AG Noorani: A Fierce Thinker And Fearless Legend

It is debatable whether he excelled as a lawyer, defending many eminent persons, including Sheikh Abdullah, the then Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir state, when he was arrested in 1958, or an academic scholar chronicling facts and paying attention to the details of the subject he was working on. He produced scholarly works and wrote books, including Savarkar and Hindutva (2002); The Babri Masjid Question 1528–2003: ‘A Matter of National Honour’, in two volumes (2003); Constitutional Questions and Citizens’ Rights (2006); The RSS and the BJP: A Division of Labour (2008); Jinnah and Tilak: Comrades in the Freedom Struggle (2010); Article 370: A Constitutional History of Jammu and Kashmir (2011); Islam, South Asia and the Cold War (2012); The Destruction of Hyderabad (2014). His last book, published by Tulika was Destruction of the Babri Masjid, A National Dishonour. He was a defender of the Constitutional principles, whether in Constitutional courts or through his writings. He wrote brilliant articles in The Frontline, Economic and Political Weekly, and other publications.

While writing extensively on Constitutional and legal matters, his primary engagement was issues concerning minority rights and the Muslim community. He felt that the Muslims in India were in a worse position than they were in 1857 and 1947. For that, he blamed the Hindutva forces, including the RSS, which represented the Muslims as outsiders to the ‘Hindu nation’ and saw them as an obstruction to the creation of a Hindu state, as that was undemocratic and unconstitutional. But, more importantly, he also held the Muslim political leaders responsible for their lack of vision and misplaced priorities.

Noorani’s work deeply engaged with Savarkar and the RSS and focused on the undemocratic and anti-Constitutional politics of the Hindutva right wing. He also engaged with the impact of their politics on the Kashmir conflict and the Babri Masjid-Ramjanmabhoomi controversy. Tracing the Babri Masjid conflict, he aptly brought out how a demand of a section of Hindus in Ayodhya during the colonial rule to build a roof over the chabutra (patio) in the precincts of Babri Masjid where Lord Ram was worshipped, widened into demand for the entire land of Babri Masjid. But the Babri Masjid issue, according to Noorani, was mishandled by the Muslim leadership. In his Memorial Lecture, Noorani said, “This was a time for statesmanship and Muslims should have said 'we will organise every secular-minded person who wants to protect the mosque'.” The best research on the history of Babri Masjid, according to Noorani, was done by non-Muslims, including Niranjan Bhattacharya and Romila Thapar. However, he regretted that the Muslim political leadership responded with a communal approach. They took it upon themselves to save the mosque and failed.

The Kashmir issue, according to Noorani, “became and still is a loyalty test of Muslims. By that test, of course, I am a traitor. But I don't believe that my loyalty is to be tested. I am a good Indian precisely because I believe it is not in the national interest to keep this dispute hanging around.” He had worked hard to resolve the conflict between India and Pakistan on the Kashmir issue. The issue was nearly resolved, and the then President of Pakistan, Parvez Musharraf, had in principle agreed to the proposals. Broadly, the resolution proposed to make borders irrelevant to the Kashmiri people on both sides, free trade relations and free movement for the Kashmiri people on both sides of LoC, and making the LoC a permanent border between both countries. Both countries would respect the autonomous status of the state of J&K. The proposal was broadly approved by PM Manmohan Singh, although he was apprehensive of the Hindu nationalists.

Noorani was disturbed by the communal violence, in which Muslims suffered the most. However, he disapproved of the response of Muslim leadership when they formed Majlis-e-Mushawarat in 1964 in response to the ghastly communal violence in Jabalpur in 1961. Mushawarat was supposed to be a think tank for Muslims with the aim of bringing all Muslim sects and sub-sects under one political umbrella. Noorani was invited to the think tank. However, he refused. He clarified his stand on the issue in the Memorial Lecture. He said, “I will join immediately and readily, but on one condition, viz. you open the doors to the non-Muslims. Because it is my belief that every act of discrimination against an Indian on the grounds of religion, race, colour, sex, or whatever, is an Indian lapse from Indian ideals. It is a matter for all Indians.”

In his Memorial Lecture, he said that Muslim political leadership “bheek mangte rahe - yeh do, woh do. Arey, tum to mobilise karo (Muslim political leaders only kept on demanding from the Indian state. They should have mobilised the community and asserted)”.

Noorani suggested the following actions to Muslims in his Memorial Lecture: “First and foremost, I would like to see an organization on the lines of NAACP of the United States. National Association for the Advancement of Colored Peoples, which has whites as well as blacks. Or, if I had my way, if I were in public, I would have set it up. Invited my Hindu friends, like Mani (Mani Shankar Aiyar) and others. Come on and you be good friends and tell us when we go wrong. But this must be an Indian group which is concerned with the discrimination of Muslims. What a powerful body it would have been. There were any number of Hindus or Christians and others who would have joined hands with them (Mushawarat)."

“Secondly, I would have said documentation. I am sorry, Muslims are not good at research. Take riots. I have yet to see a single compilation of riots since 1961. There is a lot of goodwill still for Muslims. I practised law in a predominantly non-Muslim milieu in the Bombay High Court. And when I was put in prison (in 1964), my Hindu friends got together and said, we will petition for his release and we will not accept a single Muslim signature. We didn't have any problem. They didn't agree with my views. But they said, no, this is wrong. Muslims have not tapped the reservoir of goodwill. Muslims must develop a formal context of agitation which heals old wounds, and does not impose new ones. And that you can do only by secularizing the agitation.” That is, agitations by Muslims should be broad-based and inclusive, mobilizing all sections of society against discrimination and injustice, just as the anti-CAA agitation launched by the Muslim women was.

Sadly, Muslims ignore Noorani’s sound advice. They should revisit the suggestions of Noorani.