Religious Dialogue and Human Rights: SCENARIO IN INDIA

The way the religious and political leaderships in the Muslim world have joined hands to further the cause of dialogue is a potent indication that in countering the forces of clash and conflict among religions and civilizations, the religious leadership of different faiths would come forward with much more vigour and unity to intensify the process of dialogue at every level and force the political leadership to serve the cause of religious tolerance, coexistence and universal human brotherhood.

In India, though the tradition of religious interaction and dialogue is quite old and established, the process of religious dialogue, more particularly the Hindu-Muslim dialogue, is yet to find a coherent expression and a firm ground upon which to stand. The Hindu majority has not yet responded to the necessity of dialogue in the way and on the scale it demands. Small groups of different religious traditions are indeed engaged in this process at different levels but these efforts are limited to conferences and seminars alone with practically no impact on the routine affairs of society. The process of dialogue has still not found a systematic academic articulation mainly because there is almost no institutional support for it.

Academics who are engaged in this process largely remain confined to their private efforts and generally do not join the activists of dialogue. But there is still a great hope in India for religious dialogue to grow, as this country has been a pluralist society for centuries and the Indian people share a living experience of religious tolerance and coexistence.