Jama Masjid car bomb suspect held in Kolkata

An alleged Indian Mujahideen (IM) operative who allegedly planted explosives at Jama Masjid was arrested by Bangalore police in Kolkata on Wednesday.

Kamaal Hasan, 24, is alleged to be part of a module run by IM chief Yasin Bhatkal in Bihar. He was allegedly tasked with planting explosives in a Maruti 800 outside the Masjid, police said.

A shooting at the Masjid on September 19, 2010, days before the Commonwealth Games, left two Taiwanese tourists injured. Hours later, a faulty bomb set off a fire in the Maruti parked nearby.

Hasan’s arrest comes after the questioning of arrested IM suspects alleged to be involved in the blasts at Jama Masjid, outside Bangalore’s Chinnaswamy Stadium (April 2010) and at Pune’s German Bakery (February 2010). Their interrogation, sources said, revealed that Yasin Bhatkal could be in Kolkata after which a team of Bangalore police went there. Their search led to Hasan’s arrest.

The Delhi Police, which detected Yasin’s module in November 2011, had named Hasan as one of the Jama Masjid accused, and a non-bailable warrant was issued by a Delhi court.

Before moving to Kolkata, Hasan — from Balha village in Bihar’s Madhubani district — was reported to have “settled” near Delhi’s Paharganj where his family had a “bag-stitching business,” police said.

He was introduced to Bhatkal by Mohd Qateel Siddiqui and Gauhar Aziz in Delhi in 2009. Qateel and Gauhar are in custody.

Sources said Hasan was paid by Bhatkal for providing safe hideouts in Delhi.

“Since Hasan had been settled here for several years, it was easier for him to look for a hideout for Bhatkal’s recruits from Bihar and Delhi,” said an officer.

Sources said that Hasan received training in preparing explosives and using firearms while working at the weapons factory of Irshad Khan, father-in-law of Bhatkal, who was arrested last year.

Courtesy: http://www.indianexpress.com/story-print/936641

Hindu girl tells Paki SC she would rather die than convert to Islam

"In Pakistan there is justice only for Muslims, justice is denied Hindus. Kill me here, now, in court. But do not send me back to the Darul-Aman [Koranic school] ... kill me". This is the desperate, heartbreaking outburst of Rinkel Kumari, a Hindu girl aged 19, who has entrusted her heartfelt appeal to the judges of the Supreme Court in Islamabad. Her story is similar to that of many other young women and girls belonging to religious minorities - Christians, Hindus, Sikhs, Ahmadis - kidnapped by extremist groups or individuals, most of the time lords or local mafia, which convert them by force and then marry them . And that is what the girl said on 26 March, before the judges of the capital's court.

The drama of Rinkel Kumari, a student of Mirpur Mathelo, a small village in the province of Sindh, began the evening of February 24: A handful of men seized her and delivered her a few hours later into the hands of a wealthy Muslim scholar, the man then called her parents, warning them that their daughter "wants to convert to Islam."

Nand Lal, the girl's father, a teacher of an elementary school, accused Naveed Shah, an influential Muslim, of kidnapping his daughter. The man has the "political cover" provided by Mian Mittho, an elected National Assembly Member, suspected of aiding and abetting. After identifying the perpetrators of the kidnapping of his daughter, he was forced to leave the area of origin to escape the threats of people affiliated with the local mafia. The father found refuge and welcome in Gurdwara in Lahore, in Punjab province, with the rest of his family.

As often happens in these cases, even the judiciary is complicit: a local judge ordered that the girl should be given to the Muslims, because her conversion is "the result of a spontaneous decision" and also stated the marriage was above board. A claim that was repeated on February 27, at the hearing before the court, after which the girl was "renamed" Faryal Shah.

However, the story of Rinkel is not an isolated case: every month between 25 and 30 young people suffer similar abuses, for a yearly total of about 300 conversions and forced marriages. Hindu girls - but also Christian - who are torn from their family and delivered into the hands of their husbands / torturers.

On March 26, she appeared before the judges of the Supreme Court in Islamabad, while the Hindu community waited with bated breath for the girl's statements in court. To avoid pressure, the presiding judge ordered the courtroom cleared and - later - the dramatic testimony was relayed: in Pakistan, "there is no" justice, "kill me here but do not send me back" to the kidnappers.

Speaking to AsiaNews Fr. Anwar Patras, the Diocese of Rawalpindi, condemned "with force" the kidnapping and forced conversion. "The Hindus in Sindh - adds the priest - live a hard life. The reality is getting harder for them, they are forced to migrate because the state is unable to protect them and their property.”

(Rinkel Kumari) 

From Bosnia to Syria: Is History Repeating Itself?

by Benjamin Schett

Anyone closely following the ongoing crisis in Syria will notice that the desire for reforms is coming from a large part of the Syrian population which has no ties to the armed insurgency supported by foreign powers. These groups, many of them Wahhabi or Salafi terrorists, constitute a serious threat to the unity of Sunni, Shia, Alawite, Christian and Druze living together in a sovereign secular state.

In fact, reports suggest that in places where the armed insurgents have managed to gain control, the actions being carried are tantamount to “ethnic cleansing”. However, as long as those allegedly responsible are acting in a way which serves US-NATO interests, their various undertakings go unreported and media attention is strategically diverted.

(See: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=29842)

In reality, many Syrians who are demanding reforms are not opposed to President Al Assad, and in fact believe in his commitment to implement change. Such reforms, however, require time to be carried out in the face of certain obstacles. Indeed, after decades of Baath rule, certain factions within the current regime have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo rather than having their privileges threatened by major changes brought about through reforms. 

Moreover, there is also a peaceful opposition within the country that stands for change through dialogue with the government, knowing that sudden provocations could plunge the country into chaos. In an interview with “Syria Comment” from October 2011, writer Louay Hussein, an outspoken and longstanding opponent of the Syrian government, warned of further escalation:

“I believe there are two reasons why demonstrations will significantly diminish; first, the violent oppression by the authorities recently and second, the increase in the number of armed operations by groups opposed to the authorities such as 'The Free Syrian Army'. This is why I expect more bloodshed in Syria. Moreover, I worry that if we fail to reach a homegrown settlement of the conflict very quickly, we will clearly witness different aspects of a civil war in the near future.”

(See: http://www.joshualandis.com/blog/?p=12507&cp=all)

The mainstream media has dismissed this assessment and ignored these basic facts. Media attention has focussed on the exiled “opposition” group, the “Syrian National Council” (which is already breaking apart thanks to the domineering role of the Muslim Brotherhood) and the “Free Syrian Army”, supported covertly by the West. In addition, one of Western media's favourite sources of information is the small, London-based organization called the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, whose claims, though unverified, have nevertheless been broadly quoted.

All this bears a striking resemblance to events leading up to last year’s NATO attacks on Libya, in which tens of thousands of Libyan civilians were killed. But there are two key differences: 

1] This time Russia and China have been playing a more decisive role. They have expressed their opposition to actions which might lead to aggression against Syria.

2] The so-called Libyan “rebels” had some kind of a stronghold in the city of Benghazi in the East of the country, from where NATO could bomb their way into Tripoli. Comparable conditions do not prevail in Syria.

Might this be a reason for the Syrian insurgents to increase violence by carrying out bomb attacks and provoking shootings, in order to cause severe reactions from government troops and destabilize the country, and thereby reinforce sectarian conflicts? Namely, until the situation escalates to the point that Western powers feel they can “justify” the need for intervention?

The efforts for a peaceful solution made by former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan would only stand a chance if Western countries and their Saudi and Qatari allies stopped their unilateral support for anti-Assad armed insurgency.

The Lessons of History: Yugoslavia

Historically, this situation is not unique and prompts us to consider how similar events have played out in the past, particularly during the civil war in Yugoslavia in the 1990s which set a historical precedent for armed Western intervention. These tragic conflicts, especially in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo, served as a playground for exercising the destabilization of an entire region, manipulating public opinion in order to start a war of aggression, and carrying out regime change and economic (and partly territorial) colonization.

(See: Michael Parenti's incisive speech on the destruction of Yugoslavia:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEzOgpMWnVs)

Given the extent to which insurgents in Syria can count on full support from the outside, some parallels to the outbreak of the Bosnian civil war (1992 – 1995) are worth emphasizing. Consider the following: during the war, the leader of the Bosnian Muslims, Alija Izetbegovic, supported covertly by the West, set as a priority the creation of an independent Bosnian state under Muslim rule. However, he had to deal with the problem that his vision did not represent the will of Bosnia’s majority population: according to a 1991 census, 44% of the population considered themselves Muslim/Bosniak, 32.5% Serb and 17% Croat.

While quite accurately all of Bosnia's Serb population (one of the three constitutional nations within the republic) did not wish to leave the Yugoslav federation, the Croat side did support the holding of a referendum on an independent Bosnia. However, anyone familiar with the political aspirations of Croatia's then president Franjo Tudjman and his Bosnian Croat allies will understand that the Croatian side certainly did not favour Bosnia's independence because they wanted to live in such a state; rather, breaking Bosnia apart from Yugoslavia was supposed to be the first step in amalgamating the Bosnian territories having a Croatian majority population within the Croatian “motherland”.

Facing these facts and knowing that civil war had already broken out in Croatia in 1991, the only reasonable way to prevent a catastrophe in Bosnia would have been through sincere negotiations on all sides. This, in fact, was the goal of the most popular Bosnian Muslim politician at the time, Fikret Abdic, who considered himself pro-Yugoslav and received the most votes in Bosnia’s 1990 elections. Nevertheless, Izetbegovic – the candidate favoured and supported by US officials – seized the Bosnian presidency instead. (Incidentally, the fact that Izetbegovic had been in prison for having disturbed the order of the Yugoslav state by stating there could be “no peace or coexistence between the Islamic faith and non-Islamic social and political institutions” in a text called the “Islamic Declaration” did not seem to pose a problem to Washington.)

In March 1992, a peaceful solution for Bosnia finally seemed to be within reach. All three Bosnian leaders (Alija Izetbegovic/Muslim, Radovan Karadzic/Serb and Mate Boban/Croat) signed the so-called Lisbon Agreement, which proposed ethnic power-sharing on all administrative levels and the delegation of central government to local ethnic communities. However Izetbegovic withdrew his signature only ten days later, after having met with the US ambassador to Yugoslavia, Warren Zimmermann. It has been widely confirmed that the US was pushing for an immediate recognition of Bosnia at that time.

(See short clip from “Yugoslavia – An Avoidable War”:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Iobb8xMFRc)

A few weeks later, war broke out, and the West was one step closer to achieving its goal of nationwide destabilization. Could the same fate be in store for Syria given the parallel involvement of the West in Syria?

In Syria as in Bosnia, efforts to find a compromise would mean putting pressure on both sides to reach an agreement. But if one side already has full support from the West, what incentive is there in pursuing a compromise with the government? In Syria, the insurgents had foreign support from the outset, automatically sabotaging the possibility of real negotiations.

Further exacerbating the situation, the mainstream media has been aggressively building the case for intervention in Syria. Several statements made by Syrian government opponents and some Western media blame the Syrian government of being responsible for the bloody terrorist bomb attacks in Damascus and Aleppo that took place on the weekend of March 17 and 18. But they were stuck for an answer regarding why it would be in President Al Assad’s interest to cause an escalation in the two largest cities of the country where he is still enjoying the support of a majority of the population.

If we go back to the Bosnian example, we can see who has historically taken advantage of such events. On May 27, 1992, a massacre took place in the Bosnian capital Sarajevo, killing many innocent people waiting in line to get some bread. The terrible event was immediately and repeatedly broadcast across the world. Just four days later, on May 31, harsh UN sanctions were imposed on the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. For Western decision-makers, it was clear that the Serbs were responsible for the crime. Many experts disagreed with the finger-pointing, and reference should be made particularly to Major-General Lewis MacKenzie, then Commander of the Bosnia UN troops:

“The streets had been blocked off just before the incident. Once the crowd was let in and lined up, the media appeared but kept their distance. The attack took place, and the media were immediately on the scene. The majority of the people killed are alleged to be 'tame Serbs'.”

(http://www.srpska-mreza.com/Bosnia/Sarajevo/breadline.html)

Similar events took place in 1994 and 1995

(See for example “Yugoslavia – An Avoidable War”, in its entirety:

http://video.google.de/videoplay?docid=5860186121153047571#)

This finally caused the NATO bombing campaign against Bosnian Serbs, carried out between August 30 and September 20, 1995, as justified by Western calls for “humanitarian intervention”. Following from the Damascus and Aleppo attacks, could a similar “justification” be around the corner for Syria?

A great irony, of course is the hypocritical stance taken by the US government, which calls for peace on the one hand and is a leading global supplier of weapons on the other. While the Obama administration might have called on the Syrian rebels to lay down their arms, there is a vast difference between official statements and what is being carried out on the ground. Indeed, there is currently a multi-billion dollar deal underway between the US and Saudi Arabia (a leading arms supplier for the Syrian rebels) for the sale of US advanced weapons.

(See: http://rt.com/news/saudi-arabia-protests-piety-514/)

This double standard was certainly applied in Bosnia, where the CIA was secretly smuggling weapons into the area despite an arms embargo officially being in place. (See: “Wie der Dschihad nach Europa kam: Gotteskrieger und Geheimdienste auf dem Balkan” [“How Jihad Came to Europe: Holy Warriors and Secret Services in the Balkans”] by Jürgen Elsässer, 2008)

It is worth noting that in the cases of both Syria and Bosnia (among other examples), Al Qaeda-affiliated mercenaries from several Arab countries were involved. In Syria, they integrated the “opposition”, heralded by the Western mainstream media as the victims of the government crackdown.

This should come as no surprise. Those who operate under the “Al Qaeda” label are often serving the interests of Washington. In Bosnia, where Mujahideen fighters trained Bosnian soldiers and fought against Serbs and Croats, the Al Qaeda leadership had to approve military actions by the Bosnian Muslim Army. (See: Balkan Investigative Reporting Network,http://www.bim.ba/en/79/10/4113)

One of the Bosnian Muslims who refused to fight against the Serbs, the previously mentioned Fikret Abdic, created his own safe haven by making a peace agreement with the Serbian side and by forming the “Autonomous Province of Western Bosnia”, located in the area of Velika Kladusa. British diplomat David Owen described him as “forthright, confident and different from the Sarajevan Muslims. He was in favour of negotiating and compromising with Croats and Serbs to achieve a settlement, and scathing about those Muslims who wanted to block any such settlement.” (David Owen, “Balkan Odyssey”, 1995, S. 82)

In August 1995, under a joint attack carried out by Izetbegovic's troops and the Croatian army (both Western allies), Abdic's peaceful, autonomous province collapsed. Often in the media, conflicts are portrayed with reference to “good guys versus bad guys”, peacekeepers versus terrorists, us versus them. As this example from Bosnia shows, the full story cannot be accurately conveyed using these stylized concepts; not all Muslims were automatically against the Serbs, and certainly not all were interested in having Izetbegovic as president. 

And in Syria, it is clear that not all of those who are demanding democracy are enemies of the Al Assad government. However, delving into the “grey area” of the good/evil dichotomy puts into question the clear-cut “justification” for intervention, and casting such doubts is certainly not in the interest of the mainstream media and the Western interests they serve. In order to avoid misunderstanding, the people on all sides suffered terribly in the Bosnian civil war. But as in Syria, it is important to establish who has an interest in triggering increased social chaos and violence.

Throughout the entire Yugoslav civil war, separatist forces served the Western agenda which consisted in destabilizing and destroying an entire country. Yugoslavia had free education, an equitable distribution of income. It preserved its independence by being a key player within the Non-aligned Movement. In turn, this historical stance by Yugoslavia served as an example for other countries of the Non-aligned Movement which refused to accept the neoliberal diktats of the IMF.

In the context of the Balkans, the Serbian people bore the brunt of the blame from the West, and were vilified largely because they firmly opposed the disintegration of Yugoslavia. Serbia was the largest Yugoslav nation and suffered heavily during World War Two, when the Croatian fascist Ustasa movement systematically slaughtered Croatia's and Bosnia’s Serb population. It was largely this trauma that made the idea of living in the independent states of Croatia and Bosnia, both led by extremists, unbearable for most Serbs. A realistic image of Serbia’s role in the Yugoslav wars was given by then Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic, in an interview made during the Kosovo war:

“We are not angels. Nor are we the devils you have made us out to be. Our regular forces are highly disciplined. The paramilitary irregular forces are a different story. Bad things happened, as they did with both sides during the Vietnam War, or any war for that matter.”

(See: http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/jared/MiloInt.html)

All facts considered, the same could easily be said of the Syrian army and other groups fighting on Al Assad’s side. But maintaining an ambivalent position on current events in Syria, as is the trend among many mainstream liberal-leftist circles, means giving in to the neo-colonial and imperialist agenda of Western powers and their pseudo-humanitarian justification. And this despite the fact that they have actively stirred up ethnic and/or religious hatred and ignored reasonable voices, in Yugoslavia as well as in Syria, in order to follow the old Latin concept of “divide et impera”.

Author's Note: According to the latest reports, Syria's government has accepted Kofi Annan's 6-point peace plan. On April 1, the “Friends of Syria” will be meeting in Istanbul, bringing together mostly Arab and Western countries favouring stronger action against President Bashar al-Assad's government. Time will tell how these developments will impact the Syrian crisis and the potential effectiveness of the peace plan, knowing that so many outside players are acting in the background. [The meeting failed – ed]

 

Courtesy: http://www.vijayvaani.com/FrmPublicDisplayArticle.aspx?id=2257

Zardari loved, Rushdie hated in 'Secular' India

Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari is all set to visit India, not on an official diplomatic visit but on a spiritual endeavour to visit the Ajmer Dargah. The reaction of the so called hardline Muslim janta is surprisingly calm after this news came out, which was strikingly different from the treatment meted out to controversial author and writer of the infamously famous ‘The Satanic Verses.’ 

 There was such a hue and cry after it was announced that author Salman Rushdie will be visiting his ‘own’ country to attend the Jaipur Literature Festival, but Zardari’s visit to supposedly ‘enemy’ territory got a very lucid response. While Rushdie managed to irk some mullah’s and others with his non-conformist ideals on Islam and his expert work of fiction; Zardari is more welcome in a country that had to face the most brunt of Pakistan-sponsored extremism. 

When finally Rushdie came to India to attend the Indian Today Conclave, he spoke passionately about him being barred from entering India, and commented, “This is a case of the world turned upside down. What's happening here, tonight, is what I would call 'normal'. A writer of Indian birth, who loves this country, who has spent much of his life writing about it, shows up to talk to an Indian audience about India. I would call that normal. What is abnormal is for that to be prevented. And we seem to be in danger of getting this upside down."

Zardari, on the other hand, should ideally have faced more criticism on Indian soil considering that the neighbouring Pakistan have been instrumental in carrying veiled attacks across the border, with 9/11 being the last nail in the coffin. Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani has been quoted as saying during an economic forum in China, “China's friend is our friend and China's enemy is our enemy." This statement only shows Pak’s feelings towards India and how the all-weather relationship between Pakistan and China will only spell doom for Indian in the long run. – [Read: Salman Rushdie calls off India visit after assassin threat]

On a previous unsuccessful attempt to visit India in 2008 to attend a summit organized by a capital based media group, Zardari spoke eloquently on the emotions shared by Pakistani’s and Indian’s. He said in a video conference, “There`s a little bit of India in every Pakistani and a little bit of Pakistan in every Indian. They have to settle their issues so that the coming generations live peacefully.”

But it is the political leaders that have swayed violently between what’s right and what’s not to the whims and fancies of a select few that have caused the most damage during Rushdie’s proposed visit. When Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee pulled out of the India Today Conclave after coming to know that Rushdie was attending; citing that there was pressure from his constituency, Jangipur, in West Bengal that has a large Muslim population. 

Omar Abdullah, CM of Jammu and Kashmir after waxing eloquently that Salman Rushdie was not unwelcome in Indian stated, “We underestimate the intelligence of Indian Muslims when we try to raise issues like this which have no bearing on a day to day concerns of Muslims. I don't believe that there are many Muslims in India for whom visa to Salman Rushdie will be an election issue.” In spite of his progressive thoughts, he too pulled out of attending the conclave attended by the controversial author conforming to hardline beliefs. Similarly, young UP CM Akhilesh Yadav also succumbed to political pressure to not meet Salman Rushdie considering that lower caste and Muslim votes were the primary reason for his stunning win in the Assembly elections and defying them will be strongly opposed. 

But it remains a fact that when India boasts of its ‘tolerant’ attitude towards all evils, the aam aadmi has to face the brunt of terrorism wreaking havoc in their everyday lives. And if there is one message to the politicos out there who wants to blow up every non-issue, it is terrorism, and only terrorism that makes walking across the street or catching a metro train seem like risking your life at the hands of such violent forces and not reading a book that purportedly “incites religious intolerance”.

Courtesy:

http://news.oneindia.in/feature/2012/zardari-loved-rushdie-hated-in-secular-india.html

Jonathan Kay: From Brampton to Bangladesh, anti-Hindu hate is all too real

by Jonathan Kay 

The last week has done much to educate me in the ethnic politics of South Asia. After writing this blog spot criticizing those Canadian Sikh activists who expressed support for convicted terrorist Balwant Singh Rajoana, I received an avalanche of hate mail. Many of the messages repeated the same words, and clearly were part of an organized mass-mailing campaign against me and CBC reporter Terry Milewski (who also has reported on Rajoana’s supporters) — similar to the Tamil mass-mailing campaigns that targeted me when I wrote negatively about the Tamil Tigers.

Still, two of my critics’ themes jumped out at me.

The first theme was that Rajoana is not really a terrorist — even though he has admitted to masterminding the 1995 bomb plot that killed the Chief Minister of Punjab, and 17 innocent bystanders. Instead, the Sikhs who emailed me insisted, he was a warrior, fighting back against the persecution of Sikhs by India and its local allies (including the Punjab Chief Minister, Beant Singh. who himself was Sikh). Many militant Sikh activists compared Rajoana to Nelson Mandela. Another common claim was that Beant Singh was a sort of South Asian Nazi. “If a Jew killed Hitler, would he be a terrorist?” one activist Tweeted to me.

I was shocked by how similar these messages were to the ones I received from radical Muslim activists who complain when National Post writers denounce Palestinian suicide bombings. The thesis is exactly the same: Don’t call so-and-so a terrorist — he’s a “martyr.”

A related theme among my critics was that, by calling Rajoana a “terrorist,” I am somehow attacking all Sikhs. This plainly isn’t true. Yet I lost count of all the messages I got accusing me of being “divisive” and “racist.” I had to keep reminding myself that most Canadian Sikhs don’t lionize suicide bombers — it’s only the radicals, the same ones who still make excuses for the Air India bombing.

It is important to concede that, during the crackdown against the Punjab insurgency of the 1980s, many innocent Sikhs were indeed killed — including during the military’s bloody raid on the Golden Temple of Amritsar (which had become a military base for the Sikhs’ most radical cadres). Some of the Indian police and soldiers involved in the counterinsurgency engaged in slaughter and rape. After Sikh bodyguards killed Indira Gandhi, armed mobs killed innocent Sikhs in pogroms.

All of this is true — even if Sikh activists are careful never to mention why the Indian counterinsurgency was necessary in the first place: Sikh gangs took control of much of the Punjab, and terrorized their fellow Sikhs. From Afghanistan to the Middle East to the Punjab, all counterinsurgency campaigns are bloody. This one was no different.

What I found especially disturbing was the manner in which many of my Sikh correspondents demonized India’s Hindu majority, accusing them of all sorts of horrific crimes. Many correspondents threw the words “holocaust” and “genocide” around casually. Some spoke of Indian Hindus the way Arab defenders of suicide terrorism speak of Jews.

What makes this accusation absurd (as well as hateful) is that it completely ignores the economic and political prosperity that Sikhs have achieved in recent decades. The Punjab is one of the most vibrant parts of India, and Sikhs are well-represented throughout India’s elites. This helps explain why Sikh separatism is a dead letter in India. It is primarily in immigrant communities such as Canada, many of whose leaders are still stuck in a time warp from the time of their arrival, that militant Sikh politics are still in fashion.

The propaganda campaign against Hindus gets relatively scant attention in Western journalistic circles, despite the many articles we pump out about Muslim anti-Semitism and (more recently) anti-Christian violence in Egypt, Iraq and Syria. Presumably this is because we take it for granted that Hindus are well-protected, since they comprise a majority in India, one of the world’s rising powers.

But not all Hindus live in India. In neighboring Muslim-majority Bangladesh, Jamaat-e-Islami militants recently have been attacking Hindu temples, and looting Hindu-owned homes and shops in the southeastern part of the country. The campaign has nothing to do with Hindu predations against Muslims (as in Pakistan, the ethnic cleansing than began in the 1940s drove the vast majority of Hindus out of Bangladesh), but rather is a spillover from opposition to a tribunal that is prosecuting crimes committed by Islamists during the 1971 war. Like Jews and Westerners, Hindus make convenient targets for local demagogues.

In Pakistan, as I’ve written before, paranoia about the Hindu faith is rife. And many madrassas teach students to despise Hindus as much as any other “infidel.” Such attitudes have taken center stage in a bizarre legal-religious case that has unfolded in recent weeks in Pakistan’s Sindh province — one of the few areas of South Asia where Muslims and Hindus generally do get along. On Feb. 24, men took a 19-year-old Hindu woman named Rinkel Kumari from her home in a small village named Mirpur Mathelo. A few hours later, an Imam called the woman’s family to inform them that Kumari had converted to Islam. A few hours after that, she was married to a Muslim man. She had been renamed “Faryal Bibi.”

The woman herself has claimed that her conversion was voluntary. But during the whole process, the woman has been surrounded by well-armed Muslim minions of a local politician renowned for such gaudy stunts.

In any event, Pakistan’s 3-million remaining Hindus have grounds for suspicion. “In many Sindhi towns, wealthy Hindu traders have been targeted by kidnappers,” the New York Times reports. “Conversions, which are freighted with notions of collective honor, can present a jarring social fault line. Officials with the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan have spoken of up to 20 forced conversions a month — and Hindu families fleeing for India — but they admit that the research is thin.”

The good news is that, in Kumari’s case, some powerful people have begun speaking out in favour of Hindu rights, including legislator Azra Fazal Pechuho, the sister of Pakistan’s president, who on March 15 gave a speech in Parliament calling on fellow lawmakers to protect the many Hindu women who are being forcibly confined in Muslim madrassas, and forced to marry Muslim men.

Good on her for standing up against targeted Hindus. Here in the West, where we always are on guard for hatred against Jews, Christians, Muslims and Sikhs, we should do the same.

Courtesy: http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2012/04/02/jonathan-kay-from-brampton-to-bangladesh-anti-hindu-hate-is-all-too-real/

A few talks with Rajiv Malhotra

INTERVIEW: Rajiv Malhotra on where his work fits within the Hindu tradition

Shri Malhotra, what are your views on gurus, acharyas, swamis and other leaders of Sampradayic traditions?  How do you see their role in the modern world? When you represent Hinduism at various public fora, are you presuming to replace these individuals and institutions with a new mould of spokesperson?

RM: Can anyone presume to "replace" them, ever? I can't imagine how. 

The leaders of Sampradayic lineages and mathas are not merely an integral feature of Hindu Dharma. They are, in themselves, proof of the core competence of our Dharmic traditions. Each enlightened master transmits the distilled wisdom of generations of embodied practice in a particular technique, a specific tradition customized to the community he or she teaches. The very existence of such masters is a testament to the enduring vitality of Dharmic spiritual practice.  It is from their inspiration, their teachings, that others in turn are guided on their own paths of personal spiritual discovery. 

In my  own life, and the task I've committed myself to, I continuously derive inspiration from such teachers. In the 1990s, it was the influence of my own guru that inspired me to give up all business activity at the peak of my material success, and devote all my energies to the work I have taken up. 

My immersion and devout association with many Sampradayic traditions goes all the way back to my childhood... when I was raised in a prominent Arya Samaj family of Punjab. Early on, I became involved with the Ramakrishna Mission in Delhi, and studied Gita under Swami Chinmayanand.  In the 1970s, I was initiated into Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's Transcendental Meditation movement, in which I was active. About 20 years ago, I became an adherent of Sri Sri Ravi Shankar's  Art of Living as well. 

I've also studied with Yogi Amrit Desai, the founder of Kripalu Yoga in the USA,  and was certified as a teacher of Yoga Nidra under this tradition.  I've attended workshops with Swami Nityananda as well.  My experience of all these sadhanas, has proved invaluable to me.

Besides having availed of treasured spiritual interactions with living masters,  I've made it my business to study and imbibe the works of the historical greats: Sri Aurobindo, Ramana Maharshi, Adi Shankara, and many more recent interpreters and thinkers of our tradition.  The systematic study of Madhyamika Buddhism has also added to my understanding of Dharma.

There's no question of my "replacing" any of these exponents of our tradition. Indeed, without the millennia of cumulative wisdom they embody, I might not even have a Dharmic tradition to fight for today.

You appear to have benefited from these relationships a great deal, but have you given back to such spiritual masters in any form? How have you helped them?

RM: I'm continuously engaged with many of them, as part of the work I do. In the process, I try to be of service in whatever form is needed of me.

Swami Dayananda Saraswati, head of the Hindu Dharma Acharya Sabha, is one of the individuals I've worked very closely with.  On many occasions, he's asked for my participation in strategic planning and discussion of issues facing Hinduism across the global theater. In 2008, I had the privilege of being centrally involved in the Second Hindu-Jewish Leadership Summit, which he convened.  The summit concluded with a historic resolution removing certain critical biases that had long endured about Hinduism... and much of the language that I proposed, as lead scholar, was included in that resolution.

[Interviewer's Note: See the text of this declaration at:http://www.scribd.com/doc/2258129/2nd-Hindu-Jewish-SummitFinal-DeclarationP-1#archive ]

Building on the success of that, I was once again included at the Hindu-Buddhist Summit of 2010 in Cambodia,  which aimed to conclude strategic resolutions between our two Dharmic traditions. 

I've also been blessed with opportunities to be of service to the Chinmaya Mission. When their temple project in New Jersey faced legal hurdles, I actively mobilized supporting voices that were successful in overturning the local biases. Recently, I was invited to speak before three large groups by the Chinmaya Mission at Washington, DC...  other centers have sent invitations as well.

I was privileged to have been hosted by Ramakrishna Mission mathas for days together, and to have participated in discussions at the highest level regarding issues of major concern for the future of Dharma.  Subsequently, I was honored by their invitation to write an article for a special volume they are producing to celebrate Swami Vivekanand's 150th anniversary. 

Additionally, I've shared the dais with leaders like Sri Sri Ravi Shankar on many occasions, and availed of private sessions with them to discuss the kinds of issues I raise in my writings.  I'm active in the HMEC (Hindu Mandirs Executive Committee), which is doing great work in bringing together the Hindu temples of North America on issues of common concern.  I can't even begin to estimate the number of times I've been invited by Hindu temples across the USA, to address their congregations. 

I do not cite these instances to emphasize the degree of my personal achievement, but rather out of gratitude that I've been able to provide seva at so many levels. 

Some have been critical of your statement that our Acharyas should have looked beyond their traditional roles and also studied philosophers such as  Hegel and Kant, to refute the West in its own terms.  How do you justify such a statement? Do you think that the Acharyas have failed in this role, and therefore are to blame for the intellectual bankruptcy of our Brown Saheb class today?

RM: You say "look beyond their traditional roles."  In fact, purva-paksha is very much part of the traditional roles our Acharyas have performed for thousands of years!  How else do you explain the sublime intellectual vigor of Adi Shankara in studying the diverse theological positions that existed in his day, and traveling the length and breadth of the country to debate the adherents of them all?  

What do the Vaisheshika teachings expounded by Kanada,  or the Nyaya Sutras of Akshapada Gautama represent?  They are the vibrant response of Hindu traditions after having conducted purva-paksha of contemporary Buddhist and Jaina philosophies. This sort of work has been the life-blood of relevance and vitality, pumping through the veins of Dharmic tradition since it began.

I do not "fault" our traditional Acharyas for the emergence of Brown Sahebs at all... far from it. In fact, it is thanks to their efforts that Dharmic traditions endure independently even today, despite the best efforts of Brown Sahebs to aid in their cultural digestion by the West. 

It is not a "failure" I'm speaking of here... rather, it is a tragedy, and the result of 800 years of predatory colonialism by brutal foreign agencies.  The magnitude of trauma that our society and its institutions experienced from this, is hard to even imagine.  Continuous, relentless suppression and frequently realized threats of extermination will eventually drive a society to look inwards to the exclusion of all else... to "keep its head down" so as to appear less threatening to the dominant outsider.  But in keeping  one's head down, one's horizon becomes limited, and one is denied the opportunity for vigorous purva-paksha.

The Macaulayization of our educational system directly produced the Brown Sahebs as its offspring; but that was only one aspect of it. The other aspect was to systematically, viciously delegitimize Dharmic traditions of knowledge by all methods of cultural, economic and physical violence available to it.  So it is hardly a "fault" of our Acharyas that collectively, India's philosophical perspective turned inwards; rather, it is  a credit to them that our traditions survived through such monstrously difficult times. 

Yet, the fact remains that the perspective did turn inwards; had the same intellectual vigor of Adi Shankara been applied to a purva-paksha of the West, had we studied and understood the positions of Kant and Hegel and engaged in rigorous, logical refutation using our own traditional hermeneutics, who knows what might have happened!  Instead, the Brown Sahebs were given the "legitimacy" of Macaulayite education, and through them, the Western perspectives of Kant and Hegel became universalized. 

I do not say all this to put the blame on any of our own people, especially not the enlightened masters who inspire me and whom I engage with regularly in my work.  I say it because it needs to be recognized as a tragedy of history... and corrected by us in the present.

So how are you helping present-day Hindu samaj to correct this tragedy? How have you contributed to arming modern exponents of Dharmic tradition, with the instruments to conduct such a "purva paksha" of the West?

RM: I continuously strive towards conducting, and equipping others to conduct, such a purva-paksha. In fact, that's one of the primary goals of the Infinity Foundation I have established.

For instance, over a ten-year period, we provided grants to a department of the University of Hawaii that researches and teaches Indian philosophy. Among other things, our efforts produced a Sanskrit book that explains modern Western thought to Sanskrit scholars. 

That book was written by Professor Arindam Chakrabarti, himself a highly regarded scholar of both Dharmic and Western thought.  Professor Chakrabarti used the text in conducting workshops with a number of Sanskrit scholars, at Tirupati University as well as at Varanasi. 

The results were astoundingly clear in revealing the immense potential for our traditional scholars to study the Western "other", and to respond to it with our own system of hermeneutics, our traditional siddhanta. The success of Professor Chakrabarti's workshops was met with many requests for more such programs to be convened. 

More recently, at the World Sanskrit Conference held at Delhi in 2012, I presented my thesis on this issue as addressed in "Being Different". Again, the responses were very encouraging: multiple invitations from the heads of Sanskrit universities and traditional mathas, requesting further workshops on purva-paksha. Similarly, following a seminar on my work hosted by Banaras Hindu University early this year, the Dean of their Faculty of Arts asked for my help in creating a new center for intercultural studies, aimed specifically at initiating purva-paksha. 

Most people would agree that all this indicates a widespread and resolute acceptance of my thesis, by many of today's Dharmic scholars and spiritual leaders. Among modern Indian intellectuals rooted in Dharmic tradition, a consensus is already forming that it is desirable, indeed necessary, to study Western thought... and to respond using the refined and sophisticated techniques of siddhanta. 

Given this, it's rather curious that a handful of cynics... these "critics" you speak of... appear to be raising "concerns" about my thesis.

What, exactly, are their "concerns" based upon? Are they aware of what purva-paksha is... of its role as a scholarly technique, in our intellectual tradition spanning thousands of years? Do they even realize that India originated critical thinking and debate many centuries before the West conceived of such things? 

For that matter, what depth of substantive research have they contributed on this issue... or any other... which qualifies them to make such sweeping pronouncements of dismissal? 

Their attitude in this regard betrays a blind adherence to prejudice... something more characteristic of the dogma-based religions of the desert, than of any Dharmic practice. 

Some of your critics also claim that you, yourself, are doing a "U-Turn" by engaging with Christians and others through the inter-faith dialogue process. In doing this, aren't you simply providing Christians with another window to continue their conversion of Hindus, and digestion of Dharmic wisdom?

RM: Let me ask you something. If I were not to engage in the "inter-faith dialogue process"... would it mean that all "inter-faith" dialogue would stop?

No. It would go on. And it would continue on the Western universalist terms that have already privileged the Abrahamic faiths for too long! 

I do not create windows for inculturation or contextualization by engaging in inter-faith dialogue. The missionary Abrahamic faiths are continuously engaged in a number of processes to create such windows and exploit them. Dialogue is only one such process... there are many more, including the appropriation of Dharmic traditions without attribution,  the denial of mutual respect to other religions, the maintenance of history-centric exclusivity, the adoption of native cultural forms of spiritual expression to disguise the ingress of missionary Christianity. So many things, and they all go on. 

I am not contributing to any of these processes by joining in inter-faith dialogue... in fact, I endeavor to bring some honesty to the dialogue, and level the playing field, by pointing these things out! 

 If someone did not point these things out, we would go on slumbering, and dreaming dreams of "sameness"... thinking that Western universalism was harmless in privileging Judeo-Christian faiths, because in the end all religions are the "same". 

In fact, they are not. In fact, Dharmic faiths are irreconcilably different from Abrahamic faiths in some fundamental ways.  It is only when we remain ignorant of the differences, that inter-faith dialogue can become a source of threat to us. When we are informed about the differences,  and demand that dialogue must proceed from a position of mutual respect... then, what is the threat? It doesn't exist, except in the reactionary minds of those who remain hopelessly and persistently colonized.

But doesn't interfaith dialogue itself provide an opportunity for missionary Christianity to further its agenda by deceitful inculturation? How do you respond to the charge that you're contributing to this agenda?

RM: I think the question has oversimplified and confused two entirely separate issues.

Inculturation and interfaith engagement exist independently of each other. Of course, we see both phenomena exert themselves in Indian society today. 

Among the Hindu elite, the fluffy popularization of the "sameness" myth... the idea that all religions are ultimately the same... has the effect of inculturating Indians in educated circles. This isn't a consequence of interfaith dialogue, but of a fad created by some of our own writers and thinkers.

Meanwhile, inculturation in villages... where missionaries put on the external trappings of hindu forms of worship, such as aarti, and apply these to Jesus... is entirely unlinked to interfaith discussions.

Conversely, much interfaith dialogue isn't based on inculturation, and has separate dynamics of its own. So it's important to recognize, and treat each of these things as an independent issue.

Firstly, let's look at inculturation, and how I've confronted it.

To begin with, my critiques of the "sameness" myth have considerably impacted Indian intellectuals' appreciation of the dangers inherent in inculturation... of the deceitful claims of "sameness" that are used to confuse and disorient our people.  My entire thesis about "difference" focuses on the need to retain awareness that we are NOT the same, so that external predators cannot stealthily digest our traditional wisdom.

Critics of my work don't seem to have the background required to understand the nature of the "sameness" myth... which, ironically, is being propagated by many of our own teachers and self-appointed spokespersons.

Moreover,  I've made a deep study of the history, psychology and politics of Westerners who appropriate and digest critical elements of our Dharma, aiming to boost Western identity while depleting our own. This is what I refer to as my U-Turn Theory, and as far as I know it's the only major study of its kind in existence. 

Beyond this, I've sought to introduce a whole new vocabulary that deepens our understanding of inculturation.  You will find that many terms of this vocabulary, including "sameness", "being different", "digestion", and "u-turn" are now gaining widespread usage, becoming part of the popular idiom among thinking Indians.

Has anyone else, in recent years, conducted this extent of research on the subject... combined with fact-finding at the ground level, with an analytical understanding of both Western and Indian identity?  I'm not aware that anyone else has done so, or articulated their findings as effectively.

Secondly, let's address the subject of my involvement with interfaith dialogue.

Besides the events that are explicitly convened for the purpose of "interfaith dialogue", there are many other instances of interfaith interaction that are not openly identified as such.

You have discussions on TV or radio involving representatives of various faiths; often, unfortunately, the Hindu participant, who is deeply knowledgeable of dharmic tradtions,  in these discussions comes across as ill-prepared to counter the arguments of the other representatives

You have the United States government making appointments to various bodies, where discussions occur that are very similar to what goes on at "interfaith" events... shouldn't we aim  to better empower the representatives who speak for us there? Or are we better advised to boycott such discussions, so that our place is taken by mala-fide opponents who claim to speak on our behalf? 

When I first began to expose the biases of the interfaith movement, I realized that such biases were frequently exercised by designating certain types of individuals for participation in discussions on Hinduism. These included anti-Hindu leftists, Indian or Western Christians, and token "Hindus" who were neither qualified nor confident enough to speak up assertively. I responded with an awareness campaign urging our temples, our community leaders and our youth to demand a seat at the table for authoritative, knowledgeable voices. 

We must realize that interfaith events are not centered on Hinduism, but on religions in general... Muslims, Christians, Jews and others have many motives of their own to participate in such discussions. Our absence as Hindus will not be enough to kill any interfaith event. The events will simply go on without us, and we will be represented by proxies who are either inadequate or hostile to our purposes.

In any case, the earlier problem has been alleviated somewhat; it has now become more common for Hindus to be invited to such gatherings. 

Today, by contrast, we have a new problem. There is a clamoring horde of Hindu spokespersons who present themselves as ambassadors of Dharma, but in fact, end up selling us out. Some of these individuals have genuine intentions. Others are in it for self-aggrandizement, ego-inflation, prestige, or to network for professional or business opportunities. 

All too often, our would-be ambassadors are handicapped by lack of training in debate, insufficient expertise in Dharmic scholarship, and minimal familiarity with the issues we face. Most of all, they lack any education in conducting purva-paksha of the Western mindset. All these handicaps have proved very costly to us.

To reverse these handicaps, we must organize workshops and educational programs. We must rigorously train the aspiring ambassadors of Dharma, equip them with the knowledge they need, and arm them to face public forums with confidence, so that they're unafraid even to go on the offensive when that's necessary. This has been another major focus of my efforts, as they relate specifically to interfaith engagement.

From your explanations, it appears that the arguments being used by some of your critics... or should I say detractors... are quite spurious. However, they continue to insist that you are against our spiritual leaders, that some of them are against you... why is this?

RM: According to our Dharma, one must draw one's own conclusions based on the evidence of one's own experience. Hearsay is no substitute at all.

In this case, the appropriate thing to do is to find out which specific gurus or acharyas, allegedly, are purported to have expressed hostile opinions towards me.  Personally, I am unaware of any who have. 

As I've mentioned before,  my collaboration has been requested... and continues to be requested... by so many groups affiliated with a number of different Sampradayic traditions, both in India and in North America.  I'm honored by the opportunity to serve them through writing, speaking engagements, discussions on strategy, and so much more. I hardly think that such  relationships could be predicated on a basis of hostility... do you?

I don't claim to understand why some people persist in making these sorts of allegations about me. The allegations themselves are easily identifiable as unfounded, and that's what matters. 

One might examine the relationship of my detractors with the types of individuals and traditional institutions, that they're trying to portray as being hostile towards me. Do they have a depth of engagement with these institutions, similar to mine?  Is their involvement as consistently sought after by these institutions, as mine?  If not, then what qualifies them to judge the nature of something that's clearly outside their own realm of experience?  Of course, judgments borne of personal prejudice don't need to be qualified in this way... but most people wouldn't consider such judgments to be valid, either.

Do you think that you're being attacked by some people out of simple jealousy? A few individuals seem particularly obsessive about making these sorts of personal attacks on you. Yet, they seem to lack any personal contributions or achievements in your field of scholarship, that might lend credibility or authority to their attacks. How do you view such attacks: do they reflect a personal grudge, or a psychological issue?

RM:  I'm really not interested in reversing the smear. Let such persons do what they will. I shall continue with my work.

Are you ever concerned that such nuisance attacks might adversely impact your work, or your standing with others?

RM: My sva-dharma does not demand that I must compete against anybody for electoral victories, public approval, high-profile appointments or other contests of popularity. I'm busy enough as a writer and public speaker...busier than ever these days, with all the invitations to various engagements coming in. 

It's hard enough to keep up with the legitimate demands on my time and energy...  so these sorts of silly insinuations are hardly worth bothering with!   I do not think that the energetic, involved collaborators that I’d welcome would turn away from my work because of such attacks. In fact the number of serious thinkers, groups and invitations to conduct briefings has kept growing rapidly.

Courtesy: http://indospheric.blogspot.in/2012/03/interview-rajiv-malhotra-on-where-his.html