Is there a right to convert? Can it be banned? The short answer is that there is no right to convert, but there is a right to be converted. Hence, there cannot be legislation banning conversion. Yet, such anti-Constitutional legislation is precisely what Parliamentary Affairs Minister Venkaiah Naidu has proposed to enthusiastic backing from the RSS and BJP Mps.
It was none less than the Father of our Constitution, Dr B.R. Ambedkar, who in a dalit rally in Mumbai in 1936, urged: “Religion is for Man, not Man for Religion. For getting humane treatment, convert yourselves. Convert for getting organised. Convert for becoming strong. Convert for securing equality. Convert for getting liberty. Convert, so that your domestic life should be happy.” He followed up by getting lakhs of his dalit followers to convert to Buddhism. Can the Father of the Constitution be said to have trampled on the Constitution?
Illustration: Bhaskaran
The fact is that Article 25 gives citizens of India the fundamental right to “freedom of conscience and free profession, practice and propagation of religion”. However, the wording of the article begins by making this right “subject to public order....” Because religion is a highly sensitive subject, possibly the most sensitive subject in a country of diverse religions where religion is seriously practised. The Supreme Court has recognised the right of state legislatures to make laws for the regulation of conversions, so as to enable states to ensure that “public order” is maintained in matters pertaining to religion. This general endorsement is being used to push the idea of a ban on religious conversion. That is unacceptable because you cannot have a right to propagate when there is a ban on being influenced by such propagation. Hence, the word “conscience” right at the start of the article. Anyone is entitled to follow the dictates of his conscience and that includes the right to change the religion an individual happens to be born into or to change to no religion at all.
Of course, the second sub-clause of the article also grants states the authority to regulate “any activity which may be associated with religious practice”. But regulation is one thing; banning is another. In the 1967 and 1968 acts of Orissa and Madhya Pradesh respectively, which are cited in this regard as having been upheld by the apex court, the principal thrust was on prevention of conversion by “force, fraud or allurements”. Precisely because force, fraud and illegitimate allurements are already covered by the Indian Penal Code, when attempts were made in 1954 and 1960 to introduce Central legislation to regulate conversions, Nehru explained that “the major evils of coercion and deception can be dealt with under the general law”. He added that further legislation “will not help very much in suppressing the evil methods of gaining converts but might very well be the cause of great harassment to a large number of people”. He also said that “to suggest that there should be a licensing system for propagating a faith is not proper. It would lead in its wake to the police having too large a power of interference”.
Finding themselves cornered, advocates of ghar wapsi, who are curiously the most vocal of the advocates of a ban on religious conversions, fall back on quoting Gandhi. Of course, Gandhi was against conversion by missionaries. But that was at a period of history when missionary activity had the protection of the imperial flag. Evangelical societies in the UK and the western world made the change of religion an essential element of their “mission civilisatrice”―their mission to “civilise” the uncivilised. It was this manifestation of colonialism that Gandhi pitted himself against. To miss the historical context of his remarks, particularly by those who reject Gandhi in everything else that has to do with religion, is a classic case of the devil quoting the scriptures.
Aiyar, former Union minister, is an MP and social commentator.