Ever since 2014, India has witnessed a huge surge in Religious related violence. India was ranked fourth in the world in 2015 – after Syria, Nigeria and Iraq – for the highest social hostilities involving religion, reported the Huffington Post,2017. There lies a substantial need for establishment of a government body to look after the atrocities faced by Minorities, Dalits and Tribals.
These practices have a long history beyond Pre-Independent India. Therefore, the First Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru sought an Government advisory body to look through these problems and find ways to stop and solve them. Thus, the National Integration Council was formed in Sept, 1961. The main purpose was to find ways to counter problems that were dividing the country by Communalism, Casteism and Regionalism. It was a group of Senior politicians and public figures including Chief ministers, Cabinet ministers, , entrepreneurs, celebrities, media heads, chief ministers, and opposition leaders to find a way to address these problems.
The last assembly of the council was on 28th October, 2013 under the leadership of the then PM Manmohan Singh. The next years from 2014-2020, were of no commitment by the NDA Government to Reconstitute the National Integration Council. One of the major reasons could be understood by their opposition to Communal Bill in 2011. Of which Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar said Bill may create 'impression' among the people at large that the majority community is "always responsible for communal incidents.
On an RTI dated 8th Dec, 2017 had stated “ Reconstitution of National Integration Council under government Consideration” . But then again after almost 3 years another RTI dated 21st June,2020 replied “ there exit no regular of specific time intervals for conveying NIC meeting. The Centre Government assists State Government/UT’s in maintaining communal harmony in a varied ways like sharing of intelligence, sending alert messages, advisories, etc from time to time on important developments having bearing on communal harmony”. The Contradictions of two RTI’s filed between a gap of 3 years proves that there is no commitment to Reconstitute the National Integration Council, nor to Curb violence based on Communalism, Casteism or Regionalism.
Ambedkar, in his writings on communalism, had posited that in democratic politics if the communal majority undermines state power then it is imperative for the democratic state to develop a certain institutional mechanism to safeguard the rights of the minorities. In other words, it is imperative to bridge the gap between the majority and minority communities. However, the incumbent political regime in India has aided a widening of this gap between the two communities on the pretext of a democratic process.
The Founding Fathers of Indian Democracy were afraid of such acts in Future, thus they’ve mentioned these during their period and worked towards creating such institutions of great importance. But the Communal and Majoritarian Politics in recent times has been very ignorant of these reforms. Such ignorance lies against the Democratic and Secular Nature of Indian Constitution, which stands with empowering each and every Citizen with Justice in Social, Economic and Political forms.