Other States - Punjab   

Malerkotla Muslims want empowerment, not freebies

Sarabjit Pandher

Citizens critical of attempts to appease them

MALERKOTLA (PUNJAB): Sikhs are a majority in Punjab, but a minority at the national level where Hindus are a majority. Muslims, who are a minority both at the national level and here in Punjab, are a `majority' in this town. That such communal arithmetic must become starker in the run-up to any elections is quite obvious to a visitor here.

This constituency located on the border of Sangrur district with Ludhiana has 1.67 lakh voters, of whom about 72,000 are Muslims, 45,000 Sikhs, 25,000 Dalits and 22,000 Hindus. Since 1954, when Chand Ram won the election to the State Assembly, the town has not returned a non-Muslim. Not ever a sitting MLA.

As electioneering for the upcoming polls later this month reaches a crescendo, it's time for political leaders and voters to look ahead as well as undertake a major exercise to introspect. For the dominant Muslim community, the major achievement so far has been its emergence out of the fear psychosis borne out of violence related to Partition of the country in 1947 and the subsequent persecution syndrome. The youths now seek different shores, breaking away from their traditional trades and roots. Demands for empowerment at the grassroots and resolution of issues related to assertion of identity have begun to gain currency in the political discourse here.

Leaders of the Muslim community have struggled hard against the trend that prevailed since 1947, when many of them in their attempt to remain in the mainstream took to adopting Sikh or Hindu names. However, when some Muslims reverted to their `own' names, fundamentalists of other communities raised the bogey of conversions to Islam, leading to some localised tensions.

While the mainline political parties shout themselves hoarse making counter-claims about bringing development to the State, ordinary citizens here are quite critical that for over half-a-century attempts have been made to appease the populace by just doling out a paltry sum of Rs. 5 lakhs annually for the Idgah. They rue that successive MLAs from the constituency have been mere ceremonial figures who were hardly involved in the decision-making process.

However, in the present electoral run-up, the 41-year-old sitting Congress legislator, Razia Sultana, cast in the midst of a formidable patriarchal set-up, promises to continue her quest for breaking new ground in case she is retained for a second term. She also realises that though technically she is elected from Malerkotla, being the only legislator from the community in the 117-member Punjab Assembly she also represents the interests of nearly 1.2 million Muslims in the State who are settled in clusters in Ludhiana, Qadian, periphery of Amritsar, Kharar, Ropar and Hoshiarpur.

On her way to a `door-to-door' campaign in the morning, Ms. Sultana, who is the wife of an Inspector-General of Police, agrees that as compared to the 2002 polls her campaign this time round is more organised and she knows her constituency, its people and their problems far better.

At most places, community considerations not withstanding, an enthused reception awaits her, which she attributes to her success in keeping `commission and corruption' out of her functioning during the last five years, when she experienced a roller-coaster ride in the political arena.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

NRI threatens Akali citadel in Qila Raipur
Malerkotla Muslims want empowerment, not freebies

Copyright © 2007, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu