The Iftaar dinner hosted by the Indian High Commissioner in Islamabad had a surprise visitor– the ISI Chief Lt Gen Shuja Pasha. Wearing a black sherwani and a white salwar(rather than the Army uniform), he broke bread with the host Sharat Sabharwal and some other A-listers of Pakistan power circuit.
While an invitation and its subsequent acceptance to the goodwill party by an ISI chief is unusual, politicians inviting friends and foes among the who’s who of the society have long held great symbolism in India. Not only do the photo-ops during these gala evenings keep their Muslim constituencies in good humour, it also offers an incomparable opportunity to make or break pacts, fix deals and decide coalitions.
The parties at dusk which are any gourmet’s delight, because of their extravagant layout in terms of choicest of Mughlai fare being put on the table, are also quite a costume drama. You can easily see Lalu, Mulayam or even Deve Gowda don the skull cap along with the keffiyeh., the white and black shoulder cloth which Muslim men wear.
More amusing still is the fact that while Iftaars are an occasion to eat after a day-long fast, for a whole lot of non-Muslim invitees it’s basically an occasion to gorge on delicacies despite their already filled bellies. You see, while all politicians like to show solidarity with their Muslim brethren by feasting at the end of the day, they don’t want to extend the camaraderie by fasting though the day!
The point is that this fancy dress show has become such a fixture on the Indian calendar; because of its frivolity of purpose it has also become terribly tiresome. Is digging into kebabs and kormas all that the Muslim strata are looking for? Certainly, issues much deeper need to be addressed to keep the Muslim votebank happy than such cosmetic gestures.
Need for concrete measures not appeasement
One look at the Sachar committee report reveals a lot. Literacy rate among Muslims is much below normal and the gap is even greater when it comes to the female gender. The community requires better social support and financial subsidies, besides their ratio in government jobs and armed forces needs to go up. Muslim majority villages are in need of better infrastructure like roads, drinking water and communication facilities. It follows that Muslims have a lower per capita income and poorer access to healthcare. These obviously are core concerns. Going by what has been offered in the Union Budget, it is obvious that the central government is looking into these matters.
–Agencies