Author:
Publication: Organiser
Date: July 9, 2006
URL: http://www.organiser.org/dynamic/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=138&page=16
Introduction: Our secularism has reached such
glorious heights that our liberal, intellectual, secular Hindu 'leaders' get
red under their collars if an inconsequential dargah-which is not the same
as a masjid-is sought to be demolished in Vadodara to broaden a road, the
dargah being not the only one to suffer that fate since some nineteen other
Hindu mandirs also were similarly to be demolished.
Just think of this: Reports from Dhaka that
the Khaleda Zia Government is considering relocating the Bhakeshwari Kali
Temple-the millennium-old shrine in the heart of the Bangladesh capital that
gives the city its very name, has been conveniently suppressed by the English
media. The Pioneer (June 9) alone had the courage to write an editorial on
the subject. According to this paper which has a tradition of over 120 years-"Islamist
parties that are partners in Prime Minister Khaleda Zia's coalition government
have demanded that the temple be brought down and shifted to another area".
"Appropriately" wrote the paper, "it will establish Bangladesh's
gradual but certain decline into Islamic extremism and fulfil the ghoulish
desire of the Islamists to make it a successor state to Mullah Omar's Emirate
of Afghanistan", where, it will be remembered, the Islamic fundamentalists
disfigures the beautiful mountain statues of the Buddha which had stood the
ravages to time, until they became victims of the Islamic whatever-one-may-like-to-call-them.
But the forthcoming demolition of the Dhakheshwari
Temple should not be an isolated event. According to Taslima Nasrin, quoted
by the columnist Prafull Goradia, 69-not five, ten or twenty but sixty-nine-temples
have been desecrated in Bangladesh in 1990, a clear two years before the Babri
episode. Did our liberal, secular English media ever report this massive and
deliberate crime? Not on your life. Thereafter, reports Goradia, "over
200 (temples) were martyred". There is no record of our secular government
ever once raising its feeble voice. On June 14, The Times of India (and some
other papers) reported that "the only Hindu temple" in Lahore has
been demolished to pave the way for construction of a multi-storied commercial
building.
The story was attributed to "agencies".
But within two days the report was contradicted. "The Krishna Temple
is in perfect condition. I invite L.K.Advani to visit Lahore and pray at the
temple", Pakistan's Daily Times quoted Minister for Religious Affairs,
Ejazul Haq as saying. Indeed, said Shri Haq, seven lakh rupees had been spent
on the temple renovation a few months ago. This report has been sent by UNI.
But what are the so-called "agencies", The Times of India quoted,
doing? Is the Krishna Temple still standing? But the demolition of the Krishna
Temple presuming that it is in the works, should not surprise anybody. According
to records available since 1947, as many as 244 mandirs, across eleven Pakistani
districts have been destroyed and there has not been a squeal from our secular
governments in Delhi.
The message that Delhi has been sending out
is clear: Hindus do not care about the demolition of their temples and the
desecration of their holy sites and the disfigurement of their idols. They
had lived under such circumstances for one thousand years and what if a couple
of hundred are presently desecrated? After all, Islamic rulers had demolished
over 3,000 odd temples over the centuries during their long and tyrannous
rule so what if a few temples are desecrated now? Our secularism has reached
such glorious heights that our liberal, intellectual, secular Hindu 'leaders'
get red under their collars if an inconsequential dargah-which is not the
same as a masjid-is sought to be demolished in Vadodara to broaden a road,
the dargah being not the only one to suffer that fate since some nineteen
other Hindu mandirs also were similarly to be demolished.
But judging from the reaction of our English
media it was as if a Hindu army was out to destroy the Jama Masjid. And Narendra
Modi became an instant target for our secularists' fury. India maintained
an undignified silence when the Bamiyan monuments to Budha were disfigured
by Islamic barbarians. What the Bamiyan Buddha is to Afghanistan, the Dhakhaeshwari
Temple is to Bangladesh and yet all that one hears from Delhi is a deafening
silence. But let some stupid Danish cartoonist dishonour the Prophet, our
leaders jump into the fray. We are very secular, aren't we? We should defend
the honour of our minorities, shouldn't we? This raises an important question:
Shouldn't we raise the question of constructing a temple on the Babri Masjid
site and show our respect for Muslim sentiments by building a separate and
even more beautiful masjid for Muslims elsewhere?
The Babri site is holy for Hindus? In what
way is the Babri site holy for Muslims? Prafull Goradia (who is incidentally
an authority on Islamic history) says that Janab Z.A.Mansoorie of the Jamaat-e-Islami
Hind had written to him as follows: "Islam forbids its believers to usurp
the place/structure of worship of the people of other faiths. There is a strong
and permanent fatwa in this regard, that no namaz is acceptable to Allah unless
the mosque has been built by acquiring the piece of land legally. Otherwise,
Muslims shield shun offering prayers. If, for some mosque it is proved that
it was built violating Islamic injunctions, we Muslims have to withdraw...."
It is a well-known fact that several thousand temples were demolished by Muslim
invaders and masjids built over the sites.
Even Romilla Thapar will have to agree that
Hindu temples were desecrated in Mathura and Varanasi as well. Is it too much
to ask of our fellow Indians professing Islamic faith to be sensitive to Hindu
feelings and to start with, at least agree to let the temple to Ram be built
on the Babri site in Ayodhya? Do they realise what a tremendous sense of gratitude
will sweep among Hindus throughout the length and breadth of India? The worst
enemies of India are not our minorities but our misguided secularist Hindus
who will not stand up for their faith-if they have any.
There is very little or nothing that we can
do to stop the demolition of the Dhakheshwari Kali Temple in Dhaka, just as
we could do nothing to stop the disfigurement of the Bamiyan statues of the
Buddha. We still have to be re-assured that the Krishna Temple in Lahore stays.
But no such guarantee is available. Hatred of Hindus and of India is the ruling
passion in Pakistani government circles and there is little that we can do
to educate those barbarians.
Much the same can be said of the rulers in
Bangladesh. Sadly, we have a government in Delhi which is unresponsive to
majority feelings in India for electoral reasons. If only Congress leaders
would find time to read the collected works of Mahatma Gandhi they may re-discover
their Indianness and think afresh. Gandhi used to speak about politics without
principles. He must have had the Congress of circa 2006 in mind.
