Author: M.V.Kamath
Publication: The Free Press Journal
Date: September 15, 2005
URL: http://www.samachar.com/features/150905-features.html
When India became independent after being
partitioned on religious lines, it was part of Delhi's faith that it would
be secular in every possible way in sharp contrast to Pakistan's approach
that Muslims constitute a separate nation. There was no other stand that India
could possibly have taken.
If India's political leaders agreed to partition
it was not because they agreed to the Two-Nation Theory but because they were
unwilling to land the entire country into a civil war on religious grounds.
Perhaps they should have chosen the option, even if it reduced the entire
country temporarily into a shambles.
At the very least it would have saved a lot
of trouble in later years. The Muslim community would have found its place
in a secular government and all would have been well. But after spending several
years in jail and unwilling to see the country torn to pieces because of intransigence
on the part of certain Muslim leaders, Congress leaders and they were then
the voice of the people decided, howsoever unwillingly, to accept partition.
Those Muslims left in India then realised
that they cannot afford to alienate the majority community any longer, lest
they invite its wrath. The Congress Party fully cashed in on it and won election
after election with the Muslim support.
At the same time, Muslims began to realise
that they could live in India without, fear, that indeed they got better terms
as a minority than they ever dreamt of and had not Pakistan turned into a
religious state, first under General Ayub Khan and later under Gen Zia, their
future would have been brighter than they visualised.
Instead of learning to live in peace, successive
Pakistan leaders felt compelled to treat India as an enemy, their minds psyched
to the days of Mohamad of Ghazni. That psyche has not changed. It was Gen.
Ayub Khan who said that one Pakistani (Muslim) soldier was equal to ten Indian
(Hindu) sepoys.
Never mind if he got a bloody nose and that
in three successive wars, Pakistan was defeated. But the psyche, it would
seem, continues. Pakistani students are now being taught that Hindus are "devious
and cowardly". And this, not in madrassahs which, according to facts
revealed by a US organisation, at best teach 1.7 million students, but in
Government-rum schools that cater to 25 million students.
What kind of society can one expect to grow
in Pakistan under such a vicious educational system? This was noticed even
by the Wall Street Journal. It was noticed that Pakistani text books were
also describing Christians as "vengeful conquerors" and Jews as
"tight-fisted money-lenders"; all this went unnoticed for a long
time with military-dominated Islamabad managing to camouflage its bigotry
infested curricula from outside purview.
The United States, eager to enlist Islamic
fundamentalists in its fight against the Soviet Union's presence in Afghanistan,
for a long time turned a blind eye to Pakistan's educational system, but now,
especially after what Al-Qaeda has done, is waking up to the reality that
is Pakistan.
The US State Department has now apparently
taken the matter on hand. In an unusually tough statement the State Department
has said that continued teaching of prejudice in Pakistan is a matter of "serious
concern" and that it has engaged the Pakistan Government on this issue
described as "clearly unacceptable and inciteful".
The State Department's spokesman, Sean McCormick
told the media that Pakistan's Education Minister Javed Ashraf Qazi has been
apprised of Washington's concern but there is scepticism in many US quarters
that Islamabad would do anything to rectify the situation, considering that
Qazi is a former ISI chief and like Musharraf is a product of the Pakistani
military that has fed a distorted historical narrative to its people.
According to Pakistani text books, "under
the Khiljis Pakistan moved southward to include a greater part of Central
India and the Deccan (and) in retrospect it may be said that during the 16th
century,Hindustan`disappeared and was completely absorbed in Pakistan'.
It is one thing for Pakistan to write such
stuff but, what is more to be aware of, is the increasing defiance of secularism
in India by Muslim organisations which have not, for once, stood by the Indian
Government on the matter of Jammu & Kashmir. The sheer impertinence of
a Muslim organisation to claim that Taj Mahal is its property, takes one's
breath away.
It cannot just be a coincidence that the Deoband
Dar-ul-Uloom recently tried to find out how far it can go to destroy India's
secularism. At first Deoband asserted that it has every right to issue political
fatwas.
Had India meekly succumbed to this, Deoband
would have gone a step further, and then still another step further, to destroy
India's secularism. Happily, the government quickly asserted that fatwas issued
by Islamic institutions are not valid in the eyes of law.
The Deoband fatwa claims to have been only
in connection with religious (read civil) matters. If the government had given
in, Deoband would have interfered in criminal matters as well, turning the
Government of India's Code of Criminal Procedure 1973 into a huge joke.
In a timely intervention, Union Law Minister
H. R. Bharadwaj has said in a written reply in Rajya Sabha that the procedure
to be followed in criminal courts are set out in the Code of Criminal Procedure
and that the fatwas issued by Islamic institutions do not have legal sanctity.
That is not enough; Deoband and all other
Islamic institutions must be sternly warned that any interference with established
law in the country would be very sternly dealt with.
Now we are told that Deoband has decided not
to issue any more fatwas on non-religious matters and those that have political
overtones. Maulana Marghoobur Rehman, vice Chancellor, is reported to have
said that Muftis issuing controversial fatwas discouraging Muslim women from
contesting elections, have been asked not to issue a fatwa having political
overtones.
Deoband apparently received about 200 applications
for fatwa every month. It is nobody's contention that in a caste dispute,
a caste body cannot act as an arbitrator. In Mumbai a caste organisation even
settles civil disputes through mutual understanding of parties concerned.
That has become necessary because taking civil
cases to courts is not only costly but time-consuming. Justice is not available
for months, if not years. But it is one thing to settle civilmatters privately
and quite another to issue religious fatwas making a mockery of secularism.
According to the new face of Deoband, in issuing
a fatwa that women seeking elections should wear burqa all that was meant
was that "Muslim women who participate in any political process should
dress accordingly and conduct themselves with dignity in public life".
Does that mean that Hindu women who address
public meetings are dressed indecently and don't carry themselves with dignity?
What nonsense is being so openly purveyed? One suspects that there is a larger
organisation that is behind these new developments in Bangladesh, when some
500 bombs and grenades were simultaneously exploded in 63 out of 64 districts,
it became clear that some powerful organisation of fundamentalists was behind
it.
It is not easy to manufacture these bombs,
convey them to districts without interference and get them exploded within
30 minutes without some powerful organisation behind it all. Hardly anybody
was killed; what is implied in this is that if the government does not bend
down to the fundamentalists, they are fully capable of indulging in large-scale
killings.
Some organisations like the Jammat-i-Islami,
Islami Oikya Jote, Islamic tantra-Andonlam and Khilafat Andolan have been
identified but they are obviously financed by outside bodies. Suspect are
Pakistan's ISI and, for good measure, Saudi Arabia. India is taking everything
lightly. Bangladeshi Muslims are pushed into West Bengal and Assam districts
to the point that many districts on the Nepal and Bangladesh periphery are
having Muslim majorities.
The Bangladeshis have to be identified and
summarily thrown out of the country. India cannot afford the luxury of tolerance
and patience. Its very security is involved. It makes no sense to build fences.
Fences can be broken. And the Bangladesh Rifles feel free to open fire on
India's Border Security Force in the Malda area. That is some cheek.
What India should do is to read the Riot Act
to Dhaka and warn it that India might mount a major invasion to protect its
territorial integrity. Magnanimity does not pay where fundamentalists are
concerned. They treat Indians (read Hindus) as weak and their tolerance is
misinterpreted as lack of courage and pure cowardice.
India must realise that it has to deal with
two fundamentalist states which have no respect for law. It is now learnt
that India is planning to give $ 150 million credit to Dhaka, which is totally
unscrupulous when it comes to India, with Bangla Industries Minister Motiur
Rahman Nizami even going to the extent of accusing India of triggering off
the 17 August bomb blasts!
In 1998 then Governor of Assam Lt Gen S. K.
Sinha had warned about Bangladeshi infiltration into Assam and West Bengal.
Now, a former Director General of India's Border Security Force is quoted
as saying that it is high time "we changed our policy, attitude and national
priorities and tell Bangladesh that enough is enough". It was a proper
Muslim, Turkey's Kemal Ataturk, who had the courage to ban burqa and turn
his state into a modern nation.
India must take a lesson from Kemal Ataturk.
Burqa must be banned in public. That is pure secularism. But what can one
expect from a Congress government which permits a text book published under
its auspices to say that Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa was "mentally deranged"?
Hindu saints can be insulted under secularism.
Muslim fundamentalism remains insulated. India is paying a dear price for
its fake secularism. It is time Indians have started to realise it.
