In recent days, there have been more written about the Hindu-fundamentalism and the way its tearing apart the so called “secular-fabric” of India. Nearly all the journalists are quick to jump the gun, blaming the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, RSS and other organisations for threatening the Secularism of India. The Indian press has been vehement in asking for the banning of these organisations to restore the secular balance and confidence of the minority people of India.
I wonder where the Indian press was, when SIMI was active in India. When the government banned SIMI, some sections of Indian press even were criticising the Government for the move! It was said that the “right wing” BJP government was doing this as a political move! SIMI was an organisation, which wanted India to be an Islamic State, a state that follows the Sharia laws. Ah yes, who said Taliban was not welcome in India!
Indian press seems to be ridiculously biased in its reporting, which reflects itself in the western media also. Killing of Graham Staines and his family, not only came in the headlines, but also a series of articles exalting their work, and how ashamed Hindu’s should be to be after that incident. The constructive work of organisations like RSS, hardly gets any place in the media, lest it be termed “non-secular”. I am sure the media’s bias has been to such an extent that the reader might be wondering if RSS does any constructive work at all! Here is a link to the newspaper report about the Kutch Earthquake [link]
Coming back to Graham Staines, the press was never really interested in finding why he was torched to death. They were after the sensational news, not the reasons why he was torched to death. Missionary proselytising activities have been going on in India for a long time with the support of heavy western funding. There is still a huge missionary network in India, hell bent on converting people to Christianity. These people don’t even hesitate to quote from Bhagavad Gita, to achieve their aims. For them Jesus Christ was the only saviour of mankind. But even then Hindus are fundamentalist and should be guilty as per the Indian Media [link]
On the other hand, Islamic preachers have also been active for centuries. Historically they have caused more damage to the secular fabric of India. The atrocities that were being committed by Islamic marauders centuries ago followed by the Islamic sultanates, and currently followed up by the fanatical breed of jihadi elements are listless. One may say, why go back into history, why dig sleeping graves. Indeed we should not be digging graves, but we need to look into all those facts to go behind the rise of so called Hindu Fundamentalism. Coming back to present, we saw the predicament of the Chief Minister of West Bengal, Buddhadev Bhattacharya, who said some facts about the unaffiliated Madrassa’s in the State [link]. He had to retract his statement, following the Communist party’s command. Sorry, you are only supposed to make factually politically correct statements.
Any culture that feels threatened will rise to defend itself, and violence becomes an option for that society. If you keep on suppressing a section of society, and in case of India, the majority Hindu community, time will come when they explode, which may cause damage which cannot be contained. The rise of Hindu nationalism is only an effect of this. Sprouting Madrassa’s around the country is fine, but singing Vande Maataram in Schools is wrong and is an indicator of the rising Hindu Fundamentalism!! And I always thought that Vande Maataram was a song sung by the Freedom fighters of India.
I do agree that violence does not provide a solution to any issue, on the contrary it fuels more hatred and violence completing the vicious circle. The rise of suppressed Hindu Nationalism is going to be a major factor in the future of India. Hindu’s are getting more and more active, and more getting aware of the suppression they have been facing for long. History doesn’t help here, India has seen a history, where Hindu’s have been on the receiving end for very long time. Its natural that slowly the people realise that this has to stop. Though it seems like a pessimistic future, 50+ years of Independence and misrule has brought us to this path.
