HMR Institute of Technology and Management: Human Values and Professional Ethics
HMR Institute of Technology and Management: Human Values and Professional Ethics
HMR Institute of Technology and Management: Human Values and Professional Ethics
MANAGEMENT
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India is the world’s second-most populous country with more than 1.3 billion
people and is the birthplace of four major world religions: Hinduism, Buddhism,
Sikhism, and Jainism. An officially secular nation with thousands of ethnic
groups and 22 official languages, independent India has a long tradition of
religious tolerance (with periodic and sometimes serious lapses). Religious
freedom is explicitly protected under its constitution. Hindus account for a vast
majority (nearly four-fifths) of the country’s populace. Hindu nationalism has
been a rising political force in recent decades, by many accounts eroding India’s
secular nature and leading to new assaults on the country’s religious freedoms.
And the constitution of India provides for freedom of conscience and the right
of all individuals to freely profess, practice, and propagate religion; mandates a
secular state; requires the state to treat all religions impartially; and prohibits
discrimination based on religion. It also states citizens must practice their faith
in a way that does not adversely affect public order, morality, or health. Out of
29 states, eight have legislation restricting religious conversion, with laws in
force in five of those states. Authorities often did not prosecute violence by
vigilantes against persons, mostly Muslims, suspected of slaughtering or illegally
transporting cows or trading in or consuming beef. Members of civil society and
religious minorities stated that under the current government, religious
minority communities felt increasingly vulnerable due to Hindu nationalist
groups engaging in violence against non-Hindu individuals and their places of
worship.
The 2014 national election victory of the Bharatiya Janata Party (Indian Peoples’
Party or BJP) brought newly acute attention to the issue of religious freedom in
India. Tracing its origins to a political party created in 1951 in collaboration with
the Hindu nationalist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (National Volunteer
Organization or RSS).
Status of Government Respect for Religious Freedom
Legal Framework
Government Practices
Jammu and Kashmir is another state where a ban on cow slaughter and sale of
beef has been the matter of a raging controversy, given that the state has a
considerable Muslim population. Much disruption of the state assembly’s
autumn session proceedings can be attributed to the differences between
politicians regarding the beef ban. Following the terrible controversy in the
state, the assembly, and in the media, the High Court of Jammu and Kashmir
constituted a 3-member Bench to hear a petition against the beef ban in the
state on 16 October 2015. Ultimately the matter boils down to the politicizing
of a ban that should be tackled on more sensitive notes.
2. Triple Talaq
In recent times, the practice was spread to social media platforms like
Facebook, WhatsApp and other messenger tools. The wife has no say in the
matter and the only option left for her is to accept the divorce quietly. The
husband was not even required to state any reasons for calling off the marriage
and in fact the wife’s presence were also not required at the time he decides to
verbalize the T word three times. The wife was allowed the custody of kids until
she remarries and after that, the guardianship automatically gets transferred to
the husband.
The law is far from preaching equality. If the wife wants to end the marriage but
does not have her husband’s approval, she would have to seek the proceedings
under Dissolution of the Muslim Marriages Act. She does not have the right to
use Triple Talaq at all.
All India Muslim Women Personal Law Board raised voice against the
3. Ayodhya dispute
On May 21, Madhya Pradesh police arrested six Christians for allegedly
kidnapping 72 minors with the intention of forcibly converting them to
Christianity. The children’s parents stated they were already Protestants and
had given consent for their children to attend a summer Vacation Bible School
(VBS) camp in Nagpur under the care of the arrested Christians. Police stated
the children’s families had not provided proof they had already converted to
Christianity. According to the Christian NGO Morning Star News (MSN), on June
12, the state high court denied bail to the six VBS volunteers: Ameya Jaal,
Alkesh Ganava, Pandu Singh Vasuniya, Nitin Mandod, Lalu Babore, and Vijay
Meda, a 17-year-old minor. Authorities reportedly held one of the VBS
attendees, 15-yearold Akash Gundia, in juvenile detention center for nearly a
month before releasing him on June 20. Gundia said children as young as six
years old were also in police custody until police released them when their
parents arrived. His father, Singh Gundia, told MSN, “I got to know from the
police station that police had not intended to file the case, but that there was
pressure from RSS [a self-defined Hindu nationalist group] and Bajrang Dal
activists, because of whom my child spent 25 days in judicial custody.” NGO
Human Rights Without Frontiers (HRWF)’s Prisoners List 2017 stated, although
it was reported police released the children to their parents, there was no
precise information on the status of the 71 children besides Gundia.
Media reported police arrested seven Christian pastors – Stanley Jacob, Vijay
Kumar, Sumit Varghese, David from New Delhi, Amit from Mathura, Anita from
Hathras, and Dinesh from Rajasthan – on December 4 while they were holding a
prayer meeting in a private home. The following day a court sentenced them to
14 days in judicial custody for carrying out a forcible conversion campaign.
Family members of the seven pastors said local residents were upset because
some individuals were converting to Christianity.
Members of civil society and religious minorities said, under the current
government, religious minority communities felt more vulnerable to Hindu
nationalist groups engaging in violence against non-Hindu individuals and places
of worship. Religious minority communities stated, while the national
government sometimes spoke out against incidents of violence, local political
leaders often did not, and at times made public remarks that individuals could
interpret as condoning violence. Some longstanding legal cases involving
religiously motivated violence and riots continued to advance slowly. In May the
Kerala High Court annulled a marriage between a Hindu woman and a Muslim
man based on third-party allegations the woman was forcibly converted to
Islam, despite her denial she was forced to do so. On August 22, the Supreme
Court ruled the practice through which a Muslim man could divorce his wife
instantly by saying the word “talaq” (Arabic for divorce) three times was
unconstitutional. On May 23, the government banned the sale of cattle for
slaughter through animal markets. In July the Supreme Court stayed the
implementation of the order across the country for three months; the
government was expected to withdraw the ban after receiving negative
feedback from state- level agricultural sectors but had not done so by year’s
end. The government continued its challenge to the minority status of Muslim
educational institutions in the Supreme Court. Minority status afforded these
institutions independence in hiring and curriculum decisions.
ii. In November 2015, another megastar Aamir Khan invited the wrath
of the masses for voicing his concerns about the security situation in
the country. While talking at a public event, he confessed that his wife
and family were "alarmed" and wanted "to move out" of India at one
point. He was lambasted on social media for his "unpatriotic"
comments, and people threatened to boycott his films. Some even
asked him to go to Pakistan, the usual right-wing barb on Twitter.
Khan later clarified his statement and said that he "was born here...
will die here."
Conclusions
This study has demonstrated that compromises from secular and non-secular
citizens are required for a peaceful multicultural society, particularly in an
Indian context. In order to accommodate differences and radical point of views,
society as well as the state needs to be tolerant; thus, contextual secular-
multiculturalism could be an answer in the mitigation of multicultural conflict,
particularly between free expression and religion. However, this concept has
certain limitations as it still leaves leeway for religious polarization, communal
violence and silencing of secular minded people.