The precarity of being Muslim in today’s India

Muslim citizenship in India is increasingly framed as conditional, not constitutional

Nothing is more unsettling than having to question the foundational values of the Republic of India. Reflecting on the precarity of being Muslim in today’s India shakes the core of my long-held belief that this land, with its pluralist promise, has space for all its children.

This precarity reflects a growing sense of insecurity, marginalisation, and vulnerability experienced by millions of Muslims across India’s socio-political and cultural landscape. For centuries, Muslims have been integral to India’s fabric, shaping its language, music, food, architecture, politics, and history. Yet, in recent years, a marked shift is obvious. Rising Hindutva nationalism, targeted policies, and communal rhetoric have eroded safety, belonging, and equal citizenship for India’s 200 million Muslims.

In any democracy, the right to speak, protest, and demand one’s share in the republic is not a privilege granted by the majority — it is a constitutional guarantee. Today, when Muslims articulate grievances or assert rights, the ruling dispensation perceives this as intolerable, even subversive. Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, both the executive and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have recast the Indian Muslim as a perpetual suspect to be disciplined and silenced. This political project is not merely about electoral polarisation, it strikes at the heart of India’s constitutional democracy.

Leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru, B R Ambedkar, and Maulana Abdul Kalam Azad resisted pressures to make religion a marker of belonging. Equal citizenship, regardless of faith, was a deliberate commitment. Ambedkar warned against the dangers of a ‘Hindu Raj’, calling it a path to disaster. Despite the trauma of Partition, the Constituent Assembly refused to treat Muslims as ‘the other’. Nehru declared that India’s greatness would depend on how it treated minorities. Azad reminded the Assembly that Muslims who stayed after Partition did so out of conviction, not compulsion. The Constitution embodied a radical promise: fraternity across faith, equality before law, and dignity for all.

Today, the BJP consistently frames Muslim assertion as a threat to national integrity. From the framing of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the proposed National Register of Citizens (NRC), to the protests at Shaheen Bagh, Muslim voices are painted as illegitimate. Their insistence on rights is derided as ‘appeasement’, their protests dismissed as ‘anti‑national’, and their identity conflated with ‘infiltrator’ or ‘jihadi’. Terms like ghuspaithiya (illegal infiltrator) are not accidental — they are deliberate dog‑whistles. All these cumulatively have severe material and chilling effects; they render the constitutional citizen an ethnic suspect. The Muslim voter is reduced to a silent presence, expected only to queue at polling stations — not to speak in the public square.

This trend extends beyond rhetoric. Bulldozers demolishing Muslim homes in Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, vigilante lynchings in the name of cow protection, and targeted arrests under draconian laws have created a climate of fear. The Oxfam India Discrimination Report 2022 shows Muslims face higher unemployment rates than any other religious community, and representation in legislatures has steadily declined. The message is unmistakable: citizenship is becoming conditional on cultural and political conformity to majoritarian norms.

The Shaheen Bagh movement was historic. It mobilised thousands of Muslim women and redefined citizenship itself. Draped in the tricolour, reading the Preamble aloud, and invoking Gandhi and Ambedkar, these women declared: We are citizens, and we will not be excluded. Their protest was a reminder that constitutional patriotism, not majoritarian loyalty, defines belonging in India.

Rather than engaging with their constitutional claims, the State vilified the movement as foreign-funded, Islamist, and even terrorist‑inspired. TV anchors branded the protesters as ‘traitors’, while BJP leaders openly called for violence. The message was clear: Muslim voices demanding citizenship rights would not be heard, only silenced. Whether the demand concerns protection from lynching, access to housing and employment, or religious freedom, every assertion of Muslim rights is recast as provocation. In contrast, when dominant communities demand privileges, they are treated as legitimate political actors.

What we are witnessing is not simply anti‑Muslim prejudice, but a dangerous redefinition of democracy itself. Citizenship is being hollowed out, converted from a universal guarantee into a conditional badge, granted only to those who conform to the cultural majoritarian ethos. This is a profound break from India’s historical trajectory: From Akbar’s sulh‑i‑kul (peace with all) to the syncretic traditions of Bhakti and Sufi saints, from Tagore’s inclusive imagination to Gandhi’s pluralist politics, India’s strength has always lain in recognising the equal worth of diverse voices. Silencing Muslims does not injure one community alone; it corrodes the moral fabric that has held India together.

The Modi government may find Muslim voices anathema because they expose the hypocrisy of majoritarian nationalism, but such voices are indispensable for India’s democracy. Muslims, when insisting on their rights, are not asking for special treatment, but are reminding the Republic of its original promise. Ambedkar’s prophetic warning in the Constituent Assembly deserves recalling: “However good a constitution may be, it is sure to turn out bad because those who are called to work it, happen to be a bad lot.” Will the majority uphold the Constitution, or allow majoritarianism to gut the Republic from within?

The demand for equal citizenship by Muslims must be recognised for what it truly is: an affirmation of the democratic spirit. It is not Muslims who are ‘othering’ themselves, but the ruling establishment that treats them as outsiders. History shows that nations that refuse to accommodate diversity find it difficult to achieve their social and economic goals.

States that are constantly at war with their citizens, cannot achieve much beyond enriching their cronies and the political and economic elite. India’s future will not be secured by silencing its Muslims, but by listening to them, by acknowledging their fears, their rights, and their dignity. Our collective resolve and efforts should be focused on extinguishing the flames and countering those who keep fanning them; the hot wind and scorching gusts sweeping across the country will not only scorch Muslims — they will singe everyone. By confronting prejudice head-on and protecting the rights of all communities, we ensure that the next generation inherits a nation where liberty and dignity are the air we all share.

(Manoj Kumar Jha is an RJD leader, Member of the Rajya Sabha, and the author of ‘In Praise of Coalition Politics and Other Essays on Indian Democracy’.)

(Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH)