Muslim Women and Minority Rights in India

by MONICA MUNJIAL and POONAM KAUSHIK

India is one of the largest democracies in the world. It also has one of the largest minorities. A true democracy ensures not only individual rights but also rights of minorities as a community. Our Constitution has laid down in Articles 25 to 30 the rights of religious, cultural and linguistic minorities and thus made India a truly democratic and pluralist nation.

There was, however, a big gap between noble intentions and actual realisation. The minorities continued to face several problems. The most important was of security, especially as far as Muslims were concerned. Minority rights in India have, at least indirectly, obstructed the pursuit of gender equality.

In India each community is, in matters relating to family, inheritance, adoption etc., governed by the Personal Laws of the community. Although protection of the Personal Law was not considered as the fundamental right of the community or its members, yet, the right to culture, granted to communities, has been used to advocate non-interference of the state in the Personal Laws of communities. Insofar as the communities’ Personal laws are concerned, they are generally biased against women, and the continuation of these laws has hindered the process of ensuring gender equality for all sections of the population. Minority communities which are not politically dominant have traditionally evolved a relationship with the majority community that has been based on social, political and economic dependency.

Minority Rights 

MINORITY communities, except for the Muslim community, were able for the first time to influence political and economic policies through concerted group action and, therefore, could counteract the disadvantages of their minority position. Traditional groups, based on caste, language and religion, form the multifaceted minority communities throughout India, all seeking to overcome, or in cases to maintain, their traditional hierarchal positions. The Muslim community in India was subject to pressures similar to those of other groups, but their historically dominant role coupled with their minority position made their situation unique.

There are noteworthy socio-economic and demographic differentials among the various sets of population groups in India. Among the major religious identities, Muslims dominate the minorities and they are of particular interest because of both their numbers as well as their historical and cultural characteristics. India consists of one of the largest Muslim populations in the world next to Indonesia and Pakistan. After partition (1947) a large number of Muslims (especially from North India) moved to Pakistan, yet in 1951, according to the first Census after independence, there were 35.4 million Muslims living in India, which formed the largest minority. Minorities are not only confronted with different types of violence but also face various forms of discrimination in every walk of life.

The main grievance of the Indian minorities has been discrimination, especially in the economic field, with the result that they are economically worse off than the majority community. The discrimination against Muslims in matters of employment, permits, contracts, and admissions to various institutes has brought them to the verge of economic ruin.

Status of Women

THE status of women in Indian society is a much-debated subject. There are points of view put forth defending or condemning the position occupied by or imposed upon women in the Indian subcontinent. The position of women under Islam has been the subject of repeated controversies among educated Muslims ever since they came under the impact of Western liberalisation. The controversial subject of women’s rights has assumed great importance in the Islamic world and is a burning issue today.

Equality of men and women and non-discrimination on the basis of gender constitutes one of the vital human rights concerns, finding expression in all international instruments as well as in the Indian Constitution. In reality, however, Muslim women in India constitute one of the most deprived groups who are unable to fully enjoy their equal rights. Their deprivation and vulnerability derives from the following sources:

1) Cultural and Religious,

2) Legal,

3) Socio-Economic and Educational, and

4) Violence against Muslim Women.

The problems of Muslim women are many-sided and closely related to the problems of the Muslim society as a whole. Hence the approach to bettering the lot of Muslim women depends mainly on the approach towards solving the problems of the Muslim society. Muslims today should not be limited by those constraints, but reinterpret the teachings of Islam in accordance with the needs and circumstances of our own age.

The one main argument for an alternative, cultural view of human rights in the UN General Assembly came from Saudi Arabia, sometimes joined by Egypt and other countries. In particular several Muslim countries objected to the Articles of the Declaration guaranteeing the freedom to change religion and the equality of men and women.

The theory of divine law is no longer applicable to the institution of slavery. Human consciousness in modern society is conditioned by the concept of human rights and human dignity. The laws regarding women, drawn up during the medieval period by the jurists, though based on interpretations of the scriptures, are unlikely to be accepted by women today. They no longer accept their subordinate position. They demand equal status with men.

The rights of women have assumed an enhanced significance in the modern times in general, and in the Islamic world in particular. Islam supervises the entire lifespan of a woman in sufficient detail. Islam also contributes to the improvement of the status of women in many ways—for example, meting out good treatment and respecting a foster mother, by making a woman the mistress of her own property with no interference, by giving her the right to claim divorce on certain grounds, permission to hold any public office, remarriage, encouragement to study.

Many religious books point to the fact that women are not treated badly by Islam. Unfortu-nately, in actual practice, the tendency seems to be to overlook or misinterpret the principles and orders of the Quran and consequently to accord to the woman an inferior status.

On the other hand, Asghar Ali Engineer in one of the leading Muslim journals said that the “Minorities are often stereotyped as ‘fanatical’ and ‘fundamentalists’ and the acts of few individuals would be seen as of the entire community.” Even if a religious leader issued any appeal to the Muslims, it will be described by a loaded word like fatwa binding on all Muslims. The way the Shah Bano movement was projected in the media, including the secular media, gave an impression as if only Muslims mistreat their women and deny them their basic rights. Suddenly the national press became the champion of Muslim women’s rights! That Islam treats women better than many other religious traditions or legal systems, was never brought out in any media analysis. The only thing projected in the media was that Islam metes out worse treatment to women.

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TO summarise, the role of women in Islam has been misunderstood due to the general ignorance of the true Islamic system, the Islamic way of life, and because of the distortions of the media. The need of the hour is to come together to find a new approach which will overcome the shortcomings and limitations of the above approaches. It is now necessary for the Muslim women to realise and enjoy their full human rights and start a process of reform within the community and empowerment through affir-mative action programmes for their greater access to educational, economic and political institutions and opportunities. Denial of human rights, especially to women, means tampering with the developmental potentials of half the human resource available in the world.

The 21st century will be the century of democracy and human rights. India can be justly proud of being democratic. The task is to further deepen and consolidate democracy. And this certainly depends on the treatment of minorities.

As the quality of democracy improves, the minorities will get all opportunities for their own creative contribution to the process of nation-building. The majority should realise that the more secure the minorities’ feel, the more they will contribute to nation-building.

A new approach, based on ‘faith and custo-mary religious laws’ that uphold basic human values, will lead to the end of exploitation of Muslim women. 

REFERENCES 

Bhatty, Zarina (ed.), ‘Indian Women: From Purdah to Modernity’, Status of Muslim Women and Social Change, Vikas Publishing House, New Delhi, 1976.

Engineer, Asghar Ali, ‘Media And Minorities’, Secular Perspective, Institute of Islamic Studies and Centre for Study of Society and Secularism, 1999.

Jain, Sushila (ed.), ‘The Process of Modernisation in India and the Status of Muslim Women’, Status of Women, Printwell Publishers, Jaipur, 1988.

Menon, Indu, Status of Muslim Women in India, Uppal Publications, Delhi, 1981.

Roy, Shibani, Status of Muslim Women in North India, B.R. Publishing Corporation, New Delhi, 1979.

Dr Monica Munjial is a Senior Research Fellow, Population Research Centre (PRC), Centre for Research in Rural and Industrial Development (CRRID), Chandigarh, and Poonam Kaushik is a Research Fellow, Population Research Centre (PRC), Centre for Research in Rural and Industrial Development (CRRID), Chandigarh.