No, don’t scrunch up your noses now. Communalism knocks the door to your subconscious while you are scrolling through social media, at family gatherings (specifically), at formal luncheons or at a bar, during a casual convo- you name it- clad in the hideous garb of wokeism. 

(I abstained from titling it as communalism so as to be sensitive enough to not dent and libel the reputation of people claiming to be apolitical. I could never dare to call out the blatant hypocrisy of that.)

Wokeism is the product of an unfortunate farcical counter-‘il’logic to the long nourished legacy of secularism.

A streak which runs common in all the hackneyed posts through social media accounts of ‘woke hindus’ is a desperate attempt to earn legitimacy by quoting (read as ‘misquoting’) the spuriously diced texts/speeches by freedom fighters, exhortations to the fellow members of the religion, downright trying to provoke ‘action’ over the ‘wrongs’ bore by them through chapters of history.

Allow yourself the favour to wonder at the apparent impossibility of the claims at tribulations and miseries , raised simultaneously by two dominant religions, hurling accusations over one another. The easy logic to this seemingly impregnable dilemma actually has got to do with the fundamental illogic of viewing history as a struggle between warlords of one religion against the oppressed of the other religion- a Muslim ruler persecuting Hindu subjects or Hindu landlords over-exacting Muslim peasants. This is an utterly bleared perception of history. The nature of these conflicts was class based and not a crusade against a particular religion. The landlord exacted rents savagely and indiscriminately from peasants- maximising the collection and not the consideration of religion was the primary determinant of directing the nastiness of the burgeoisie class.The history of freedom movement proudly displays an array of examples when the solidarity was was shared by the oppressed against the oppressors. 

Such seemingly harmless confabulations are often accompanied with the cries of ‘imperiled’ religion, invoking ‘pride’ to salvage the falling grandiose monument of the religion (after all, monuments are what we are interested in).

Here are few reasons why it isn’t ‘pride’ but insecurity, propaganda and a cagey lie to harness vote bank and what Wokes will never tell you- 

• Bhakti tradition (of which Sufism is an offshoot- epitome of syncretism) flourishing through 5th century CE to 18th century CE was itself an outcome of a spiritual movement inclusive of the lowest rungs of society and women against the conversion of religion into an Orthodox, exclusive, inaccessible, unemotional system.

Conservatism could never be the way of Hinduism- the religion which worships rivers and owes its greatness to its resemblance of a perennial river itself, in motion.

• Let’s see if any woke ever told you that Hinduism is the only major religion of the world that accommodates atheists ranked parallel to believers in its Nastika tradition of philosophy.
• Different local traditions and deities spanning the subcontinent were incorporated and proclaimed the avatars or incarnations of Vishnu – the Nurturer. The famous Jagannath Puri is an exemplar of this practice.
• Jainism and Buddhism- started out as parallel counter-forces- were eventually converged and adopted into its ever accepting folds.

I shall not enter the definitions and adaptations of secularism because I believe the examples given here are themselves evident of the powerful tradition of secularism inherent in the religion. Secularism is more the spirit of Hinduism- than all the liberals of the world combined.

Are you ‘woke’ or insecure? Well, I just happen to be proud.

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thenewsbeans and Marisha Singh

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