Ms Droupadi, a Santhal Tribal, occupied the highest position as the President of India. She represents a minority. Azam argues that other minority groups in India did not get representation. Is it a hit or miss? An exclusive for Different Truths.
  

On 25 July 2022, Ms Droupadi Murmu was sworn in as India’s second female and first Tribal President. “My election is evidence that the poor in India cannot just dream but also fulfil those dreams,” said President Murmu. Prime Minister Narendra Modi proclaimed the ceremony a “watershed moment for India, especially for the poor, marginalised and downtrodden.”

Although the ground reality of these lofty semantics will now come under critical scrutiny, India must be appreciated for electing yet another president from one of its diverse minorities. After all, by accepting secularism at Independence, Hindu-majority India bound itself to manage its diversity within a democratic framework and has, overall, done well with it. Of the sixteen Presidents to date — including acting presidents — four, or 25%, have been Muslim, representing15.4% of the population and 6.25%, Sikhs who constitute 1.7% of the populace.

The representation of both communities in the presidency has been advantageously disproportionate.

There has even been a Sikh Prime Minister, Sardar Manmohan Singh, doubling their participation at the summit of governance. And, if Rajiv Gandhi, son of Feroze Jehangir Gandhi, a Zoroastrian, may be argued to have been one by birth, Zoroastrians, too, have been welcomed at the pinnacle of power.

Buddhists (0.70%) and Christians, whose 2.4% population is higher than that of the Sikhs’ 1.7%, are patiently munching Happy chocolate chips in the presidential anteroom while the tea is getting cold.

But then, these aren’t the only minority groups in India.

The 8.6% of tribals do not adhere to any of the subcontinent’s main religious communities of Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Sikhism, Buddhism, Jainism or Zoroastrianism. They, too, have the right to access the presidency, now granted in the investiture of Ms Murmu, former governor of her home state, Odisha. Born in 1958 in Baidaposi village of the remote Mayurbhanj district, she is the daughter of a tribal chief of the Santhals, one of India’s most prominent tribal groups. After a stint as an office worker and voluntary teacher, she stepped on the political ladder as a local councillor.

Ms Murmu’s accomplishment will impact domestically by affirming the ruling party’s claim of inclusive governance and supporting India’s Tribals. Those prejudiced against minorities will, of course, use her appointment to clamour impartiality, while under this shelter, they go about their spiteful pettiness. After all, under Barack Obama’s presidency, racism continued unabated and, on occasion, even appeared to be flourishing.

Internationally, Ms Murmu’s investiture will buff India’s claim of secular inclusiveness and anti-casteism and further bolster its increasing soft power. But whether it will lead to a permanent Security Council seat for India remains to be seen.

By postponing the choice of a Christian candidate, the BJP has missed an opportunity liable to be picked up by its successors — and successors there will be since no governing party in a democracy can defy its shelf-life.

A Christian president would have offered the possibility of harmonising Indian and Vatican interests for mutual soft-power benefits.

On 30 October 2021, the BBC reported that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Pope Francis “met for the first time on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Rome.” The photos showed them looking deep into each other’s eyes and warmly hugging.

PM Modi cordially invited the Pope to India, but the visit has not yet materialised.

Had that event happened and coincided with the investiture of a Christian President, it would have increased the chances of “Cardinal Gracias, … the Archbishop of Mumbai, …tipped by some as the next possible Pope” (BBC 22 February 2019). An Indian head of the Vatican State would significantly augment India’s diplomatic positioning.

However, even without Cardinal Gracias actually stepping into the current pontiff’s black orthopaedic pharmacy-bought shoes, the message to the countries crucial in deciding an extension of permanent Security Council members would have been loud and clear. And, through Vatican City, India’s influence on world policy would have been immeasurably, untraceably, and deniably enhanced!

At the same time, the Indo-Vatican buddyness would have radiated an implicit rebuttal of any unfavourable mention in the U.S. State Department’s International Religious Freedom Reports.

Vatican City, a pragmatic, temporal state, would occupy a privileged, strategic perch within temporal India and its necklace of diamonds encircling China in response to the Middle Kingdom’s string of pearls and the latter’s propensity for getting away with persecuting its religious minorities.

It is perplexing that PM Modi’s political astuteness under-valued this expedient configuration on the horizon. Chances are, he conceded to elements within his party who perceived Indian Christians as a residue of colonisation or part of a mythical transnational political Christianity. They are still processing the reality of Christian-majority secular democracies cynically pursuing national over religious interests.

This ripe plum of a Christian President’s possible investiture in the presence of a Pope will probably be plucked by PM Modi’s successors, who will no doubt convince the world that the colonial hatchet has been definitively buried, and they will count coup at each soft power success accruing from it.

N.B.: What if Pakistan pre-empts India, appoints a Christian president, invites the pope to the swearing-in and starts positioning its Cardinal Joseph Coutts as the next pope?

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Azam Gill

Azam Gill is a novelist, analyst and retired Lecturer from Toulouse University, France. He has authored eight books, including three thrillers — Blood Money, Flight to Pakistan and Blasphemy. He also writes for The Express Tribune, a New York Times affiliate, blogs on his website and is a Contributing Editor for The Big Thrill, a webzine of the International Association of Thriller Writers. He served in the French Foreign Legion, French Navy, and the Punjab Regiment.

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