The Historic Bonhomie

While the BJP Is trying to invoke the trope of Bangladeshi infiltrators”, the ground reality paints a different picture pertaining to the historical significance of Muslim-Adivasi camaraderie

- Abhik Bhattacharya

THE Union Home Minister Amit Shah, while launching the electoral manifesto of the BJP in Jharkhand, said that the party would bring a law to restrict the transfer of land from Adivasis to ‘Bangladeshi infiltrators’. He also reiterated the promise of implementing the Uniform Civil Code (UCC) in the state, but this time with a twist—“Adivasis will be exempted from its ambit,” he said. This is, however, not the first time that the trope of Bangladeshi infiltrators has been invoked by BJP leaders in the run-up to the Jharkhand Assembly elections. It started with the BJP’s plan to bring in Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma as the election-in-charge of the state. Sarma is known for invoking the narratives of ‘love jihad’ and ‘land jihad’ on his home turf. But the way it worked in his favour in Assam, will it serve the same purpose in Jharkhand? The historic cultural transactions and bonhomie between Adivasis and Muslims in the Chhota Nagpur region vouch for a different reality where the sense of assimilation prevails over imaginative separation.

A meeting with Padma Shri lokgeet singer Madhu Mansoori—who gained prominence with his song ‘Gao Chorab Nahi’—around 20 km from Ranchi, behind a roadside dhaba named ‘Jharkhand Muslim Hotel’, brings forth a new form of identity assertion. Showing reverence to his Muslim identity, if you greet him with Assalamu Alaykum, he responds with folded hands and a broad smile and says, ‘Johar’. Explaining his identity in a lucid manner, he says: “I consider myself to be an ‘Oraon Muslim’. The privileging of Adivasi identity over religious identity stems from the long cultural relations we share with the Adivasis.” Although his family embraced Islam several generations ago, being Adivasis, their cultural practices remain the same. He says that while he celebrates Eid and Baqarid, he never desists from celebrating Karma or Sarhul.