Divine Currency

‘Trishul vs Cross’: Hindutva, Church, and the politics of secularism in Christian-majority states of North-east India

“…14 However, as Bijukumar 15 argues, the legitimacy for the Church's political activism came from its religious authority and it, therefore, established an 'ecclesial citizenship' in parallel to the political citizenship, making the Church a 'state within a state'-a position which was further enforced by the fact that while the 'tribals' were exempted from paying income tax to the Indian Government, the Church collected one-tenth of their income as tithes. 16 Such intertwining of religion and state also marginalized religious minorities. In Mizoram, the ethnic and religious 'others'-the Brus, the Hmar, the Chakmas, and the Gorkhalis-had to face systematic persecution ranging from denial of seats in professional colleges to physical violence and, in the case of the Bru, even ethnic cleansing and forced displacement to refugee camps in the neighbouring Tripura.…”

“…Debates on secularism in India hardly ever took into account this phenomenon which Singh calls 'reverse secularism' and which, he argues, resembled 'the church's role in eighteenth century Europe when religious doctrine got mixed up with political administration'. 47 The Hindutva ideologues had for long been critical of 'Nehruvian secularism' for keeping Hindus divided while appeasing minorities and allowing their consolidation as vote banks, thus preventing their 'integration with the national mainstream'. 48 Rejecting it as 'pseudo-secularism' they championed instead uniform civil code and 'positive secularism' which would ensure equal rights to all but not 'appease' any group.…”