Deafening grumbles....

It is becoming fashionable again to seek State intervention in everything, right from the economy to morality to even getting people to respect each others’ beliefs. And to my mind, this is a dangerous tendency. To start considering the State as some sort of final adjudicator in our disputes, our dilemmas is to abdicate one’s own reason and repose blindly in the ‘wisdom’ of the State. The quotes are necessary because what may be wise at one juncture of time may not be justifiable in the future.

Turkey and Egypt are often touted as examples of secular states. Their devotion to secularism and their zealousness in their resolve to preserve it has been called exemplary. And yet, I have no more respect for their zeal than I have for Saudi Arabia’s theological state structure. For in their enthusiasm, they are seeking to enforce the unenforceable on their populace.

Human nature rebels against authority. It may accept it for some time, a few decades, maybe even a few centuries, and if the authority is really accomplished, even a few millennia. But after its self-determined threshold has been breached, no amount of coercion can stop the grumbling masses from destroying the edifice of power.

Even if Turkey, Egypt and their likes may state their noble intentions behind their coercive approaches, they in the end deny the basic maturity of their populaces. They take an inherently paternalistic approach to a problem the debate over which can at best be delayed by a few decades, but which is bound to resurface with double force thereafter. Paternalism, one may bear sometimes, some may bear it all the time, but not all can bear it all the time (forgive my rephrasing of Lincoln’s quote here).

Supporters of a coercive approach may state the divisive properties of religion, and how a nation can never be truly called united while its people put religion before their national identities. One hears this argument much too often in India. One presumes too much into the unitary effect of religion. And aren’t there more divisive identities that men may presume? There is regionalism, casteism (in the particular case of India) et al.

Coercion never works, especially when it comes to getting people to agree to something, and it is a miserable failure when you want it to get people to respect each others’ beliefs. Trust me, I don’t want you telling me to respect someone else; I’d rather do that on my own. Coercion makes the majority resentful of having to suppress their emotions, their beliefs in the State’s desire for uniformity. The minority stands the risk of becoming arrogant and aggrandize the resentment of their fellow compatriots. A point to note. By majority and minority, I don’t just mean religious majorities or minorities; it could be ethnic, casteist, gender etc.

Turkey and Egypt may have had it easy so far, but now their masses are beginning to demand the right to be overt about their beliefs. They are demanding the right to be seen to belong to a faith, to a system of beliefs. The struggle that these populaces find them in could lead them in either direction. Either they could become fanatics and reject modernity and all that their nations have achieved so far, or become apathetic and lose all their momentum to change their future for the better.

Secularism by coercion is a form of display of authority. The masses are grumbling. It behooves us to hear their grumbles while they are just so. Trust me, their screams and shouts could become too deafening to bear.

Asana Troubles...

I read in the newspapers today that a State Government has decided to make the practice of a Yoga asana, the Surya Namaskar, in educational institutions, voluntary, owing to objections from minority (read non-Hindu) communities in the State. The communities believe, and they are right to some extent, that the asana has religious connotations, as in it is intended to be seen as a respectful offering to the Sun, who is deified in Hinduism as the Giver of Life.

But the point here is that while the said asana has religious connotations, it isn't limited to just that. The Surya Namaskar is perhaps the best exercise that a growing child can be exposed to, and regular practice of the same is guaranteed to ensure that the child grows into a very healthy and well-balanced individual. Rejecting the exercise solely on the basis of its 'communal' association, without taking into consideration the health benefits derivable by its practice, is a dangerous idea, and even more foolish, to say the least.
Secularism is something that the Indian State is expected to cherish, and I have no objections to all that, because it is a nice idea to reject any particular faith primacy in State affairs. But I feel we are overdoing this idea. The State government concerned could have explained that if people have an objection to the nomenclature of the exercise, it can be changed for the purpose of the exercise, but as such the exercise should really be done, because it will benefit the children at large. They could have assuaged the concerns of the parents that their wards were being required to acquire quasi-religious education by pointing out that this exercise can be viewed as a part of physical education, and not as religious education at all.

Their decision to have announced the scheme as a purely voluntary one sadly escapes the main issue, and establishes a dangerous precedent, a precedent which could be used by anyone in the future to justify non-inclusion of a potentially beneficial course of education in the curricula solely on the basis that it originates from the tenets of a specific faith or community.
One hopes that better judgement prevails and the decision taken is reversed, if not for the sake of common sense, then at least for the children.

Equality before law, I think not!

Over time, I have come to believe that the Indian family laws are deeply flawed, in that they encourage different interpretations of the same issues based on who the law is to be applied to. So, if a Hindu has some issues, his/her issues are to be resolved by some law, but the same law may not be applied to a Muslim or a Christian. Although I agree that religious and communal differences do matter, that a secular state should so differentiate amongst its people on the basis of their religious affiliations is to me an irony.

Private laws are defined to be that part of a legal system which is part of the jus commune that involves relationships between individuals. Family laws basically deal with, but not limited to, family-related issues, such as marriages, adoption, domestic abuse, divorce, alimony, parental responsibility, as also property settlements in the event of the termination of a marriage.

So, basically these are issues which are common to all faiths, to all people, to all communes. Then why have different laws to govern different people?
That customary law has been prevalent in India for so long is and can never be seen as justification for implementing a common civil code for its citizens. And mind you, the Constitution of India also envisaged the administration of an uniform civil code for its citizens, and as such included the same as a Directive Principle.

Basically a uniform civil code envisages administering the same set of secular civil laws to govern different people belonging to different religions and regions. This supersedes the right of citizens to subject themselves to different personal laws based on their religion or ethnicity. The superseding of this right should not be construed to be an attempt to destroy one's communal identity, and in truth, maintaining such an identity in the context of law and jurisprudence is contradictory to the concept of all being equal before the law.

That the communes who in India clamour for separate personal laws can very well exist peacefully under the common civil codes in European countries and beyond shows that in truth common civil codes are not conflicting with religious obligations. Perhaps I am being a tad optimistic about their existence, but as far as I know, and I stand to be corrected should I be wrong, there seems to be no real problem in these countries. So why should India have such a problem with implementing what it had envisaged at the dawn of its freedom?

Different personal laws for different communes are inherently unequal, and hence in contravention of Article 13 of the Constitution which guarantees the equality before law and prohibits discrimination among citizens on the basis of their religion, race, caste, sex, or place of birth.

It isn't that there doesn't exist an example of a uniform civil code in India, which has been accepted by people of different faiths. The Portuguese Civil Code, applicable in Goa till date, owing to the promise exacted by the people of Goa from the Government of India in 1960 that their hitherto applicable laws would remain in force, is a fine example of such a code, and should ideally serve as a model for a larger Civil Code for the entire Indian nation.

The idea that the Muslim population per se is incapable of being governed by laws other than those mandated by the Shariat is wholly incorrect. Pakistan, which maintains itself to be an Islamic Republic, has altered, amended, and modernized its Muslim Laws to a greater extent than the 'secular' India. Turkey and Tunisia, predominantly Muslim countries, have outlawed polygamy, a privilege that India denies to all save its Muslim citizens.

The Special Marriage Act of 1954, similar in all aspects to the later Hindu Marriage Act of 1955, envisaged a uniform treatment of all citizens with respect to marriage, divorce and alimony issues. That this act was later stonewalled by the conservatives in the Muslim community is sad, for this law would have considerably reduced the inherent inequality that the Muslim Personal Laws continue to display between men and women. The Muslim Personal Laws offer no strong penalties against child marriage, marital abuse, nor do they confer upon the wife the right to terminate her marriage, as it does for her husband. Implementation of these Laws also have been sadly not inspiring, wherein people have violated not just private laws, but also Sharia laws, and have done so with remarkable impunity.

It isn't that I am opposed only to the Muslim Personal Laws. The Hindu Inheritance Laws, until recently, discriminated amongst men and women. Daughters have a lesser right upon the properties of their parents than their male siblings. A husband may appropriate a greater share of his deceased wife's properties in preference to her parents or relatives, but a wife may not do so in preference to her deceased husband's relations.

Christian law permits a husband an easy divorce on merely stating grounds of adultery, while the wife must prove her claims of her husband being adulterous or cruel. Christians are forbidden from willing their properties to charitable and/or religious institutions, as stated by the Indian Succession Act. The Hindu Undivided Family or HUF enjoys a special tax system, but an undivided family adhering to any other faith may not claim such a privilege. Sikhs are permitted to carry a kirpan or dagger on grounds of religion, but should any other person carry it, he/she is liable to be arrested as a danger to public safety.

So basically the rot is in all communes. No religion or commune is ready or willing to forsake its unique privileges and rights that their personal law confers upon them. 50 years have passed, and Article 13 remains just another noble intention in a great text. When and how this nation will truly treat its citizens on an equal footing in all matters remains to be seen.

My experiences with Science

It has always been a matter of great astonishment to me that people should insist that the pursuit of science and that of religion are two different things, and one cannot be or rather should not be mistaken for the other. Science, for all those who believe it be the supreme source of life, is the art of the intellect, while religion, in common belief, is the fact of the senses.

To some, the intellect is any day more superior to the senses, for what are the senses in comparison to the mind? They feel, they see, they hear, but they do not think. And for some, the knack of thought is more important than the ability to emote, the skill of sensation, and the art of feeling. But to quote Ralph J. Cudworth, the 15th century theologian and philosopher, “Sense is like a line which is the flux of a point running out from itself, but intellect, like a circle, keeps within itself.” Can there be a more eloquent yet simple expression, a more subtle speech that should so demonstrate the superiority of the senses over the mind? But, in no way do I wish to state that religion is superior to science, for the twain are brothers of the same seed, and within brethren, there is no one superior to the other, for brethren are born equal, equal halves of the seed. The seed here is the human race, and from its mind, and its senses have arisen the sciences and religion. Whenever the mind dominated our understanding of our world, we termed it as science, and whenever the senses dominated, it became religion. Different names for different viewpoints, yet the view remains the same.

It is remarkable that despite the apparent differences in the two, they are so very similar. True science and true religion can both never be achieved so long as there exists rigidity in the rules governing that concerned. God and science alike reserve their attentions for those who go beyond the rules, who dare to seek new heights, who dare to challenge what they perceive to be wrong. Why is then that we should insist on the separation of the religious mind from the scientific mind? Why should scientific temper be so highly valued as opposed to religious piety? For are not they sides of the same coin, expressions of devotion to the supreme Knowledge, be it science or God? Were not the greatest scientists such as Galileo Galilee, Isaac Newton, Nicolas Copernicus, Edward Hubble, C.V. Raman and Albert Einstein devout theologists? In the earlier days, there was no difference between a scientist and a theologian. Monasteries and temples have for countless millennia been the seat of learning, be it spiritual or scientific. In the medieval ages perhaps, a few black sheep in religion persecuted those whose ideas went against their beliefs. Can we not to blame the mind here, for “the eye sees only that what the mind comprehends”? In response to this, science left the folds of religion, and since has never re-entered into it. We do have to realise that history is the story of the victor, and today, science assumes such a role. But what hath brought about the brethren, shall it cause them to drift apart so? That will remain the existential question as to whether man, who created the two, shall now cause them to go so apart that one cannot survive so long as the other exists. The death of either is tragic, and will reduce our race and our world to an insentient one for sure.

I have but few experiences with science, and very few with what one could call “pure science”, but in my experiences with computer programming, and they remain but a drop in the ocean, I have come to realise that whatever I have learnt so far has to some extent connotations of Hindu and sometimes even sociology. I jest for sure, you say? But no, for we all see these signs, yet like horses with blinkers, we choose to look only at what we set out to do, and not at the environs in which we must attain our goals.

Consider this. The Hindu faith emphasises on the collection of good karma in one’s life, for the life to be deemed successful. The procurement of even a single moment of bad karma, or experiences that go against the laws of society, propels man back down to rebirth. But a life filled with experiences compliant with the laws of society is but a gateway to enlightenment, to perpetual moksha. Now compare this with a C or C++ program. There exist laws of programming that define the rights and wrongs that may arise when writing a program.

Should we go against these laws, we encounter erroneous code when compiling and we are compelled to debug the program from start. But if we always maintain conformity with the laws, our program runs without a hitch, and to say the least, we need never even look at the program code again, a sort of programming moksha. Again, all religions insist on the duality of faith, the existence of good and evil in the same world. Compare this with the language of the conventional computer. The basis of all communication with the computer is the binary system, the dual system, where 0 stands for “inactive” or “false”, and 1 stands for “active” or “truth”. To see such similarities between programming and religious faith may seem naive, but as said before, the pursuit of knowledge is important, not the source of the knowledge.

Often, I would think that the human race is like a couple of adaptive machines. Adaptive machines, you ask what are these? Well, I am not sure whether such a term already exists, but in my mind, these machines are those who are not instructed as to what situations they may possibly encounter in their lifecycle, nor are they told what they may do when such situations arise. These machines are expected to experience, learn and adapt to these situations, and should they ever come across the same situation again, act according to what they have experienced before. It is clear to even the lay mind that the machines of our day, such as the computer, the telephone, etc. are very much non-adaptive machines, for they need to be told everything. In this very significant fact lies the reason why the human race is superior to machines. I wouldn’t say that we are superior to animals, because they too have the power to adapt, just their ability to retain these experiences may seem limited as compared to us.

In this context, whenever I read of someone researching in the field of AI (Artificial Intelligence to the uninitiated), I would be confused. Is man so noble a creature to bestow a power that makes him so unique, the power to learn of one’s own volition, upon insentient machines? For when such powers be resident in the metallic hearts of robots and machines, what would the uniqueness of the human race, and why would the earth feel the need to retain them? These questions troubled me, and still do, though not to such an extent. For the reduction of my doubts, I am eternally grateful to a most dear friend of mine, who explained to me that the uniqueness of man does not lie merely in the fact that he is able to learn of his own choice, rather it lies more importantly in the fact that he is able to discern between right and wrong, a power that no other being on this earth possesses to such a large extent.

So long as man confers mere learning powers onto machines, no harm is done, for still man makes the decision as to what the machine may learn and what it may not. But should the discretionary powers be bequeathed to machines, then what? Where shall the human race go from there? Such are the questions that the human race shall have to live with for all eternity.