What’s in a Name? An Identity Criterion or a Means to Discriminatory Politics?

The UP government's move, in a sense, legitimises ‘untouchability’ and promotes the politics of divisiveness.

The Uttar Pradesh government has issued a notification that during the auspicious month of Shravan, food vendors, including eateries or dhabas, on a certain highway in Muzzafarnagar are required to exhibit a poster mentioning the name and other details of the proprietor/owner of that establishment.

The highway is the route that many Kanwariyas take on their annual yatra to and from Haridwar, carrying the holy water from the Ganges for offering to a Shiva linga in a Shiva temple. The Kanwariyas are required to strictly maintain the prescribed Hindu norms regarding what food and drinks they can consume during the yatra.

The notification holds that exhibiting the name of the vendor or the owner of an eatery would be indicative of the owner’s religion, and this would help Hindu Kanwariyas to avoid consuming food from an eatery owned by a non-Hindu ie, a Muslim, and/or being prepared or served by a Muslim waiter. It is to safeguard this interest of Hindu Kanwariyas that the state government has issued such a notification.

The justification for such an unprecedented notification is that it is only a temporary ‘time-bound’ measure for ‘security’ reasons. The apprehension is that communal violence may be caused without such a safeguard measure in place. Initially, the police order mentioned the word ‘voluntary’ which was later revoked since it was quite clear that being a government notification, the word ‘voluntary’ was a total misnomer. The practical underlying message was that of ‘strict compliance’.

Apparently, owners of the eateries have also been asked to temporarily ‘lay off’ non-Hindu employees for the same reason. The question is - Does this move by the state government smack of discriminatory politics in the garb of avoiding an unmanageable ‘law and order situation’?

Understandably, there has been uproar about this most recent move by the state government already maligned for its discriminatory politics. Many politicians, both from the ruling coalition and the Opposition, have unequivocally expressed their criticism of this move by the government which, in a sense, is legitimising ‘untouchability’ and promoting politics of hatred and divisiveness.

The state government’s stand is that in the past many establishments serving the Kanwariyas were found to be violating their own claims of being ‘vegetarian’ eateries, thereby defiling the ‘sanctity’ of the Kanwariya’s religious purpose. This, however, is a classic example of ‘throwing the baby with the bathwater’.

If there have been such violations in the past, then these must be addressed in an effective manner by the administration rather than targeting the malafide intentions of an entire community against another community. In doing this, it is ignoring the fact that there are many instances where diverse religious communities participate and celebrate each other's religious festivals in the true spirit of brotherhood.

But politics aside, there is an interesting aspect to this move that can be culled from what the discipline of the Philosophy of Language teaches us about the exercise of ‘naming’ and whether names tell us anything about the ‘essential core identity’ of an individual who is given that name. There is a long-standing debate about the significance of names given to things, including individuals, and what these names tell us about the named entity.

One view is that a name is merely a ‘meaningless’ symbol given to an entity after a ‘naming’ ceremony for the purpose of identifying and re-identifying the entity when it is not present. A name is merely a means of referring to an individual and does not necessarily tell us any essential quality (what kind of being it is, human or animal) or non-essential quality (his/her caste, class, gender, religion, etc) of that individual.

Names to be given to entities are mostly chosen arbitrarily depending on the personal choice of the name giver. And, even if they are not arbitrarily chosen, ie, if there happens to be a reason why that particular name is chosen, the important point is that there is no necessary connection between what the name happens to signify and the individual named to the extent that a changed situation would necessitate a name change.

How does this fact revealed by the Philosophy of Language impact the relevance and need for the kind of injunction brought forward by the UP government? If a name does not necessarily reveal the essential or non-essential identity of an individual, then trying to gauge his/her religious identity by the name is a futile exercise, and a means to political discrimination with some ulterior motive. A product may be sold by a Muslim vendor having a Hindu name or vice-versa. The vendor may be a Hindu but the product may have been handled by non-Hindus in its journey from its source of origin to its present locale. Would that affect the quality of the product?

Service to mankind, especially to those who are in need when on a long journey, as is the case with the Kanwariyas, is an honourable and rewarding duty. Just as much as the travellers look forward to this ritual, the servers too, both Hindus and non-Hindus, look forward to it. It must not be given a political colour in any form, especially in a manner that creates differences and arouses feelings of ‘othering’ and discrimination and distress to some who are being temporarily ‘laid off’. Our common sense of ‘brotherhood’ teaches us that. But, if we have lost that, there is some logical sense provided by the Philosophy of Language that we can resort to.

(Dr (Ms) Shashi Motilal (Retd) Professor of Philosophy, Department of Philosophy, University of Delhi, India, obtained her PhD from the State University of New York (SUNY) at Buffalo, USA in 1986. She has been Visiting Faculty at the University of Akron, Ohio, USA and Carleton University, ON, Canada, TERI University, New Delhi and IIT/Delhi and IISP, New Delhi. This is an opinion piece and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)