Political Socialization and Religion in Indian Democracy

Political Socialization and Religion in Indian Democracy

Political socialization describes the process through which citizens crystalize political values, behaviours and identities that remains for an extended period throughout later life (Bhattacharya 83). Citizens learn through this process by successful transfer of political behaviour and norms that are acceptable to the ongoing political system to the succeeding generations. Political socialization entails both formal and informal learning as well as deliberate and accidental learning. Besides, it involves non-political knowledge that influences political behaviour, such as the acquisition of politically relevant personality traits and knowledge of social attitudes that are politically relevant. The process of indoctrination of individuals into a particular political culture plays a crucial role in perpetuating a specific political system. In the Indian political process, some significant number of its citizens do not believe that elections are the only approach to a democratic society.

On the other hand, there is mass illiteracy which remains the major bottleneck to the state-sponsored political socialization via the print media. The beliefs, practices, and organizational forms of religion influences the entire process of political socialization to a greater extent. The primary objective of this essay is to explore the aspect of religion as one of the primary agents for political socialization in India (Torney-Purta 89).

In India, political socialization was aimed at maintaining, transforming, and establishing a new political culture in the country. Its main purpose was to transmit the political culture to a new generation from the old one. Besides, political socialization was employed as a tool to abolish the anti-indigenous and alien-imposed political culture that was introduced earlier via the British authority. The greatest emphasis was placed on establishing new political structure through which the modern socio-political values are exhibited. Since India was struggling for independence, Hinduism played a key role in the development of its own political culture.

There are approximately one billion people in India, rendering it the second-most populous nation in the world. This implied that every sixth person in the world is an Indian. India has about 450 million people living below the poverty line. However, it is still recognized across the world for the suppression of the religious minorities as well as its nuclear blasts. Religion has been an integral part of India’s culture, and formation as individuals who resided there have discovered different religious practices that have persisted through centuries. Its major religions include Jainism, Hinduism, Sikhism, and Buddhism. Islam, however, remains prevalent because it is the second-largest region across the world. About 84% of India’s population are devoted to Hinduism, which makes it the most dominant religion in India. The different religious views and beliefs portrayed by these religions have been vital for the political socialization of India.

As long as religion is strongly instilled with the minds of people in a country, their beliefs will always serve a vital role in politics and decision making. In India, Hinduism and Islam are the most practised religions, and they have become a way of life for citizens who follow them and often associated with their culture. Such strong practices force their way into political matters. Political leaders like Ambedkar is regarded as one of the most renown personality who utilized religion as a tool to lead the community in harmony. He made significant changes to India which remains memorable to its past, particularly the strategies to revive Buddhism between 1947 to 1950 as well as inspiring the modern Buddhist movement. Both Hinduism and Islam teach simplicity, honesty, love, kindness, and tolerance and thus shaping the people’s beliefs (Bhattacharya 83).

Both religion and caste have a significant influence on the selection of political leaders. Citizens with higher education are often willing to pick leaders from different religion and caste. Majority of Indians prefer electing political leaders from their caste, religion and tribe and thus indicating how the identity politics plays a significant role in both the state and the general elections. This particular relationship is common, particularly among the non-elites across religious groups and caste. Over 55% of Indians in states such as Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Ahaeashtra, Jharkhand, Rajasthan, Telangana, and Chhattisgarh prefer a political leader from their religion or caste (Ahmed 125). These decisions are fueled by the distrust in leaders that come from an outside community across different classes caste-class-interactions.

The communalism and caste system in India impacted Indian politics to a greater extent. The Morley-Minto Reforms Act of 1909 was enacted to create a different legislature electoral for both Muslims and Hindus as a reaction to the tensions that existed between the two religions (Khan 68). This particular move is a strong demonstration of how religions impacted political decisions in Indian democracy. Also, it allowed the leaders to establish the grounds on how to best lead their land because most of the citizens were quite religious (Pearson-Merkowitz and James Gimpel 84). This approach to leaderships keeps the Indian community connected as a whole.

Religion has been an influential agent in the political views and elections in India. Post-1947, some political leaders from the Muslim leaders have been blackmailing the Hindu community who are the majority (Torney-purta 91). As a result, a large number of Hindu politicians gave given in to this blackmail. The interests of the majority of the Muslims have been traded off by Hindu politicians who have been resistant to the modification of the Muslim personal law. With regards to resource allocation, a vast amount has been apportioned to the Hindu political leaders for madrasa education with little changes to the curriculum. These particular decisions have left madrasa to maximize teaching hate for other religious communities and thus promoting extremism that ultimately hurts the interests of the ordinary Hindus and Muslims.

Hinduism has played a crucial role in nation-building, which commenced with the tradition of pluralism as well as social inequality. This particular role is best demonstrated by the classic Hindu dharma-karma theory that was presented as an issue of justice whereby the right action in an individual’s birth would assure a reward in the next higher birth. Also, wrong actions would give rise to the lower form of birth. With regards to the beliefs of this theory, mobility was possible, and many social groups elevated their position in the caste order. Besides, most Indians were influenced by favourably via Sanskritization (Pearson-Merkowitz and James Gimpel 121). This theory, however, gave rise to a large number of casteless and low caste individuals based on racial and ethnic criteria.

The element of religion was utilized by the British to bring about political socialization in India. This political strategy resulted in the British giving political recognition to different religious groups as well as the oppression and alienation of some groups ((Pearson-Merkowitz and James Gimpel 101). In 1909, for instance, a separate system for electorates was created to grant the Muslim community a distinct representation within the legislative and municipal councils. Also, the minorities, including the Sikhs of Punjab, were offered separate electorates. This particular development marked the start of the formation of Independent India through the collaboration of Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru among other congress leaders that ultimately resulted in the integration of different groups into the mainstream.

Religion in India has significantly impacted political unity. Despite the existence of social and economic inequalities, the political aspect has been maintained by the national integrity and unity. The major cause of the inequalities is the emergence of the egalitarian from different regions of the world as well as the presence of diverse cultures, religions and languages (Bhattacharya 86). Political unity has, however, made India become culturally tolerant. This political situation is fostered by a blend of both cultural and religious unity. In particular, the very term Chakravarti is a clear revelation of the political unification exhibited by India under a single central authority. This title was aimed at uniting India under a single central authority. In its history, many rulers rebelled against the central authority with the aim of expanding the territory in order to create the sole monarch under one control for the good of its people. Kings such as Chandragupta, Samudragupta, and Ashoka, performed Aswamedha Yaga to become the Chakravarthy. India’s political state was therefore impacted to a greater extent by its religious order.

Religion serves a crucial role in shaping Indian elections. It was a big factor in the elections where Narendra Modi won as the prime minister. His political mileage was gained through exploitation of the religious tensions after promising to erect a Hindu temple at the historic mosque’s site a situation which not only guaranteed him a win but also posed a threat to discrimination of minority religious groups. As a remedy to this situation, political parties need to accommodate diverse groups as well as cater to the plurality exhibited in India. The critics argue that political parties should not only rely on the vote of the ‘Hindu’ since it constitutes different religious beliefs. Besides Hinduism, there is also a huge Muslim population in India. Despite the Modi putting more emphasis on the development issues in his campaign, the aspect of religion and caste played a crucial role at the local level as well as in the selection of candidates.

Hindutva movement has been an important tool used to gain political power in India. Despite it being a political movement, Hindutva dates back to the movements for the reformation of Hindu including the Arya Samaj and Brahmo Samaj. These two groups arose as a reaction to the growing concern of the increasing influence of Islam and Christianity on the subcontinent and thus raising worries of the gradual disappearance of the Hinduism. The emergence of revolutionist movements resulted in pro-Hindu interest groups which mounted more pressure on the Congress Party. The initiatives, therefore, influenced the political ideologies and thus influencing the Hindu nationalism.

In the anticipation to gain Hindu nationalism, religion was at the forefront. This form of nationalism upheld the philosophy of one culture, one religion and one nation. Since it was numerically small, mass support was needed from the lower caste to aid the process of coming up with power through one man one vote system (Mishra 71). As a strategy to attain political supremacy, religion was used as a tool to mobilize the masses. In the process of mobilizing, there was an attempt to homogenize the differences through Hinduism as well as declaring war against Christians and Muslims. The nationalism, therefore, emerged from religious grounds.

Despite religion serving a tremendous role in the political socialization of in India, the record of inter-religious violence and ethnic strife since the 1947 partition raises doubts on the effectiveness of religion as a political socialization agent. The size of India’s territory itself renders the element of national belonging weak particularly at the local level, and to some extent, religious identities tend to overtake nationalism. In particular, India is a representation of the religious diversity model as well as a good example of the issues that might be caused by diversity. Amid these dichotomy stands the scramble for political power. In Northeast India, for instance, Christian groups perceive pressure from the Indian state as well as the Hindu missionaries because they are perceived by other groups as a political tool for different interests. On the other hand, the Buddhist groups are also striving to attain a political influence via regional Buddhist Associations. Hindus, on the other hand, are striving to promote the nationalist ideologies via the Hindu missionaries with the aim of preserving national unity. These religious groups have therefore rendered the struggle by India for national unit a complex phenomenon and hence derailing the aspect of political socialization.

Political socialization via religion often takes an extended duration, and it might fail to some occasions (Mishra 71). However, it is important to realize that modern religious discourse of politics varies from the one that was experienced before the modernity was embraced. Prior to modernity, religious laws were utilized as the tools for ruling and were used to regulate public life. These instruments often encroached successfully into the private sphere of the activities of an individual. Despite the development of secularism and globalization, the contrapuntal trait of religion with regards to state power, forces of globalization and modernity within the modern world renders the association between politics and religion so intricate especially in India (Torney-purta 92).

In summary, major religions tradition tend to portray the striking level of conformity of opinion among the congregants, particularly in political matters as well as the political party matters. However, some religions are influenced by some confounding factors such as socioeconomic status and race. In the quest for Hinduism nationality, some level of homogeneity was exhibited in exploring the ideological orientations as well as the issue positions with the differences between conformers and nonconformers. Strongly held religious beliefs and high levels of religious beliefs are related to the highly contained political attitudes depicting the need necessity of religious institutions as the socializing agents. Indian elections patterns were shaped by the aspect of religion whereby the Hindus offered more support to the incumbent prime ministers. From this particular essay, it is clearly shown that religion was at the centre of the development of Indian democracy.

Works cited

Bhattacharya, Swapna. “Political Implication of Resurgent Buddhism in India with Special Reference to the Eastern Region.”Political Roles of Religious Communities in India (2008): 83.

Khan, Waheeda. “Political violence and peacebuilding in Jammu and Kashmir.” Peace psychology in Asia. Springer, New York, NY, 2009. 65-81.

Ahmed, Ishtiaq. “European and Indian Nation-Building: The Position of Religious Communities.” Political Roles of Religious Communities in India (2008): 125.

Torney-purta, Judith. “Comparative perspectives on political socialization and civic education.” (2000): 88-95.

Pearson-Merkowitz, Shanna, and James G. Gimpel. “Religion and political socialization.” The Oxford handbook of religion and American politics. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2009.

Mishra, Binoda Kumar. “Politics of Identity & Independence: Sikh Political Activism at Home and in the Diaspora.” Political Roles of Religious Communities in India (2008): 71.