Kishore Singh: Confessions of a live-and-let-live believer

On this, November 8, 2015, I confess to the following - that I have friends and colleagues who are Muslim and Christian and Sikh though that has not been the basis or consideration of our relationship, but I and some other 'bleeding-heart liberals' are upset that they should constantly be asked to validate their Indianness or risk being 'sent back to Pakistan', or the Dark Ages, by elements who are no longer fringe but have set themselves up as spokespersons for societies or, worse, as part of government, yet no one tells them to rein it in or risk being thrown into jail because 'back' is not an option for people born in India, being 'sent' whether to Pakistan or elsewhere is not their prerogative, and whatever our troubles with our neighbour, I believe it consists not wholly of 'enemies' but people whose lives and hopes and aspirations are a mirror of our own in India and elsewhere.

That as Hindu, secular, non-practicing, acquainted at a conversational (and argumentative - we're Indian!) level on the epics (thank you Amar Chitra Katha), I buy idols for Diwali puja that I don't know how to perform because they are not supported by a 24x7 DIY customer service, and refuse to believe that my faith is so fragile, it is in danger of being tsunami-ed out of existence, and am appalled that someone should consider it their right to moralise, tell me what to eat, or my children what to wear.

That the diversity mentioned in the Constitution of India makes me think ridiculously, but fondly, of food, and celebrations, and interesting people to have conversations with, instead of otherness and divisiveness, or as a bogeyman that gives some people sleepless nights. That I have read Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses only because it was banned (I was bored by the book), ditto Taslima Nasreen, but am humbled that so many people from such a vast cross-section of society are returning honours and awards they have spent a lifetime achieving, that I may be elitist about the books I wish to read (and not read, Chetan Bhagat and Amish Tripathi being my choice of authors to reject for no fault of theirs - I'm just difficult to please), but, hey, you don't all have to like Orhan Pamuk, or P D James, or Vikram Seth either; that I support gays, surrogacy, live-in relationships, euthanasia and can't imagine why wayward men get to pass off their venality by blaming it on noodles, or insisting on restrictions on mobile handsets and jeans for women.

That I have eaten, and will eat, beef and pork and, where it's legal, venison and wild boar and hare; that I may have cheered a Pakistani, or Bangladeshi, cricketer because he deserved it and it is a gentleman's game and not a war between countries; that I resist attempts to denigrate M F Husain as a Muslim artist painting Hindu mythology 'obscenely' without consideration of our own liberal past; that if I'm okay with people in khaki shorts doing exercises, then they should be okay to let me decide whether or not to say "Om" or do yoga as proof of my nationalism.

That my family does not have separate utensils in the kitchen for “untouchables”, or worries about a servant using the wash room because she needed to go; we’re unsure whether to support reservations or not in higher education and specialised jobs; I didn’t vote for either the BJP or the Congress in 2014; all this and more I confess as a card-carrying Indian today, November 8, 2015.