PIN cards for Parsis

Time and again, in the past, we have seen reports in the Parsi Press about non-Parsis having entered our places of worship. At times, when such transgression is blatant, it is stopped. What happens when it is done covertly without anyone noticing?

Many a time, when we visit our places of worship, some of us may doubt whether a certain individual in the sanctum sancto­rum is a Parsi. What do we do? Perhaps we just banish the thought from our mind-space and get on with our rituals, prayers, etc.

That small element of doubt would always remain for we have no system in place — as of now — to check whether everyone entering the precincts of a holy, consecrated agiary or atash behram is indeed a Parsi/Irani Zoroastrian. When every agiary and every atash behram has placed huge notice-boards in different languages reserving the right of admission into that place of worship only for Parsi/Irani Zoroastrians, how is that right of admission enforced? If we can’t enforce this right, then might we not as well stop displaying such meaningless notices and open up our places of worship to all and sundry? Is there anybody or any mechanism to stop a non-Parsi from entering a place of worship reserved exclusively for Parsi/Irani Zoroastrians?

Also there are several non-Parsis who can pass of as Parsis and easily enter our places of worship. How do we stop them? There are Parsis who brag about having escorted their non-Parsi friends into our places of worship. Whether that is just typical "bawado” (BAWAji + bravaDO = bawado) or the truth, we will never know.

To ensure that those who enter the precincts of our holy and duly consecrated places of worship or even the bunglis at the Doongerwadi are indeed Parsi/Irani Zarathushtis only and not non-Parsis we should start a system of fool-proof identity cards where every Parsi/Irani Zoroastrian’s identity is established. This will serve the key purpose of establishing the identity of the person for entry into places of worship reserved exclusively for Parsi/Irani Zoroastrians and further help us to map the entire community, given its small size. How about something like a PIN, i.e. Parsi Identification Number? The modalities of the design of the number can be worked out so as to ensure that it is unique and accurate.

Such a PIN card should contain the holder’s photograph, name and signature, date and place of birth, date and place of navjote with names of the priests who performed the navjote, permanent address and parents’ names, and bear the stamp and signature of the priest/panthaky in-charge of the local fire temple nearest to the address mentioned on the card.

While signing and counter-signing, the panthaky and/or the high priest may call for additional information from the card-holder in order to ascertain the correctness of the information contained on the PIN card.

This idea of having a PIN card sounds slightly futuristic and may even pass off as laughable now but when the community assets of a small community like ours are encroached upon (as is the case in some places), this will prove to be invaluable. The idea can be further refined to make it more practical and easily implementable. Or maybe we could test out this idea on a small scale at any one of the agiaries in the Fort area of Bombay (because these agiaries are frequented by many Parsis who do not live in that locality) or any one atash behram in Bombay as a pilot project, see how it works and then implement it full-scale.

At the end of the day, what are the numbers we are talking about? At best, a maximum of 1,50,000 PIN cards? If Rs 5 is the cost of the card and another Rs 5 is spent on the logistics of each card, we’re talking of a project cost of roughly 15 lakh rupees or so. For about roughly US $ 30,000 we can have the whole community, globally, mapped forever and issue an identity document to each and every member of the community.

Until we get around to establishing the identity of every Parsi/Irani Zarathushti the notices outside our places of worship will remain mere notice-boards, to be ignored. And the community can afford to ignore this fact only at its own peril.

KAYOMARZ PATEL