A Muslim intellectual who is honest about the Muslim rule in India

A lack of awareness is a precondition for narcissistic pride. Bragging is as natural to a child as humility is to a wise man. An organised movement has been active for centuries to keep us away from wisdom, which grows only when we learn and think. This movement was put in motion in our past to maintain the dominance of Muslim kings and aristocracy who needed some dedicated force to fight for them. Hindu subjects could not be that force. So, Muslims were pumped with pride: the pride of faith, pride of valor, of ability to kill, of sexual prowess.

Our literature is replete with stories of massacre, of ravaging the infidels and their cities, and of sleeping with so many wives, although we claim our ancestors were the kindest, so delicately spiritual, the most pious and just of all mankind. We have been told that reciting the Qur’an was enough to be self-righteous; all skills of life except wielding the sword were low jobs for the subject people. No system of education, therefore, developed during the 800 years of the Muslim rule.

What is learning? What fields need learning? Do we need to know about agriculture, trade, manufacture, health or social matters for a peaceful society? These questions were seldom taken up; countless issues, that need the good ruler’s attention, were left to their fate. Our Muslim kings had little interest in the famous handicrafts of South and East India beyond collecting taxes or using their products. So the ancient India of arts and crafts, of mathematics and music did not grow in any field except some architecture. We make tall claims that our rulers of India established justice and equality, but the tragic truth is that the untouchables were never rescued and Sati was never challenged while our kings collected taxes on Hindu worship.

When the British colonialists ended the rule of our kings, our religious leaders declared it a tragedy for Islam and pitted us against new sciences. The narcissist self-love, which had alienated us from Hindus for centuries, again served as a tool to keep us from “Christian sciences”. Those who pleaded for new sciences were declared infidels and continue to be declared so, to this day. Whatever the motivation of Pakistan’s founding fathers was, our aristocracy and clerics were clear on their mission. The mission was to keep us sick with nostalgia and pride, to hold us from the wisdom of humility. Islam served as the most effective tool to perpetuate their hold.

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