Paper short abstract:

Paper de-bunks the myth of looking at Muslims as single, monolithic & homogenous group. It interrogates the ‘mainstream’ Muslim politics which reflects upper caste-driven symbolic/emotive/identity politics.It focuses on lived realities of Muslim communities and narratives of assertions from within.

Paper long abstract:

There has been an attempt to represent Muslims as a single, monolithic, homogenous group. These kinds of representations have been facing serious challenge in recent times due to the emergence of the perspective of understanding Muslim society from below/its margins. The paper de-bunks the myth of representing Muslims as homogenous. It interrogates the 'mainstream' Muslim politics which reflects upper caste-driven symbolic/emotive/identity politics.

The communal politics around the creation of Pakistan, and the idea of a homogeneous community overshadowed the caste discrimination. There is a need for democratic pluralistic refashioning of political communities to deal with hierarchies within Muslims. The paper focuses on lived realities of Muslim communities and narratives of assertions from within, thus promoting intersectional perspectives. It reflects on the processes that marginalize lower castes, and how it generates cultural and political consciousness in the margins. As asymmetrical hierarchical ordering, caste informs concentration of political and material power in the hands of upper caste Muslims. However, over the last decade, this has increasingly been challenged by assertions, growing consciousness, democratization and political mobilization of lower caste Muslims. It develops as counter-hegemonic force in Indian Muslim politics. Indeed, this assertion helps in turning procedural freedoms into substantive ones, this shift has been examined.

Paper interrogates the interlinkages between multiple majoritarianisms and role of lower castes within Muslim community. It maps and develops analytical framework for study of socio-cultural marginalization, physical segregation, economic/material deprivation, and symbolic subordination. Hence, experiential dimensions are central to understand the material conditions and dynamics of power.