Two child law: Not just Muslims, Lower Caste Hindus also the Target
In short, this law will
further marginalize the already marginalized, will make the poor poorer and
will further disempower the weakest sections of society. This is utterly
inhuman and inherently dangerous for India’s future.
Dr. Javed Jamil
Two-child policy imposition through law appears
to be the latest agenda of BJP state governments. After ban on “Love Jihad”,
this appears to be another attempt to ensure that the domination of Hindus,
especially the upper caste Hindus continues. In fact, the Hindutva is primarily
a Banyawaadi agenda, which has little to do with the basics of Hindu Dharma and
is largely interested in the economic domination of business community, which
in India largely means Vaish community commonly known as Banyas.
While, from political point of view, introduction of this bill
just before the elections in Uttar Pradesh is largely believed to be a communal
ploy to unite Hindus behind BJP, in social terms, it may also be an attempt to
keep the population of low caste Hindus, especially Dalits in control. They may
feel concerned not only about a slightly higher population growth rate of
Muslims but also a higher growth rate of the scheduled castes. See the
following report published in Times of India:
“Four states account for nearly half of the country's Dalit
population, reveals the 2011 census. Uttar Pradesh stands first with 20.5% of
the total scheduled caste (SC) population, followed by West Bengal with 10.7%,
says the data released by the Union census directorate on Tuesday. Bihar with
8.2% and Tamil Nadu with 7.2 % come third and fourth. Dalits form around 16.6%
of India's population. The 2011 census recorded nearly 20.14 crore people
belonging to various scheduled castes in the country. As per the 2001 census,
the number was 16.66 crore. The dalit population showed a decadal growth of
20.8%, whereas India's population grew 17.7% during the same
period." (“Half of India’s Dalit population lives in
4 states”: Times of India; B Sivakumar May 2, 2013)
It can be argued that purely in terms of caste/communal
equations; it will ultimately boomerang on Hindus, as the combined population
of SCs and OBCs is much higher than that of Muslims. But it is exactly what the
Hindutva is more concerned about. While on one hand, they do not want Muslims
to prosper, they are also keen to maintain superiority of Upper Castes in
general and Banyas in particular within the Hindu community. The proposed Bill
by Uttar Pradesh Government will serve both their purposes. On the ground of
this policy, they want to reserve more and more seats in colleges, jobs and
administration for upper castes. Already, through the privatization of
education, they have created a massive reservation for themselves, as it is
mainly the children belonging to the upper castes who have enough riches to
send their children in private colleges.
Even in terms of human values and health, the
effects of the policy will be highly damaging. First,
it will lead to sharp increase in abortions in general and female foeticide in
particular. Both are already high on many parts of the country. With fewer
women, long term effects can be highly dangerous leading to more polyandry and
promiscuity Second, family system will get increasingly weakened with more
and more people indulging in promiscuous life. This in turn will lead to more
sex transmitted diseases including HIV/AIDS, which still kills more than 60000
every year in the country.
The policy of severely strict population has already started
boomerang in many countries. China has already abandoned its one child policy
and people can now have three children. In Western societies, population growth
is already negative and with homosexuality on rise it is bound to worsen more.
They are relying on migration from other countries. This trend will continue to
rise. Till now, people from countries like India and other third world
countries have been providing a sizeable chunk of this migrant population in
Western countries. In countries like the US and Canada, already people of
Indian origin are making their presence felt through their achievements in
various fields. With strict 2 child policy, Indians will lose this advantage.
As I have argued previously also, Hindutva is mainly helping
Banyas, both in terms of caste domination (Vaish) and in business terms
(businessmen)/. In Indian terms, my now well-known phrase of “economic
fundamentalism” can easily be translated into “Baniyawaad” and Baniyas as the
biggest economic fundamentalists. Brahamainwaad represented dominance of the
power of “knowledge”; Baniyawaad represents dominance of the power
of “money”
It has been rather a fashion for long to say that
Brahamins and Brahaminwaad continue to rule the country and it is they who are
responsible for the majority of the problems of the country, especially the
plight of the deprived sections of society. We have failed to realise that the
balance has changed quite some time back. While the Upper Caste Hindus continue
to monopolise India’s socio-economic structure and their hegemony is ever on
the rise, it is not Brahamins and Brahaminwaad but banyas (Vaishyas) and
Baniyawqaad that now reign supreme.
All the propaganda about “Appeasement” of Muslims, and to a
lesser extent about the schemes favouring Dalits and OBC Hindus, emanate from
the desire to continue the centuries-old domination of Upper Caste Hindus. In
the remote past, Kshatriyas ruled with the help of the intellectual power of
Brahamins and the Money Power of Baniyas (Vaishyas). Then Brahamins started
ruling the country with the help of the money power of Baniyas and the Muscle
power of Kshatriyas. More recently, Baniyas have taken the reins in their hands
turning democracy into Corporatocracy, with the help of the intellectual power
of a section (not all) of Brahamins and the muscle power of Kshatriysa. This is
the most dangerous phase because when the money rules, morality soon gets
cremated with full honours.
Not only the consumer industry is largely controlled by the
Baniyas, even education industry is dominated by them. The mushrooming of tens
of thousands of Private institutions of all kinds in the country has introduced
another kind of Reservation — the Reservation for the Rich, which again hit the
Muslim community in a big way because less number of Muslims is likely to be
able to pay the exorbitant fees that good private institutions demand.
Privatisation has also benefited Upper Caste Hindus on business front in a big
way. Through them they earn huge money and get their children highly educated.
And of course they get most of the jobs in private companies.
The role of Baniyas is also getting increasingly high in
politics. While Congress had more Brahamins than Banyas, the BJP and its sister
organisations are now being driven by the Baniyas. It is they who are running
the BJP show. Hindutvavad is nothing but a movement that seeks economic and
political hegemony of Baniyas through polarisation of politics on communal
grounds.
The international population control
campaign was in itself a market-driven programme It may be true that the
population is growing at a rate considered fast by the experts. It may also be
true that such rapid growth of population escalates several problems. If the
infectious diseases cause mortality and morbidity at alarming rates, the
mothers still die during deliveries, a sizeable percentage of infants do not
remain alive to celebrate their first birthday and out of the rest many more
die in their paediatric age owing to lack of nutritious food and unavailability
of good medical care and cities are becoming overcrowded, the population
growth may be a significant contributory factor. But there are other factors
related with the issues that are conveniently forgotten. Disinformation is
generously used to further the birth control programme. For example, the
impression has been usually disseminated that a steep rise in population would
create shortage of food. The studies by the organisations monitoring food
production have been categorical in proving that the rise in food production in
the last seven decades has been greater than the rise in
population. If the people still starve it is because the food is not allowed to
reach them. It can be said with confidence that if the distribution of food
becomes equitable, no human being on the earth will remain hungry. The earth
allows birth of only as many humans as it can sustain. The economic
fundamentalists know this. This is why some economists have gone to the extent
in their argument that increase in food production must not be allowed to occur
because if the food production rises the population will naturally expand to
consume it. It can therefore be the reason why the food is not allowed to reach
all the corners of the earth; if it reaches all humans it would save many a
lives from starvation. This would obviously cause an increase in population.
Once there are no more deaths owing to starvation, the drive for population
control will receive further setback. Why exactly the economic fundamentalists
seek to keep population under control is explained below.
Another point that has entirely been
missed is that the total bio-mass of the earth remains the same. If the human
population grows the population of animals would decrease; and if the human
population is reduced by natural or artificial means the animal population
would increase. The question arises: should we reduce the number of human
beings and increase the population of beasts? If the human population has
always continued to increase, it is because Nature wants to replace the less
developed creatures with the better developed. Should we endeavour to interfere
with this natural phenomenon? Similarly, in order to popularise family welfare
programmes, the advertisements suggest that early marriage is detrimental to
the health of the girl. This again may be disputable; if Nature has made her
physically capable to reproduce, the probability of damage to her body would be
minimal, provided of course she takes adequate diet and receives appropriate
medical care, which is essential as well for the older mothers. Conversely, it
has been very well documented by the gynaecologists that the chances of
congenital abnormalities in children and certain kinds of malignancies
(cancers) of women rise with increase in the age of the mothers. The best
period for procreation is below thirty. Family welfare programmes are
definitely worth following as far as their objective is to save the mothers and
children from diseases and death; proper spacing is essential; avoidance of
pregnancies in mothers who are ill or when their other children are not healthy
and if the income of the family is too meagre to sustain a large family is also
understandable. But is the programme really aimed at alleviating the problems
of the common people? Unfortunately not. There is much more to what meets the
eyes. Behind the “mercifulness” for the poor are several undeclared motives.
One, by fixing the blame of every
problem of the world on the population growth, the economic fundamentalists are
able to divert the attention of the people from their own sinister games that
are in truth responsible for the sweeping poverty. When less than five per cent
have more than ninety per cent of the country’s income (and wealth) in India
for example, how a growth of less than two percent per annum is going to aggravate
the problems? Despite the high rate of population growth, the country has
become self-reliant in food production and is now in a position to export it.
Yet the poverty haunts about half of the nation. Even if the population growth
becomes zero, with the continuous flow of wealth from the poor to the rich and
from the richer to the richest, would the situation show any signs of
improvement even in decades? The situation warrants harsh measures and requires
that the holders of the ninety per cent of the wealth of the country are made,
either through force or through change in policies, to share the benefits of
their wealth with the rest of the countrymen. It is not the explosion of
“population bomb” but that of the bomb of myth that frightens the economic
fundamentalists; lest the people should know the truth, it is better to keep
them engaged in debates on the adverse effects of population growth.
Two, the big industries know that a big
family uses a big portion of its income in purchasing food items. Rest is
utilised in purchasing clothes that too are usually of cheap variety produced
by small industries. Little money is left with it to buy costly consumer goods
manufactured by the big industry. It tends to assist agricultural growth (and
that of small scale industry) at the cost of industrial growth. It is essential
therefore that the size of the family remains small so that it can save enough
money to bestow on the big industries.
Three, the popularisation of
contraceptive devices through promotion of small family norms is a great boon
for the industrialists. Through these programmes, men and women are informed
and conditioned with the use of methods for avoiding unwanted pregnancies. This
awareness helps the commercial sex. If women had not become fearless on this
account, promiscuity could never have become common. Furthermore, through the
marketing of various contraceptive devices, the industries earn billions.
Fourth, encouraging men and women to
marry as late as possible again immensely benefits the market including sex
market. The young working women in big numbers means opportunities for dating,
which helps food, fashion, hotel and many other industries. Sex market too
thrives. For the sustenance of the flesh-trade, demand and supply are essential;
and if the people start marrying as soon as they attain puberty, the market
would take a nosedive. It is hardly surprising therefore that, to achieve
success in population control, encouragement to promiscuity has been advanced
by the Western experts as a method to discourage people from early marriage. It
is also for the same reason that the so-called champions of human rights do
never raise their voice against the killing of millions of children by way of
abortion every year. The truth is that the so-called family welfare programmes
are aimed at the disintegration of the family system because the family system
is not consistent with the “development” model. The weaker the family system
the more likely the members of the family are to spend money in the consumer
and sex-market helping the “development” in the process.
What is needed is the proper
distribution in order to decrease all kinds of inequalities. Population
Management rather than Population Control should be the ultimate aim. Even if
population growth becomes zero, the problems will not ease. The big cities are
getting increasingly crowded not mainly because of population growth but
because of the migration from the rural to urban and from smaller
cities to bigger cities. Unless massive Rural Development programmews are not
organised, the problems will not cease. Anmd of coursed, massive efforts and
harsh steps are needed to reverse the rising Economic Inequality. There are
many ways but the most effective way will be to replace Income Tax and GST with
the Wealth Tax.
Specifically coming to India, it is high time the country
understood the designs of the forces of Hegemony. Baniyawaad needs to be
confronted in its ideological as well as practical forms. For this, all the
right thinking persons will have to unite. The protagonists of Hindutva should
know that Dalits, OBCs and most Muslims not only belong to the same class and
have common ancestral roots but also share similar beliefs regarding
secularism, justice and equality. Together these classes constitute around 90
pc of India, and you like it or not, it is they along with a large number of
those upper caste members, who value secularism, equality and justice, who will
play a dominant role in future India and will outsmart the forces of monopolization.
Two Child Policy needs to be abandoned without delay. If upper castes are so
wary of the decrease in their percentage in population, they must first
aggressively attend the horrendous issue of Female Foeticide. With two-child
policy, Female/Male ratio will further suffer. The Equal Right to be born is
the first right of equality that needs to be restored to women without wasting
any more time. It is already late.
In short, this law will
further marginalize the already marginalized, will make the poor poorer and
will further disempower the weakest sections of society. This is utterly
inhuman and inherently dangerous for India’s future
