HVK Archives: Forcing a faith accompli
Forcing a faith accompli - Telegraph
Imtiaz Ahmed
()
10 September 1996
Title : Forcing a faith accompli
Author : Imtiaz Ahmed
Publication : Telegraph
Date : September 10, 1996
Secularism is discussed in the abstract a great deal in
India. But what it should mean concretely in terms of
actions on the part of the state and its organs is rarely
seriously debated. One consequence of this is that
certain actions of the state or its organs which consti-
tute the very negation of the secular ideology upon which
the edifice of the state in India is believed to have
been raised - go entirely unscrutinised.
The telecasting policy of the state regulated Doordarshan
is a case in point of this serious anomaly. Every Sun-
day, Doordarshan exposes its viewers to a surfeit of
religious broadcasts. From the beginning of prime time
until the evening its programmes comprise serials which
are renderings of religious stories or have a deeply
religious content and orientation.
At 9.30 am the serial Krishna is broadcast followed by
the serial Shri Hanuman. Then at 11.30 Mahabharat is
retelecast. Again, in the evening the serial Ramayana is
retelecast. As if this were not already enough of an
overdose of religion, the film in the afternoon is also
often deeply religious or at least revolves around a
religious story or theme.
There was a time Doordarshan showed a slight degree of
sensitivity to the apparent reality that India was inhab-
ited by practitioners of other faiths whose cultural
orientations were different. At least on the festival
days of these communities, Doordarshan took care to
telecast a film which related to their culture and relig-
ious experiences and sensibilities. Even this initial
sensitivity has now virtually disappeared. On the Sunday
preceding the Id-e-milad-un-nabi - the birthday of Proph-
et Muhammad observed as a gazetted holiday throughout
India Doordarshan showed the film Shri Ram Bharat Milap.
The latter was a rendering of the Ramayana story which
could easily be expected to evoke religious sensibilities
of one kind or another.
One has no means of knowing what message
Doordarshan
intends communicating to its viewers through such an
overdose of religious programmes. There is a well known
communication theory which tells us that in culturally
diverse societies, state owned media tends almost always
to reflect the culture and religion of the culturally
dominant community. Members of the minority
communities
- be they religious groups or communities, groups of
migrants or ethnic nationalities - cannot identify With
what is relayed to them in the name of national culture.
Under these circumstances the state owned media has
almost always to take special care to maintain at least a
facade of cultural and religious neutrality. Even when
it decides to relay the religion or cultural values of
the dominant community - which is in many ways inevitable
- it has to do so in extremely subtle ways. It has to
ensure the images and stories it projects have a univer-
sal appeal. From even a most casual monitoring of Door-
darshan's Sunday telecasts it appears such pretensions to
cultural neutrality are not even deemed worth bothering
about.
The consequences are already tending to be quite
damaging
and are building up a deepseated indifference toward
Doordarshan telecasts among the minority communities.
One student of New Delhi's Jamia Millia Islamia conducted
a study some time ago of viewers' responses to Door-
darshan programmes.
Her findings were based on intensive interviews and
observations of television viewing practices in the
multicultural localities of Delhi. They revealed that -
in the perception of the members of minority religious
groups - the association between Doordarshan and the
dominant cultural and religious community was complete.
Muslims in particular saw Doordarshan as the mouthpiece
and media of the Hindus and they were unable to identify
with it. More often that not they tended to switch off
their television sets whenever the dose of Hindu religi-
ous themes and stories in Doordarshan programmes
became
too heavy.
One could perhaps discuss the Muslim response to Door-
darshan telecasts as a case of extreme overreaction
precipitated by their peculiar antipathies. Even so, the
substantive issues of the quantum of the dominant commu-
nity's culture and religion that the media in a secular
state should force on its culturally and religiously
diverse peoples remains relevant.
After all, the framers of the Constitution had not decid-
ed to make India a secular state as a mere formality. In
doing so, they had anticipated the state to play a role
in promoting the acceptance of secularism among the
people. Therefore, unless the issue of the legitimate
limits to which the state owned Doordarshan should fairly
replay the religion or religious stories of the cultural-
ly dominant community is settled, secularism of the state
shall continue to be ambiguous and questionable.
There is one argument which can plausibly be advanced in
favour of Doordarshan telecasting programmes which
draw
so heavily from stories about gods, goddesses and legend-
ary religious figures. That it is merely trying to
mirror India's cultural heritage. No doubt, in the
Indian context a clear cut distinction between culture
and religion is difficult to draw. For a great deal of
Indian culture bears the imprint of Hindu religious
values and orientations. Even so, the issue involved in
the case of Doordarshan programmes is not merely of
drawing a distinction between culture and religion. But
rather of the form in which it is rendered to the coun-
try's television audiences.
Even if a religious story or theme has to be telecast it
can be rendered in a secular language or universal idiom.
One reason the serial Mahabharat enjoyed widespread
popularity initially was that this otherwise religious
epic was rendered in a highly secular idiom which accen-
tuated its appeal across communities and regions. Other
religious stories can be similarly treated so that they
have a wider cross-community appeal.
One significant aspect in this context is that because of
a widely prevalent pluralist ethos there is no unified
version even of popular religious stories. For instance,
while the "mainstream" version of the Ramayana depicts
Ravana as a demon, other versions prevalent in India
depict him as a venerable hero. Again, while in the
"mainstream" version Rama and Sita are believed to have
been husband and wife, there are tribal versions where in
they are believed to be siblings.
When a "mainstream" version of a religious story is
rendered as such, it implies a particular version of the
story is being sought to be forced as the only authentic
one. On the contrary, when it. is rendered in a secular
idiom such apprehensions and consequent resentments
are
obviated. Therefore, even if Doordarshan telecasts
religious stories' on the ground they constitute part and
parcel of India's cultural heritage, the case for render-
ing them in a secular idiom gains in strength. Because
such rendering is unlikely to arouse fears o imposition
of a unified version of a particular religious story or
epic.
It is a moot question whether or not the choice of secu-
larism as the operative framework for the state of India
was a continuation of the latter's past traditions or
constituted a radical break from it. One thing can be
definitively argued. The makers of the Constitution were
clear, that the attitudes and orientation of the people
were dominated by religion. There was, therefore, a need
to reorient them by slow degrees towards a secular ethos
through the active intervention of the state. According-
ly, communal harmony and cultural pluralism were
emphasised, but the state was charged to pro mote secular
values and a secular world view through effective policy
processes.
For reasons of populism - if not for a strong ideological
commitment on the part of the dominant cultural elite to
using the state and its organs to propagate its own
cultural and religious values - the state in India has
fought shy of actively promoting secularism. Door-
darshan's surfeit of religion oriented telecasts on
Sundays is one expression of this weakness. The conse-
quence is that rather than acting as the propagator and
promoter of secular values the state has willynilly
contributed towards heightening religious sensibilities.
Frequent and repeated telecasts of religious stories or
stories about gods, goddesses and legendary religious
figures do after all have an impact in a culturally and
religiously diverse society. They shape the consciousness
and psychological makeup of the people one way or anoth-
er. Under the circumstances, unless the state's secular
credentials are to be seriously compromised , Door-
darshan's policies concerning serials and programmes with
an overdose of religious orientation and content deserve
serious reflection and review.
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