With what happened on 22nd of January 2024, the Pran Pratishtha, it is clear that the Indic renaissance has begun, the civilization has found out its roots and is finally proud of its cultural roots, there is no one to tell them the mistakes their religion and culture has and no one will again dare to take the confidence back from the majority of the nation.
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Many people believe that this will
give rise to a different Hinduism, which can be more assertive. The simple
question that comes to the mind of any normal Hindu is, What’s the problem if
they are more assertive? Is taking pride in a long history of India a
shameful thing? Or do you think that there is no place for Hindus in India?, we
often forget that weather a person likes it or not India is and will always be
a culturally Hindu nation, it is a simple equation, when the SC of India the
apex body who has the last say in all the legal matters had said this.
The SC said that
“Hindutva/Hinduism is a way of life of the people in the subcontinent” and is a
state of mind, not a religion, and therefore seeking votes was not illegal
under the Representation of the People Act, which outlaws poll campaigning on religious
grounds [1]
The opening of ram mandir on the
disputed site is important for the confidence of the majority of the nation
which is a large part of the nation, if 3/4rth of the nation believes in Rama,
they may not be necessarily right but the symbol means something to them and
their sentiments have to be respected, and more so in any democratic setup
where the majority decides the fate of the nation, it would be hypocritical to
not give them the right. Here are some questions that have been asked by the diaspora,
some intellectual individuals, and others who are not happy with the events.
Notion: Is the temple so important?
Why can’t we build a library/hospital there?
There is enormous land that can be
allocated to the library and hospitals in India, not just one but thousands,
but respecting the sentiments of the people at least in a democracy is needed,
if a section of people say that they need the land and they believe its
important to them then so be it, we are no more a poor nation who cannot afford
to leave a piece of land.
Secondly, the question is never
asked to any other organization or religious sect, why is it? Never has anyone
asked the question of mosques and churches: are they free from such scrutiny?
And to all those who say that mosques and churches run schools for the poor and
needy, but a similar right is denied to the Hindu fold of institutions, so it's time they give them the rights under Article 25,, gives freedom of opening
educational institutions and removes the control of the government from temples. The govt
wants the temple to be in their control and the finances managed by the temple
endowment department, the temple committee has to seek permissions for all
petty expenses from the endowment department and then you expect the Hindu
organizations to make hospitals and schools how is it possible, its like
telling someone to buy something without giving them proper resources.
Currently, the temple
management has to seek government permission to utilise the revenue generated
by the temples. The plan for the development of temples and the utilisation of
funds must be pre-approved by the government.[2]
So the onus of this is not on the community or
the temple authority, it's on the SECULAR govt, who made the Endowments Act of 1997 (no prize for guessing who made
this law).
Notion: The Hindus are getting more and more
aggressive, which could mean that the Secular nature of India would be at risk!
It is clear that those who make such comments
do not know the true nature of Hinduism and its tenets, India was secular
before Indira Gandhi inserted the word or even before the world had conceived
the concept or word as secularism, there are more than 6 religions in India
alone and there are even more sects of those religions. But, we don’t often see
clashes in these, at least in India, when we know that there are and have been
conflicts between two sects of the same religion, like the Shia and Sunni
Muslims, the Ahmadiyya and Brelvi Musli;s, this was never a
problem in this nation. The simple reason why India has never faced major
sectarian violence is its cultural tolerance. The culture of this land promotes
an individual to seek the way s/he wantto choose to worship, it only becomes
problematic when you want the freedom to practice what you believe in, but you
do not want to give the same right to the other person.
So, the concept of secularism originated
in India, and hence we need to understand that it will never be at risk, at
least in India, until people are not hypocritical.
Notion: India mistreats its minorities; the
2002 riots are the prime example of this.
The criticism comes from cherry picking very
selective incidents like the 2002 riots. Well, it's easy to say that the riot
happened and the majority started to perform genocide on the other minority
community, but that is far from reality. The fact was that people from the Muslim
community assembled and burned about 59 passengers, including women and children, which was, without any doubt, an inhuman act which cannot be pardoned or written
off with any amount of explanation., What happened later was a retaliatory
action against this. The government data says that more than 254 individuals from the Hindu and
790 from the Muslim community were killed, and more than 250 are missing. Now it's all known that the government always underreports the data, and the real data might be much
higher.[3]
Like any other functioning democracy, it was an
appalling incident and someone had to take the responsibility for I,t and since
it involved the minority group as well,, there were various commissions set up by
the then government to find the truth, which worked as truth truth-finding committee and other
special investigating teams.
There were a few reports that were constituted and made available to the public later w,, which include the Nanavati
Mehra commission of 2002 on the Godhra incident. He reports various times, which have taken into consideration as many as
44445 testimonials of the people who were present and then made this
report. The report tuns for about 196 pages and made public has suggested the
truth ans what happed that day based on large testimonials including the
staff present at the station, the para 39 and 40 of the report says that the
chain of the train was pulled and a mob of around 1500 people who belonged to
the minority community came in and started to throw stones to break the glasses
of the bogie and threw inflammables, while two men hold the door and stopped
the people from deboarding, frugal bombs were thrown inside.
The
report discusses what happened on that faithful day in detail. The last survivor
of the incident died nearly 2 months after the incident. It is also important
to note that the report refers to a scuffle that happened on the platform
between the Ghachi Muslim community working as vendors and tea sellers on the
platform and the Ram Sevak. While many testimonials refer to this incident, there is no person on duty under oath who accepts this. Which means there is a
doubt whether this happened or not. Also, there is an allegation that since the
window are at 7 feet there is no chance that inflammables could be thrown
inside and the glasses can be broken from a n open space, but these questions
were later explained by the commission scientifically in detail, which of
course the lawyer denied in the court of law.
To
say that the incident is a litmus test of how the minorities are treated in
India is an oxymoron because the commission itself said that the Ghacchi Muslim
community started it because the slogans irked them. It was a unilateral, unprovoked attack on the Ramsevaks in the train, and what happened after that
for 2 days was a purely socio-emotional response to the incident and was
nothing of a pogrom or a genocide, so to speak.
While the international community
comes and preaches how India should be treating its minority and how the Indian
government plays the game of discrimination in the name of religion, that is not true. The Economic Advisory Committee, Prime Minister the has recently released a report that
the population of the Hindu majority fold. [4]
While the Hindu share has fallen by 7.5 percent, there is an increase in the
Muslim population fold. This shows that the minority population is thriving in
India, and it doesn’t have to face any adversity in India. The thriving
population is often used as a criterion to see how well things pan out in the long
run across species. [5]
While the minority population
thrives in India unlike Pakistan the case is completely obverse, the Hindu
population has fell due to persecution, forced conversion, rapes and killing
which is nothing but a systematic genocide of the Hindu population of their
country.
There
may be a counterargument made by many that the population increase in the Muslim community of India is a myth, and they might cite the book by Q.Y.y Qureshi.
Notion: The
CAA and NRC are anti-Muslim, and the Modi government is doing this to institutionalize the genocide of a particular
community
The allegation is just as baseless and malarkey, yet even to discuss, as the draft of CAA has never even mentioned the Indian Muslim.
But the egregious attempt to make believe this lie to the Indian Muslims is the
most contentious one and malicious at the same time. A 10th-class pass student
can just read it and understand the whole act, or even a simple search would
clear the doubt looming in the minds of Indian Muslims., The act just talks of
giving citizenship to the religiously persecuted communities of neighboring
countries of India.
There
can be an argument about the Ahmadiyya, Hazara[6],
and Baloch[7]
of Pakistan, who are also persecuted. But the keyword is “religious”; the
Ahmadiyya and Hazaras are persecuted on account of the sect they follow.
This has a special name in the violent history of India, these are called
sectarian violence; they are not religious persecution community. The Muslims of
Pakistan believe that the Hindus and Muslims of India cannot live in peace and
harmony in the same nation, but if we look at the history of the creation of
Pakistan the ideology of Pakistan and division was envisioned and fought for by
the Ahmadiyya’s of the Pakistan and if that’s their ideology then how can one
be sure that they will be able to digest the reality of India?
The
question may seem irrelevant,t, but it’s very pertinent that sectarian violence is
very prevalent in the country,y, and Indian under the sun cannot give them blanket
citizenship. However, they cannot be denied the right to be a refugee and hence
they are also entitled to apply for citizenship in India,, but with a
different route, this rou, te called the CAA,, gives an early and fast access to
citizenship to the victims of the genocidal pogrom froma particular community.
It's like there is a fast access door and there is a long queue where normal people
can stand, since these people are persecuted, there are just a few exceptions to
them.
For the people who say that this is
discrimination based on religion, that isn't true; it’s a positive
discrimination based on reasonable classification and intelligible differentiation, which are the underlying criteria for the law to function in a
smoother way. Two equals have to be treated equally, and two unequals are
supposed to be treated unequally. Hencence, a person persecuted based on sectarian violence and a person persecuted based on religion-based
violence are not the same; they have fundamentally different reasons to be
persecuted, and the atrocities they go through are also different.
Since
there is a difference in the way they are being persecuted, they
cannot be treated equally, and hence, it’s a compulsory condition that they are
treated differently.
No matter the kind of notion the world has
against India, it is important to look things through facts and look beyond the
popular narrative the Western media tries to spread, because not everything we see
is true. So the readers are required to see things from a different
perspective. They need to see if the items written in the article are verifiable
and true. Only believe something.
There are many more notions that need to be
debunked. From time to time, an article will be posted in future posts in parts
or series as and when required.
References
“Baloch Genocide: Movement against Baloch Genocide: Over 200 Men
Remain in Islamabad Police Detention, Protests to Continue - The Economic
Times.” Accessed May 15, 2024.
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international/world-news/movement-against-baloch-genocide-over-200-men-remain-in-islamabad-police-detention-protests-to-continue/articleshow/106198222.cms?from=mdr.
Baloch, Shah Meer. “‘Every Year We Dig Mass Graves’: The Slaughter of Pakistan’s Hazara.” The Guardian, April 5, 2021, sec. Global development. https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/apr/05/mass-graves-pakistan-shia-minority-hazara-slaughter-imran-khan.Deepp. “Gujrat Riots 2002 – Introduction, Data, Facts, and Inquiry.” adda247, July 17, 2023. https://www.adda247.com/upsc-exam/gujrat-riots-2002/.
DESK, WEB. “Why Govt Only Control Temples
and Not Mosques & Churches, Asks Telugu Actor and Jana Sena Chief Pawan
Kalyan.” Accessed January 24, 2024.
https://organiser.org/2022/03/17/72253/bharat/why-govt-only-control-temples-and-not-mosques-churches-asks-telugu-actor-and-jana-sena-chief-pawan-kalyan/.
Hindustan Times. “Is Hinduism a Way of
Life or Just a Religion? SC to Re-Examine Today,” October 18, 2016.
https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/is-hinduism-a-way-of-life-or-just-a-religion-sc-to-re-examine-today/story-ZDU95tarD5kGnWzgfgJELL.html.
PTI. “Hindu Population Share Fell 7.8%
between 1950-2015 in India, Muslims up 43.15%: EAC-PM Paper.” The Hindu,
May 9, 2024, sec. India.
https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/hindu-population-falls-1950-2015-eac-pm-paper/article68156830.ece.
“‘Share of Religious Minorities: A Cross-Country Analysis’ Report: EAC-PM,” May 10, 2024.
https://www.ksgindia.com/study-material/news/share-of-religious-minorities-a-cross-country-analysis-report-eac-pm.html.
[1] “Is Hinduism a Way
of Life or Just a Religion?”
[2] DESK, “Why Govt Only
Control Temples and Not Mosques & Churches, Asks Telugu Actor and Jana Sena
Chief Pawan Kalyan.”
[3] deep, “Gujrat Riots
2002 – Introduction, Data, Facts, and Inquiry.”
[4] PTI, “Hindu
Population Share Fell 7.8% between 1950-2015 in India, Muslims up 43.15%.”
[5] “‘Share of Religious
Minorities.”
[6] Baloch, “‘Every Year We Dig Mass Graves.’”
[7] “Baloch Genocide:
Movement against Baloch Genocide: Over 200 Men Remain in Islamabad Police
Detention, Protests to Continue - The Economic Times.”
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