I heard him again yesterday speaking at BBC program hard talk, and I must say that I wished that I could listen to him as long as possible. Such clarity in ideas is rare to witness. Amartya Sen, who is a Nobel Laureate in economics, had many wise things to say.

He said that there is a huge difference between religion as a personal matter and religion as a political phenomenon. This simple but at the same time intricate expression, explains a lot which has happened since 1947 in subcontinent India.

Though Sen is a self proclaimed atheist, he claimed he is/can be associated with Hinduism as a political entity. Well, same was true with Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who was a secular, but had to give up to the political pressure exerted by religious rhetoric coming out of the echelons of congress led by Gandhi. Despite Ghandi being a profound secular, he was strictly religious, and in his life his political identity primarily had come from Hinduism rather than being a ’secular Gandhi’. Later after his death, though the world knows him as a Secular Gandhi, in India he is identified as the demi god of contemporary Hindu history. Despite his claims of being secular, if anything Gandhi represented the political force which primarily symbolized ancient civilisation of Hindu India rather than multicultural India of nineteenth century.

Similarly a least religious man Jinnah, has to come to Muslim league, for his political identity. Muslim league was a party which was clearly dependent upon Islam, whereas Islam had been one of the most influential political forces till the mid 1880s not only in Sub continent India but larger Asia and Africa.

Thus 1947 was an outcome of two independent political and cultural forces, one being more indigenous in nature and one being more global in nature. The question was which force will overcome the other or whether they can retain their independent identities as well as political power.

Clearly Jinnah thought that in larger India, Muslims will be exploited by Hindus, as Hindus were in overwhelming majority. To sustain Islam as a political force in South Asia, Jinnah went on to ask for a separate homeland for Muslims.

Hinduism and Islam as political forces were much like two political parties. Only one could have ruled and one would be subjugated by the other. Only the emergence of Pakistan would have ensured that Jinnah’s Islam would not live under the rule of Ghandi’s Hinduism.

Generally Muslims and Hindus or Islam and Hinduism do not seek to confront the other in pure religious sense. As Sen pointed out, both religions co-existed quite peacefully for centuries after the advent of Islam in sub continent India. Art, culture and science actually blossomed under the multicultural environment of India.

However both Islam and Hinduism become violent whenever they rise as opposite political forces. And then it doesn’t matter whether you belong to a so-called religious state or you are the largest democracy in the South and self proclaimed secular. The outcome of religion as a political entity has the same effect on secular India as it has on Islamic Pakistan. This has happened in 1947 and this is happening today.

Today, India is indeed a secular country but stained with forces of Hinduvta extremists which have nothing to do with religion and every thing to do with politics. Pakistan has it all mixed up, but again it is a country where religion is used as a political tool. The fate of Islamic Pakistan is much similar to that of Secular India. Pakistan, much like today’s India, can quite easily become a secular state with majority Muslims. It will never be politically correct to blame Jinnah. He did meant Pakistan to be a secular state. If anything, the blame goes to the subsequent dictatorial rules in Pakistan, especially that of Zia-ul-Haque, who transformed a political movement of secular Muslims of Pakistan into an extremist religious movement, by introducing religious laws into this country.

Secular India, may not be ’SECULAR’ in a sense we perceive secularism should be, but yes it is a state run by secular laws but dwelled by majority Hindus, a lot many of whom are extremists much like mullahs of their neighbouring country. The reality is that secular India and atheist Amartya Sen associate themselves with Hinduism for their respective political identities in the globe as Pakistan looks for an Islamic identity.