Yesterday's bomb blast at Lahore, Pakistan, killed around 70 people. The culprits belong to the Pakistani Taliban. The bomb blast targeted the Christians in Pakistan. This is one of the many incidents where religious minorities have been killed in Pakistan. Few days back there was a huge rally in support of the assassin Qadri, who murdered a politician after the politician spoke out against killing of religious minorities. Christians, Hindus and Sikhs have all been murdered by religious fanatics in Pakistan. Even in India, some elements within the Hindutva brigades are attempting to make India a Hindu version of Pakistan. The killing of Muslims here and there are signs of such attempts.
In India, Hindutva brigades' attempt to make India a Hindu state is a dangerous effort. This will spell trouble for the religious minorities. Christians and Muslims will be at the receiving end.
From time to time we hear of Christians and Muslims being thrashed in Sri Lanka and India. We hear of similar thrashing and even killing of Christians and Muslims in India and Pakistan. We hear of thrashing and killing of Muslims in Myanmar. Nepal and Bhutan appear more peaceful. The question is: must the Indian subcontinent continue to witness such religious butchering? What is the solution?
Many political thinkers today advance the concept of a liberal state. It's a kind of political arrangement that provides space to different cultures, ethnicity, religion etc. to live side by side. The state does not impose one version of the good life, but leaves it open to the citizens to choose. Only on those matters where there is overlapping consensus, the state enforces. So on matters like taxation, private property, racial abuse etc. the state will enforce regulation. Certain other things, the state will inculcate, but not enforce. And on certain things, the state will remain silent. So John Locke, John Stuart Mill, John Rawls, Amartya Sen et al are all political liberals of different stripes. Locke/Rawls are contractarians, Mill a Utilitarian and Sen is more an Aristotelian; and yet all of them are political liberals. How much should the state enforce and how much should the state leave it open is a matter of debate. But giving much value to liberty and equality is part of a liberal state. So as much as possible, the state leaves it open for an individual to choose this or that rather than being restrictive as much as possible. This is a feature of a liberal state.
A nation-state that has a historical baggage of diversity will falter over and over again if political liberalism is ignored. Communal riot of different scale will be frequent experience if we refuse to entertain room for the other. After all people do not want to be bullied; people want freedom. And if certain belief or practice are being shoved down the throat of a another person/community just because the other party is more powerful and bigger, specially when it is about religious matter, it will most frequently be a fight to the end. In a liberal state, citizens are allowed to debate and dialogue but not use coercion.
If Pakistani Muslims succeed in containing religious minorities, as opposed to providing room to the religious minorities to flourish, they have no moral right to speak up when in India Muslims are harmed. But if Muslims are harmed in India by the bigger religious community, Hindus have no moral right when in Bangladesh religious minorities are harmed. The solution lies in political liberalism; not in creating a religious state where religious minorities will be rendered as second class citizens.
!00 years later, things may change. But for now, I believe political liberalism is the way forward to forge communal harmony. Politicians may engineer riot to come to power, and get away with it because they have connection. But citizens should be careful -- and so must our political leaders be -- not to give in to baser instinct and trump the liberty of the religious minorities to pursue their version of the good life.
For a Christian, the fact is that God respects our choices. Whether one will worship the one true God or the Devil, the choice is given to every individual. Until Jesus returns, this choice to be wrong or to be right is given. So in this mid-term, when the kingdom is already inaugurated and yet it is not fully realised yet, there has to be given the choice to each individual to choose to be right or wrong. So the idea of a Christian state is not what Christians must seek.
