Minority

Minority doesn’t mean Muslims, though the words have become synonymous by mis-usage.

Here are few facts - Muslims are the 2^nd largest population in world and the fastest growing by a wide margin. In the Indian subcontinent, Muslims are almost as many as Hindus and at least ten times bigger than any other religion (Christianity for instance). And in India, they are not only the 2^nd largest but also more than all other minorities combined.

Hardly a species facing extinction! Then why Muslims are called minority?

Your guess is as good as mine. On my part, I daresay that they are the only majority in India. Let me explain.

In the context of electoral politics, politicians look to tap votes. No other group of people can influence the result of an election as Muslims. Monolithic or otherwise, they are veritable bank of votes! On the contrary, Hindus don’t see themselves as Hindus. They are loyal to their little caste affiliations. Some of them think for themselves. They too vote in blocks, but if and when they do, they vote in caste blocks. None of these caste blocks can come close to Muslims numerically. Muslims remain the largest vote bank. And that’s precisely why all political parties court them at the expense of so-called majority.

No matter what, no political party in democracy can stay in business without the blessings of majority. That's the scared law of electoral politics. In India what misleads is nomenclature - a majority is a majority even if you call it by any other name. It's fun and effective if you call it by its antonym. 

Let me not go pedantic on the technical definition of the word minority. But one would imagine that minorities are generally the people on the periphery. They are relegated outside the system and its discourse. They are not significant let alone powerful. In short, these people don’t count an awful much.

In India, people of North-East are real minorities. Leave skull-cap type identity politics, they have real integration issues in their own capital. It's hardly surprising that our politicians don’t talk too long about them. Politicians don't see enough return on investment. Their situation is pole-opposite to that of Muslims who hog the whole minority space alone, leaving nothing for real minority groups like homosexuals and transgenders and tribals etc.

Coming to think of it, the politics of India has been hijacked by two groups – Muslims and Corporates. The former has number-power and the latter has money-power. Everything else has become minority.