Recently, I was traveling by the
Shatabdi express train from Chennai to Bangalore. During the journey, I
observed that the steward serving us food was not very pleasant in his
demeanor. Many of the passengers felt the same. Some of them just ignored and a few others
reacted but did not get any response. And then, one of the passengers mentioned that
the stewards were from the northern part of India and that indeed was the
problem - the north Indians coming down
to south for work and vitiating the atmosphere.
As a matter of fact, the steward
was indeed unpleasant but was not rude at all. The auto-rickshaw drivers in
Chennai, on the other hand, are rude to the core. And I reckon, none of them is
from the northern part of India. Same is the case with the local auto-rickshaw
drivers in Bangalore or in Delhi. But dealing with them, people handle it as an
individual aberration. However, when an ‘outsider’ shows a little attitude, the
reaction turns parochial and an entire group is branded.
And therein lies the complexity
of majoritarianism. The regional, religious, language or the social-class
majority seeks a certain degree of primacy in the society, with a sense of
entitlement. Be it this train incident; a roadside skirmish in any Indian city;
an ostensible denial of a minority right in a majority domain; inside a
minority dominated pocket within a majority expanse or even an offbeat thinker
who doesn’t align with the majority viewpoint, be at work or in a society – the
majoritarianism tends to command everything. Right from a trivial dress-code to
a more expansive social practices or even to an organizational strategy.
As long as the smaller group
remains submissive or compliant, there are no issues. The larger group doesn’t feel
threatened as long as it maintains an upper hand. And precisely for that
reason, the migrant businessmen from a specific part of the country are highly
successful across the country and still are never at odds with the majority
groups. The psychology of
Majoritarianism, howsoever complex it may appear, has also got to do something
with the complicity of the Majoritarian. A majority group also consists of some
balanced, moderate individuals. In fact, they form the majority within the
majority. However, they remain passive on the face of such majoritarianism. And,
as a result, the small majoritarianist
group sways passionate sentiments for unjustified and unethical parochial gains.
This passive moderate group has a
major role to play if it truly believes in pluralistic principles - be it the
roadside, a place of worship or a workplace. Did I err when I did not correct
my fellow passenger in the train from branding and hence alienating a whole
community. Perhaps yes. We can become a true pluralistic society only when the
moderates thwart all attempts at isolating smaller groups in a given
environment – the context could be a public place, a work place or a place of
worship. As there is no case for any
patronage or appeasement of the smaller groups, there also is no room for any threat
or check against the freedom of opinion and movement for anybody, anywhere, as
long as the individual or the group is a responsible citizen of this country.
