Anti-Conversion Laws In India

From Marbaniang, Domenic. Secularism In India: A Historical Analysis (2009).

THERE WERE bills and acts in relation to religious conversion even before the independence. Instances are the Raigarh State Conversion Act of 1936 and the Udaipur State Conversion Act of 1946. These laws aimed at eliminating the rural and tribal rights of freedom to conscience and religion.[1] After independence, there have been at least five states (Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Arunachal Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Gujarat) that have enacted laws to either curtail or cease conversions. The following section is an account of the Freedom of Religion Acts enacted by States of Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Gujarat to check the tide of religious conversions and problems arising from it. The Gujarat Law and parliamentary affairs minister Ashok Bhatt, recently, has referred to these laws as anti-conversion laws.[2]

1. The Madhya Pradesh Freedom of Religion Act of 1968

This anti-conversion law was enacted in face of allegations that the Christian Missionaries were using lure and force for religious conversions. In 1954, the Niyogi Committee set up by the Congress government in Madhya Pradesh accused Christian missionaries of creating ‘a state within a state’ and observed that the ‘philanthropic activities of Christian missionaries are a mask for proselytization.’[3] The Sangh Parivar also alleged that the missionaries were promoting political dissent in the State.[4]

The Madhya Pradesh Assembly rejected the Freedom of Religion Bills of 1958 and 1963. However, this bill was passed in 1968 as ‘The Freedom of Religion Act.’[5]

The Madhya Pradesh ‘Freedom of Religion Act’ requires that a convert produce a legal affidavit that s/he was not under any pressure, force, or allurement to convert but was converting by own will and desire after evaluating the religion properly.[6] Also according to this law, anyone who writes or speaks or sings of ‘divine displeasure’ (with an intention to induce forced conversion by means of threat) can be imprisoned for a period of up to two years and fined up to five thousand rupees.[7]

Evidently, this law is an open violation of the right to freedom of religion that includes the freedom to propagate one’s religion. What is ‘divine displeasure’ in one religion may not be ‘divine displeasure’ in another religion. However, without propagation of religion, this cannot be known to a person belonging to another religion. Moreover, if there is no propagation of such fundamentals of religion, which distinguish one religion from the other, then there can be no conversions. Therefore, a law prohibiting the preaching of a fundamental tenet such as ‘divine displeasure’ is an attempt to prevent the citizen from a proper exercise of his/her right to freedom of religion.

2. The Orissa Freedom of Religions Act of 1968

 The state of Orissa enacted the Orissa Freedom of Religions Act in 1968. It stated that “no person shall convert or attempt to convert either directly or otherwise any person from one religious faith to another by the use of force or by inducement or by any fraudulent means nor shall any person abet any such conversion.”[8] Contravention of this law was punishable with imprisonment of up to one year and/or a fine of up to Rs 5,000. In the case of a minor, a woman, or a person belonging to a Scheduled Caste or Tribe, the punishment was up to two years of imprisonment and the limit of the fine raised to Rs. 10,000.[9]

The Orissa High Court, however, struck down the Act as ultra vires of the Constitution[10] on the ground that the state legislature did not have the right to legislate matters of religion.[11] The same year, the state of Madhya Pradesh also enacted the Madhya Pradesh Freedom of Religion Act as seen above. However, the Madhya Pradesh High Court, in contrary to the Orissa High Court, negated the challenge of some Christians that the Act violated their fundamental right as provided under Article 25 of the Constitution. The decisions of both the Courts were challenged before the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court upheld the decision of the Madhya Pradesh High Court and reversed the decision of the Orissa High Court.[12] The Supreme Court ruling by a full bench said:

We find no justification for the view that Article 25 granted a fundamental right to convert persons to one’s own religion. It has to be appreciated that the freedom of religion enshrined in the Article is not guaranteed of one religion only, but covers all religions alike and it can be properly enjoyed by a person if he exercises his right in a manner commensurate with the like freedom of persons following other religions.

What is freedom for one is freedom for others, in equal measure; and there can be no such thing as a fundamental right to convert any person to one’s own religion.[13]

Ruma Pal notes that this decision of the Supreme Court has been justifiably criticized for its failure in distinguishing between conversion by force and conversion by persuasion.[14] Even advertisements make use of the art of persuasion. The right of freedom to choose one’s own religion has no meaning if the very means of choice were removed. Choice between religions is unthinkable in the absence of an intellectually persuasive propagation of religion. Thus, the Supreme Court’s ruling that disregards the fundamental right to freedom of propagating one’s own religion is unjustifiable. As H.M. Seervai notes:

Art. 25(1) confers freedom of religion—a freedom not limited to the religion in which a person is born. Freedom of conscience harmonizes with this, for its presence in Art. 25(1) shows that our Constitution has adopted a “system which allows free choice of religion.” The right to propagate religion gives a meaning to freedom of choice, for choice involves not only knowledge but an act of will. A person cannot choose if he does not know what choices are open to him. To propagate religion is not to impart knowledge and to spread it more widely, but to produce intellectual and moral conviction leading to action, namely, the adoption of that religion.[15]

Thus, the Orissa Freedom of Religions Act of 1968 cannot at all be considered a Freedom of Religions Act since it takes away the very means of freedom to choose and practice one’s own religion.

3. The Arunachal Pradesh Freedom of Religion Act of 1978

This Act was enacted to prevent the tribals of Arunachal Pradesh from converting to other religions. It reads:

3) Prohibition of forcible conversion.

No person shall convert or attempt to convert, either directly or otherwise any person from indigenous faith by use of force or by inducement or any fraudulent means nor shall any person abet any such conversion.

4) Punishment of Contravention of the Provision of Section.

Any person contravening the provisions contained in Section 2, shall without prejudice to any civil liability, be punishable with imprisonment to the extent of two (2) years and fine up to ten thousand (10, 000) rupees. (i) whoever converts any person from his indigenous faith to any other faith or religion either by himself performing the ceremony for such conversion as a religious priest or by taking part directly in such ceremony shall, within such period after the ceremony as may be prescribed, send an intimation to the Deputy Commissioner of the District to which the person converted belongs, of the fact of such conversion in such forms as may be prescribed.[16]

Evidently, the meanings given to the word ‘inducement,’ namely ‘the offer of any gift, or gratification, either cash or in kind and also include grant of any benefit, either pecuniary or otherwise,’ in the law can dangerously affect social work by religious groups, even though their intentions are charity-oriented. Such ambiguity within the law is a clear indication of the State’s intention to restrain individuals from using their right to freedom of religion.

4. The Tamil Nadu Anti-Conversion Act of 2002.

The Tamil Nadu Anti-conversion Act of 2002 stated that ‘No person shall convert or attempt to convert directly or otherwise any person from one religion to another either by use of force or by allurement or by any fraudulent means.’[17] The immediate provocation for this Act, supposedly, ‘was the threat of hundreds of Dalits of Koothirambakkam village, near Kancheepuram, to change religion because their decades-old demand that their right to enter and worship at the common village temple be protected by the government had not been conceded.’[18]

There had been great protest against this ordinance from various corners. Police arrested 10 people who were planning a mass conversion on December 6, 2002 in protest to the new anti-conversion law. About 3,000 Dalits were to be converted to Christianity and Buddhism, without applying to the local magistrate to approve their conversion in accordance to the new law, on this day according to this plan.[19] Apparently, the Dalits saw this law as violating their fundamental rights and also ridding them of the opportunity to rise. However, President of the Maharashtra branch of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), Ashok Chowgule, congratulated the Tamil Nadu government on the ordinance. He said conversions cause social tensions.[20] The State Council of the All-India Democratic Women's Association also opposed the bill as being unjustified and opposed to the rights of minorities and Dalits ensured in the Constitution.[21]

On May 7 2004, the Prohibition of Conversion Act Protest Committee appealed to the electorate to vote for the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam-led Democratic Progressive Alliance (DPA). The DMK was said to have in its manifesto a promise to repeal the Anti-conversion law.[22] However, soon after the defeat of the BJP led coalition in the 2004 elections, the Tamil Nadu Government led by Jayalalitha repealed the law in June to the chagrin of many Hindu Fundamentalists and Nationalists.[23]

5. The Gujarat Freedom of Religion Act.

Soon after its victory in Gujarat the Narendra Modi government decided to accord "top priority" to the commitment given in the BJP poll manifesto and enact a law against religious conversions in the state.[24] Accordingly, the Gujarat Assembly passed the Freedom of Religion Act in March 2003.[25] It was called the Dharam Swatantrata Vidheya[26] (Freedom of Religion Act). Narendra Modi called the Act as one of the main ‘achievements’ of his government’s one year in office.[27] Evidently, anti-conversion law is a significant part of BJP agenda. The law prohibited conversion by force or inducement.[28]
All the above anti-conversion laws violate the Constitutional provision of fundamental rights to the citizens of India. Thus, it has been seen that the various anti-conversion laws are a direct contravention of the provisions given in the Constitution.

Also, the opposition of conversion is, evidently, an attempt to destroy the citizen’s right to freedom of religion and desecularize Indian society. Though it is known that this attempt is futile in this globally connected world of information explosion, yet many of the Sangh activists are actively busy in trying to stop conversions, reconvert non-Hindus to Hinduism, and make India a Hindu nation. Back in 2002, L.K. Advani, the then Deputy Prime Minister of India, told the parliament that ‘India can never be turned into a Hindu nation.’[29]

True to Advani’s statement, India can never be turned into a Hindu nation because of the educational, economical, social, and political foundation that the British and the early leaders of Independent India laid.

NOTES

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[1] Ebe Sunder Raj, The Confusion Called Conversion, p. 140.
[2] ‘Anti-conversion Laws Yet To be Framed,’ The Times of India, Nov. 7, 2004, Ahmedabad.
[3] Subhash Agarwal, ‘Law, Order, & Religious Conversions’, The Financial Express, Sept. 25, 2003.
[4] Hansel D’Souza, ‘Christians Awake! The Secular Citizen’, June 1995, http://www.hvk.org/Publications/cihp/an1.html
[5] Ebe Sunder Raj, The Confusion Called Conversion, p. 140.
[6] Ibid, p. 146 & R. Domenic Savio, ‘A Descriptive Study of Prarthana Bhavan, Sanjay Koyala Nagar’, (unpublished M.A. Thesis, Acts Academy of Higher Education, 2004), p. 81.
[7] Ebe Sunder Raj, The Confusion Called Conversion, p. 142.
[8] Section 3 of the Orissa Freedom of Religions Act, 1968. As cited by Ruma Pal, ‘Religious Minorities and the Law’, Religion and Personal Law in Secular India (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001), http://iupress.indiana.edu/textnet/0-253-33990-1/0253108683.htm
[9] Ibid.
[10] Ebe Sunder Raj, The Confusion Called Conversion, p. 140.
[11] Ruma Pal, ‘Religious Minorities and the Law’, op. cit.
[12] Ibid.
[13] Ebe Sunder Raj, The Confusion Called Conversion, p. 140.
[14] Ruma Pal, ‘Religious Minorities and the Law’, op. cit.
[15] As cited by Ruma Pal, op. cit.
[16] Ebe Sunder Raj, The Confusion Called Conversion, pp. 141-2.
[17] ‘Anti-conversion Ordinance Decried’, The Times of India, Nov. 6. 2004, http://www1.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/articleshow?artid=2469800
[18] Frontline, Dec.3, 2004, p.10.
[19] ‘Crackdown Over India Mass Baptism’, BBC News, South Asia, Friday, 6 December, 2002, 04:56 GMT .
[20] ‘Anti-conversion Ordinance Decried’, The Times of India, Nov. 6. 2004.
[21] ‘Anti-conversion Bill unjustified: AIDWA’, The Hindu, Nov. 12, 2002. http://www.hinduonnet.com/2002/11/12/stories/2002111204290500.htm
[22] http://www.hindu.com/2004/05/08/stories/2004050803510400.htm
[23] http://www.hindu.com/2004/06/09/stories/2004060905050500.htm
[24] http://paknews.com/PrintPage.php?id=1&date1=2003-01-11&news2=main1
[25] http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/382992.cms
[26] BBC News, Tuesday, 25 February, 2003, 17:25 GMT, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/2798771.stm
[27] http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/382992.cms
[28] http://paknews.com/PrintPage.php?id=1&date1=2003-01-11&news2=main1
[29] BBC News, 5 December, 2002, 19:08 GMT, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/2546023.stm

Nehru's Secularism and the Shaping of Modern India

© Domenic Marbaniang, Indian Secularism (2005)

To an atheist, religion represents superstition, primitive fear, and suppression. Such blind faith is antithetical to the rational and scientific character of secularism. While religion looks beyond the world, secularism looks within the world for answers. Nehru who represented this atheistic form of secularism wrote:

‘India is supposed to be a religious country above everything else.. The spectacle of what is called religion or at any rate organised religion in India and elsewhere has filled me with horror and I have frequently condemned it and wished to make a clean sweep of it. Almost always it seemed to stand for blind belief and reaction, dogma and bigotry, superstition and exploitation, and preservation and exploitation of vested interests.’ 

Nehru’s aversion towards religion is well known. He is said to have ‘always grimaced painfully whenever he had to go through even the most perfunctory religious observance.’ He once even angrily waved away a Hindu sadhu who tried to anoint him with holy water at a dam dedication. During the Independence Struggle, it was Nehru, Jinnah, and Subhash Chandra Bose who maintained that it was wrong for religion to interfere in politics. From 1920 onwards, Nehru’s view that all human enterprise should be delivered from religious dominance became more apparent. As an agnostic, he believed in rationality, secularism, and a scientific approach as the true means of progress in India. He understood that the destruction of religious superstition by secularism was the only means to a peaceful India. In a country divided by religious differences, of fundamental nature, Nehru looked at secularism as a great cementing force of the diverse people of India. Secularism had to displace the religious outlook if people of India were to live and grow together in unity and fraternity.

Nehru represented the Western form of secularism very well. While Gandhi stressed on the equality of all religions and religious pluralism, Nehru was more inclined towards the modernity of the Enlightenment. In fact, Kazi Anwarul Masud considers him to be the first in India to have accepted Western secularism. He writes:

‘While Mahatma Gandhi and Maulana Azad spoke of secularism from the perspective of religion, Pandit Nehru was the first in the sub-continent to accept the western concept of secularism.’ 

When he became the Prime Minister of Independent India, he confessed that it had been extremely difficult for him as a Prime Minister to build a secular State out of a religion-dominated nation. It was the able leadership of a secular visionary such as Nehru that held India together through out the early turbulent years of the country. In a country where the population in majority was Hindu (one reason behind the Muslim League’s skepticism regarding the possibility of true secularism in India), it was the secular vision of Nehru that helped him maintain the ‘rule of law’ in a democracy which was continually in danger of falling into the ‘rule of people.’ India, therefore, owes a lot to Nehru for the development of a form of secularism in India that was Constitutional and not majoritarianist. To the chagrin of the Hindutvavadis, it is this form of secularism that makes possible for people of all religions to live together under legal protection and keeps any community in majority from violating the rights of the minority. Nehru’s agnosticism and rationalism had no place for religious dictates in political matters. Therefore, he was able to see religion with a scientific eye and keep religious fundamentalism from sabotaging Indian politics.

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Kazi Anwarul Masud, How fares secularism in India? The Daily Star
Harvey Cox, The Secular City, p. 76
Laxminidhi Sharma, Dharma Darshan ki Rooprekha, p. 434
Vishal Mangalwadi, India: The Grand Experiment, p. 12

Gandhi's Views on Secularism

© Domenic Marbaniang, Indian Secularism (2005)

Most Hindus can see no problem in worshipping two deities at the same time. This polytheistic nature of popular Hinduism helps Hindus to be pluralist and open to other religions as well. Gandhi viewed secularism from a religious perspective. He believed that religion and the State are inseparable, that irreligiosity encouraged by the State leads to demoralization of the people and that, therefore, the State’s religious policy should be pluralistic with equal respect to all religions. Mahatma Gandhi believed that all deities were manifestations of the One and all religions led to the same goal. It was this kind of a pluralistic approach to religion that made him to oppose religious conversions.

Though claiming to be liberal, Gandhi opposed religious conversions, especially of the Untouchables, on arguments based on religious pluralism. This, however, caused a lot of agitation among the leaders of the Untouchable community. Dr. B.R. Ambedkar was against this pluralistic perspective of Gandhi. He said that Gandhi opposed religious conversions for political reasons. In his Writings and Speeches, he wrote:

‘That Mr. Gandhi is guided by such factors as the relative strength of the Mussalmans and Christians, their relative importance in Indian politics, is evident….’

However, Gandhi said that his opposition to conversions, especially Christian conversions, originated from his own position that all religions were fundamentally equal and that equal respect, (Sarva-dharma-samabhava) not mutual tolerance, was the need of the hour. He also accused Christian Missions of using social services to net in converts. He argued that the Harijans had ‘no mind, no intelligence, no sense of difference between God and no-God’ and that they could no more distinguish between the relative merits than could a cow. Thus, the Gandhian pluralistic perspective of secularism disfavors conversions, especially among the Harijans for at least two reasons:

1. Since no religion can claim absolute truth and since all religions are fundamentally equal, conversions (or the use of the right to freedom of conscience) are out of question.
2. The secularism that provides freedom of religion to all people alike without considering their intellectual ability is unjust. Bluntly put, the Harijans do not qualify to exercise their right to freedom of religious conversion.

After going through all such arguments of Gandhi against religious conversions, Ambedkar concluded that they were all invalid arguments based on false premises. Following are the arguments that Ambedkar advanced:

Regarding the argument that all religions are fundamentally equal and, therefore, religious conversions unwanted

‘…If I have understood him correctly then his premise is utterly fallacious, both logically as well as historically. Assuming the aim of religion is to reach God – which I do not think it is – and religion is the road to reach him, it cannot be said that every road is sure to lead to God. Nor can it be said that every road, though it may ultimately lead to God, is the right road. It may be that (all existing religions are false and) the perfect religion is still to be revealed. But the fact is that religions are not all true and therefore the adherents of one faith have a right, indeed a duty, to tell their erring friends what they conceive to be the truth.’

Regarding the argument that the Untouchables were no better than a cow

‘That Untouchables are no better than a cow is a statement which only an ignoramus, or an arrogant person, can venture to make. It is arrant nonsense. Mr. Gandhi dares to make it because he has come to regard himself as so great a man that the ignorant masses will not question him in whatever he says.’

Regarding the argument that the Christian Missions were baiting native converts by means of social services

‘It is difficult to understand why Mr. Gandhi argues that services rendered by the Missionaries are baits or temptations, and that the conversions are therefore conversions of convenience. Why is it not possible to believe that these services by Missionaries indicate that service to suffering humanity is for Christians an essential requirement of their religion? Would that be a wrong view of the process by which a person is drawn towards Christianity? Only a prejudiced mind would say, Yes.’

Laxminarayan Gupta has pointed out that Gandhi had perceived that in an intellectually developing society, segregations over castes will only result in depopulation of Hindus in India. Gandhi also said that if the Harijans were to be kept from joining the Christian fold, the Hindus themselves must embrace them.

Ambedkar, the leader of the Dalits, as has been seen, was sceptical towards the absolute claims of any religion. The impossibility of equality and absoluteness of any religion, according to Ambedkar, makes the propagation of religious beliefs even more necessary. Plurality of religions necessitates choice of religion on the basis of rational and secular analysis. Ambedkar’s choice of Buddhism itself was based on purely secular reasons, namely the liberation of the lower castes.

Contrary to the contention of Ambedkar and other pure secularists, Hindu pluralists still believe that pluralism is the only solution of religious plurality in India. For instance, in the preface of his Modern Myths, Locked Minds, T.N. Madan states the thesis of his book:

‘Throughout Modern Myths, Locked Minds runs the conviction that participatory pluralism, rather that a hegemonic and homogenizing secularism, is what will serve India’s interests best.’

Of course, secularism that claims hegemony over all facets of the people and tries to bring every aspect of the citizen’s life under its supervision cannot be acceptable to the Indian context. Secularism in India simply has to be a non-intermingling of religion and politics.

In his article Religious Tolerance and Secularism in India, Sudheer Birodkar argues that secularism has become possible in India only because of the pluralistic and unorganized nature of Hinduism, the religion of the majority in India. However, it has already been shown that secularism in India is a concept borrowed from the West and that it could never have been possible if the Colonialists had not contributed towards education, laws, unification, and reforms in India. It was the religious interference in politics by Hinduism that stipulated the dharma of Brahmins to be priests, of the Kshatriyas to be warriors (politics), of the Vaishyas to be traders, and of the Shudras to be servants of all. The State and religion were never, therefore, separate in Hindu politics. Secularism, contrary to the Hindu pluralist’s contention, has never been a characteristic of Hinduism.
Cox has rightly said of India that ‘…India’s vast variety of sects and religions, beside which North America’s so-called pluralism must appear dully homogeneous, can survive only within a secular state. Also, since the deeply divisive castes represent remnants of kinship and tribal groupings, only further secularization will release Indians from the social fetters that caste imposes.’

Thus, pure secularism based on a humanistically and scientifically directed mutual tolerance and respect, not pluralism, is the solution for religious plurality. India cannot be united religiously; however, it can stand united politically and secularly. The scientific and rational mind needs to become the deciding factor in Indian democracy, not a pluralism based on blind-faith. However, the atavistic perspective of Gandhi was far from accepting any notion of pure rationality in matters of religion. Nirad Chaudhuri has explained that this inherent deficiency of civilization and reason in Gandhism led to its ‘descent towards the old rancorous and atavistic form of Indian nationalism.’

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Laxminidhi Sharma, Dharma Darshan Ki Rooprekha, pp.432-433
Aleyamma Zachariah, Modern Religious and Secular Movements in India, pp. 280-281
D.C. Ahir (Ed.), Ambedkar on Christianity in India, (New Delhi: Blumoon Books,1995)
Laxminarayan Gupta, History of Modern Indian Culture, (Agra: Prem Book Depo, 1973), p. 281
T.N. Madan, Modern Myths, Locked Minds (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1997), p. xxi
Vishal Mangalwadi, Missionary Conspiracy, p. 99