A 13 minute documentary by Paromita Vohra, titled ‘Cosmopolis – A tale of two cities’.  It shatters the myth that Bombay is a Cosmopolitan.  Bombay, said to accept all and sundry in its ever wide arms providing shelter and employment, is not really so.

In a small documentary of just thirteen minutes, Paromita Vohra says it all.  The abundance of the people, the closure of the mills, the opening of restaurants, eat joints shopping malls in plenitude.

The documentary has two parts.  One is a poem – ‘The forgotten city’ – about the several mills and the working class, the closure of mills and subsequent unemployment.  And another more interesting is: ‘Defeat of the Minor goddess.’   

The Minor Goddess here is Goddess ‘Annapurna’ who claims to have come first to the city and provided food in abundance to its people.  All is well till her sister the Goddess of Wealth – Lakshmi , comes along and the attitudes of the people change.

Goddess Lakshmi is given more importance and people worship her more fervently.  We are shown monologues of the two goddesses who vie to outdo each other. 

Then the scene zooms into a locality where a young woman is emphatically stating that all the residents in her locality are vegetarians not because they hate the non-vegetarians but because their beliefs are strong and that they have respect for life.  This is their way of respecting life – ousting the non-vegetarians out of their localities, not letting houses to them either on sale or rent.  (Heard how even Aamir Khan was denied a house in one of the posh localities because he is a non-veggie? Read a Muslim.)

The young woman candidly says that in her locality all are diamond merchants who have clout, so they can have their way.  Decide who lives in their locality.

And Lakshmi becomes greater than Annapurna who is forced into vegetarianism.  Ultimately she decids to leave the city thus giving all the power to her sister Goddess Lakshmi.

Then we have the Shiv sena kholi fisherwomen organisation in a meeting shouting slogans:

Ek do, ek do,

Bhaiyya ko phenk do

Kaatenge bhai kaatenge,

macchi jaise kaatenge’

( One, Two, Three, Four,

U.P men have to go,

If they don’t do as we wish

We will cut them like fish)

That is the kind of acceptability they have in their‘Amchi Mumbai!!!’

And many Non-vegetarian restaurants are forcibly shut down in some localities.  The underlying message is one particular community dominates the scene.

And it was a mere coincidence that, that day (26/05/08), after watching the documentary; I read this article in ‘The Hindu’ titled: ‘Vegetarianism, tolerance and discrimination’ by Tarunabh Khaitaan.  Mr Khaitaan tells us how the Supreme Court of India has indirectly discriminated on religious grounds in its verdict in the case of “Hinsa Virodhak Sangh Vs Mirzapur Moti Kuresh Jamat”. This verdict given on 14^th March, 2008 is anything but secular. It has directed that the sale of meat be banned during the nine days of the Jain festival.  

Though the Constitution of India prohibits discrimination on grounds of religion, the Supreme Court does just that by forcing this ban. 

In view of this, the writer has a very interesting point to make.  He says that ‘The impugned law forces everyone else to refrain from eating meat because Jains don’t eat meat for religious reasons.  Wouldn’t it be the same thing to require non-Christians to fast during lent, non-Muslims to refrain from eating pork and non-Jews to eat only kosher food?’

Fundamental Rights are neither about number nor sentiments.  If this ban is out of respect for the sentiments of one particular religious group then what about the sentiments of the other religious groups?

If due to bird flu, the sale of chicken is banned, then it is justified.  But if it is out of religious sentiments of one particular group, then it is discriminatory. The Court instead of being secular is discriminative.  There are other similar cases wherein the sale of meat, eggs, and fish has been banned out of respect for the sentiments of one particular religious group. 

The outright refusal to accept people from different beliefs is becoming stronger by the day.  As I read this article about how even those who wanted to sell their houses to Muslims were discouraged by their Hindu neighbours and well wishers, I began to think more deeply about the various times I have been discriminated too.  And I asked myself: “How would I react if I had a neighbour who ate pork?”  I must confess it took me a long time to come to realize that I need not believe in the other person’s faith.  But as a fellow human being, I needed to accept that there are bound to be differences in our ideals, religious beliefs.  And accepting those differences is what ‘tolerance’ is all about.  Acceptability and tolerance are so intertwined.  And that is the key to peaceful co-existence.