Litmus test for democracy must be social cohesiveness: Ansari

Acknowledging that heterogeneity is a distinctive feature of India, Vice President Hamid Ansari today said the "litmus test" for preserving democracy must be the maintenance of social cohesiveness through a sense of citizenship.
Delivering a lecture on 'Citizenship and Identity' at the prestigious Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies here, Ansari said, "The question of minority rights as a marker of identity, and their accommodation within the ambit of citizenship rights, remains a live one in India."
"A distinctive feature of Indian society is its heterogeneity. The historian Ramachandra Guha depicts our recent history as 'a series of conflict maps' involving caste, language, religion and class and opines that conflicts relating to these 'operate both singly and in tandem'," Ansari, who arrived here yesterday on the third and last leg of his three-nation tour, said.

He noted that each of these also brings forth an identity of varying intensity and together they constitute what the opening line of the Preamble of the Constitution depicts as 'We, the People of India'.
Talking about harmony between different cultures and identities, Ansari said, "A Constitutional Amendment in 1977, adding a section on Fundamental Duties of citizens as part of the Directive Principles of State Policy, carries a clause stipulating promotion of harmony and spirit of brotherhood, transcending religious, linguistic and regional or sectional diversities."
"The litmus test, eventually, must be the maintenance of social cohesiveness through a sense of citizenship premised on equality of status and opportunity so essential for the maintenance of democracy. The need for sustaining and reinvigoration of this sentiment is thus essential," the Vice President said.

Ansari, during his speech, also spoke about minority rights at length. He noted that a government-commissioned report on Diversity Index some years back concluded that unequal economic opportunities lead to unequal outcomes which in turn lead to unequal access to political power.
Ansari flew in here from Havana after completing a visit to Cuba and Peru.