There is no space now for nothing

By M J Akbar

It is hardly a state secret that Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee considers foreign travel one of the redeeming features of his job. It is not simply the joys of exotic locales that are the preferred destinations of VIPs; Vajpayee also enjoys the pleasures of shaping international relations. The hangover of those nineteen dizzying months a quarter of a century ago when he was foreign minister in the Morarji Desai government of 1977 has not quite gone. He learnt the subtle flavours of foreign policy initiatives then. As Vajpayee reminded his distinguished visitor of the month, Hamid Karzai, he went to Kabul more often as foreign minister than anywhere else; and Kabul was not, even before the Taliban dispensation, Bali.

And so when the Prime Minister of India cancels an important foreign tour scheduled for the first week of April without attributing any reason, we must sit up and take notice. The cancellation of the tour to Australia was understandable the violence in Godhra and the subsequent carnage in Gujarat would have forced the Prime Minister to return without landing if it had happened when he was in mid-air. But there is no reason proffered whatsoever for the premeditated abortion of a visit to Cambodia and Singapore with a substantive foreign policy objective; to take India one step closer to full membership of ASEAN. The last time Vajpayee cancelled a foreign trip was in the early days of his prime ministership, when he scrubbed a visit to Cairo without explanation. A sort while later India changed the climate of the world by announcing that it had become a nuclear power. There cannot be anything quite as dramatic this time, but the market is open for intelligent guesses.

The options are not that numerous. Ayodhya, Kashmir, Pakistan. Nothing.

Solution seems too brazenly optimistic a wod to use in the context of any of the three great problems of our time. But each of them has a far greater impact on the life of ordinary Indians than the formal transformation of our country into a nuclear power.

At some level of our subconscious we have stopped believing that there can ever be a solution to the Ayodhya confrontation. The record of fudge, prevarication, lies and deceit is not encouraging. But through the drama of last week, most of it artificial, one vital point was established. The Prime Minister took a line that had often been drawn in sand and stood firmly on it. He made courts, institutions of law and justice, the non-negotiable heart of any decision pertaining to 15 March. He did this at the cost of severely upsetting the constituency that had brought his part to power. He used an opportunity provided, paradoxically, by the seers and hardliners when they picked 15 March as their cut-off point for temple construction. The Prime Minister neatly placed the courts in between the government and the demand, and the placed the full weight of authority behind the decision of the court. If P V Narasimha had done exactly the same thing, the events of 6 December 1992 would never have taken place.

The BJP's official position remains that it would prefer a settlement by negotiation, but that is an euphermism for nothing since everyone knows that an out-of-court settlement is impossible as there will never be agreement between the antagonists. The temple builders are also apprehensive that a court judgment might never give them the kind of victory they fervently await, if there is any judgment at all: the wait so far has been long enough.

The courts came into the picture in this dispute from the very beginning. But if there is empty space today where the Babri mosque once stood, it is because successive governments placed themselves above the courts, and betrayed principle under pressure. There is much hot air being spouted about puja and a shilanyas, quite forgetting that the first shilanyas was permitted by Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, home minister Buta Singh, adviser-in-chief on all matters of compromise, R K Dhawan and then chief minister of Uttar Pradesh Narayan Dutt Tewari in the middle of the general election from which the Congress has never quite recovered, the one in 1989. Buta Singh is a learned leader of the Congress in Parliament, headed for one of the key positions in Parliament; Dahwan is honourable member of the party's working committee and of courseTewari is now chief minister of Uttaranchal, placed there by his leader Sonia Gandhi.

If Mahant Paramhans was shocked to the point of threatening suicide, whether he meant it or not, who can blame him? The whole experience of the temple movement is that governments have surrendered under pressure. The seers and activists were convinced that the authorities, now consisting of their own people, might pay lip service to the ''secularists'' but would permit ground conditions to reach a point where it would be impossible to stop temple construction. After all, this is what Narasimha Rao did. Rao deliberately and consciously allowed a situation to arise in which the mosque was destroyed, sleeping while that happened; then he turned around and pleaded helplessness and pretended to be as injured as the next man. The next man, at that time, was Ghulam Nabi Azad, and the man next to him Salman Khurshid, bot now ranking members of Sonia Gandhi's ''secular'' brigade. The shoulders of Azad and Khan were essential for Rao's crocodile tears. He had to weep before Muslims, you see. In return a grateful Rao gave them better jobs in his next reshuffle. Careful man, Rao. He always rewarded sycophants quickly, before they could take their sycophancy elsewhere. The only Prime Minister who stuck to principle on this tempestuous issue was Vishwanath Pratap Singh. It cost him his chair. He paid the price without demur.

The least that the leaders of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and the mahants were expecting was the shuffle and disappear treatment that they got from Narasimha Rao and his secular Cabinet colleagues like home minister S B Chavan, last seen in public sitting beside Sonia Gandhi in front of Mahatma Gandhi's statue in defence of secularism. What utter fraud is going on! Congress governments have been far more generous to the first vital stages of this movement than the Vajpayee government proved to be on 15March. L K Advani led the movement for the destruction of the mosque as BJP leader; he stood at Ayodhya and watched, doubtless with satisfaction, when the mosque came down. And yet when he was home minister of India on 15 March he did not run to his bedroom and forget to take telephone calls, as Rao and Chavan did on 6 December. I am absolutely certain that Advani does not agree in his heart with the decision of stand by the court decision for 15 March but as home minister of India, he ordered what forces were required to move to Ayodhya and prevent the law from being violated. A government is elected to protect the law, not go to sleep as Rao and Chavan did; or to weedle and lie as Ghulam Nabi Azad did after the event. Is it any wonder that there was a sense of genuine bewilderment and hurt on the face of Mahant Paramhans when he was not allowed by the authorities to cross what might be called Vajpayee's Ram Rekha? Some of the less polite Hindutva leaders accused the Vajpayee government of being worse than the Congress, and they were quite right too.

Will Prime Minister Vajpayee have the courage to keep the law above the authority of the Government, or will he succumb before the backlash that must inevitably follow in his own ranks ? It would require more conviction than I have to make a prediction. I can only hope he does. There has been criticism, and justified a sop to Mahant Paramhans. It was his first sign of weakness but not one that made any fundamental difference. A second sign of weakness could make that difference.

The Vajpayee formula is to make the courts proactive in this dispute. By waiting for the Supreme Court to decide what would happen on 15March, he reestablished the court's credibility. This is critical. If the court is not believed to be impartial, then its judgment will not be respected; and if it is not respected the it will not find the support so necessary o carry the decision through, whatever it may be. Vajpayee also began the difficult process of lifting the problem out of the grasp of those who have made the temple movement their single priority. This was particularly difficult for him since the temple movement had been handed over to the seers and organisations like the Vishwa Hindu Paishad by the BJP itself. L K Advani gave life to a dormant demand in the last few years of the 1980s and watched, certainly with pleasure, as governments squirmed and shifted and wormed past their own positions in order to pick up leaves shed by the Advani storm. After the frenzied demolition of the Babri mosque in 1992 the BJP changed its strategy. It handed the flag of temple construction to the children it had spawned during the Advani movement, and using Vajpayee as its next mascot gradually created space between the party and its past. That space was reserved for the allies that the BJP knew it needed. The allies were slow in coming. One reason why George Fernandes is a favourite of the BJP is because he was the earliest of the big birds (sparrows flock around, chirp and are useful for soundbites, but they don't have body weight). But once Sonia Gandhi took over the Congress, she made the decision for the parties floating in between the Congress and the BJP- the went over to Vajpayee.

The next stage of the game will be crucial. For Vajpayee there is really no turning back; if he steps away from the commitment he has shown to the law of the land, on this central and emotive issue, then his own credibility will crumble and his government will unravel. What he has done is only the beginning. It makes sense now to persuade the courts to deliver a judgement, if necessary by continuous hearing. It is up to the government to defend that decision, whatever it is. There is no middle path. Maybe I got that wrong; maybe there is a middle path, but that middle path is slipper with the blood of innocents. Too many politicians and Prime Minister have washed their hands with that blood. It is far better, Mr Prime Minister, to leave than to live with blood on your hands.

There is of course that last option before you as you sit in India in early April; to do nothing. In truth, that option is over. Something has already happened. There is no space for nothing.

Urdu as Mother-Tongue Medium at Primary Level

By Ashok K Pandey

The responsibility of the State ined-ucating its masses is not only em-phatically enshrined in the Indian constitution but also finds its reiteration at several places. The constitutional safeguards for the linguistic minorities are enumerated in Articles 29, 30, 347, 350, 350A and 350B of the constitution. These provisions do not leave any doubt about the vision of India our elders had in their minds.

Unfortunately we embarked on setting our goals premised on to ill-conceived assumptions:

i) that the inherited language of the child does not play a significant role in developing his/her cognition. And even if there is any correlation between the two, it can well be compromised rather than addressed to.

ii) that the future of our children lies safe in English medium schools.

The language that the children inherit from mothers is the edifice of their future development. The entire programming of the syllable in the subconscious domain of the child is written in the mother-tongue. We all have seen, how children, respond to people, events and indeed to a wide range of stimuli around them. The problem begins when we start interfering with this natural process at a very tender age when they begin to formally think, appreciate, reason and communicate.

Urdu as Mother-Tongue

The present article confines to the issues and challenges involved with regard to Urdu as a Mother-tongue medium of instruction. Urdu is a very important, rich and sophisticated language of India both born and spoken here. The importance of Urdu has certain unique dimensions. Except for a few pockets in the South the Urdu Zuban has shown preference for a North-West direction. It had to suffer due to partition of the country. It was also the beginning of many a misunderstandings around the language. Particularly disturbing is the attempt to brand Urdu as community centric and as a language rival to Hindi. The fact is that Urdu and Hindi being sister languages have the potential to grow symbiotically. The father of the nation Mahatma Gandhi was so moved by the rendition of Manahajat-e-Bewa by Altaf Hussain Hali that he is believed to have exclaimed that if such a language, truly Hindustani, existed, then why did we need any other language. The prosody of Masadas-e-Hali is believed to be the chief inspiration behind the creation of much acclaimed Bharat-Bharati by Shri Maithili Sharan Gupt, a great Hindi poet of modern India. The significant contribution made by many a non-Muslim scholars to the growth and literature of Urdu should dispel any doubts about its secular caracter. L M Singhvi advocates that Urdu can be a language of India's liberal ethos. What is needed, according to him, is a new route map, a new dialogue about Urdu and a new mindset.

Constitutional Obligation

The issue here is the implementation of the constitutional provisions with regard to the mother tongue education at the primary level (Article 350 A). And in the context of Urdu as the mother tongue medium of instruction the two issues are to be dealt with in tandem. At present Urdu as a language is dwindling. The situation in the State of Jammu and Kashmir is very interesting where Urdu is its official language. Ironically Urdu is not even a compulsory language at an level, let alone imparting education in Urdu medium. The states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka with a large population of Urdu speaking minorities should have set the agenda of urdu education in the country. The finest breed of Urdu Wallas is fast diappearing. As young students some three decades ago we used to take pride in interacting with these scholars possessed with the grace and dignity of Urdu language. If one were to analyse the compulsions, the following points would emerge as helpful in the promotion of Urdu as medium of instruction and, by implication, of Urdu language itself :

Discussion Points :

The government should take responsibility for setting up schools with adequate infrastructure in a locality inhabited by people declaring Urdu as their first(mother tongue) language. Many would debate as to the threshold number of people for such an arrangement. But the point remains that if there are children they need to be educated, number notwithstanding. However, if number is important, let us say that a locality with 300-400 houses should have a Urdu medium primar school.

The parents need to be convinced that there is a vale in imparting education to their children in their own language, at least upto primary level (Class V). Hindi may be introduced as compulsory language from Class IV as second language and English as the third compulsory language from Class VI.

Education is a process operating at many levels. If qualified and trained teachers are required to impart education, quality text books and learning materials are required to facilitate the learning.

Linking Urdu medium instruction with job prospect is unfair. According to Ather Farouqui it is sheer madness. In any case formative years are not meant to prepare a child for a career.

I see the State Boards of Education and Central Board of Secondary Education playing a significant role in the implementation of the mother tongue as medium of instruction. Some may say it infringes upon the right of one's choice of medium. However, I view it as an implementation of quality. Imagine a situation where a group of prospective students seeking enrolment in a new school to be set in a locality declare their mother tongue as Urdu. Now what is the justification in a school like this to impart education to young children in a medium other than Urdu. The concerned Boards and local bodies can examine these aspects while granting affiliation/permission.

The community needs to be educated to derive strength from and take pride in their linguistic heritage. Community participation in making right choices and its efficient implementation is very essential. In fact only the proud parents and the elders of the community can ensure the preservation of the rich heritage of the language. Here, I would urge that we learn from the experiences of the South Indian languages, particularly, Malayalam and Tamil. Despite many contemporary adversities these two languages have not suffered as much as Urdu.

The implementation of appropriate medium of instruction can be initiated in the schools owned and aided by the State. However, education of Urdu as a subject must be encouraged in private schools also. This can be done only if the educational managers acknowledge the importance and arrange for competent teachers. Services of the retired teaches well versed in Urdu language may be sought in designing the curriculum and teacher training programmes. It would be worthwhile to mention here that the State of Jammu and Kashmir invited the late Noor-U-Zaman Siddiqui Noor from Uttar Pradesh after partition to provide leadership in Urdu education in Jammu Province. He was made a 'State Subject' and offered several facilities. Prof. Zahur-ud-Din of the Urdu department, University of Jammu has made significant contribution in the promotion of Urdu language in the State of J&K. He has suggested that short duration courses in Urdu language for the administrators and programme implementers can be introduced.

Scholars of Urdu language may engage in popularizing the language among the masses. A refrain from Persianising Urdu may be called for. The dynamic and assimilative character of the Urdu language can be utilized to spread it. The potential of Urdu lies in its innate beauty. It can serve as an important link to bring about linguistic harmony in the country. If these things are explained properly to the students and their parents, its acceptance as an optional language will also expand. Mr Salman Khurshid* rightly opines that the students particularly the Hindi knowing should be encouraged to opt for Urdu from Class VI onwards as a third language under the straight jacket of Three Language Formula.

It was quite painful to read Christina Oesterheld's reflections where in she laments that in India even the basic learning material in Urdu is hard to get. Lot of good work in preparing learning materials in reading, writing and speaking skills of Urdu language was done in the Jamia Milia Islamia under the tutelage of Dr Zaikur Husain. I have come across two very old publications, which have by now become classics. They are Rashid Hussain Khan's Urdu Kaise Likhe How to write Urdu (1977) and Dr Saify Preme's Hamare Muhavare. I suspect these books are out of publication now. Lack of interest in material preparation cannot be more obvious. The recommendations of the NCERT's Guidelines and syllabi for Primary Stage on Urdu as Mother Tongue can prove helpful.

Conclusion :

Wide diversities in culture and language are to be matched by diversifying schooling opportunities. It is a phenomenon that is gaining acceptance globally. It would be a pity if we fail to be leaders in this campaign (Jumbesh). It reminds me of the famous lines by the poet laureate Shri Maithili Sharan Gupt,

Hum Kaun the, Kya ho gaye hain, aur kya honge Abhi,

Aao Vichare aaj milkar, ye Samasyyayin Sabhi.

(Who we were! What have we become, and what will we be, come ponder together over all these problems)

(The author is Principal Delhi Public School Jammu)