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MAY 2002 Contents Sports & Adventure Rachel
Thomas - First South Baichung
Bhutia - India's
Art
of Correct Breathing &
Gurinder
Chaddha's 'Bend it 'Knock
at Every Alien Door' Lifestyle Ritu
Kumar's Style for the
Viewpoint
Books
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The anatomy of Godhras & anti-Godhras by Madhu Jain and Kishwar Hameed Gujarat has been in focus, for all the wrong reasons, for over a month now. A lot has been said and written by the 'secularists' in the past weeks - decrying, and justifiably so, the holocaust unleashed upon the innocent. The beast within the humans was at its worst. World media zoomed into the carnage and killings while Chief Minister Modi sat, surveyed and seemingly endorsed the savagery. Right wing Hinduism is an unfortunate recent phenomenon. Never in the history of India, prior to the last fifty years , was there a calculated and a premeditated attack on any group or community by the Hindus. In fact, Hindus were victimised in their own land for centuries , first by the Muslim invaders-turned-rulers, then by the colonial powers - Portuguese, French and the English. These facts are not talked about openly. The 'secularists' are shy to mention it and foreign media is almost ignorant about it. There are historic reasons for the present behaviour of a handful of Hindu extremists. The first mosque in India was built on the razed ruins of a temple. This was followed by unrestrained destruction of temples - Somnath was not the only casualty. Hindus were taxed, in their own land, for not being Muslims or 'believers' - the residents of Delhi were massacred time and again by Muslim invaders and looters. This pattern lasted a few centuries. There was no CNN or BBC or Human Rights Commission at the time to tell the world what the Hindus were suffering. Their temples were destroyed and mosques and churches built on the ruins. The ongoing ethnic cleansing of Kashmiri Hindus is seldom talked about. The Hindu fundamentalist is a result of centuries of religious oppression and frustration. The need of the hour however is not to foment such emotions but to diffuse them. RSS had no place in independent, secular India. It should not have been allowed to exist. For that matter, any political party with a religious platform should not be acknowledged in a secular nation. The 'teachers' of Islam - the maulvis - could not have made a more negative contribution to the society we live in. Muslims are taught to view the world as 'Muslims' or 'Non-Muslims' and that Muslims are the true believers - the rest are infidels. No right-minded Muslim buys this. However, we are talking of Muslim communities, where illiteracy is very high, and Muslim children consequently do not have a multi-cultural exposure, but only a focused access to the local maulvi who takes control of innocent minds. The rest is history. Who will detoxify our minds and hearts? Politicians and our so-called leaders only aim to get electoral mileage from such divides - a pattern so subtly introduced by the British. Mahatma Gandhi was the last leader who beseeched the millions to forget these divides and move on towards more meaningful goals. The profile of our leaders is undergoing a change. Criminal and murderers are elected to political office - illiterate housewives succeed their husbands to political office - who really cares what is happening in the country - or elsewhere!
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