Reservation at the cost of Hindu tax payers is criminal looting-Dr Pravin Togadia
VHP general secretary Dr Pravin Togadia criticised the West Bengal Government for announcing 10 per cent reservation for Muslims in the state despite the fact that the Andhra Pradesh High Court quashed the state Government’s unconstitutional move to grant 4 per cent quota to Muslims in education, jobs and so on. "For an eye-wash the West Bengal government has shown that these reservations would be for socially, educationally and economically backward Muslims and OBCs in Muslims. This is all twisting the Constitution and exploiting the hard-working Hindus. Majority Hindus from middle class, higher middle class and other working/business class work hard and pay taxes. Instead of giving benefit of this money to poor Hindus-Scheduled Castes, OBCs and Vanvasis, the government is all out to use this money to subsidise Muslims who do not even limit number of children quoting religion. This is not only unfair to Hindus but also is a criminal looting of Hindus," Dr Togadia said in a statement issued in New Delhi on February 8.
He termed the Sachar and Rangnath Misra reports as "preparation for criminal looting of Hindus. "Andhra’s 4 per cent quota, Sachar and Rangnath reports and now West Bengal giving 10 per cent reservation to Muslims are not sporadic isolated incidents. They are well connected and are part of a larger conspiracy against Hindus. This criminal conspiracy of looting Hindus is being hatched to please and appease Muslim vote bank. Today Union government also announced that youth from PoK would be encouraged to come to J&K and would be given special facilities. At this moment 78 per cent Hindu youth in Bharat are unemployed, 79 per cent Hindu farmers have already lost their lands/crops and most are about to commit suicides, 68 per cent Hindu children are malnourished. Yet, instead of helping them, governments are showering favours on Muslims. This is not acceptable to Hindus," he said.
Dr Togadia said the Hindus are being exploited in every field like education, employment, bank loans, trade facilities, housing and so on. "From Inheritance Act to Marriage Act, all laws are only to trouble Hindus. Essential food costs have gone so high that even well-to-do middle class families are no more able to feed their children even a cup of milk daily and now there is Muslim reservation burden on the Hindus. Hindus have reached their limit of patience and without waiting for anyone to lead; Hindus would hit the streets any moment against this continued injustice. Muslims claim that they are no more just a simple minority; but they are ‘the second largest majority in India (as Jamait-e-ulema-e-Hind’s Maulana Madani says) and yet governments are bent on giving them facilities and reservations snatching education, employment, loans and lives of Hindus," the statement said.
He termed the move unconstitutional and expressed concern that this would encourage not just conversions but also jehadi incidents. He said, "Those who argue that Muslims are poor in Bharat and therefore they turn to jehad, are living in a fool’s paradise. Pilots, engineers, professionals from well-to-do families are following jehad as a lifestyle based on madarsa preaching. If they are poor they do jehad by bomb and when they get rich or educated they use planes, computers against Bharat. Therefore, it will help governments to get all Hindus to avail of education, employment, trade facilities instead of wasting Hindu taxpayer’s money on inspiring jehad. When majority develops, the nation automatically develops. Those who do not even follow Bharat’s Constitution should not be given an opportunity to misuse Bharat’s democracy and Constitution for increasing their population to ‘minoratise’ Hindus."
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Murder of Hindu fishermen
Marad terrorists convicted
By S Chandrasekhar
Despite continuous court judgments and judicial interventions against the spreading Jehadi menace, both the CPM and the Congress are pampering the likes of Madhani, NDF etc. for the fish and loaves of vote banks.
THE ‘Marad Massacre’ of eight Hindu fishermen in Marad beach in Kozhikode, on May 2, 2003 in still fresh in the mind of Hindus in Kerala. This was part of a Jehadi strategy to kill Kerala’s Hindu fishermen (Arayas). The role of Mayin Haji, confidant of Muslim League Minister P.K. Kunjalikutty was behind the massacre. Also Hilal Mohammed, who financed the operation is among loyalties to both the CPM and the Congress-League.
But, this united the Hindus of Kerala, like rock. Massive protests were organised for CBI probe and the Muslim families of Marad had to abandon their homes for almost a year. The RSS demand for Rs 10 lakh compensation for dead and job for dependent was agreed by then CM and now Defence Minister A.K. Antony.
The Thomas P. Joseph Judicial commission indicted Mayin Haji and Hilal Mohammed and called for CBI probe into the role of L-E-T and ISI in the carnage.
But the CPM and the Congress conspired to torpedo CBI probe, as it will expose their Jehadi nexus.
A few months back, the Marad Special Courts Judge gave life term totalling 27 Years to 62 Jehadis for the May 2 massacre. He also sentenced the manager of the marad mosque to five years for hiding the blood- stained weapons in the mosque. He also fined Rs. 10,000 on each convicted, the amount to be given to the dependents of the butchered. Incidentally the present Minister E. Ahmed ordered opening of the sealed ‘Marad Mosque’ and offered Namaz as a defiance to the Hindus.
Prior to the 2 May massacre five Hindus were killed by Jehadis at Marad during January 3 and 4, 2002.
The special Court in a judgement dated February 6, 2010, convicted seven Jehadis Latheef, Rizan, Manaf, Thajudeen, Manaf, Shafi and Anafi to Life imprisonment. They had killed among others Shimjith (16) after setting his house on fire. He had 70 cuts in his body!
The court also sentenced nine others to five years rigorous imprisonment. The court has also imposed a total fine of Rs.10 lakhs which is to be given to the dependents of dead at the rate of Rs. Two lakhs
Despite continuous court judgments and judicial interventions against the spreading Jehadi menace, both the CPM and the Congress are pampering the likes of Madhani, NDF etc. for the fish and loaves of vote banks. Kerala has become the terror factory of the whole world with kerala jehadis available all over.
By S Chandrasekhar
Despite continuous court judgments and judicial interventions against the spreading Jehadi menace, both the CPM and the Congress are pampering the likes of Madhani, NDF etc. for the fish and loaves of vote banks.
THE ‘Marad Massacre’ of eight Hindu fishermen in Marad beach in Kozhikode, on May 2, 2003 in still fresh in the mind of Hindus in Kerala. This was part of a Jehadi strategy to kill Kerala’s Hindu fishermen (Arayas). The role of Mayin Haji, confidant of Muslim League Minister P.K. Kunjalikutty was behind the massacre. Also Hilal Mohammed, who financed the operation is among loyalties to both the CPM and the Congress-League.
But, this united the Hindus of Kerala, like rock. Massive protests were organised for CBI probe and the Muslim families of Marad had to abandon their homes for almost a year. The RSS demand for Rs 10 lakh compensation for dead and job for dependent was agreed by then CM and now Defence Minister A.K. Antony.
The Thomas P. Joseph Judicial commission indicted Mayin Haji and Hilal Mohammed and called for CBI probe into the role of L-E-T and ISI in the carnage.
But the CPM and the Congress conspired to torpedo CBI probe, as it will expose their Jehadi nexus.
A few months back, the Marad Special Courts Judge gave life term totalling 27 Years to 62 Jehadis for the May 2 massacre. He also sentenced the manager of the marad mosque to five years for hiding the blood- stained weapons in the mosque. He also fined Rs. 10,000 on each convicted, the amount to be given to the dependents of the butchered. Incidentally the present Minister E. Ahmed ordered opening of the sealed ‘Marad Mosque’ and offered Namaz as a defiance to the Hindus.
Prior to the 2 May massacre five Hindus were killed by Jehadis at Marad during January 3 and 4, 2002.
The special Court in a judgement dated February 6, 2010, convicted seven Jehadis Latheef, Rizan, Manaf, Thajudeen, Manaf, Shafi and Anafi to Life imprisonment. They had killed among others Shimjith (16) after setting his house on fire. He had 70 cuts in his body!
The court also sentenced nine others to five years rigorous imprisonment. The court has also imposed a total fine of Rs.10 lakhs which is to be given to the dependents of dead at the rate of Rs. Two lakhs
Despite continuous court judgments and judicial interventions against the spreading Jehadi menace, both the CPM and the Congress are pampering the likes of Madhani, NDF etc. for the fish and loaves of vote banks. Kerala has become the terror factory of the whole world with kerala jehadis available all over.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
a satire
Pakistan's common man is innocent.
Pakistan's common man is not in Pakistani militarty. Pakistani military is consisting of Dutch, Africans and Japanese people.
Pakistan's common man do not give votes to India hating politicians. All the voters in Pakistani voter list are from Moskow and Timbaktu and France.
Believe me, I am telling honestly that common pakistani is innocent and wants peace with India.
But you Indians are making so much of noises while dieing just to disturb the peace talks.
Indians are really very cruel people.
Pakistan's common man is not in Pakistani militarty. Pakistani military is consisting of Dutch, Africans and Japanese people.
Pakistan's common man do not give votes to India hating politicians. All the voters in Pakistani voter list are from Moskow and Timbaktu and France.
Believe me, I am telling honestly that common pakistani is innocent and wants peace with India.
But you Indians are making so much of noises while dieing just to disturb the peace talks.
Indians are really very cruel people.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
"misquote as politicians’'
Quote, misquote as politicians’ last resort
What our editors should know is that some reporters do not attend meetings but get their information from someone who did; such reporters should be sharply pulled up. They are not doing their job, for which they are paid.
TWO issues stand out in the matter of the Shashi Tharoor case which need to be addressed. One is of being misquoted by the media. That is a serious enough charge, and needs to be immediately looked into. How can one possibly misquote a speaker if one is an attentive listener? In his presidential summing-up Tharoor was quoting Lord Bhiku Parekh who, apparently, was critical of both Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. The media ignored what Lord Bhiku Parekh said, which is bad enough. Then Shashi Tharoor was charged with criticising the Mahatma and Nehru when he was merely quoting Lord Parekh. That is worse. What our editors should know is that some reporters do not attend meetings but get their information from someone who did; such reporters should be sharply pulled up. They are not doing their job, for which they are paid. That is only one aspect of the problem.
A more serious one is the right of a politician to criticise his predecessors in the party. Mahatma Gandhi does not need anyone to defend him. In his time he was the unquestioned leader not just of the Congress, but of the country at large. In that sense, so was Nehru. Both made certain grievous mistakes. Nehru, for instance, should not have taken the Kashmir issue to the UN Security Council. In retrospect many have questioned Gandhi’s demand that the British should Quit India in 1942.
Happily, the media has risen to the occasion. The DNA (January 12) conceded that the media has erred in its reportage. But then it also pointed out: “The Congress Party is so steeped in its culture of worship, especially of the Nehru legacy, and to a lesser extent of Mahatma Gandhi, that it cannot countenance any criticism of its greats.” The paper pointed out that even when both Gandhi and Nehru were alive they had come in for regular criticism in the public domain, and even from within the party itself. Said DNA: “The (Congress) Party could just as well take a mature stance on what its members say about historical figures. It might help most Indian political parties if they encourage a little internal debate and discussion in the merits of democracy rather than take immediate umbrage. Party discipline need not be taken to Stalinists heights or depths as the case may be.” DNA did not say so, but the Congress is suffering from a major inferiority complex and for its behaviour deserves condemnation.
The Asian Age (January 12) said that the Congress (represented by its spokesmen) seems to go into an overdrive and it is “time someone reined them in”. “The whole affair is disgraceful,” said the paper, adding: “The country’s oldest party can surely do better.” Importantly, it asked: “Since when has there been a ban in the Congress on making a critical appraisal of Nehru or his foreign policy? If so, Jawaharlal would be mortified, were he alive…. His was a life that naturally lends itself to penetrating analysis by scholars, statesmen and admirers… If Gandhi, Marx and Mao can be criticised, why not Nehru unless we choose to subscribe to unending hypocrisy and shaming sycophancy?” The paper pointed out that Tharoor is a Nehru scholar and that “ a great many things Nehru did and thought are no longer a part of the Congress’ make-up today”. It asked: “Will the party’s spokesmen arraign their leadership for this? Or do they prefer to emulate their counterparts in Beijing who say praise-be to Mao Zedong even as they run down in practice everything the great revolutionary leader stood for?”
The Asian Age didn’t say this, but who are Sonia Gandhi and Dr Manmohan Singh to defend the Congress when they were nowhere near the party from 1929 to 1949? How spineless can the Congress be? The Telegraph (January 12) pointed out that “dissent is going to be stifled within the Congress” and “there seems to be a tendency to make the Congress into a replica of a communist party with a ‘line’ on everything and on all subjects”. “If that were to happen,” said the paper, “the Congress would become a monolithic and a doctrinaire party”. Noting that “the Congress has always had an umbrella character and under that umbrella many have been called” and that the Congress has never been known to have a ‘line’ the paper said that “it cannot be anybody’s argument that Gandhi and Nehru—or for that matter any other major and charismatic Congress leader—are above criticism and historical re-evaluation”.
In conclusion, it said: “Every generation looks at past historical figures in its own terms. This is one of the unchanging principles of democratic discussion. The Congress, ever since its inception, has been part of such discussions and has always upheld debates in the best democratic tradition. The past must be open to interpretation; history cannot be frozen. Unfortunately, some elements within the Congress in a bid to display their loyalty are trying to overturn democratic traditions and turn the Congress into a party to which many are called and one voice is heard. It is necessary to nip those totalitarian tendencies in the bud. Otherwise the Congress will catch a tartar.”
This columnist who in his time has covered practically every AICC meeting from 1946 to 1955 and was present at the party meeting in 1942 when the Quit India resolution was passed, feels ashamed of the current Congress leadership to which they rose either by sheer accident or by planned design and not because of any sacrifice they made in the fight for freedom. Tharoor was defended in full by Arvind Adiga, author of the Booker Prize-winning book The White Tiger in another paper by claiming that Shashi Tharoor has written glowingly about Nehru’s contribution in creating a secular democracy and for giving India a role in international affairs that far exceeded military or economic strength. The truth is that today’s Congress leaders, whoever they are, do not deserve to be Congresswallahs. The Mahatma had realised it much before he was assassinated and had asked for its dissolution, which the party leadership declined to do. Perhaps the time has come now for the party to take some other name. It has no respect for past Congress tradition. Their leaders are all johnnies-come-lately attempting to cash in on the party’s great historic past. For them not democracy but power is all that matters. The Tharoor case has shown that in all nakedness. The best name for the party would be: Indian Sycophants Party—and that will reflect the truth.
What our editors should know is that some reporters do not attend meetings but get their information from someone who did; such reporters should be sharply pulled up. They are not doing their job, for which they are paid.
TWO issues stand out in the matter of the Shashi Tharoor case which need to be addressed. One is of being misquoted by the media. That is a serious enough charge, and needs to be immediately looked into. How can one possibly misquote a speaker if one is an attentive listener? In his presidential summing-up Tharoor was quoting Lord Bhiku Parekh who, apparently, was critical of both Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. The media ignored what Lord Bhiku Parekh said, which is bad enough. Then Shashi Tharoor was charged with criticising the Mahatma and Nehru when he was merely quoting Lord Parekh. That is worse. What our editors should know is that some reporters do not attend meetings but get their information from someone who did; such reporters should be sharply pulled up. They are not doing their job, for which they are paid. That is only one aspect of the problem.
A more serious one is the right of a politician to criticise his predecessors in the party. Mahatma Gandhi does not need anyone to defend him. In his time he was the unquestioned leader not just of the Congress, but of the country at large. In that sense, so was Nehru. Both made certain grievous mistakes. Nehru, for instance, should not have taken the Kashmir issue to the UN Security Council. In retrospect many have questioned Gandhi’s demand that the British should Quit India in 1942.
Happily, the media has risen to the occasion. The DNA (January 12) conceded that the media has erred in its reportage. But then it also pointed out: “The Congress Party is so steeped in its culture of worship, especially of the Nehru legacy, and to a lesser extent of Mahatma Gandhi, that it cannot countenance any criticism of its greats.” The paper pointed out that even when both Gandhi and Nehru were alive they had come in for regular criticism in the public domain, and even from within the party itself. Said DNA: “The (Congress) Party could just as well take a mature stance on what its members say about historical figures. It might help most Indian political parties if they encourage a little internal debate and discussion in the merits of democracy rather than take immediate umbrage. Party discipline need not be taken to Stalinists heights or depths as the case may be.” DNA did not say so, but the Congress is suffering from a major inferiority complex and for its behaviour deserves condemnation.
The Asian Age (January 12) said that the Congress (represented by its spokesmen) seems to go into an overdrive and it is “time someone reined them in”. “The whole affair is disgraceful,” said the paper, adding: “The country’s oldest party can surely do better.” Importantly, it asked: “Since when has there been a ban in the Congress on making a critical appraisal of Nehru or his foreign policy? If so, Jawaharlal would be mortified, were he alive…. His was a life that naturally lends itself to penetrating analysis by scholars, statesmen and admirers… If Gandhi, Marx and Mao can be criticised, why not Nehru unless we choose to subscribe to unending hypocrisy and shaming sycophancy?” The paper pointed out that Tharoor is a Nehru scholar and that “ a great many things Nehru did and thought are no longer a part of the Congress’ make-up today”. It asked: “Will the party’s spokesmen arraign their leadership for this? Or do they prefer to emulate their counterparts in Beijing who say praise-be to Mao Zedong even as they run down in practice everything the great revolutionary leader stood for?”
The Asian Age didn’t say this, but who are Sonia Gandhi and Dr Manmohan Singh to defend the Congress when they were nowhere near the party from 1929 to 1949? How spineless can the Congress be? The Telegraph (January 12) pointed out that “dissent is going to be stifled within the Congress” and “there seems to be a tendency to make the Congress into a replica of a communist party with a ‘line’ on everything and on all subjects”. “If that were to happen,” said the paper, “the Congress would become a monolithic and a doctrinaire party”. Noting that “the Congress has always had an umbrella character and under that umbrella many have been called” and that the Congress has never been known to have a ‘line’ the paper said that “it cannot be anybody’s argument that Gandhi and Nehru—or for that matter any other major and charismatic Congress leader—are above criticism and historical re-evaluation”.
In conclusion, it said: “Every generation looks at past historical figures in its own terms. This is one of the unchanging principles of democratic discussion. The Congress, ever since its inception, has been part of such discussions and has always upheld debates in the best democratic tradition. The past must be open to interpretation; history cannot be frozen. Unfortunately, some elements within the Congress in a bid to display their loyalty are trying to overturn democratic traditions and turn the Congress into a party to which many are called and one voice is heard. It is necessary to nip those totalitarian tendencies in the bud. Otherwise the Congress will catch a tartar.”
This columnist who in his time has covered practically every AICC meeting from 1946 to 1955 and was present at the party meeting in 1942 when the Quit India resolution was passed, feels ashamed of the current Congress leadership to which they rose either by sheer accident or by planned design and not because of any sacrifice they made in the fight for freedom. Tharoor was defended in full by Arvind Adiga, author of the Booker Prize-winning book The White Tiger in another paper by claiming that Shashi Tharoor has written glowingly about Nehru’s contribution in creating a secular democracy and for giving India a role in international affairs that far exceeded military or economic strength. The truth is that today’s Congress leaders, whoever they are, do not deserve to be Congresswallahs. The Mahatma had realised it much before he was assassinated and had asked for its dissolution, which the party leadership declined to do. Perhaps the time has come now for the party to take some other name. It has no respect for past Congress tradition. Their leaders are all johnnies-come-lately attempting to cash in on the party’s great historic past. For them not democracy but power is all that matters. The Tharoor case has shown that in all nakedness. The best name for the party would be: Indian Sycophants Party—and that will reflect the truth.
Oh God! All in the name of God
A Ph.D thesis on how to develop a church planting movement in India
www.rickross.com
HERE comes one more revealing document—a research conducted by a Missionary, interestingly to submit as his Phd thesis on Developing a Church Planting Movement in India!
These studies, especially from the Horses Mouth itself will have the right effect on true secular Hindus, who are unaware of these crookedness. There is a need to spread this among secular Hindus who fight tooth and nail to protect the undue rights granted to them by our pseudo secular Government.
One who goes through it can unearth their sinister designs and their dangerous game plan. More surprisingly how well they are implementing the same in our day-to-day life by fooling the majority.
In this thesis they highlight the importance to develop a new generation of Crypto Christians who can keep Hindu names, surname, can use Hindu sacred symbols, marks like tilak, bindi, can adorn hair partition with Kumkum to maintain their secrecy.
Christian missionaries on one hand preach high moral values, yet at the same time, they follow the lowest most despicable ones in order to convert people to their religion. Missionaries especially prey on the poorest, most rural folk under the guise of helping them out of poverty when in fact they have chosen to convert them because they are the most uneducated and therefore most likely to fall for their deception.
One common tactic employed by missionaries is to give a sick villager fake medicines which have no medicinal value and ask them to worship in the name of their faith for wellness. After several days, the missionary gives the villager an identical dose of the medicine, but this time it is the real medicine. Then the missionary will instruct the villager to now pray to Jesus. Soon after, due to the medicine and not due to Jesus, the villager will be cured. The uneducated and gullible villager, however, will attribute his cure to Jesus and convert to Christianity.
In villages in India, missionaries place a stone or metal idol of a Hindu deity in a bucket of water. The statue will sink in the bucket. Next the missionary brings a wax-coated idol of Jesus or Virgin Mary (though Christianity prohibits idols) and places that in the bucket. Due the wax-coat, the Christian idol will float. The missionary will then conclude that because the Christian idol floated, it is “higher” and, therefore, better than the Hindu one. The uneducated villager, not knowing anything about buoyancy or density, falls for the missionary’s ridiculous explanation and converts to Christianity.
Often missionaries will disguise themselves as religious leaders of the local religion and subtly attempt to convert the locals.The classic example was that of Robert de Nobili, a Jesuit from France, who came to India in the early 17th century. He adopted the saffron robe, started to live in a hut, squatted on the floor for conducting his discourses, became a vegetarian and gave up liquor, projected that he was a Brahmin saint from Rome and that the Bible was one of the lost Vedas (Hindu holy scriptures), and generally tried to pass himself as another Hindu sanyasi.
www.rickross.com
HERE comes one more revealing document—a research conducted by a Missionary, interestingly to submit as his Phd thesis on Developing a Church Planting Movement in India!
These studies, especially from the Horses Mouth itself will have the right effect on true secular Hindus, who are unaware of these crookedness. There is a need to spread this among secular Hindus who fight tooth and nail to protect the undue rights granted to them by our pseudo secular Government.
One who goes through it can unearth their sinister designs and their dangerous game plan. More surprisingly how well they are implementing the same in our day-to-day life by fooling the majority.
In this thesis they highlight the importance to develop a new generation of Crypto Christians who can keep Hindu names, surname, can use Hindu sacred symbols, marks like tilak, bindi, can adorn hair partition with Kumkum to maintain their secrecy.
Christian missionaries on one hand preach high moral values, yet at the same time, they follow the lowest most despicable ones in order to convert people to their religion. Missionaries especially prey on the poorest, most rural folk under the guise of helping them out of poverty when in fact they have chosen to convert them because they are the most uneducated and therefore most likely to fall for their deception.
One common tactic employed by missionaries is to give a sick villager fake medicines which have no medicinal value and ask them to worship in the name of their faith for wellness. After several days, the missionary gives the villager an identical dose of the medicine, but this time it is the real medicine. Then the missionary will instruct the villager to now pray to Jesus. Soon after, due to the medicine and not due to Jesus, the villager will be cured. The uneducated and gullible villager, however, will attribute his cure to Jesus and convert to Christianity.
In villages in India, missionaries place a stone or metal idol of a Hindu deity in a bucket of water. The statue will sink in the bucket. Next the missionary brings a wax-coated idol of Jesus or Virgin Mary (though Christianity prohibits idols) and places that in the bucket. Due the wax-coat, the Christian idol will float. The missionary will then conclude that because the Christian idol floated, it is “higher” and, therefore, better than the Hindu one. The uneducated villager, not knowing anything about buoyancy or density, falls for the missionary’s ridiculous explanation and converts to Christianity.
Often missionaries will disguise themselves as religious leaders of the local religion and subtly attempt to convert the locals.The classic example was that of Robert de Nobili, a Jesuit from France, who came to India in the early 17th century. He adopted the saffron robe, started to live in a hut, squatted on the floor for conducting his discourses, became a vegetarian and gave up liquor, projected that he was a Brahmin saint from Rome and that the Bible was one of the lost Vedas (Hindu holy scriptures), and generally tried to pass himself as another Hindu sanyasi.
Monday, January 25, 2010
Hajj Subsidy: An Instrument of Muslim Appeasement in Indian Politics
Dr Radhasyam Brahmachari
The Indian government, outrageously contravening its Secular Constitution, spends huge sums of money to subsidize Muslim Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca as appeasement for Muslim votes...
Hajj: The fifth Pillar of Islam
Islam stands on five pillars, namely (1) Kalema or six sentences of oath to Islam, (2) Namaaj or prayer, five times a day, (3) Roja or fasting in the month of Ramadan, (4) Zakat or giving away a part of income (2.5%) for the sake of Jihad (i.e. for terrorist activities) and (5) Hajj or pilgrimage to Mecca.
The Islamic Hajj, i.e. pilgrimage to Mecca, is an obligation that every able-bodied Muslim, who can afford, is expected to perform at least once in life. This ritual demonstrates the solidarity of the Muslim people, and their submission to the Allah, the Islamic God. The Hajj occurs from the 8th to the 12th day of Dhul Hijjah, the 12th month of the Islamic lunar calendar.
It should be mentioned here that the Hajj ritual was considered ancient even in the times of Prophet Muhammad in the 7th century AD. Islamic scriptures say that it was practiced even in the days of Ibrahim (Abraham of Bible). In ancient times, tens of thousands of pagan pilgrims used to join processions, simultaneously converging on the ancient idol-temple of Kaaba in Mecca for the Hajj, and perform a series of rituals. Many believe that initially the Kaaba was a temple of Lord Shiva, Hajj was a Hindu practice, and later on included into Islam by Prophet Muhammad. In ancient tradition, the pilgrims would walk counter-clockwise seven times about the Kaaba, a process called Tawaf, kiss the Hazr-e-Aswad (the Black Stone), then run back and forth from the Zamzam Well near the Kabah back and forth between the hills of Al-Safa and Al-Marwah, then go to the plains of Mount Arafat to stand in vigil, then proceed to Muzdalifah to gather appropriate pebbles, which they would throw at three pillars in Mina to perform the ritual of the “Stoning the Devil”. The pilgrims would then shave their heads, perform an animal sacrifice, and celebrate the three day global festival of Eid-ul-Adha. Muslims continue to imitate the same.
Every male Muslim, proceeding toward Mecca to perform the Hajj, must clad himself with Ihram, namely two pieces of white cloth, one to wear and the other to cover the upper part of his body and thus he enters a state called Muhrim. A person in the state of Muhrim must not tie any knots or wear any stitched items except for a money belt if it is needed. He should allow the ankle and back of foot to be exposed. Furthermore, whilst in the state of Muhrim, a Muslim must also not use any scented things at all on himself or on clothes. For women, there is no clear prescription. Women's clothing, therefore, varies considerably and reflects regional as well as religious attitudes. In general, female pilgrims clothe themselves in long white robes, covering the body from head to foot and leaving the face exposed. The simple, white Ihram clothing is indeed a Hindu practice, which is still continuing as part of the Hajj pilgrimage.
Last year (i.e. 2009 AD), an estimated 2.5 million Muslims from around the world converged on Mecca in November for the Hajj pilgrimage, of which 160,491 from India. Indian pilgrims were the first to arrive, when the Hajj Terminal opened for the season on Oct. 20, according to the Consulate General of India, who coordinated the arrangements of 115,000 pilgrims coming through the Mumbai based Hajj Committee of India. The remaining 45,491 pilgrims came through private tour operators. About 500 buildings were hired to accommodate the pilgrims in the Mecca region; 70,000 pilgrims grouped ‘green’ stayed within one kilometer from the Holy Masjid-ul-Haram (i.e. Kabaa); 13,000 grouped ‘white’ between 1 and 1.6 km from it and 32,000 others in Aziziyah. The Indian mission set up a 50-bed hospital in Mecca. About 1,100 stayed in various accommodations (Ribats) set up by erstwhile princely states of India.
Hajj subsidy spending
In 2007, the Hajj subsidy paid by the Indian government was 5.95 billion rupees and Rs. 7 billion for 2008 (Rs. 45 = US$ 1). Since 1994, the roundtrip cost to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia has been fixed at Rs. 12,000 per pilgrim, and the government has footed the rest of the bill. In 2007, this difference came to Rs. 47,454 per passenger. The total Government spending for the 2009 Hajj subsidy is not yet clearly known. Many estimate that it could be as high as over 18 billion rupees (Rs. 1800 crore).
According to Hajj Committee CEO Mohammad Owais, the committee has been asked by the Ministry of External Affairs to collect Rs 12,000 from each person towards airfare. According to Owais, accepting financial assistance like subsidized airfare for Hajj pilgrimage is un-Islamic. He also believes that one should not be under any obligation while undertaking Hajj and the pilgrims should be allowed to travel by any airline of their choice. “We should be allowed to place bulk orders with the airline, which quotes the lowest price for a ticket. As of now, we are bound by the Government to travel by Air India only”, adds Mr Owais.
It should be pointed out here that considerable criticism has been leveled against this practice, both by Hindu organizations and by Muslim religious groups. However, after the filing of a Public Interest Litigation by B.N. Shukla and former BJP Rajya Sabha member Prafull Goradiyam, seeking an end to Hajj subsidies. The Supreme Court of India, although declared the practice unconstitutional, ruled that the subsidy may be continued.
History
The practice of providing subsidized airfare by the Government of India began as early as 1959, as a policy of appeasing Muslims, in contravention of the secular principle of the government. While commenting on it, Bipin Pal, in his article The Haj subsidy: A Himalayan shame, writes, “How absurd, if not sad, that India is the only country in the world that provides a subsidy to its second-biggest majority for pilgrimage to Mecca; in the pretext of her constitutional obligation (of secular) and later enacted as the Hajj Act, way back in 1959! Thanks to Janab Jawaharlal Nehru, who chose to give this gift to the second-biggest majority! Thanks to his stream of secular ideologists and India's urban English press that even after 27th May 1964 (after the Janab's demise), that they chose to remain silent on the Act that can surpass all the Constitutional provisions that can make a mockery of democratic republic India's secular image.”
In 1992, after the demolition of the disputed structure at Ayodhya, Mr P V Narasinha Rao, the then Prime Minister of India, to cool down aggrieved Muslims, increased both the Hajj quota and amount of subsidy. It may be mentioned here that the government does not provide any such subsidy to the Hindu pilgrims, who go to visit Kailash-mansarobas in China, or to Amarnath in Kashmir or Gangasagar in West Bengal. On the contrary, the government imposes direct and indirect pilgrimage taxes on them.
Dispute
“Regarding a trip to Mecca for performing Hajj pilgrimage, the Koran is very strict and says that those who perform Hajj have to do it only from their hard-earned money. Not only that, before setting off for the Hajj, he/she must repay his/her loans and return everything he/she might have taken as deposits from others. The question of accepting a subsidized trip is totally frowned upon pious Muslims. Particularly for the Indian pilgrims, the money for subsidizing the plane fare is Kafir's money! How can a true Muslim perform Hajj pilgrimage out of the dole or tax given by Kafir's comprising of Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Christians, Parsis and Atheists. Is it not Haram? Recently, Muslim ulemas could have understood the point and expressed their opinion that accepting subsidy for the Hajj pilgrimage is un-Islamic and unethical (haram)”, according to author G K Menon. It should be mentioned here that the Chennai-based Nawab of Arcot was the only Muslim, who was most vocal on this point and campaigned to stop the subsidy. But his pleas fell on deaf ears. The matter has also created confusion amongst Indian pilgrims. However, recently a group of Muslim MPs has requested the Central Government to discontinue the Hajj subsidy, and implement other means to ease the Hajj pilgrimage.
It has been suggested that a fund (Hajj Kitti) would be created and those, who are interested to perform the pilgrimage, would deposit money on monthly or yearly installments, and would withdraw the money during the journey. In fact, the present Government, led by the Indian National Congress, is considering such an alternative as the present practice is under severe criticism as an instrument of appeasing Muslims for votes by the certain parties. A case against the present UPA Government is also pending in the Allahabad High Court moved by a Hindu nationalist leader, because offering such a financial assistance to a religious group goes directly against the secular spirit of the Indian Constitution. Many believe that the present Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is determined to settle the issue within his tenure, which is going to end in 2014.
But there are indications that the dispute would continue. A spokesman of the National Hajj Committee has been reported to have said: “We are also citizens of this nation and, despite our hardships, we also pay tax to the government. We also contribute to the government exchequer. So, we have the right to enjoy government subsidies.”
But, as mentioned above, the matter is controversial even amongst Muslims. Meanwhile, K Rahman, the Vice Chairman of the Rajya Sabha has given a nod to an alternative arrangement as the Koran denounces accepting subsidy for the Hajj pilgrimage. Another influential Muslim leader, Shahid Siddiki, an MP of the Samajwadi Party, said, “Receiving Hajj subsidy is against the tenets of Islam,” adding that, except India, no other country in the world, even the Muslim countries, offer subsidy to Hajj pilgrims.
Demanding an end to the subsidy, Maulana Mehmood Madani, Rajya Sabha member and general secretary of the Jamiat-e-Ulema- e-Hind, says: “It is against the Shariat to be under any kind of obligation while undertaking Hajj. According to the Quran, only those Muslims, who can afford the expenses, should perform Hajj. It’s recommended only for adult, financially able and sane Muslims.” Others, like S Q R Ilyas, convener of the Babri Masjid Committee and a senior member of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), says, “The Hajj subsidy a sop to gain political mileage.”
In a recent article, the renowned scholar Dr Babu Susheelan said, “Hajj subsidy is irrational, unwise and illegal. It is for appeasing Muslims. Why taxpayer money should be channeled for Muslim visit to Saudi Arabia? Every Muslims going for Hajj is required by Islam to behead an animal in the name of their desert deity Allah. Why should a secular government subsidizing Jihadis for animal slaughter? I understand that animal slaughter to please God is banned in India. Then, it is natural for the public to ask the question why subsidizing Islamic animal slaughter in the name of Allah? Visit to Mecca with government money is for advanced training on beheading. Advanced skill building will help Jihadis for beheading kafirs. It is a self-inflicted suicidal policy of the secular government.”
It should be pointed out here that, for a Muslim of India, Hajj pilgrimage is indeed an expensive affair, which only the wealthy Muslims can afford; it is unthinkable for the common and poor ones. So, proving aid to this rich and well-off section of Muslims is unethical, too. In other words, it is simply carrying coal to Newcastle. However, the Indian Government is doing that for the sake of Muslim votes. Apart from that, the government is spending huge money on Muslims and providing many other facilities to appease them, e.g. paying monthly salary to Imams of mosques, expanding madrassa education, providing quota for Government jobs, providing easy bank loans, scholarships for Muslim students, and so on and so forth. Still the government is failing to earn their loyalty.
In India, the appeasement of Muslims for the sake of vote-bank politics has reached such a point that Muslims can commit many crimes without being convicted, can break any law even in front of the law-enforcement authorities, can do any kind of violence on Hindus and the people of other community under the protection of the political parties. Not a single political party is above this mess. It has been mentioned above that BJP, known to be a Hindu nationalist party, is raising hue and cry that the present Congress Party-led Government is indulging in Muslim appeasement through the Hajj subsidy. Yet, when BJP was in power, it increased the Hajj quota and the subsidy. Moreover, previously the Hajj pilgrims had to move to Mumbai to board the planes for Jeddah. But the BJP government, spending several thousand crores of rupees, erected Hajj rest-houses in every metropolitan city and made it possible for the Hajj pilgrims to board the planes for Jeddah in their home towns.
We have seen above that, though most of the ulemas are against accepting government subsidy for the Hajj pilgrimage, yet Hajj pilgrims are happily to avail the subsidized journey to Mecca, and performing Hajj. While Muslim dignitaries are probably ashamed of disclosing the truth, a Muslim cleric, nonetheless, has conceded that a subsidized Hajj would be haraam, provided the subsidy was un-Islamic. The injunctions of the Quran are for Muslims; they do not apply to non-Muslims and others. Therefore, a Hajj, subsidized by the secular Government of India, can still be halaal, because the subsidy, offered by the kafir government, is simply a kind of spoils or mal-e-ganimat, which Almighty Allah has made legal (halaal) in the Quran for the Muslims.
To conclude, it may be said that, whatever may be arguments and counter arguments, the Hajj subsidy by the Indian Government would continue so long the politics of Muslim appeasement persists in India.
The Indian government, outrageously contravening its Secular Constitution, spends huge sums of money to subsidize Muslim Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca as appeasement for Muslim votes...
Hajj: The fifth Pillar of Islam
Islam stands on five pillars, namely (1) Kalema or six sentences of oath to Islam, (2) Namaaj or prayer, five times a day, (3) Roja or fasting in the month of Ramadan, (4) Zakat or giving away a part of income (2.5%) for the sake of Jihad (i.e. for terrorist activities) and (5) Hajj or pilgrimage to Mecca.
The Islamic Hajj, i.e. pilgrimage to Mecca, is an obligation that every able-bodied Muslim, who can afford, is expected to perform at least once in life. This ritual demonstrates the solidarity of the Muslim people, and their submission to the Allah, the Islamic God. The Hajj occurs from the 8th to the 12th day of Dhul Hijjah, the 12th month of the Islamic lunar calendar.
It should be mentioned here that the Hajj ritual was considered ancient even in the times of Prophet Muhammad in the 7th century AD. Islamic scriptures say that it was practiced even in the days of Ibrahim (Abraham of Bible). In ancient times, tens of thousands of pagan pilgrims used to join processions, simultaneously converging on the ancient idol-temple of Kaaba in Mecca for the Hajj, and perform a series of rituals. Many believe that initially the Kaaba was a temple of Lord Shiva, Hajj was a Hindu practice, and later on included into Islam by Prophet Muhammad. In ancient tradition, the pilgrims would walk counter-clockwise seven times about the Kaaba, a process called Tawaf, kiss the Hazr-e-Aswad (the Black Stone), then run back and forth from the Zamzam Well near the Kabah back and forth between the hills of Al-Safa and Al-Marwah, then go to the plains of Mount Arafat to stand in vigil, then proceed to Muzdalifah to gather appropriate pebbles, which they would throw at three pillars in Mina to perform the ritual of the “Stoning the Devil”. The pilgrims would then shave their heads, perform an animal sacrifice, and celebrate the three day global festival of Eid-ul-Adha. Muslims continue to imitate the same.
Every male Muslim, proceeding toward Mecca to perform the Hajj, must clad himself with Ihram, namely two pieces of white cloth, one to wear and the other to cover the upper part of his body and thus he enters a state called Muhrim. A person in the state of Muhrim must not tie any knots or wear any stitched items except for a money belt if it is needed. He should allow the ankle and back of foot to be exposed. Furthermore, whilst in the state of Muhrim, a Muslim must also not use any scented things at all on himself or on clothes. For women, there is no clear prescription. Women's clothing, therefore, varies considerably and reflects regional as well as religious attitudes. In general, female pilgrims clothe themselves in long white robes, covering the body from head to foot and leaving the face exposed. The simple, white Ihram clothing is indeed a Hindu practice, which is still continuing as part of the Hajj pilgrimage.
Last year (i.e. 2009 AD), an estimated 2.5 million Muslims from around the world converged on Mecca in November for the Hajj pilgrimage, of which 160,491 from India. Indian pilgrims were the first to arrive, when the Hajj Terminal opened for the season on Oct. 20, according to the Consulate General of India, who coordinated the arrangements of 115,000 pilgrims coming through the Mumbai based Hajj Committee of India. The remaining 45,491 pilgrims came through private tour operators. About 500 buildings were hired to accommodate the pilgrims in the Mecca region; 70,000 pilgrims grouped ‘green’ stayed within one kilometer from the Holy Masjid-ul-Haram (i.e. Kabaa); 13,000 grouped ‘white’ between 1 and 1.6 km from it and 32,000 others in Aziziyah. The Indian mission set up a 50-bed hospital in Mecca. About 1,100 stayed in various accommodations (Ribats) set up by erstwhile princely states of India.
Hajj subsidy spending
In 2007, the Hajj subsidy paid by the Indian government was 5.95 billion rupees and Rs. 7 billion for 2008 (Rs. 45 = US$ 1). Since 1994, the roundtrip cost to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia has been fixed at Rs. 12,000 per pilgrim, and the government has footed the rest of the bill. In 2007, this difference came to Rs. 47,454 per passenger. The total Government spending for the 2009 Hajj subsidy is not yet clearly known. Many estimate that it could be as high as over 18 billion rupees (Rs. 1800 crore).
According to Hajj Committee CEO Mohammad Owais, the committee has been asked by the Ministry of External Affairs to collect Rs 12,000 from each person towards airfare. According to Owais, accepting financial assistance like subsidized airfare for Hajj pilgrimage is un-Islamic. He also believes that one should not be under any obligation while undertaking Hajj and the pilgrims should be allowed to travel by any airline of their choice. “We should be allowed to place bulk orders with the airline, which quotes the lowest price for a ticket. As of now, we are bound by the Government to travel by Air India only”, adds Mr Owais.
It should be pointed out here that considerable criticism has been leveled against this practice, both by Hindu organizations and by Muslim religious groups. However, after the filing of a Public Interest Litigation by B.N. Shukla and former BJP Rajya Sabha member Prafull Goradiyam, seeking an end to Hajj subsidies. The Supreme Court of India, although declared the practice unconstitutional, ruled that the subsidy may be continued.
History
The practice of providing subsidized airfare by the Government of India began as early as 1959, as a policy of appeasing Muslims, in contravention of the secular principle of the government. While commenting on it, Bipin Pal, in his article The Haj subsidy: A Himalayan shame, writes, “How absurd, if not sad, that India is the only country in the world that provides a subsidy to its second-biggest majority for pilgrimage to Mecca; in the pretext of her constitutional obligation (of secular) and later enacted as the Hajj Act, way back in 1959! Thanks to Janab Jawaharlal Nehru, who chose to give this gift to the second-biggest majority! Thanks to his stream of secular ideologists and India's urban English press that even after 27th May 1964 (after the Janab's demise), that they chose to remain silent on the Act that can surpass all the Constitutional provisions that can make a mockery of democratic republic India's secular image.”
In 1992, after the demolition of the disputed structure at Ayodhya, Mr P V Narasinha Rao, the then Prime Minister of India, to cool down aggrieved Muslims, increased both the Hajj quota and amount of subsidy. It may be mentioned here that the government does not provide any such subsidy to the Hindu pilgrims, who go to visit Kailash-mansarobas in China, or to Amarnath in Kashmir or Gangasagar in West Bengal. On the contrary, the government imposes direct and indirect pilgrimage taxes on them.
Dispute
“Regarding a trip to Mecca for performing Hajj pilgrimage, the Koran is very strict and says that those who perform Hajj have to do it only from their hard-earned money. Not only that, before setting off for the Hajj, he/she must repay his/her loans and return everything he/she might have taken as deposits from others. The question of accepting a subsidized trip is totally frowned upon pious Muslims. Particularly for the Indian pilgrims, the money for subsidizing the plane fare is Kafir's money! How can a true Muslim perform Hajj pilgrimage out of the dole or tax given by Kafir's comprising of Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Christians, Parsis and Atheists. Is it not Haram? Recently, Muslim ulemas could have understood the point and expressed their opinion that accepting subsidy for the Hajj pilgrimage is un-Islamic and unethical (haram)”, according to author G K Menon. It should be mentioned here that the Chennai-based Nawab of Arcot was the only Muslim, who was most vocal on this point and campaigned to stop the subsidy. But his pleas fell on deaf ears. The matter has also created confusion amongst Indian pilgrims. However, recently a group of Muslim MPs has requested the Central Government to discontinue the Hajj subsidy, and implement other means to ease the Hajj pilgrimage.
It has been suggested that a fund (Hajj Kitti) would be created and those, who are interested to perform the pilgrimage, would deposit money on monthly or yearly installments, and would withdraw the money during the journey. In fact, the present Government, led by the Indian National Congress, is considering such an alternative as the present practice is under severe criticism as an instrument of appeasing Muslims for votes by the certain parties. A case against the present UPA Government is also pending in the Allahabad High Court moved by a Hindu nationalist leader, because offering such a financial assistance to a religious group goes directly against the secular spirit of the Indian Constitution. Many believe that the present Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is determined to settle the issue within his tenure, which is going to end in 2014.
But there are indications that the dispute would continue. A spokesman of the National Hajj Committee has been reported to have said: “We are also citizens of this nation and, despite our hardships, we also pay tax to the government. We also contribute to the government exchequer. So, we have the right to enjoy government subsidies.”
But, as mentioned above, the matter is controversial even amongst Muslims. Meanwhile, K Rahman, the Vice Chairman of the Rajya Sabha has given a nod to an alternative arrangement as the Koran denounces accepting subsidy for the Hajj pilgrimage. Another influential Muslim leader, Shahid Siddiki, an MP of the Samajwadi Party, said, “Receiving Hajj subsidy is against the tenets of Islam,” adding that, except India, no other country in the world, even the Muslim countries, offer subsidy to Hajj pilgrims.
Demanding an end to the subsidy, Maulana Mehmood Madani, Rajya Sabha member and general secretary of the Jamiat-e-Ulema- e-Hind, says: “It is against the Shariat to be under any kind of obligation while undertaking Hajj. According to the Quran, only those Muslims, who can afford the expenses, should perform Hajj. It’s recommended only for adult, financially able and sane Muslims.” Others, like S Q R Ilyas, convener of the Babri Masjid Committee and a senior member of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), says, “The Hajj subsidy a sop to gain political mileage.”
In a recent article, the renowned scholar Dr Babu Susheelan said, “Hajj subsidy is irrational, unwise and illegal. It is for appeasing Muslims. Why taxpayer money should be channeled for Muslim visit to Saudi Arabia? Every Muslims going for Hajj is required by Islam to behead an animal in the name of their desert deity Allah. Why should a secular government subsidizing Jihadis for animal slaughter? I understand that animal slaughter to please God is banned in India. Then, it is natural for the public to ask the question why subsidizing Islamic animal slaughter in the name of Allah? Visit to Mecca with government money is for advanced training on beheading. Advanced skill building will help Jihadis for beheading kafirs. It is a self-inflicted suicidal policy of the secular government.”
It should be pointed out here that, for a Muslim of India, Hajj pilgrimage is indeed an expensive affair, which only the wealthy Muslims can afford; it is unthinkable for the common and poor ones. So, proving aid to this rich and well-off section of Muslims is unethical, too. In other words, it is simply carrying coal to Newcastle. However, the Indian Government is doing that for the sake of Muslim votes. Apart from that, the government is spending huge money on Muslims and providing many other facilities to appease them, e.g. paying monthly salary to Imams of mosques, expanding madrassa education, providing quota for Government jobs, providing easy bank loans, scholarships for Muslim students, and so on and so forth. Still the government is failing to earn their loyalty.
In India, the appeasement of Muslims for the sake of vote-bank politics has reached such a point that Muslims can commit many crimes without being convicted, can break any law even in front of the law-enforcement authorities, can do any kind of violence on Hindus and the people of other community under the protection of the political parties. Not a single political party is above this mess. It has been mentioned above that BJP, known to be a Hindu nationalist party, is raising hue and cry that the present Congress Party-led Government is indulging in Muslim appeasement through the Hajj subsidy. Yet, when BJP was in power, it increased the Hajj quota and the subsidy. Moreover, previously the Hajj pilgrims had to move to Mumbai to board the planes for Jeddah. But the BJP government, spending several thousand crores of rupees, erected Hajj rest-houses in every metropolitan city and made it possible for the Hajj pilgrims to board the planes for Jeddah in their home towns.
We have seen above that, though most of the ulemas are against accepting government subsidy for the Hajj pilgrimage, yet Hajj pilgrims are happily to avail the subsidized journey to Mecca, and performing Hajj. While Muslim dignitaries are probably ashamed of disclosing the truth, a Muslim cleric, nonetheless, has conceded that a subsidized Hajj would be haraam, provided the subsidy was un-Islamic. The injunctions of the Quran are for Muslims; they do not apply to non-Muslims and others. Therefore, a Hajj, subsidized by the secular Government of India, can still be halaal, because the subsidy, offered by the kafir government, is simply a kind of spoils or mal-e-ganimat, which Almighty Allah has made legal (halaal) in the Quran for the Muslims.
To conclude, it may be said that, whatever may be arguments and counter arguments, the Hajj subsidy by the Indian Government would continue so long the politics of Muslim appeasement persists in India.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
The precious Parijata Tree
By Manju Gupta
WHEN the great deluge occurred, everything was swept under the swirling waters. Even the most precious and irreplaceable things were washed away or got submerged deep in the ocean bed. The gods decided to retrieve whatever they could by churning the ocean. It was during the churning process that the Parijata tree emerged to the surface. It was the most beautiful tree that one could have laid eyes on. Even the gods and goddesses had not seen such a beautiful tree. It had star-shaped blossoms which spread their sweet fragrance in the air around. Indra saw the tree come out of the ocean and laid his claim to it. He thought, “This is the most beautiful tree that I have ever seen. I will take it away and plant it in my kingdom before anyone else sees it.”
The other gods too had seen the tree emerge from the ocean waters but they decided not to stake a claim to it because they all knew that once Indra had set his mind on anything, nothing could stop him from possessing it, come what may. Moreover, no one wanted to annoy him as they feared that an angry Indra could either release no rain and cause a drought on earth, or else release too much water and lead to floods.
As was expected, Indra took the Parijata tree to his garden and planted it, telling his wife Sachi to take good care of it. Sachi religiously watered the tree and nurtured it as her own child. Its enticing fragrance captivated the entire kingdom of Indra.
One day Sri Krishna decided to pay a visit to Indra. Krishna and his wife Satyabhama reached Indra’s palace and on getting the fragrance waft in the air, they were drawn to the source and found the Parijata tree blossoming in full glory. Satyabhama said to Krishna, “I want this tree in our kingdom. We have all kinds of trees but none emits such a fragrance as this one does.”
Krishna tried to dissuade her, “Dear wife, how can I take something which belongs to somebody else? Moreover, Indra will never forgive me if I took his tree.”
But Satyabhama insisted and refused to relent. She persisted, “Surely you can take this Parijata tree forcibly because you are more powerful than Indra.”
A reluctant Krishna gave in to his wife’s wishes. After meeting Indra and his wife Sachi, Krishna quietly uprooted the tree when Indra and Sachi had returned to their chamber. He took the Parijata tree to Dwarka and planted it in his garden. Indra soon discovered that his precious tree was taken away by Sri Krishna. He became livid with anger and collecting his army, launched an attack on Dwarka. A fierce battle ensued and ultimately Indra was defeated. Krishna told the humiliated Indra, “The tree will remain with me as long as I am alive. After my death, you can take it away to do whatever you want with it.”
The Parijata tree blossomed in Dwarka till Krishna’s death. On the seventh day, following his death, when the city of Dwarka began to get submerged under the deluge, Indra rushed to Dwarka and uprooted the Parijata tree to plant it in his own garden. He was happy and so was his wife Sachi.
WHEN the great deluge occurred, everything was swept under the swirling waters. Even the most precious and irreplaceable things were washed away or got submerged deep in the ocean bed. The gods decided to retrieve whatever they could by churning the ocean. It was during the churning process that the Parijata tree emerged to the surface. It was the most beautiful tree that one could have laid eyes on. Even the gods and goddesses had not seen such a beautiful tree. It had star-shaped blossoms which spread their sweet fragrance in the air around. Indra saw the tree come out of the ocean and laid his claim to it. He thought, “This is the most beautiful tree that I have ever seen. I will take it away and plant it in my kingdom before anyone else sees it.”
The other gods too had seen the tree emerge from the ocean waters but they decided not to stake a claim to it because they all knew that once Indra had set his mind on anything, nothing could stop him from possessing it, come what may. Moreover, no one wanted to annoy him as they feared that an angry Indra could either release no rain and cause a drought on earth, or else release too much water and lead to floods.
As was expected, Indra took the Parijata tree to his garden and planted it, telling his wife Sachi to take good care of it. Sachi religiously watered the tree and nurtured it as her own child. Its enticing fragrance captivated the entire kingdom of Indra.
One day Sri Krishna decided to pay a visit to Indra. Krishna and his wife Satyabhama reached Indra’s palace and on getting the fragrance waft in the air, they were drawn to the source and found the Parijata tree blossoming in full glory. Satyabhama said to Krishna, “I want this tree in our kingdom. We have all kinds of trees but none emits such a fragrance as this one does.”
Krishna tried to dissuade her, “Dear wife, how can I take something which belongs to somebody else? Moreover, Indra will never forgive me if I took his tree.”
But Satyabhama insisted and refused to relent. She persisted, “Surely you can take this Parijata tree forcibly because you are more powerful than Indra.”
A reluctant Krishna gave in to his wife’s wishes. After meeting Indra and his wife Sachi, Krishna quietly uprooted the tree when Indra and Sachi had returned to their chamber. He took the Parijata tree to Dwarka and planted it in his garden. Indra soon discovered that his precious tree was taken away by Sri Krishna. He became livid with anger and collecting his army, launched an attack on Dwarka. A fierce battle ensued and ultimately Indra was defeated. Krishna told the humiliated Indra, “The tree will remain with me as long as I am alive. After my death, you can take it away to do whatever you want with it.”
The Parijata tree blossomed in Dwarka till Krishna’s death. On the seventh day, following his death, when the city of Dwarka began to get submerged under the deluge, Indra rushed to Dwarka and uprooted the Parijata tree to plant it in his own garden. He was happy and so was his wife Sachi.
Judicial imposition of Muslim Law on a Hindu girl
By V Sundaram, IAS (Retd)
WHEN two or three years ago, the Supreme Court of India passed what I considered to be a patently illegal and unconstitutional order in a specific case, I wrote an article in these columns under the title: ‘The darkest day in India’s Legal History’.
I am constrained to use the same words again in respect of a blatantly and patently illegal order recently passed by the Calcutta High Court. It is a matter of national shame for all the Hindu women of India that the Calcutta High Court on December 17, 2009 granted the anticipatory bail plea of a 26-year-old youth from Murshidabad who had been accused of kidnapping and marrying a 15-year-old Hindu minor girl.
One Sairul Sheikh, a resident of Bakultala in Behrampore, has been accused of kidnapping and forcibly marrying a Hindu minor girl called Anita Roy. Anita’s mother Jyotsna had lodged a complaint with Behrampore Police Station that her daughter had been missing since October 14. On October 15, she came to know that Sairul Sheikh had ‘kidnapped and married’ her minor daughter.
A Division Bench of the Calcutta High court consisting of Justice Pinaki Chandra Ghosh and Justice S P Talukdar allowed Sheikh’s plea after his lawyers submitted that the marriage was legal under Muslim Personal Law. Holding the marriage to be legal, the Calcutta High Court Bench granted Sheikh’s anticipatory bail application.
Even if Sairul Sheikh had married a minor Muslim girl then he would have been entitled to the full benefit of Muslim Personal Law. But he has no right to impose that Islamic law upon the Hindu men and women of India in general and Hindu minor girls in particular. He cannot claim kidnapping of a Hindu minor girl or rape of a Hindu minor girl as a legitimate ‘minority right’ under the Indian Constitution!!
The Calcutta High Court has given a new and twisted illegal interpretation to Muslim Personal Law. By denying legitimate legal relief to the Hindu minor girl Anita and her mother Jyotsna under The Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929 (Courtesy: Website of Ministry of Women and Child Development, GOI http://wcd.nic.in/cmr1929.htm), the Calcutta High Court has made the Hindus of India stateless non-persons similar to the status of non-Muslims in Saudi Arabia.
I fervently hope that many Hindu organisations in India would file an application to the Chief Justice of India for Public Interest Litigation in order to prevent the General Blanjet's illegal imposition of Muslim Personal Law on the Hindu citizens of India.
The standard legal dictum is that no citizen can legally claim ignorance of law as an excuse for violation of laws of the land. What is applicable to an individual is equally applicable to all our courts of Law as well. In this context let me invite the attention of the Calcutta High Court to the following provisions of The Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929 (19 of 1929):
Section 2 : Definitions — In this Act, unless there is anything repugnant in the subject or context:
(a) “Child” means a person who, if a male, has not completed twenty one years of age, and if a female, has not completed eighteen years of age ;
Section 4 : Punishment for male adult above twenty one years of age marrying a child — Whoever, being a male above twenty one years of age, contracts a child marriage shall be punishable with simple imprisonment which may extend to three months and shall also be liable to fine.
Sairul Sheikh, the accused in this case as per Muslim Personal Law is patently guilty of blatant violation of Section 4 of the Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929. Any special Islamic privilege he might have under Muslim Personal Law cannot be invoked under this Act when the offence is committed against a Hindu minor girl.
Jagmohan Singh Khurmi, a fearless writer, has written a brilliant essay titled ‘Islamic Lust for Hindu Women: Psychological Warfare’. Let me quote his hilarious and yet sobering words here: “If these silly Bollywood Hindu film-makers think that they are actually building “secular bridges” by portraying a Muslim hero riding a Hindu woman, then they are in error. They fail to understand Islamic mindset. Even if you make all the Muslims in India superstars, in Pakistan this will not be accepted as a sign of Hindu benevolence or even a gesture of genuine ‘Congress secularism’ but as an explicit evidence of Hindu inferiority and Islamic superiority! Such is their contempt for all things Hindu.”
One woman journalist Tavleen Singh, known for her pro-Islamic stand and who at times went so far as to even justify Islamic terrorism, once got inside the Islamic house of the fanatic Dar-ul-Uloom at Deoband and for the first time in her life discovered the real nature of Islam for herself! To her horror she found that it was millions of light-years away from the rosy imagery Khushwant Singh and Romila Thapar had taught her for years. After a few minutes Tavleen Singh came out stamping her feet in fury. She was so angry that she wrote her next article under title: “If this is what secularism means, give me Hindutva.”
Finally, I cannot help quoting the beautifully apt words of Koenraad Elst: “One of the most painful aspects of Muslim demographic warfare is the open attempt by Muslims to grab non-Muslim girls to use them for their own demographic ambitions, meanwhile also inflicting a good dose of humiliation on the accursed kafirs. In Bangladesh and in Muslim-majority areas inside India, this often takes the form of simply kidnapping girls, or of threatening their families to marry them out to Muslims.”
WHEN two or three years ago, the Supreme Court of India passed what I considered to be a patently illegal and unconstitutional order in a specific case, I wrote an article in these columns under the title: ‘The darkest day in India’s Legal History’.
I am constrained to use the same words again in respect of a blatantly and patently illegal order recently passed by the Calcutta High Court. It is a matter of national shame for all the Hindu women of India that the Calcutta High Court on December 17, 2009 granted the anticipatory bail plea of a 26-year-old youth from Murshidabad who had been accused of kidnapping and marrying a 15-year-old Hindu minor girl.
One Sairul Sheikh, a resident of Bakultala in Behrampore, has been accused of kidnapping and forcibly marrying a Hindu minor girl called Anita Roy. Anita’s mother Jyotsna had lodged a complaint with Behrampore Police Station that her daughter had been missing since October 14. On October 15, she came to know that Sairul Sheikh had ‘kidnapped and married’ her minor daughter.
A Division Bench of the Calcutta High court consisting of Justice Pinaki Chandra Ghosh and Justice S P Talukdar allowed Sheikh’s plea after his lawyers submitted that the marriage was legal under Muslim Personal Law. Holding the marriage to be legal, the Calcutta High Court Bench granted Sheikh’s anticipatory bail application.
Even if Sairul Sheikh had married a minor Muslim girl then he would have been entitled to the full benefit of Muslim Personal Law. But he has no right to impose that Islamic law upon the Hindu men and women of India in general and Hindu minor girls in particular. He cannot claim kidnapping of a Hindu minor girl or rape of a Hindu minor girl as a legitimate ‘minority right’ under the Indian Constitution!!
The Calcutta High Court has given a new and twisted illegal interpretation to Muslim Personal Law. By denying legitimate legal relief to the Hindu minor girl Anita and her mother Jyotsna under The Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929 (Courtesy: Website of Ministry of Women and Child Development, GOI http://wcd.nic.in/cmr1929.htm), the Calcutta High Court has made the Hindus of India stateless non-persons similar to the status of non-Muslims in Saudi Arabia.
I fervently hope that many Hindu organisations in India would file an application to the Chief Justice of India for Public Interest Litigation in order to prevent the General Blanjet's illegal imposition of Muslim Personal Law on the Hindu citizens of India.
The standard legal dictum is that no citizen can legally claim ignorance of law as an excuse for violation of laws of the land. What is applicable to an individual is equally applicable to all our courts of Law as well. In this context let me invite the attention of the Calcutta High Court to the following provisions of The Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929 (19 of 1929):
Section 2 : Definitions — In this Act, unless there is anything repugnant in the subject or context:
(a) “Child” means a person who, if a male, has not completed twenty one years of age, and if a female, has not completed eighteen years of age ;
Section 4 : Punishment for male adult above twenty one years of age marrying a child — Whoever, being a male above twenty one years of age, contracts a child marriage shall be punishable with simple imprisonment which may extend to three months and shall also be liable to fine.
Sairul Sheikh, the accused in this case as per Muslim Personal Law is patently guilty of blatant violation of Section 4 of the Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929. Any special Islamic privilege he might have under Muslim Personal Law cannot be invoked under this Act when the offence is committed against a Hindu minor girl.
Jagmohan Singh Khurmi, a fearless writer, has written a brilliant essay titled ‘Islamic Lust for Hindu Women: Psychological Warfare’. Let me quote his hilarious and yet sobering words here: “If these silly Bollywood Hindu film-makers think that they are actually building “secular bridges” by portraying a Muslim hero riding a Hindu woman, then they are in error. They fail to understand Islamic mindset. Even if you make all the Muslims in India superstars, in Pakistan this will not be accepted as a sign of Hindu benevolence or even a gesture of genuine ‘Congress secularism’ but as an explicit evidence of Hindu inferiority and Islamic superiority! Such is their contempt for all things Hindu.”
One woman journalist Tavleen Singh, known for her pro-Islamic stand and who at times went so far as to even justify Islamic terrorism, once got inside the Islamic house of the fanatic Dar-ul-Uloom at Deoband and for the first time in her life discovered the real nature of Islam for herself! To her horror she found that it was millions of light-years away from the rosy imagery Khushwant Singh and Romila Thapar had taught her for years. After a few minutes Tavleen Singh came out stamping her feet in fury. She was so angry that she wrote her next article under title: “If this is what secularism means, give me Hindutva.”
Finally, I cannot help quoting the beautifully apt words of Koenraad Elst: “One of the most painful aspects of Muslim demographic warfare is the open attempt by Muslims to grab non-Muslim girls to use them for their own demographic ambitions, meanwhile also inflicting a good dose of humiliation on the accursed kafirs. In Bangladesh and in Muslim-majority areas inside India, this often takes the form of simply kidnapping girls, or of threatening their families to marry them out to Muslims.”
New generation Bengali is more religious
By Asim Kumar Mitra
Bengali youths are no longer shy of asserting their religious self.
BELIEVE it or not but the fact remains that now-a-days more and more Bengali youths are getting attracted towards religion. As CPI (M) led Left Front is at the helm of affairs of West Bengal for nearly thirty two years, people living outside Bengal naturally inclined to draw a conclusion that Bengalis are, in general, atheist. Especially, Bengali youths do not have faith in religion. Sometime ago, a daily newspaper of Kolkata, had conducted a survey on this subject. Surprisingly their report hit on a completely different fact. One of the different questions the surveyors asked was: “Do you seek solace in religion?” and the answer recorded was “84 per cent YES and 16 per cent NO”.
The report headlined as Turning To God published in The Telegraph (June 4, 2006) said, “Among the devotees waiting impatiently under the sizzling summer sun is a young woman who, in slit denims and silver danglers, sticks out like a sore thumb in the mostly traditionally attired crowd. But Dia Mukherjee, 28, couldn’t care less as long as she catches a glimpse of Ma Kali before catching the evening flight to Mumbai, where she works in an advertising agency. “When I come home, I try and visit the temple at least once to get Ma’s blessings,” she says.
“Yes, it is quite true that today’s Bengali youth is no longer afraid to express his or her religious self,” says Ajoy Kumar Mitra, president of the Kalighat Temple Committee. “Compared to the previous generation, they are less inhibited and less embarrassed to appear god-loving.” And Mitra stresses that he is talking about urban, educated youth. At least one out of every two temple goers, Mitra stresses, is a youth—the footfall of the young was “a lot less”, he adds, even a decade ago.
Religion clearly is in the air. For some, it translates into ritualistic practices, and for others, it is often a way of life. Recently, “Sanskrit Bharati” a social-work institution organised ‘a ten-day Sanskrit speaking classes’ in different parts of the state. It was found that love for Sanskrit was so much that almost all the classes were over crowded. It is further noticed that a considerable portion of the participants were Bengali youths of the state.
Here there was no such undertaking given by the Institution that persons getting this training will be provided with employment. Still they are coming because they believe that only with the knowledge of Sanskrit they will be in a position to know the true Indian culture. It is the love for Indian culture that has pushed them to take such training.
But then, another startling fact came to light which said that even recently the colleges in West Bengal were planning to close the Sanskrit classes for want of students. There were 60 colleges affiliated to University of Calcutta where Sanskrit is being taught as the under-graduate level. But the fact remains that even before five years; these colleges were not getting sufficient number of students. Hence many of them started thinking to close down the department. As a consequence to this, the University of Calcutta was also not getting scheduled number of students. Sanskrit department of University of Calcutta started functioning as a full fledged Post-Graduate department of Calcutta University from 1907 and since then they had not faced any such problem. But after the advent of Left Front government in West Bengal, they simply deleted Sanskrit from the curriculum of school education. Not only that, they had started a vilification campaign against Sanskrit just to hurt the sentiments of the people who love their religion, culture and heritage. Of course, primarily the offensive came from the Congress rulers. They made Sanskrit an optional subject for the school students which was formerly a compulsory subject for them. Now these efforts have become counterproductive for them.
For whatever reasons there may be, the scenario has been totally changed and the latest report of the Sanskrit department of University of Calcutta said that the number of students in each year of M.A. 150 are there. In examinations the success rate is 94 per cent to 98 per cent. The report further says, “Among the students approximately 80 per cent are girls and more than 70 per cent of the total number of students (boys and girls) come from rural areas. About 30 per cent of the total students come from economically weaker section of the society.
Apart from this, colleges are now getting sufficient number of students. One remarkable point to note is many Muslim students are taking admission to learn Sanskrit. There are a number of Muslim teachers who teach Sanskrit in different rural schools of West Bengal.
May be, on the political arena they are always at loggerheads, but the fact remains that these teachers believe that they also belong to the same Indian culture.
Prasanta Ray, who teaches Political Science and Sociology at Presidency College, Kolkata, while reminiscing his student days, maintains that in the Sixties the ambience was different. “We were more secular. We grew up being exposed to a Marxist critique of religion – religion as a source of oppression, a justification for exploitation,” says Ray. “In fact, in Bengal education in the social sciences was modeled on the western value system —rationality, objectivity, scrutiny, and secularity.”
But there has been a change in recent times. Ray, who has been teaching for 40 years, holds that his students are a lot more religious today than they were earlier. “The secular understanding of religion is that it is basically a human creation. In my classrooms I initiate discussions on this issue. And I have noticed that the majority of students argue that there is a God,” he says. “It is now a rare experience, in fact, to have a student support for the secular point of view.”
Today’s Bengali youth is no longer afraid to express his or her religious self. They are definitely turning to God. The newspaper which had surveyed the minds of Bengali youth put forward five questions: (1) Are you religious? (2) Have you always been religious? (3) Is your family religious? (4) Do you often visit a place of worship? (5) Do you seek solace in religion? The answers received by the surveyors were astonishing if not unbelievable. Let me quote the questions and their answers:
1. Are you religious? Answer: YES 84 per cent, NO 16 per cent
2. Have you always been religious? Answer: YES 67 per cent, NO 33 per cent.
3. Is your family religious? Answer: YES 82 per cent, NO 18 per cent.
4. Do you often visit a place of worship? Answer: YES 54 per cent, NO 46 per cent.
5. Do you seek solace in religion? Answer: YES 84 per cent, NO 16 per cent.
Mitra, President, Kalighat Temple Committee, believes that the turn towards religion is a reflection of the Bengali youth’s desire to return to his or her roots. “Young Bengali intellectuals of the previous generation had by and large distanced themselves from religion,” he says.
Mitra believes that they had their reasons. The plethora of so-called gurus and godmen—from the 1960s to 1980s put people off religion, he argues. “Yesterday’s youth wanted to stay away from this brand of Hinduism. But the current generation of youngsters has realised the depth of their own ancient culture,” he says. “They see that even in the West there is great respect for eastern principles such as yoga and ayurveda, which are intrinsically associated with Hindu philosophy. So there is a growing desire among the youth to understand their own culture and religion.”
Some, like Prasanta Ray, believe that a turn towards religion underscores rising levels of insecurity in society. “Family support is dwindling. Children do not have the same network of family support that the previous generations enjoyed. They sometimes miss out on the protection of parents who work outside the home. They don’t even have a large number of siblings. And in this competitive and consumerist world today’s kids also have fewer friends.
There are so many other arguments as well. But the fact remains that the Bengali youths are turning towards God, is a pleasant feature of our social life. Hence the need of hour is to stand united to protect our culture and society and youths should be motivated towards that.
Bengali youths are no longer shy of asserting their religious self.
BELIEVE it or not but the fact remains that now-a-days more and more Bengali youths are getting attracted towards religion. As CPI (M) led Left Front is at the helm of affairs of West Bengal for nearly thirty two years, people living outside Bengal naturally inclined to draw a conclusion that Bengalis are, in general, atheist. Especially, Bengali youths do not have faith in religion. Sometime ago, a daily newspaper of Kolkata, had conducted a survey on this subject. Surprisingly their report hit on a completely different fact. One of the different questions the surveyors asked was: “Do you seek solace in religion?” and the answer recorded was “84 per cent YES and 16 per cent NO”.
The report headlined as Turning To God published in The Telegraph (June 4, 2006) said, “Among the devotees waiting impatiently under the sizzling summer sun is a young woman who, in slit denims and silver danglers, sticks out like a sore thumb in the mostly traditionally attired crowd. But Dia Mukherjee, 28, couldn’t care less as long as she catches a glimpse of Ma Kali before catching the evening flight to Mumbai, where she works in an advertising agency. “When I come home, I try and visit the temple at least once to get Ma’s blessings,” she says.
“Yes, it is quite true that today’s Bengali youth is no longer afraid to express his or her religious self,” says Ajoy Kumar Mitra, president of the Kalighat Temple Committee. “Compared to the previous generation, they are less inhibited and less embarrassed to appear god-loving.” And Mitra stresses that he is talking about urban, educated youth. At least one out of every two temple goers, Mitra stresses, is a youth—the footfall of the young was “a lot less”, he adds, even a decade ago.
Religion clearly is in the air. For some, it translates into ritualistic practices, and for others, it is often a way of life. Recently, “Sanskrit Bharati” a social-work institution organised ‘a ten-day Sanskrit speaking classes’ in different parts of the state. It was found that love for Sanskrit was so much that almost all the classes were over crowded. It is further noticed that a considerable portion of the participants were Bengali youths of the state.
Here there was no such undertaking given by the Institution that persons getting this training will be provided with employment. Still they are coming because they believe that only with the knowledge of Sanskrit they will be in a position to know the true Indian culture. It is the love for Indian culture that has pushed them to take such training.
But then, another startling fact came to light which said that even recently the colleges in West Bengal were planning to close the Sanskrit classes for want of students. There were 60 colleges affiliated to University of Calcutta where Sanskrit is being taught as the under-graduate level. But the fact remains that even before five years; these colleges were not getting sufficient number of students. Hence many of them started thinking to close down the department. As a consequence to this, the University of Calcutta was also not getting scheduled number of students. Sanskrit department of University of Calcutta started functioning as a full fledged Post-Graduate department of Calcutta University from 1907 and since then they had not faced any such problem. But after the advent of Left Front government in West Bengal, they simply deleted Sanskrit from the curriculum of school education. Not only that, they had started a vilification campaign against Sanskrit just to hurt the sentiments of the people who love their religion, culture and heritage. Of course, primarily the offensive came from the Congress rulers. They made Sanskrit an optional subject for the school students which was formerly a compulsory subject for them. Now these efforts have become counterproductive for them.
For whatever reasons there may be, the scenario has been totally changed and the latest report of the Sanskrit department of University of Calcutta said that the number of students in each year of M.A. 150 are there. In examinations the success rate is 94 per cent to 98 per cent. The report further says, “Among the students approximately 80 per cent are girls and more than 70 per cent of the total number of students (boys and girls) come from rural areas. About 30 per cent of the total students come from economically weaker section of the society.
Apart from this, colleges are now getting sufficient number of students. One remarkable point to note is many Muslim students are taking admission to learn Sanskrit. There are a number of Muslim teachers who teach Sanskrit in different rural schools of West Bengal.
May be, on the political arena they are always at loggerheads, but the fact remains that these teachers believe that they also belong to the same Indian culture.
Prasanta Ray, who teaches Political Science and Sociology at Presidency College, Kolkata, while reminiscing his student days, maintains that in the Sixties the ambience was different. “We were more secular. We grew up being exposed to a Marxist critique of religion – religion as a source of oppression, a justification for exploitation,” says Ray. “In fact, in Bengal education in the social sciences was modeled on the western value system —rationality, objectivity, scrutiny, and secularity.”
But there has been a change in recent times. Ray, who has been teaching for 40 years, holds that his students are a lot more religious today than they were earlier. “The secular understanding of religion is that it is basically a human creation. In my classrooms I initiate discussions on this issue. And I have noticed that the majority of students argue that there is a God,” he says. “It is now a rare experience, in fact, to have a student support for the secular point of view.”
Today’s Bengali youth is no longer afraid to express his or her religious self. They are definitely turning to God. The newspaper which had surveyed the minds of Bengali youth put forward five questions: (1) Are you religious? (2) Have you always been religious? (3) Is your family religious? (4) Do you often visit a place of worship? (5) Do you seek solace in religion? The answers received by the surveyors were astonishing if not unbelievable. Let me quote the questions and their answers:
1. Are you religious? Answer: YES 84 per cent, NO 16 per cent
2. Have you always been religious? Answer: YES 67 per cent, NO 33 per cent.
3. Is your family religious? Answer: YES 82 per cent, NO 18 per cent.
4. Do you often visit a place of worship? Answer: YES 54 per cent, NO 46 per cent.
5. Do you seek solace in religion? Answer: YES 84 per cent, NO 16 per cent.
Mitra, President, Kalighat Temple Committee, believes that the turn towards religion is a reflection of the Bengali youth’s desire to return to his or her roots. “Young Bengali intellectuals of the previous generation had by and large distanced themselves from religion,” he says.
Mitra believes that they had their reasons. The plethora of so-called gurus and godmen—from the 1960s to 1980s put people off religion, he argues. “Yesterday’s youth wanted to stay away from this brand of Hinduism. But the current generation of youngsters has realised the depth of their own ancient culture,” he says. “They see that even in the West there is great respect for eastern principles such as yoga and ayurveda, which are intrinsically associated with Hindu philosophy. So there is a growing desire among the youth to understand their own culture and religion.”
Some, like Prasanta Ray, believe that a turn towards religion underscores rising levels of insecurity in society. “Family support is dwindling. Children do not have the same network of family support that the previous generations enjoyed. They sometimes miss out on the protection of parents who work outside the home. They don’t even have a large number of siblings. And in this competitive and consumerist world today’s kids also have fewer friends.
There are so many other arguments as well. But the fact remains that the Bengali youths are turning towards God, is a pleasant feature of our social life. Hence the need of hour is to stand united to protect our culture and society and youths should be motivated towards that.
Jyoti Basu: The rise and fall of WB
By Kanchan Gupta
Did Jyoti Basu, who never smiled in public lest he was accused of displaying human emotions, ever spare a thought for those who suffered terribly during his rule? Was he sensitive to the plight of those who were robbed of their lives, limbs and dignity by the lumpen proletariat which kept him in power? Did his heart cry out when women health workers were gang-raped and then two of them murdered by his party cadre on May 17, 1990 at Bantala on the eastern margins of Kolkata?
HAD it been Jyoti Banerjee lying unattended in a filthy general ward of SSKM Hospital in Kolkata and not Jyoti Basu in the state-of-the-art ICCU of AMRI Hospital, among the swankiest and most expensive super-speciality healthcare facilities in West Bengal, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh would not have bothered to arrange for a video-conference for top doctors at AIIMS to compare notes with those attending on the former Chief Minister of West Bengal.
Jyoti Banerjee, like most of us, spent his working life paying taxes to the Government. Jyoti Basu spent the better part of his life living off tax-payers’ money — the conscience of the veteran Marxist was never pricked by the fact that he appropriated for himself a lifestyle shunned by his comrades and denied to the people of a State whose fate he presided over for a quarter century. Kalachand Roy laid what we know today as Odisha to waste in the 16th century; Jyoti Basu was the 20th century’s Kala Pahad who led West Bengal from despair to darkness, literally and metaphorically.
Uncharitable as it may sound, but there really is no reason to nurse fond memories of Jyoti Basu. In fact, there are no fond memories to recall of those days when hopelessness permeated the present and the future appeared bleak. Entire generations of educated middle-class Bengalis were forced to seek refuge in other States or migrate to America as Jyoti Basu worked overtime to first destroy West Bengal’s economy, chase out Bengali talent and then hand over a disinherited State to Burrabazar traders and wholesale merchants who overnight became ‘industrialists’ with a passion for asset-stripping and investing their ‘profits’ elsewhere. A State that was earlier referred to as ‘Sheffield of the East’ was rendered by Jyoti Basu into a vast stretch of wasteland; the Oxford English Dictionary would have been poorer by a word had he not made ‘gherao’ into an officially-sanctioned instrument of coercion; ‘load-shedding’ would have never entered into our popular lexicon had he not made it a part of daily life in West Bengal though he ensured Hindustan Park, where he stayed, was spared power cuts. It would have been churlish to grudge him the good life had he not exerted to deny it to others, except of course his son Chandan Basu who was last in the news for cheating on taxes that should have been paid on his imported fancy car.
Let it be said, and said bluntly, that Jyoti Basu’s record in office, first as Deputy Chief Minister in two successive United Front Governments beginning 1967 (for all practical purposes he was the de facto Chief Minister with a hapless Ajoy Mukherjee reduced to indulging in Gandhigiri to make his presence felt) and later as Chief Minister for nearly 25 years at the head of the Left Front Government which has been in power for 32 years now, the “longest elected Communist Government” as party commissars untiringly point out to the naïve and the novitiate, is a terrible tale of calculated destruction of West Bengal in the name of ideology. It’s easy to criticise the CPI(M) for politicising the police force and converting it into a goons brigade, but it was Jyoti Basu who initiated the process. It was he who instructed them, as Deputy Chief Minister during the disastrous UF regime, to play the role of foot soldiers of the CPI(M), first by not acting against party cadre on the rampage, and then by playing an unabashedly partisan role in industrial and agrarian disputes.
The fulsome praise that is heaped on Jyoti Basu today — he is variously described by party loyalists and those enamoured of bhadralok Marxists as a ‘humane administrator’ and ‘farsighted leader’ — is entirely misleading if not undeserving. Within the first seven months of the United Front coming to power, 43,947 workers were laid off and thousands more rendered jobless as factories were shut down following gheraos and strikes instigated and endorsed by him. The flight of capital in those initial days of emergent Marxist power amounted to Rs 2,500 million. In 1967, there were 438 ‘industrial disputes’ involving 165,000 workers and resulting in the loss of five million man hours. By 1969, there were 710 ‘industrial disputes’ involving 645,000 workers and a loss of 8.5 million man hours. That was a taste of things to come in the following decades. By the time Jyoti Basu demitted office, West Bengal had nothing to boast of except closed mills and shuttered factories; every institution and agency of the State had been subverted under his tutelage; and, the civil administration had been converted into an extension counter of the CPI(M) with babus happy to be used as doormats.
After every outrage, every criminal misdeed committed by Marxist goons or the police while he was Chief Minister, Jyoti Basu would crudely respond with a brusque “Emon to hoyei thaakey” (or, as Donald Rumsfeld would famously say, “Stuff happens!”). He did not brook any criticism of the Marich Jhapi massacre by his police in 1979 when refugees from erstwhile East Pakistan were shot dead in cold blood. Till date, nobody knows for sure how many died in that slaughter for Jyoti Basu never allowed an independent inquiry. Neither did the man whose heart bled so profusely for the lost souls of Nandigram hesitate to justify the butchery of April 30, 1982 when 16 monks and a nun of the Ananda Marg order were set ablaze in south Kolkata by a mob of Marxist thugs. The man who led that murderous lot was known for his proximity to Jyoti Basu, a fact that the CPI(M) would now hasten to deny. Nor did Jyoti Basu wince when the police shot dead 13 Congress activists a short distance from Writers’ Building on July 21, 1993; he later justified the police action, saying it was necessary to enforce the writ of the state. Yet, he wouldn’t allow the police to act every time Muslims ran riot, most infamously after Mohammedan Sporting Club lost a football match.
Did Jyoti Basu, who never smiled in public lest he was accused of displaying human emotions, ever spare a thought for those who suffered terribly during his rule? Was he sensitive to the plight of those who were robbed of their lives, limbs and dignity by the lumpen proletariat which kept him in power? Did his heart cry out when women health workers were gang-raped and then two of them murdered by his party cadre on May 17, 1990 at Bantala on the eastern margins of Kolkata? Or when office-bearers of the Kolkata Police Association, set up under his patronage, raped Nehar Banu, a poor pavement dweller, at Phulbagan police station in 1992? “Emon to hoyei thaakey,” the revered Marxist would say, and then go on to slyly insinuate that the victims deserved what they got.
As a Bengali, I grieve for the wasted decades but for which West Bengal, with its huge pool of talent, could have led India from the front. I feel nothing for Jyoti Basu.
Did Jyoti Basu, who never smiled in public lest he was accused of displaying human emotions, ever spare a thought for those who suffered terribly during his rule? Was he sensitive to the plight of those who were robbed of their lives, limbs and dignity by the lumpen proletariat which kept him in power? Did his heart cry out when women health workers were gang-raped and then two of them murdered by his party cadre on May 17, 1990 at Bantala on the eastern margins of Kolkata?
HAD it been Jyoti Banerjee lying unattended in a filthy general ward of SSKM Hospital in Kolkata and not Jyoti Basu in the state-of-the-art ICCU of AMRI Hospital, among the swankiest and most expensive super-speciality healthcare facilities in West Bengal, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh would not have bothered to arrange for a video-conference for top doctors at AIIMS to compare notes with those attending on the former Chief Minister of West Bengal.
Jyoti Banerjee, like most of us, spent his working life paying taxes to the Government. Jyoti Basu spent the better part of his life living off tax-payers’ money — the conscience of the veteran Marxist was never pricked by the fact that he appropriated for himself a lifestyle shunned by his comrades and denied to the people of a State whose fate he presided over for a quarter century. Kalachand Roy laid what we know today as Odisha to waste in the 16th century; Jyoti Basu was the 20th century’s Kala Pahad who led West Bengal from despair to darkness, literally and metaphorically.
Uncharitable as it may sound, but there really is no reason to nurse fond memories of Jyoti Basu. In fact, there are no fond memories to recall of those days when hopelessness permeated the present and the future appeared bleak. Entire generations of educated middle-class Bengalis were forced to seek refuge in other States or migrate to America as Jyoti Basu worked overtime to first destroy West Bengal’s economy, chase out Bengali talent and then hand over a disinherited State to Burrabazar traders and wholesale merchants who overnight became ‘industrialists’ with a passion for asset-stripping and investing their ‘profits’ elsewhere. A State that was earlier referred to as ‘Sheffield of the East’ was rendered by Jyoti Basu into a vast stretch of wasteland; the Oxford English Dictionary would have been poorer by a word had he not made ‘gherao’ into an officially-sanctioned instrument of coercion; ‘load-shedding’ would have never entered into our popular lexicon had he not made it a part of daily life in West Bengal though he ensured Hindustan Park, where he stayed, was spared power cuts. It would have been churlish to grudge him the good life had he not exerted to deny it to others, except of course his son Chandan Basu who was last in the news for cheating on taxes that should have been paid on his imported fancy car.
Let it be said, and said bluntly, that Jyoti Basu’s record in office, first as Deputy Chief Minister in two successive United Front Governments beginning 1967 (for all practical purposes he was the de facto Chief Minister with a hapless Ajoy Mukherjee reduced to indulging in Gandhigiri to make his presence felt) and later as Chief Minister for nearly 25 years at the head of the Left Front Government which has been in power for 32 years now, the “longest elected Communist Government” as party commissars untiringly point out to the naïve and the novitiate, is a terrible tale of calculated destruction of West Bengal in the name of ideology. It’s easy to criticise the CPI(M) for politicising the police force and converting it into a goons brigade, but it was Jyoti Basu who initiated the process. It was he who instructed them, as Deputy Chief Minister during the disastrous UF regime, to play the role of foot soldiers of the CPI(M), first by not acting against party cadre on the rampage, and then by playing an unabashedly partisan role in industrial and agrarian disputes.
The fulsome praise that is heaped on Jyoti Basu today — he is variously described by party loyalists and those enamoured of bhadralok Marxists as a ‘humane administrator’ and ‘farsighted leader’ — is entirely misleading if not undeserving. Within the first seven months of the United Front coming to power, 43,947 workers were laid off and thousands more rendered jobless as factories were shut down following gheraos and strikes instigated and endorsed by him. The flight of capital in those initial days of emergent Marxist power amounted to Rs 2,500 million. In 1967, there were 438 ‘industrial disputes’ involving 165,000 workers and resulting in the loss of five million man hours. By 1969, there were 710 ‘industrial disputes’ involving 645,000 workers and a loss of 8.5 million man hours. That was a taste of things to come in the following decades. By the time Jyoti Basu demitted office, West Bengal had nothing to boast of except closed mills and shuttered factories; every institution and agency of the State had been subverted under his tutelage; and, the civil administration had been converted into an extension counter of the CPI(M) with babus happy to be used as doormats.
After every outrage, every criminal misdeed committed by Marxist goons or the police while he was Chief Minister, Jyoti Basu would crudely respond with a brusque “Emon to hoyei thaakey” (or, as Donald Rumsfeld would famously say, “Stuff happens!”). He did not brook any criticism of the Marich Jhapi massacre by his police in 1979 when refugees from erstwhile East Pakistan were shot dead in cold blood. Till date, nobody knows for sure how many died in that slaughter for Jyoti Basu never allowed an independent inquiry. Neither did the man whose heart bled so profusely for the lost souls of Nandigram hesitate to justify the butchery of April 30, 1982 when 16 monks and a nun of the Ananda Marg order were set ablaze in south Kolkata by a mob of Marxist thugs. The man who led that murderous lot was known for his proximity to Jyoti Basu, a fact that the CPI(M) would now hasten to deny. Nor did Jyoti Basu wince when the police shot dead 13 Congress activists a short distance from Writers’ Building on July 21, 1993; he later justified the police action, saying it was necessary to enforce the writ of the state. Yet, he wouldn’t allow the police to act every time Muslims ran riot, most infamously after Mohammedan Sporting Club lost a football match.
Did Jyoti Basu, who never smiled in public lest he was accused of displaying human emotions, ever spare a thought for those who suffered terribly during his rule? Was he sensitive to the plight of those who were robbed of their lives, limbs and dignity by the lumpen proletariat which kept him in power? Did his heart cry out when women health workers were gang-raped and then two of them murdered by his party cadre on May 17, 1990 at Bantala on the eastern margins of Kolkata? Or when office-bearers of the Kolkata Police Association, set up under his patronage, raped Nehar Banu, a poor pavement dweller, at Phulbagan police station in 1992? “Emon to hoyei thaakey,” the revered Marxist would say, and then go on to slyly insinuate that the victims deserved what they got.
As a Bengali, I grieve for the wasted decades but for which West Bengal, with its huge pool of talent, could have led India from the front. I feel nothing for Jyoti Basu.
A cultural Taliban in secular India
—VS
I proudly assert my inalienable, indivisible, immutable, and inexorable constitutional right to be a practicing Hindu. Yet, seeing the conduct of E Ahmed, Union Minister of State for Railways, at a recent public function organised by the Indo-Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Chennai, I am constrained to raise these questions.
Are we living in Islamic Pakistan? Are we living in Islamic Bangladesh? Or are we living in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan? Let me move from this macrocosm to the microcosm. Are we living in the Muslim-majority Malappuram District of Kerala, rightly described by some journalists as a mini-Pakistan in India?
I am raising these issues because the Union Minister of State for Railways, Ahmed who recently participated at a public seminar on ‘Status of Infrastructure’, organised by the Indo-Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Chennai refused to light the kuthuvilakku as a traditional and well-established part of the inaugural ceremony. The Union Minister caught the other dignitaries and the organisers of the function off guard when he declined to accept the candle offered to him to light the kuthuvilakku on the podium. It is reliably understood that one of the organisers told the Press that the Minister refused to light the lamp because it is an un-Islamic action. It is understood that the Minister told some of the helpless and totally clueless organisers; “The Muslim community does not light lamps. It is against Shariah, the code which governs Islam.”
I understand that some time back, PK Kunhalikutty, a Muslim League leader who was Kerala’s Industries Minister, courted controversy when he refused to light the lamp while inaugurating a State function at Thiruvananthapuram. The famous playback singer K J Yesudas who was also one of the guests at the same function, walked out protesting against it.
The Cheraman Mosque, Kodungallur in Kerala has an ancient oil lamp which always burns and which is believed to be more than a thousand years old.Every day people of all religions bring oil for the lamp as offering. This is one of the few mosques in Kerala which allow entry for people of other religions. In recent years, the mosque has observed vidyarambham, a Hindu initiation ritual marking the beginning of a child’s learning. I am mentioning this so that Union Minister E Ahmed can use his authority for getting a fatwa issued against the managers of this ancient Mosque for violating the tenets of Islam!!
The anti-Hindu ways of Ahmed were very well known in Kerala even before he became the Union Minister of State for Railways. After becoming the Union Minister of State for Railways, he is functioning like a Mughal chieftain. Many organisations like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad have already publicly condemned this Hindu-hating Minister for having issued instructions to Railways officers not to do ‘Ganesha Puja’, breaking of coconut, etc before starting of new trains, inauguration of tracks, bridges, etc. He has banned lighting of traditional oil lamps during inaugurations. Likewise, garlanding of trains, anointing them with sandal paste, sindoor, etc. have also been banned. Railway stations have been discouraged against doing puja to electronic panels etc. during ‘Vijayadashami’ and ‘Durga Puja’.
Finally, he has ordered the closure of temples in Railway compounds and is planning their demolition. This anti-Hindu move of Ahmed has caused deep religious resentment and intense anger among the 25 lakh strong railway staff and Hindus at large. I am presenting below the shining symbols of Hinduism and Sanatana Dharma which have been deliberately denigrated by Ahmed!!
While crores are being spent on ‘Haj’ even basic amenities are not being provided to the eight crore plus Sabarimala pilgrims, by the Indian Railways. These Hindu pilgrim are treated as stateless persons by the Ministry of Railways! VHP leader Kummanam Rajasekharan has described this anti-Hindu attitude of this despicable anti-Hindu Union Minister as a threat and challenge to Hinduism. He has rightly charged E Ahmed of communalising a national asset like Railways. He called for immediate restoration of the withdrawn ancient Indian customs and traditions, failing which RSS and VHP will launch nationwide massive agitations. I spoke to a very important VHP leader from Kerala to know more about the blatantly anti-Hindu ways of E Ahmed. He said: “What more can be expected from E Ahmed who is allegedly close to a jehadi suspect in the Bengaluru blasts and who is hiding in Gulf, thanks to Ahmed and the UPA Government!”
Seeing the conduct and opposition of this Union Minister to the lighting of kuthuvilakku at a public function in Chennai, I am reminded of the savage manner in which the Talibans of Afghanistan destroyed the two 6th century statues of standing Buddhas carved into the side of a cliff in the Bamyan Valley in the Hazarajat region of Central Afghanistan
I proudly assert my inalienable, indivisible, immutable, and inexorable constitutional right to be a practicing Hindu. Yet, seeing the conduct of E Ahmed, Union Minister of State for Railways, at a recent public function organised by the Indo-Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Chennai, I am constrained to raise these questions.
Are we living in Islamic Pakistan? Are we living in Islamic Bangladesh? Or are we living in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan? Let me move from this macrocosm to the microcosm. Are we living in the Muslim-majority Malappuram District of Kerala, rightly described by some journalists as a mini-Pakistan in India?
I am raising these issues because the Union Minister of State for Railways, Ahmed who recently participated at a public seminar on ‘Status of Infrastructure’, organised by the Indo-Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Chennai refused to light the kuthuvilakku as a traditional and well-established part of the inaugural ceremony. The Union Minister caught the other dignitaries and the organisers of the function off guard when he declined to accept the candle offered to him to light the kuthuvilakku on the podium. It is reliably understood that one of the organisers told the Press that the Minister refused to light the lamp because it is an un-Islamic action. It is understood that the Minister told some of the helpless and totally clueless organisers; “The Muslim community does not light lamps. It is against Shariah, the code which governs Islam.”
I understand that some time back, PK Kunhalikutty, a Muslim League leader who was Kerala’s Industries Minister, courted controversy when he refused to light the lamp while inaugurating a State function at Thiruvananthapuram. The famous playback singer K J Yesudas who was also one of the guests at the same function, walked out protesting against it.
The Cheraman Mosque, Kodungallur in Kerala has an ancient oil lamp which always burns and which is believed to be more than a thousand years old.Every day people of all religions bring oil for the lamp as offering. This is one of the few mosques in Kerala which allow entry for people of other religions. In recent years, the mosque has observed vidyarambham, a Hindu initiation ritual marking the beginning of a child’s learning. I am mentioning this so that Union Minister E Ahmed can use his authority for getting a fatwa issued against the managers of this ancient Mosque for violating the tenets of Islam!!
The anti-Hindu ways of Ahmed were very well known in Kerala even before he became the Union Minister of State for Railways. After becoming the Union Minister of State for Railways, he is functioning like a Mughal chieftain. Many organisations like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad have already publicly condemned this Hindu-hating Minister for having issued instructions to Railways officers not to do ‘Ganesha Puja’, breaking of coconut, etc before starting of new trains, inauguration of tracks, bridges, etc. He has banned lighting of traditional oil lamps during inaugurations. Likewise, garlanding of trains, anointing them with sandal paste, sindoor, etc. have also been banned. Railway stations have been discouraged against doing puja to electronic panels etc. during ‘Vijayadashami’ and ‘Durga Puja’.
Finally, he has ordered the closure of temples in Railway compounds and is planning their demolition. This anti-Hindu move of Ahmed has caused deep religious resentment and intense anger among the 25 lakh strong railway staff and Hindus at large. I am presenting below the shining symbols of Hinduism and Sanatana Dharma which have been deliberately denigrated by Ahmed!!
While crores are being spent on ‘Haj’ even basic amenities are not being provided to the eight crore plus Sabarimala pilgrims, by the Indian Railways. These Hindu pilgrim are treated as stateless persons by the Ministry of Railways! VHP leader Kummanam Rajasekharan has described this anti-Hindu attitude of this despicable anti-Hindu Union Minister as a threat and challenge to Hinduism. He has rightly charged E Ahmed of communalising a national asset like Railways. He called for immediate restoration of the withdrawn ancient Indian customs and traditions, failing which RSS and VHP will launch nationwide massive agitations. I spoke to a very important VHP leader from Kerala to know more about the blatantly anti-Hindu ways of E Ahmed. He said: “What more can be expected from E Ahmed who is allegedly close to a jehadi suspect in the Bengaluru blasts and who is hiding in Gulf, thanks to Ahmed and the UPA Government!”
Seeing the conduct and opposition of this Union Minister to the lighting of kuthuvilakku at a public function in Chennai, I am reminded of the savage manner in which the Talibans of Afghanistan destroyed the two 6th century statues of standing Buddhas carved into the side of a cliff in the Bamyan Valley in the Hazarajat region of Central Afghanistan
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Was the US Senate Attack on Hinduism an isolated Instance?
Article by: Rajiv Malhotra, USINPAC Leadership Committee Member
The US Senate has a long tradition of opening with Bible prayers, occasionally extending a symbolic courtesy to prayers of other faiths. For the first time in its history a Hindu priest was invited to conduct the opening prayer. Indian-Americans, having contributed immensely to America, naturally felt proud to be afforded equal respect alongside other American religions. But the Hindu prayer was attacked as an “abomination” by hate-filled heckling that resulted from an organized mobilization by civic groups such as the American Family Association attempting, to demonize Hinduism as heathen, immoral and dangerously un-American. The President of the Family Research Council mobilized Americans to block the Hindu priest, saying, “There is no historic connection between America and the polytheistic creed of Hinduism.” David Barton, one of the scholars informing the attackers, declared that Hinduism was “not a religion that has produced great things in the world," citing social conditions in India as proof of its primitiveness.
The denigration of Hinduism influences the way Americans relate to Indians. Andrew Rotter, an American historian, in his book on the US foreign policy’s tilt against India and towards Pakistan during the Nehru era, cites declassified documents revealing US presidents’ and diplomats’ suspicions of Hinduism. They regarded “Hindu India” as lacking morality and integrity, and its “grotesque images” reminded them of previous pagan faiths conquered by Christians, such as Native Americans. American ideas about India are intertwined with stereotypes about Hinduism.
There are domestic implications concerning the diaspora as well. The great American meritocracy has enabled us to succeed as individuals, and many Indians see American Jews as a role model. But it took the Jews over half a century of organized lobbying and litigation by organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League, to establish their religious identity in public life. The lesson Jews had learnt in the European Holocaust was that their individual success could easily be used against them if their civilizational identity was defamed. Indians also faced hate crimes in New Jersey when the Dotbusters targeted Hindus. Recent rants by Pat Buchanan and Lou Dobbs generate xenophobia against Indians for “stealing” jobs from “real” (i.e. white Judeo-Christian) Americans. As Indian-Americans stand out for their individual success, while US economic standards deteriorate, we may one day regret having neglected the projection of a positive civilizational image. Unlike many other ethnic and religious groups, we have not adequately engaged US universities, schools, media and think-tanks deeper than the pop culture layer of cuisine, Bollywood and fashions. On the contrary, many Indian writers have fed the “caste, cows, curry” images of India.
Hindu-Americans need to be educated on the history of American public religion and the “American way” of claiming one’s religious identity across the spectrum of liberals and conservatives. In fact, even liberal Americans have always been a very Christian people. Hilary Clinton’s devout Christianity has shaped her liberalism. She told New York Times that her Methodist faith has been “a huge part of who I am, and how I have seen the world and what I believe in, and what I have tried to do in my life.” She carries a Bible on her campaign travels and confidently quotes from St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas and John Wesley, the father of Methodism. Another liberal, Barak Obama, proudly projects his Christianity and delivers many of his key campaign speeches before church congregations. It comes as a surprise to many secular Indians that the very liberal President Jimmy Carter describes himself as a Bible evangelist, and asserts that his Christian faith provided the moral compass to guide his presidency.
Liberalism in America is about egalitarian economic and race policies, and is not a rejection or even a departure from the nation’s majority religion, i.e. Christianity. The equivalent scenario would be for India’s CPM leaders (the liberal/left equivalent of Obama, Clinton and Carter) to quote Hindu sacred texts and deliver campaign speeches in major Hindu temples. While American labor unions have always been very deeply rooted in Christianity, India’s labor unions are encouraged to discard the Hindu identity. Unlike in Europe, American public life has never abandoned its deep rooted Christian foundations. America’s separation of state and church affects only formal institutions, and does not imply de-Christianizing the leadership or the national ethos.
Indian intellectuals have misunderstood America’s Christian psyche because the Indian notion of secularism in India is very different to that of the Amerrican. Indian secularism requires distancing from the majority religion, i.e. Hinduism, by one or more of the following ways: by espousing a “generic spirituality” without any specific religious identity, by condemning any Hindu identity as a mark of communalism with BJP links, or by explicitly blaming Hinduism for all sorts of human rights problems. The equivalent situation would be to blame the Bible for all the US abuses in Guantanamo and in its domestic society, and to de-Christianize America into a sort of generic spirituality. While Hinduism, like all other world religions, does have social problems, it also has internally generated reformations, as well as immense resources to deal with the human condition.
Unraveling this requires understanding Hinduphobia’s nexus in the American academy and seminaries. This is the subject of a well-researched eye-opening new book, titled, Invading the Sacred: An analysis of Hinduism Studies in America. (See: www.invadingthesacred.com for details.) The book exposes influential scholars who have disparaged the Bhagavad Gita as “a dishonest book”; declared Ganesha’s trunk a “limp phallus”; classified the Hindu Devi as the “mother with a penis” and Shiva as “a notorious womanizer” who incites violence in India; pronounced Sri Ramakrishna a pedophile who sexually molested the young Swami Vivekananda; condemned Indian mothers as being less loving of their children than white women; and interpreted the bindi as a drop of menstrual fluid and the “ha” in sacred mantras as a woman’s sound during orgasm. To understand the hatred spewed at us by the Senate hecklers one needs to understand the systemic creation and distribution of such one-sided “data” by an army of “scholars” whose mission is to bolster the image of Hinduism as a danger to the American way of life.
The US Senate has a long tradition of opening with Bible prayers, occasionally extending a symbolic courtesy to prayers of other faiths. For the first time in its history a Hindu priest was invited to conduct the opening prayer. Indian-Americans, having contributed immensely to America, naturally felt proud to be afforded equal respect alongside other American religions. But the Hindu prayer was attacked as an “abomination” by hate-filled heckling that resulted from an organized mobilization by civic groups such as the American Family Association attempting, to demonize Hinduism as heathen, immoral and dangerously un-American. The President of the Family Research Council mobilized Americans to block the Hindu priest, saying, “There is no historic connection between America and the polytheistic creed of Hinduism.” David Barton, one of the scholars informing the attackers, declared that Hinduism was “not a religion that has produced great things in the world," citing social conditions in India as proof of its primitiveness.
The denigration of Hinduism influences the way Americans relate to Indians. Andrew Rotter, an American historian, in his book on the US foreign policy’s tilt against India and towards Pakistan during the Nehru era, cites declassified documents revealing US presidents’ and diplomats’ suspicions of Hinduism. They regarded “Hindu India” as lacking morality and integrity, and its “grotesque images” reminded them of previous pagan faiths conquered by Christians, such as Native Americans. American ideas about India are intertwined with stereotypes about Hinduism.
There are domestic implications concerning the diaspora as well. The great American meritocracy has enabled us to succeed as individuals, and many Indians see American Jews as a role model. But it took the Jews over half a century of organized lobbying and litigation by organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League, to establish their religious identity in public life. The lesson Jews had learnt in the European Holocaust was that their individual success could easily be used against them if their civilizational identity was defamed. Indians also faced hate crimes in New Jersey when the Dotbusters targeted Hindus. Recent rants by Pat Buchanan and Lou Dobbs generate xenophobia against Indians for “stealing” jobs from “real” (i.e. white Judeo-Christian) Americans. As Indian-Americans stand out for their individual success, while US economic standards deteriorate, we may one day regret having neglected the projection of a positive civilizational image. Unlike many other ethnic and religious groups, we have not adequately engaged US universities, schools, media and think-tanks deeper than the pop culture layer of cuisine, Bollywood and fashions. On the contrary, many Indian writers have fed the “caste, cows, curry” images of India.
Hindu-Americans need to be educated on the history of American public religion and the “American way” of claiming one’s religious identity across the spectrum of liberals and conservatives. In fact, even liberal Americans have always been a very Christian people. Hilary Clinton’s devout Christianity has shaped her liberalism. She told New York Times that her Methodist faith has been “a huge part of who I am, and how I have seen the world and what I believe in, and what I have tried to do in my life.” She carries a Bible on her campaign travels and confidently quotes from St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas and John Wesley, the father of Methodism. Another liberal, Barak Obama, proudly projects his Christianity and delivers many of his key campaign speeches before church congregations. It comes as a surprise to many secular Indians that the very liberal President Jimmy Carter describes himself as a Bible evangelist, and asserts that his Christian faith provided the moral compass to guide his presidency.
Liberalism in America is about egalitarian economic and race policies, and is not a rejection or even a departure from the nation’s majority religion, i.e. Christianity. The equivalent scenario would be for India’s CPM leaders (the liberal/left equivalent of Obama, Clinton and Carter) to quote Hindu sacred texts and deliver campaign speeches in major Hindu temples. While American labor unions have always been very deeply rooted in Christianity, India’s labor unions are encouraged to discard the Hindu identity. Unlike in Europe, American public life has never abandoned its deep rooted Christian foundations. America’s separation of state and church affects only formal institutions, and does not imply de-Christianizing the leadership or the national ethos.
Indian intellectuals have misunderstood America’s Christian psyche because the Indian notion of secularism in India is very different to that of the Amerrican. Indian secularism requires distancing from the majority religion, i.e. Hinduism, by one or more of the following ways: by espousing a “generic spirituality” without any specific religious identity, by condemning any Hindu identity as a mark of communalism with BJP links, or by explicitly blaming Hinduism for all sorts of human rights problems. The equivalent situation would be to blame the Bible for all the US abuses in Guantanamo and in its domestic society, and to de-Christianize America into a sort of generic spirituality. While Hinduism, like all other world religions, does have social problems, it also has internally generated reformations, as well as immense resources to deal with the human condition.
Unraveling this requires understanding Hinduphobia’s nexus in the American academy and seminaries. This is the subject of a well-researched eye-opening new book, titled, Invading the Sacred: An analysis of Hinduism Studies in America. (See: www.invadingthesacred.com for details.) The book exposes influential scholars who have disparaged the Bhagavad Gita as “a dishonest book”; declared Ganesha’s trunk a “limp phallus”; classified the Hindu Devi as the “mother with a penis” and Shiva as “a notorious womanizer” who incites violence in India; pronounced Sri Ramakrishna a pedophile who sexually molested the young Swami Vivekananda; condemned Indian mothers as being less loving of their children than white women; and interpreted the bindi as a drop of menstrual fluid and the “ha” in sacred mantras as a woman’s sound during orgasm. To understand the hatred spewed at us by the Senate hecklers one needs to understand the systemic creation and distribution of such one-sided “data” by an army of “scholars” whose mission is to bolster the image of Hinduism as a danger to the American way of life.
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