KO Analysis: Can different value systems co-exist in a single polity?

The Division Bench of Jammu and Kashmir High Court on Tuesday issued a notice to the government over a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) seeking blanket ban on sale of alcohol in Jammu and Kashmir. The court was hearing a writ petition challenging the free sale and consumption of liquor in Muslim majority state and asked the state to file its response within one week. The PIL appears to be a tit for tat reaction to the PIL filed a few weeks earlier against the slaughter and sale of bovines in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. While the reactivation of the bovine ban PIL appeared to have been a political and motivated action obscured by a legal cover, the latter seeks to ban sale of alcohol through a very circuitous piece of legislation. The significance of either is that both pertain to religious sensibilities of adherents of different religions- Muslims in the case of the liquor ban and Hindus in the instance of the bovine ban. The issue however is broader and wider. It pertains to the co-existence of different beliefs, cultures and the nature of the ‘good life’ in a polity. Can different value and faith systems really co-exist in a single polity? According to liberal political theory and the liberal state that is premised upon this theory, they can. The basic premise is that the state has to be neutral especially in negotiating difference and different value and faith systems. State intervention is, in this schema, warranted only if only actions by individuals or perhaps even groups harm others. But what about sensibilities? By and large, the liberal theory is mostly silent about this.

But as is oft stated: context is everything. In the context of the beef/bovine slaughter and sales ban, the state of Jammu and Kashmir took recourse to unusual activism. This happened in a Muslim majority state where the ban would jar with the sensibilities of the majority of the people. While the state’s zeal in enforcing and implementing the ban is rather curious, the question that assumes significance and salience is will the state, if the PIL is successful, be as zealous with the liquor ban? The state’s reaction and approach will determine whether the state is actually and really neutral.

There are also wider and broader issues that pertain to the respective PIL’s. Judicial activism and hair splitting debates and juridical theories may or may not resolve the issue and the state may take a stance that either is neutral or corresponds to the strengths of arguments made in the hallowed courts of law, but the essential issue of co-existence of different peoples and value or faith systems remains. Ultimately, prudence suggests that while institutions of the state might help in arbitrating competing claims and the fourth estate(the media) might highlight various issues and grievances, it is ultimately upon the shoulders of the people that co-existence in plural societies rests upon. People should and must learn to respect each other and negotiate their differences in various spheres. This naturally calls for a refined and a sophisticated sensibility and a psycho-social maturity. Alas, and unfortunately, we may not have reached these states of maturity and sensibility. It is the lack of these that allows unscrupulous elements to take advantage and excite and arouse the emotions of one community against the other and this is what , in the final analysis , leads to what amounts to vexatious litigation.  Are there any antidotes to these? Yes. There are. The antidote lies in education , education and education.

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