An Iranian Exile in Sambhalpur

re: HP # 35

Although I have no association with RSS, VHP, or any other assorted religious organizations, I will be happy to address at least some of your concerns. My vision of Hinduism is very different from that of RSS etc. Yet within the narrow confines Islam-Hinduism debate, my brand of Hinduism will be quite indistinguishable from theirs, except that my views are openly designed to eliminate the long-term hold of Islam on my native country.

I will pick one, since this is of signficant interest to me, and to many other Hindus - the issue of Shuddhi.

There is an absolute need to launch an all out, all-India, shuddi program aimed at reclaiming all Hindus lost to Islam during the period of Islam`s military victories on our peoples. This shuddhi program, directed specifically and exclusively against Islam, is totally reasonable, rational, and absolutely necessary for the benefit of Hindus, both current and ex.

Any Hindu or Muslim, who ever organized, funded, or supported any shuddhi program to reduce the role of Islam within India was and must be recognized as amongst the greatest of Hindu heroes, benefactors, and saviors.

This is not a RSS view or VHP view, or at least not only theirs.

``The idea of a `clash of civilisations` goes against the grain of our civilisation. [Ours is] a land of diversity where modern democracy has come to be built on the notion of pluralism and inclusiveness. Admittedly, there are those even among us who do not share this syncretic view of India. They not only believe in the `clash of civilisations` but wish to encourage it.``
- Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh speaking at the HT Leadership Initiative.

“I do wonder what the extremist wing of the BJP-RSS thinks about this. In particular, I am intrested in seeing radical cleric`s Modi and Togadia views on the subject. Perhaps some BJP supporters might want to weigh in with their views, if they have managed to solve the mess that their party`s leadership is in.”

http://o3.indiatimes.com/thenote/archive/2004/11/15/24463.aspx

I don’t know how the RSS/BJP and rest of the sangh pariwar would respond to the question above but what I do know is that Hindu revivalism is based on its hatred for Muslims in India. It is kind of strange that the Hindu revivalism actually took hold when the Brits were fully in control of India and the Muslims rule was almost history besides the token Mughal King in Red Fort Delhi.
Raja Rammohan Roy (1772-1833) the founder of Brahmo Samaj, was the founder of the hindu nationalism and he was followed by Dayananda-Saraswati who openly raised the slogan ‘India for the Hindus.’ According to him, Hinduism was to be the sole religion of the sub-continent, and the Hindus its sole masters. The Muslims were foreigners and must be pushed out. He was also the founder of “Shuddhi” movement or individual conversion of Muslims to Hindu faith.
The founder of Hindutva Veer Savarkar was I guess right behind the other two leaders who also believed in one religion and one culture for India. What this all says is that the hatred for Muslims in India is not something that happened after the partition but the there is no doubt now that the partition happened because of open hatred that some Hindu groups showed against the Muslims. The intensity of this hatred has increased manifold since the partition, as it is evident from the fact that even the lowliest placed Hindu in the India society refuse to communicate with Muslims in public life as was the case with hasina begum in post #3. The Indian educated middleclass fully subscribes to Hindutva. What that really means is that Muslims, as Muslims have no future in India. They will continue to be scorned and made scapegoats for the failure of the majority community to uplift the country from the utter helplessness that the poor have been placed into


“According to 1991 nationwide census., Muslims constitute 12.60 percent of the total Indian population. However, the representation of Muslims in the parliament, state legislatures, administrative services, armed forces, police and para military forces, educational institutions and the private and public sectors is far below their proportion. The percentage of the Muslims in the civil and foreign services is less than a quarter of their population. According to a white paper, prepared by All India Milli council (AIMC) and presented to Prime Minister Inder Kumar Gujral, on the performance of Indian Union during last 50 years, there were only 116 Muslims out of a total of 3883 administrative officers (2.98%), 45 out of 1433 police service officers (3.14%) and 57 out of 2159 foreign service officers (2.64%). In central government, Muslims constitute 1.6% of all class I officers, 3.9% of all class II officers and 4.4% of the technical supervisory staff. According to an official report prepared by Dr. Gopal Singh Committee, there is a marked disparity between Hindus and Muslims in economic, social and educational field. The committee’s report based on a sample survey of 80 districts across the country, found that there were only 92 Muslims out of 2698 students in Engineering colleges. The number of Muslim students in the MBBS course in 8 universities of eight states was only 98 out of 2895.”
http://www.geocities.com/WestHollywood/Park/6443/India/imuslims.html

Tupac,

It is good that you connect...:)

amrita,

Thanks! I thought you were on a sabbatical like BeeJay.... Thanks to chowk editors, the installments are being spaced out now. It is true about narrative writing, and I am told penguin etc are looking for narrative non-fiction writing in India lately.

HN

Ref HP #26

[The US government makes the right call. This person should be confined to India where he is a celebrity for killing or plotting to kill minorities.

US denies visa to Indian Gujarat CM]

This has placed the ``secular`` leftists of India in a quandary.

They don`t know whether to applaud the US for trying to punish a Hindutva-wadi or to condemn it for insulting India.

Poor secularists! I feel so sad for them!

Ref HP #26

[A report ordered by the Congress-led coalition government said in January that the Godhra train fire resulted from a cooking-related accident or from burning cigarette butts and absolved Muslims on the rail platform from blame that sparked bloody riots in Gujarat in 2002, when up to 2,000 Muslims were killed.]

a) This specific report that was a SECOND inquiry ordered by Lallu Prasad Yadav, the Railways Minister, was produced just in time for the Bihar elections. It didn`t help the Congress or Lallu in Bihar. It didn`t help the Congress or Lallu in Jharkhand. It was almost immediately contradicted by the earlier commission that is stioll working on its report.

b) The report on the New Delhi riots where 3000+ Sikhs were killed after Indira Gandhi`s well-justified assassination that has been submitted to the Central government has not been published as promised by Manmohan Singh the Neutered.

It is obvious that secularism as defined by HP, Harish Nambiar, Amrita Rajan, Sadhna, Dost-Mittar, etc., is:

a) Electing Congress and its left-wing cronies to power, if necessary by propping up one or more of the Nehru clan.

b) Killing Hindus by Muslims and Sikhs by Hindus.

c) Ensuring India is subservient to China while decrying any efforts at a rapproachment with the US.

tupac:

i remember reading about your travails during the aftermath...forgive hazy memory but i recall posting emails, yours or your friends` here...

what came off it?

if not here you can email my address is in the profile)

rgds

t

Harish - this was worth waiting for. Again, this hit on a number of personal nerves, which was wonderful. It`s struck me for the longest time that there is a dearth of Indian writers (and artists in general) who can record or feel like recording the past 20 years as an active participant. Not as a victim or as a social conscience or as a parody but as a person who simply lived the time. I`m thoroughly enjoying this series. :)

=== Interact Removed ===

HN:
Thanks, and sorry for distracting attention from your wonderful write-up.

rahul-capri:

I fully agree with you in general on not bringing externalities into the debate on Indian secularism. But in this piece, the central character is an Iranian who has left his home country to live not in neighbouring Pakistan, with which his country has strong historical, cultural, linguistic and sometimes even marital links but an obscure town in Orissa. One would naturally want to know, why?

That said, knowing chowk, I should have refrained from the comment which has distracted discussion from this nice piece.

Reply to #24, #25, #26 by HP:

Dear HP:

I just looked for the first time at your interactor page - the one with the animated graphic, and I believe the graphic essentially captures the spirit of all of your posts: (1) hides its true face, (2) dances around issues, (3) goes all over the place but not really anywhere.

In order to be of help, I am providing the following short summary list which you can copy and paste in all your future posts to convey your message more economically:

(1) Hello, I am HP. (2) I like to talk a lot. (3) The Hindus are at fault here. (4) The Hindus are at fault everywhere on everything. (5) I have no solution (what is that?). (6) See you again (and again).

You are welcome.

Sincerely,
BeeJay

The US government makes the right call. This person should be confined to India where he is a celebrity for killing or plotting to kill minorities.

US denies visa to Indian Gujarat CM
(Updated at 1245 PST)
NEW DELHI: The United States has revoked a visa for hardliner Hindu nationalist leader Narendra Modi, who has been accused of complicity in a Muslim massacre, the US embassy said on Friday.

Modi, chief minister of India`s western Gujarat state, was also denied a diplomatic visa as he was ``not coming for a purpose that qualifies for a diplomatic visa,`` an embassy statement said.

The controversial politician was to visit the US this month at the invitation of a Gujarati-dominated hotel owners` association.

A report ordered by the Congress-led coalition government said in January that the Godhra train fire resulted from a cooking-related accident or from burning cigarette butts and absolved Muslims on the rail platform from blame that sparked bloody riots in Gujarat in 2002, when up to 2,000 Muslims were killed.

India presents a unique case where after fifty-seven years of Independence and total control of all branches of government, the majority community still claims that the minority community is victimizing it. Mind you, the 12% minority is behind the majority community in every conceivable economic, education, jobs, or prosperity indicators.

How is that possible that majority community still feels victimized? Well! In the area of make-believe world, that Indian middle class lives in, it is not only possible but it is happing every day. Minority is victimizing the majority and the poor majority has no way to stem the tide! Only in India!

Some gripes against the minority community:

The minority is eating all the resources by using the hajj subsidies. The minority has its own laws. The minority has its vote bank and if any party approaches the minority for vote that party is appeasing the minority, it is playing the vote bank game! If somebody raises voice about the true ghetto like living condition of the minority- that person is pseudo-secularist, or pinko, and many more supposedly derogatory terms.

For the last 57 years, only one community is in control of India and so far, this majority community has failed to resolve its own problems and when the issue of extreme communalism and treatment to minority and lower caste is raised in Indian context, some of majority community start looking for balancing factors!

There is no doubt that the majority community is passing the buck in blaming the minority community of it is own failures!

Whose fault is that that for the first 47 years of its independence, India chased the mirage!
Answer: The minority community.

Whose fault is that that for the last 57 years India has failed to provide adequate livelihood to 750 million of its population?(If 200-250 million are middle class, then rest of 750-800 million are poor- simple math!)
Answer: The minority community.

That is just a partial list. The irony is that the minority community is also blamed for its backwardness as if the majority community is providing all the resources to the minority to move out of ghettoes.

There seems to be a tendency in some here to avoid unpleasant facts about India. If they have to, they will attempt to whitewash it as much as they can. First, it was oh! it only happened in Gujarat and rest of the India is fine. When facts point out another state, the answer is oh! It is only two states and cannot be extrapolated to whole India. Well! The undeniable truth is that communalism is an ALL India problem and it is not just two states but it is pretty much all states in the union. Cursory look at all major Indian states would reveal that communal parties are in power or are the second largest political group. Yes, we can make some exceptions in some southern Indian states but Kerala seems to be getting there and if the Indian society fails to respond to it fast, whole country would fall under the communal parties.

Look at Bihar, UP, Jhakarkand, Maharashtra, MP, Gujarat, Orissa, Punjab, Haryana, and Rajasthan just to name a few states that I can think of right now. In all these states, the communal political parties BJP/RSS either are in control along with its natural allies like VHP, RSS, Hindu Maha Sabha, Bajarang Dal or Shive Sena or are viable groups to form the next govt. Just a year ago, BJP/RSS alliance was in control of the central govt.

With this situation in hand, why would some body even pretend that India is NOT a communal society or a society that is getting ready to have Ram Rajya or Hindu rajya in the near future?

dost,

I understand what you are saying. However, my intention for choosing this form on this theme was to essentially making an argument with the usual arsenal. The way you put it makes good material for the argument on secularism, if I am merely pushing that idea alone. I am trying to make thi8s more multi-hued than an opinion piece where clarity of thought is of paradigm importance. Here, what I am trying to achieve is a more crowded, more colourful and complex world, created through my perspective, of course. This world is the matrix where this entire fight of secularism versus ciommunalism is going on.

And, while the ideological points have been taken on various points on the line, right, left, centre, and left and right away from the centre. Those arguments tend to deliver dead points, which is why we can individually carve out all counterpoints the ``other`` will make against an arguement one favours.

There is a limitation to merely point scoring debates. Like, in the South Asian context, the debate on nuclear issue is by now a foregone conclusion. No South Asian talks of the experience of being nuked!

On communalism, that is not so. We all experience it on a daily basis. The idea is to present the complexity of ``daily`` life, where the debate is a live thing, as opposed to the ``dead`` transaction of known positions. I do not know if this clarified the point. In anycase your point has been taken up by more able practitioners of the trade!

Thanks.

ana,

I am waiting for your comments, whenever you finish the second read. That said, the Persian accent when speaking Hindi would generally be most obvious in the softening of the harsher consonants. The J and Z thingy in the Urdu versus Hindi speaker`s debate equivalent, perhaps. This is more pronounced in harsher sounds like T for Tata....:)


Puyu,

Thank you. I am overwhelmed. And do stay...:)

rahul_capri,

You are my very competent literary lawyer. I had a tough time respoding to dost, after you covered the ground so clearly and with brewity to boot! :)


harimau,

As we Hindus say, maybe I was a Shia in the last birth! Thanks for arriving here though.

rozaiba,

``ligering sense of spookiness,``....:)

The debate ....may it rage on!

HN


HN

#16 dost-mittar I see your point.Only, I think that any perspective that has to come in an analysis about secularism has to be to pay equal attention to all slights to secularism, not just by the Hindu right.Including different countries to the mix could make the canvas too wide to make any relevant analysis.

bucaphelus#19:

You are right. I should have used ``one`` instead of ``I`` there. Thanks.