celebrate the season of Advent preparing in hope for the birth of Jesus Christ,
and as they have begun singing carols for the season, Prime Minister (PM)
Narendra Modi announced that 25th December 2014 needs to be observed
as “National Good Governance Day” (NGGD) celebrating the birthday of Mr. Atal
Bihari Vajpayee, the former BJP Prime Minister of India and also the birthday
of the veteran Hindu Maha Sabha Leader Mr. Madan Mohan Malavyia. He further
calls on the BJP leaders to pay rich tribute to these leaders and propagate the
schemes and good governance modes of the BJP. It has been further reported that
“The PM said all lawmakers must, on December 25,
lead efforts to remove litter in their constituencies as part of the Clean
India mission that he launched on Independence Day. The PM said he will be in
his constituency, Varanasi, to lead by example.”[2]
This news of the celebration became a matter of public
controversy because this has been announced when there have been an annual
vacation for students and all public enterprise workers during these days on
the occasion of Christmas. I don’t bring this issue in to the public space just
because, Christmas has been a Christian festival. It is a fact to say that to
observe NGGD on a Christmas day and to work on that day hurts the deep
sentiments of several Indian Christians across the length and breadth of India.
Taking into cognizance all those deep hurts of Christians, affirming on the
deep theological and spiritual implications this festival have, celebrating
Christmas in India is an expression of the well-knit secular fabric of India,
and it is a celebration of right to religion as ensured in the Constitution of
India, and therefore eclipsing & evading such a celebratory Constitutional
spirit by celebrating the birth anniversaries of one particular ruling party
leaders, becomes and evolves to be a public issue of public interest for the
public space in India.
To capture the intention of the right-wing ideologues in
bringing this issue, Sitaram Yechury from the Leftist party while speaking the
Parliament on the issue was quoted telling, "On Gandhi Jayanti, you have a
programme of Swacch Bharat (Clean India); on Christmas, you want
a programme for good governance; then, there is an entire campaign on religious
conversions that's going on. All this is a whole package that we think is very
dangerous to the very constitutional guarantees that have been given."[3] On the other hand, the political context of
the country has been filled with the air on re-conversion and conversion of
religious minorities into Hindu-fold, with methods of allurement and force,
which again is very much against the very ethos of secularism in India.
The joy of the BJP was further invigorated when they
announced that the Central Board Schools (CBSE) run by Union government of
India would remain open to observe the NGGD, by partaking in a nationwide essay
competition. However with the pressure coming from the four corners of the
nation, the Union Education Minister today declared that schools would remain
closed on Christmas day, and the essay completion would be conducted online and
will be voluntary. But the law makers need to work on NGGD to ensure
propagating good governance, which had fallen from heaven with the present rule
for the last six months by this present government!!!
2.
The Implications of Observing NGGD on Christmas Day:
On the Christmas Day, now it has almost became a law that
most government officials, and all public workers will have be on duty to
promote efficient governance among the citizens of the country. The colleges in
Delhi have been sent a circular from Union Human Resources Development Ministry
that they wanted colleges to hold two events on Christmas - a seminar on the
topic 'Use of Technology and Innovations in promoting Good Governance' and an
oratory competition[4].Therefore there are several sociological, political
and religious implications in making Christmas day a working day, an in
observing the NGGD. Allow me to share in brief those implications to set our
discussion in perspective.
i.
Violence &
Violation: From the recent history, we have observed, how intentionally the
fundamentalist groups target the religious minority groups on their festivals,
and Odisha’s Kandhamal is one such good example to convey the attacks on Dalit
& Tribal Christians in Kandhamal by the fundamental groups in 2007. Eventually
there have always been attacks on Christians during the season of Christmas at
places like Mangalore, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Odisha, Jharkhand, Gujarat,
Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh etc. Now this observance of NGGD can be used by the
fundamentalist groups to attack Christians on their festival day for no
government machinery, the police or any other public worker would come in
rescue of those attacked as they would be busy attending in propagating
efficient governance. There are all chances for the fundamentalist groups to
take advantage of this NGGD on a Christmas working day and lest the stains
don’t remain on the central government for their observance.
ii.
Nationalism
(Patriotism) & Churches: The fundamentalist
groups can also barge into the Dalit & Tribal churches who form the
majority of the Indian Church and force them to cancel the Christmas payers and
can even force them to partake in the NGGD, for this has been a call given the
Prime Minister himself and so they can always take law and order into their
hands, as has been done in the past.
iii.
Spirituality & Forcibility: The Christian law makers and public workers who are forced to work on
NGGD would lose a time of prayer & fellowship on an important occasion like
Christmas, which experience they can never replace with. It distorts and
curtails the right to religion in this secular India, for no one can force
someone not to participate or practice one’s own faith. NGGD’s intention is to
rub on the wrong shoulders of the Christian brothers and sisters
iv.
Politics & Religion: Today it is on a Christmas day they have announced to celebrate a
birthday of their leader, it can tomorrow be the celebration of another leader
of their party on Ramdan, or on any other religious festivals. There can be no
ending to it. This is only mere imposing of political & communal ideology
on the religious identities and to keep up their communal majoritarian
domination.
3.
A Subaltern Counter Public Interrogation:
On reading the implications, though in brief, there are
several adverse effects on the lives of the subaltern Christians especially and
on Christians in general. In such a context, the calling of the civil society
is to voice out against such un-public announcements made by the government. “Eclipsing Christmas by Vajpayee-mas” is a public issue to be addressed collectively and
creatively by the members of our public sphere, and by all responsible people
of faith. Leaving this issue to the Church alone to fight it over doesn’t come
in good taste, as the creative public space in India is gearing up to voice and
counter the powers of hegemony and empire to its best.
I do understand the limitation of the Indian Public sphere,
as it is mostly dominated by the dominant caste, dominant classes, elitist
groups and those exposed to the global realities have taken the front rows and
high chairs in leading the Indian civil society. In such a time like this, the
subaltern counter public spaces will evolve from among the Dalit & Tribal
communities for whom their local congregations are their counter-public spaces,
for these counter-spaces are bold in speaking back to the empire, and will
advocate for the justice to Christians in affirming their faith. Counter-
spaces of the subalterns don’t get into the centres in expressing their
protest, but will ground their resilience in the local groundings and
congregations. Two subversive practical ways of action these counter spaces can
engage in expressing their dissent to the “Eclipsing Christmas by Vajpayee-mas” with are as follows:
a.
Ringing uninterruptedly the Church bells for one hour or more
on Christmas day – as a sign of protest against the eclipse: Ringing of the bell for Subaltern communities is very
significant especially in rural areas, for they are rung three times in three
equal intervals before the Church service, be it on Sunday or on any other day,
to gather people for worship on time. The other four occasions the bells are
rung in our local community are, when someone in the community dies, they ring
the bells in equilibrium to the age of the person dead. This ring gathers the
community to the bereaved family’s house. The other occasion the bell is rung
is on the wedding day, when the groom ties knot of the thread in coherence with
the wedding vows, these are called auspicious rings of the bell. The other
occasion I know is thirty three bells are rung on the Good Friday day at 3pm,
during the worship service to commemorate the death of a 33 year old young
Jesus on the Cross. The last occasion is on the mid-night of the 31st
December, when the old year is crossed when the congregation which is at
worship during that time, welcomes the new-year with the ringing of Church
bells.
Therefore to counter the fundamentalist
forces and to express the dissent of the subaltern communities, the call is to
ring the Church bells uninterruptedly on Christmas day, so that it would gather
the communities to express their protest. The ringing the church bells in the
local community for quite a long period of time will catch the attention of the
public around us, and the resilience is communicated.
b.
Christmas Worship Services to be conducted on the Public
streets: Since the NGGD will be observed at the public schools and public areas,
those areas must be already used by the congregations to conduct the services
on the streets. Take the congregational worship onto streets. The local
congregation is in the public and is the public. Thus a subservient subaltern
counter public space evolves with ’occupying the centres’ of public space. The
law makers and politicians need to find it difficult in cleaning India and in
propagating efficient governance. Theologically speaking, after all Christmas
is all about celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ, who inaugurated the
alternative good governance (Isaiah 9:6, 11:1-9) unlike these fundamental
politicians, who do it for selfish motives.
When Christmas worships are conducted on
the public streets in the villages and towns, the message of protest, the
message of ‘just angst’ is given back to those in the power. They would see the
subaltern counter-public space rising like a wave.
Closing:
“Eclipsing Christmas by Vajpayee-mas”
has been of concern of the public today, and there are many other traditional
ways of making delegations to the Prime Minister and the Ministers in exempting
the Christians to work on the NGGD which is the Christmas day, submitting
memorandums to local government officers etc. to express our protest. However
occasions such as this, should bring together the creative and responsible
public sphere in India to voice out and advocate for justice to those on the
margins. Public issues of controversy in a way impact those on the margins
adversely than on any others, and therefore being bold in expressing our
dissent and being collective in mobilising dissent is the need of the hour in
responding to the sings of our times. These are the times for the margins to create
and contribute for transformation of the entire society, and allow that process
to progress.
This has been a small public outcry made out of concern for
one’s home land and therefore this is not an end in itself. This is making a
public interrogation on a public issue that affects those on the margins. I
only pray that peace & justice would prevail in India, those in the margins
can affirm and live life with dignity, lest the religious fundamentalists dare not
to get into the cribs at the Churches destroying baby Jesus and placing the
pictures of Vajpayee in the hands of
mother Mary!!!! I am sure public just-sense would prevail, and the eclipse of Vajpayee-mas would soon get over to see
the bright new dawn of hope, peace, equality and justice.
Rajbharat Patta,
[1] A satirical usage to express about the celebration of Mr. Vajpayee’s
birthday on December 25th.
[2] http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/no-school-on-christmas-clarifies-smriti-irani-amid-anger-over-government-circular-634786
[3] Ibid…
[4] http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/pm-modi-please-intervene-says-st-stephen-s-principal-635421
