The Sikh Diaspora: The Search for Statehood - Vidhia.com

24 THE SIKHS: SEARCH FOR STATEHOOD
Arguably, the Indian state, as it has evolved over 50 years, can be
characterized as an ethnocracy 44 that has privileged the dominant Hindu
communities in three characteristic ways. (a) By disproportionately
recruiting civil, military and government elites from the majority ethnic
group. 45 (b) By employing cultural attributes and values of the
dominant ethnic community for defining its national ideology, its
history, language, religion and moral values; thus the Indian national
identity is neither ethnically neutral nor multiethnic, but derived from a
Hindu world serving the language of universalism. (c) The state’s
institutions, its constitution, its laws and monopolization of power have
had different effects on different communities, empowering the
dominant ethnic community, a common feature of postcolonial states in
Africa and Asia. Myron Weiner has observed:
In country after country a single ethnic group has taken control
over the state and used its powers to exercise control over others…
in retrospect there has been far less ‘nation-building’ than many
analysts had expected or hoped, for the process of state building
has rendered many ethnic groups devoid of power or influence.
(1987:36–7)
The state has dismantled rules and safeguards devised by the imperial
rulers for fair representation of minorities and for re straining majority’s
tyranny. The adoption of universal franchise has put minorities at a
disadvantage, especially in ethnically divided provinces such as Punjab
and the northeastern provinces. Its constitutional centralism has led to
manipulation and repression of regional nationalisms. Even the second
chamber of parliament has no provision for articulating and
safeguarding provincial interests, a common practice in many federal
polities. Thus, the democratic franchise is effectively for majorities,
while minorities are subject to “hegemonic control”, including spells of
“violent control”. In such a context the main ethnic group can
effectively “dominate another through its political, economic, and
ideological resources and can extract what it requires from the
subordinated”. 46
From the 1950s, India’s state-building process has affected various
non-Hindu communities in a differential way. While adoption of Hindi
as official language has put regional languages on the defensive, the
drive towards integration and unification of personal laws has aroused
suspicion of the Hindu hegemony. 47 In the resources-bargaining
process, the central government’s enormous powers have reduced