Panel No. 36

Panel Title: Differing Organisation of Society ” Different Value-Ideas

Convenor: Judith Dick, Lawyer, Berlin, Germany
Co-convenors: Moez Khalfaoui, Religious Science, Erfurt University; Uwe Skoda, Freie Universität, Berlin; and Christian Strümpell, Freie Universität, Berlin, Germany

    Tuesday 6 July, 13–18

Panel Abstract: The panel is intended to address a wide range of questions concerning South Asia's differing forms of organising society or societies as well as the questions of pluralism, pluralistic society and the different value-ideas involved. Not only plural cultures, languages, laws, religions are on the screen, but also varying, though co-existing politico-religious configurations of pre-modern states (little kingdoms), tribal societies and institutions of the modern, democratic and industrial nations. In the political arena the discussions on communalism, federalism, secularism, positive discrimination and minority rights shape, negotiate as well as possibly reduce this plurality. The recent religious riots in Gujarat and the ideology of "hindutva" could be the pretext to a fundamental future of South Asia.
In this context we have to deal with questions like: What is the relationship between pluralism as theory or value and the South Asian practices? What are the models involved in South Asia”s plurality? In this regard the roles and mutual influences of as well as conflicts with or among politicians, former kings, parties, unions, priests and their networks shall be discussed. What tells us the South Asian practice of pluralism, anti-pluralism or holism and are there indigenous South Asian models? Which role plays hierarchy and the relation between religious authority and secular or secularised power as recently expressed by attempts of the Kanchi Sankaracharya to solve the Ayodhya-conflict.
This panel aims to discuss ways of organising society in its plurality in South Asia. The convenors welcome papers dealing with the anthropological, religious, political, historical and legal approaches to understand South Asia’s diverse society.

Papers accepted for presentation in the panel:

Paper Giver 1: Dr. Uwe Skoda, Free University of Berlin, Germany

Paper 1 Title: Playing on the sentiment – Former Kings and the Indian Democracy

Paper Abstract: More than 50 years after Indian Independence and after the merger of the princely states with the Indian Union, politics in India is still largely dominated by Rajas and their relatives. Major states such as Punjab and Rajasthan, to name couple, are ruled by members of former "ruling families". Leaving aside Union level politics, this article will first attempt to explore post-Independence politics in two constituencies of assembly in north western Orissa, Bonai and Bamra / Deogarh. In both constituencies, as parts of the former "feudatory states" of Orissa, the royal families exercise considerable influence although quite differently. While the royal family of Bamra / Deogarh could remain MLAs for decades, due to the reservation of the constituency for candidates of the Scheduled Tribes the ruling family in neighbouring Bonai has been excluded from becoming MLAs and, thus, has had to find other ways to enter the political realm. Apart from examining local political configurations and how the role of the former kings has changed in modern politics, this article will more generally investigate the relationship between kingship and democracy in India and will try to answer the question of how apparently conflicting values such as the loyality towards dynasties and political competition are combined?

      Full paper to be downloaded (as a pdf-file)

Paper Giver 2: Arshad Alam, PhD Research Scholar, Islamic Sciences University of Erfurt, Germany

Paper 2 Title: Contemporary Indian Islam: Denominational plurality; Religious insularity?

Paper Abstract: Islam’s encounter with colonialism generated far reaching changes for the identity of Indian Muslims. The political and intellectual defeat of Muslims generated an internal interrogation regarding their location in the cultural matrix of Indian society. More often than not these interrogations were couched in religious terms asking where they had erred in following the religious scriptures. The ulemas who during this period assumed themselves to be the natural leaders of the Indian Muslim community, strove to place their understanding of Islam in the public domain. In what followed was plurality of views on what constituted Islam. The definition of Islam got variegated, each of these definitions propagating particular versions of Islamic truth. In a Weberian sense, some of these truths got routinized, crystallizing into various denominations. Thus the 18th and 19th century India saw the emergence of Islamic denominations such as the Deobandis, the Ahl-e-sunnat-wa-Jamaat, the Ahl-e-Hadith, the Ahl-e-Quran, etc. Today these denominations are an entrenched feature in the cultural setup of everyday Muslim life. The boundaries between these various denominations are clearly marked and often guarded and refined by communitarian activities. Such activities include publications, lectures and more importantly setting up of madrasas or Islamic religious schools. Far from the perceived notion that madrasas help to inculcate a reified Islamic identity, the truth is that they are engaged more in imparting a denominational identity.
Such denominational plurality is unprecedented in Indian Islam. The medieval Muslim society had its own fissures in terms of the differences between the Shia and Sunni, Sufis and Ulema. However, these differences were confined mostly to the upper class Muslims and those who had knowledge of religious texts. The average Muslim was not conscious of his identity while interacting on social level. This not only meant that the doctrinal differences within Muslims were minimal but also that inter-religious differences were minimum at the level of social interaction. The popular Indian identities were at best ‘fuzzy’ and inchoate which meant that there were lot of liminal spaces which Muslims and Hindus could participate in. Thus Hindus could and did take part in Muslim religious festivities and vice-versa. In contrast to the modern ones, the medieval madrasas did not lecture on the finer points of doctrinal differences but rather its curriculum taught syncretism. More importantly, it was indexed to the needs of upper class Muslims and Hindus.
The diminishing of the shared, liminal, blurred spaces between communities coincides with the coming of textual plurality in Indian Islam. The paper will try to understand and explore the issue further. It seems plausible at this stage to argue that the various denominations not only castigated the others as false, but also that in their attempt to be counted as ‘the true Muslims’, they redefined the boundaries of inter-religious sharing in much more stricter and narrower terms. Thus rituals and practices which were considered perfectly justified by Muslims half a century ago are now considered as reprehensible innovations by some denominations. For example the debate over visiting shrines in India is couched not only in terms of whether it is Islamic to do so, but also whether it is a Hindu influence or not. It seems that the test of a true Muslim is not only in terms of how much he follows the doctrines of his or her particular denomination, but also how far removed is he from Hindu influences or in other words, how un-Hindu he is. These processes and practices are making Islam much more insular than ever before. The paper will be partly based on field work conducted in India during 2002.

Paper Giver 3: Moez Khalfaoui, PhD Candidate, University of Erfurt, Germany

Paper 3 Title: Architectural pluralism in south-Asia: different representations of different realities or contradictory representation of ideologies?

Paper Abstract: The aim of this paper is to examine how do people in South-Asia approach their architectural models?
It should be pointed out that there are four recognized architectural styles in South-Asia today: Hindu- traditional, Buddhist, Islamic and colonial.
It is a fact that architecture offers people more liberty of thought and expression and allows them to represent their different points of view in freely. Hence architecture nowadays is considered as one of the important domains where South Asian pluralism could be successfully studied.
This paper doesn’t accord much importance to practical models of representation and construction. It deals more with the conceptual representations. This question is of a great importance when focused on different political and religious groups.
- How does a Hindu understand Islamic architecture? Does he use some of its concepts to build his house or does he conform to other models? The same question will be asked for the Muslim architectural construction.
This paper proceeds by two types of research:
The first is conceptual one. In which I will expose the different representations from different historical period in south-Asia to examine their diversity in order to find out if they consist of different representations of different realities or different representation of one reality?
The second aspect will be based on the diachronic understanding of some contemporary aspects of public and private building. I will try to answer the following questions:
- How do people now, want to build their houses? And why?
- What do they think about others’ model especially when they are neighbours?
This paper doesn’t try to give definitive answers; it only tries to explain some aspects of reality.

Paper Giver 4: Judith Dick, Lawyer, PhD Candidate, Berlin, Germany

Paper 4 Title: Personal Laws as an indian way of organising plurality

Paper Abstract: India has chosen to keep the system of plural Personal Laws though its Constitution proclaims an uniform civil code for all peoples of the country. My thesis is, that India has chosen so, because of its attitude versus plurality in general. This attitude consists in avoiding conflicts between communal groups by keeping them at a distance. This means to keep the fields of discours separate and to open only small channels of discours between them. The way of operating different value ideas in india is by avoiding direct conflict of the value ideas.
Official judiciary and legislation are two of the channels between the communal groups. In my Paper I will persue my thesis from a legal perspective by analyzing legal texts in respect of their teleological and argumentative content. How do they deal with the plurality of laws? Is conflicting law an issue in these texts? In which way is the praxis of personal laws pluralistic or anti-pluralistic? Is this praxis gender based? What tell's us for example the fact that central parlament changed the majority hindu personal law frequently, but only recently changed the long criticised divorce laws for christians? I will show the scope of the interpersonallaw discours and the techniques of avoidance. I argue that interdisciplinary research on the techniques of operating plurality is needed to achieve a more complete picture of plural india.

Paper Giver 5: Lorenza Acquarone, University of Milan, Italy

Paper 5 Title: Federalism As a Way of Organising Plurality

Paper Abstract: Federalism is a way of organising a society complying with the principle of unity in diversity formulated as a slogan by Jawaharlal Nehru. The federal system set forth in the Constitution of India is moulded on foreign models (Canada, United States, Australia and Germany) and it is based on historical reasons (Government of India Act, 1919 and Government of India Act, 1935). With the reorganization of the Union – a process which started at the beginning of the ’50s and is still under way – many new States were incorporated principally on the basis of linguistic criteria and the concept of federalism developed. As new States were created the regional political parties emerged and got more power also at the Central Government and federalism became the prevailing model for organising a pluralist and multicultural society such as the Indian one. However a sort of struggle between the Centre and the States took place for many years and is still going on. The Supreme Court tried to find a balance between the two also following the Sarkaria Commission on Centre-States relations recommendations in judgements relating to article 356 of the Constitution. As a matter of fact the issue of limiting the Centre's power to impose President's Rule in a State by invoking this article on the grounds of failure of the constitutional machinery has been an important aspect of the debate on Indian federalism. What is the practical outcome of the President’s Rule over States? Does it exist a parallel conflict between the States and the Centre with regard to authority, i.e. are the States which tend to refuse to accept the central authorities the ones that are generally put under President’s Rule?