One of my friends grew up with four sisters as the only son. He says he never felt he was in a minority. In fact, the parents or sisters never told him he was in a minority.

Let's hang the term 'minority'

One of my friends grew up with four sisters as the only son. He says he never felt he was in a minority. In fact, the parents or sisters never told him he was in a minority.

What we don't do to our family, we do to our nation. So when it comes to hanging an Ajmal Qasab or Afzal Guru, our politicians stop to ask, 'Hang on, these two are Muslims. What will the minorities think?'

And of course, a handful of Muslims may feel that Qasab and Guru are being hanged because they are a part of a numerically weaker community. It is difficult to entirely blame them. By that one term, 'minority', the state emotionally clubs a hardworking, law-abiding, normal human being who believes in Islam with a sponsored, insane mass-murderer. Whatu00a0 an insult.

It is time we hang the term, 'minority'. Or for that matter, 'majority'. There are many ways you can divide human beings into minority and majority: by age, sex, language, skin colour, occupation. We frown upon
such divisions.

And still, the deeply bigoted Indian polity officially chooses religion to prop up a majority and a minority. Religion should really be as private as one's preference for bondage or missionary. Can we still call ourselves secular?

Can political parties, social workers, lawyers and journalists who claim to fight for either the majority or minority call themselves secular?

A 'secular' India cannot continue to hide behind this semantic absurdity. It has to address it. Sooner, the better.

Interestingly, the Constitution does not recognise the term 'minority'; it talks about 'minorities'. Article 15 (1) and (2), which talks about "prohibition of discrimination against citizens on grounds of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth," is a robust-enough ground for community rights in this country.

There is no need to obsess with 'minority' and 'majority' tags. But on Thursday, when Qasab's death sentence was dragged in a daylong rodeo by competing news channels, some politicians were blushing when the question of Qasab or Afzal's hanging came up, some others pouncing. But should it even be a question whether a killer is Hindu or Muslim or Christian or Parsi?

The mainstream argument is that identifying a group of people as minority helps address the historic injustices, speed up development in the community. How many schools, hospitals, homes or jobs have Indian Muslims gleaned by consenting to carry the 'minority' tag? I think they have lost a lot. The nation has more, of course, for dividing siblings in the family on the basis of prayers they say. And that rubs off on our diplomacy. Frankly, Pakistani and Indian politicians give a damn about the peace process. It is in their interest to keep it
permanently derailed.

Pakistani ministers keep lying about Dawood and 26/11 suspects, and India makes pompous friendly noises knowing full well it wouldn't even try forcing Pakistan to concede anything. The occasional posturing just keeps the nations they do business with happy.

To weigh the implications of hanging Qasab or Afzal on this farcical peace process is a bigger, shameless farce. The hesitation in hanging them is purely because politicians see these criminals as 'minority'.

We need to execute the term, heed the mercy petition of an entire nation.

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