South Central

South Central 43: Umar Khalid’s UAPA bail rejection and southern leaders' secularism dilemma

By Dhanya Rajendran

September 14, 2025 at 10:00 AM

In this episode of South Central, hosts Dhanya Rajendran and Pooja Prasanna discuss the long legal process endured by Umar Khalid, Sharjeel Imam, and others who have been in prison without trial. The hosts are joined by lawyer and activist Shahrukh Alam and Poorna Ravishankar, lawyer and researcher whose focus area of study has been the Indian Constitution.

“This is not purely a legal case, Many political underpinnings have also influenced this. The court’s fidelity to rule of law can be gauged by how much space it gives the prosecution to rely on social and moral prejudices,” Shahrukh says.

She also adds that the court, at this point, comes across as penalising dissent. “This kind of an allegation requires a much higher threshold, which they should then prove. But that is not the case here. The political aspect is also about how this is presented as a problem of national security. But the moment you say political action against the ruling government is a problem, you are banning dissent,” she says.

“They also use what is happening in the neighbourhoods like Nepal. The are trying to pre-empt dissent by detaining consistent dissenters. In all this, the violence by the state on the protestors is not accounted for,” Shahrukh further says.

Pooja says that statistics show how Muslims, dissenters,and scholars are targeted more frequently, presenting a pattern of selective enforcement of bail and trial. “Umar should be given a trial. Unless that happens, in the minds of the public, the narrative alone remains. There can be no redemption,” she adds.

Dhanya asks if this is a case of the process being the punishment.

“Yes. They know the case may not stand. So their agenda is to keep them in jail for as long as they can,” Shahrukh says. “The prosecution is also criminalising Muslim mobilisation and this is being endorsed by the courts,” she adds.

In the second part of the discussion, the hosts discuss how political leaders in the South are navigating the thin line between secularism and faith. They are joined by Dr Meera Velayudhan, a writer, policy analyst, activist, feminist scholar, and former president of IAWS. She is the daughter of Dakshayani Velayudhan, the youngest and only Dalit member of the Constituent Assembly.

Dhanya starts the discussion by citing examples of how, in Karnataka, Siddharamaiah has promised to review the anti-conversion laws, the controversy on Banu Mushtaq inaugurating Dasara, in Kerala, the government is walking the tightrope of faith and politics with the upcoming Global Ayyappa Sangamam, and so on.

Dr Meera says that although the Left government took a progressive stand at the time of the Sabarimala judgement, there was some unease. “Now, though the government says they are not part of organising the Global Ayyappa Sangamam, that the Dewaswom is the body conducting it, the conflict of how to address the whole issue in terms of gender parity and appeasement politics is very evident,” she says.

“Even during the Vaikkom satyagraha, the initial consensus by Periyar was only to allow all people to access the roads leading to the temple, not the temple itself. Only later did the temple entry itself become a movement. When the verdict came, the government backed it, but the attempt was not to socially integrate communities to build a secular fabric. It was more to address political Hindutva and press for Left politics,” she adds.

Pooja asks what can be done when even a CPI(M) government like the one in Kerala does a U-turn, stating this is about devotees and not communalists. “The event itself, the upcoming Global Ayyapa Sangamam, is not religious, they say, but it signals that way,” she adds.

Poorna says that Ambedkar speaks about a communal majority, when you do everything to appease a certain community, eventually becoming a majoritarian democracy. “Whereas, he pointed out that the agenda should be to prioritise Constitutional morality. Which means we put focus on secularism and integration,” she adds.

Pooja points out how it would be ironic if MK Stalin comes to the Ayyappa Sangamam, upon invitation by the Kerala government.

Dhanya asks what the dividend of organising an Ayyappa Sangamam for the Left government is.

Meera says that they say they would have commercial benefits in the form of investments for developing the pilgrimage site. “But if the government argues that the event is not in the temple but at the banks of the Pampa, why can’t women be part of it?” she asks.

Pooja steers the discussion to the Banu Mushtaq controversy in Karnataka over her Dasara inauguration invite.

Poorna asks what it is that the BJP and other forces strive to achieve here? They try to paint every festival, every event as a Hindu-ised one. “Dasara itself has a history of even Muslims participating. This controversy is to make Karnataka look like a monolithic state with monolithic traditions. This is the more concerning aspect of the problem,” she says.

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Audio Timecodes

00:00:00- Introductions

00:03:03 - Media Rumble

00:04:47- Headlines

00:09:58 - UAPA: Umar Khalid and Sharjeel

00:46:50- Southern CMs and Secularism

01:20:43 - Recommendations

References

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