Chapter Fourteen

Peace in a Plural Society methods in this matter will only further exacerbate the problem, rather than solve it. In this context, there is an important issue that needs to be clarified with regard to the specific Indian case. Some people claim that Hindus are loyal to India, their holy places being located here. They claim that it is different with the Muslims of the country, whose centres of devotion—for instance, Makkah and Madinah—are located outside India. That is why, they allege, Muslims can never be loyal to India. I see this issue differently, however. Suppose a Hindu is devoted to a temple in Somnath. This does not mean that he cannot be devoted to a temple located in Ayodhya as well. Likewise, if a person loves his mother, it surely does not mean that he has no love for his father. Similarly, if an Indian Muslim has an emotional bonding with Makkah and Madinah, it does not mean that he has no such bonding with India. To think otherwise is to underestimate man’s emotional capacity. Any person, be he or she Hindu or Muslim or anything else, is an expression of nature, and nature has made every human being with enough inner spaciousness to contain within him or her multiple loves and loyalties at the same time. This is such a basic fact of life that every person can testify to it personally. Every man and woman knows this from his or her own experience. As a Western thinker very aptly put it, ‘I am large enough to contain all these contradictions.’ Religion and Politics Very often, religion is invoked in communal conflicts. Repeatedly, political and communal controversies are turned into religious controversies, and then people’s passions are roused, leading to confrontation and violence between communities. Because of this, many people have become opponents of religion itself. They