Coexistence with India – III

by Rishi Tue Feb 26, 2013 11:34 pm

Indian leaders chose the path of inclusiveness to combat communal clashes. Without this wise approach, the vengeance of the Hindu who was vanquished for centuries in his own motherland could have caused immense bloodshed. Imagine a Muslim population whose places of worship are attacked and destroyed for centuries, whose holies are repeatedly insulted for generations and then they rise to freedom and power! What massacres of revenge will you expect?

The gradual cooling down of temper and insanity is possible only in a tolerant democracy which permits diversity and discussion. It is this constitutional openness that saved India from falling apart. We, in Pakistan, chose to decide all matters on religious belief; first our ulema rejected people of other religions as “heretics”, then our own religious minorities one by one.

The question lingers on whether India aspires to annex Pakistan. In 1946, the Muslim League leadership had agreed to remain part of the Indian Federation, in accordance with the Cabinet Mission Plan which provided the Muslim majority provinces with constitutional autonomy. Parties agreed to draft that constitution as the Cabinet Mission Plan stipulated. But within days, the congress policy changed. Maulana Azad, obviously in a considered move, handed over the Congress presidency to Jawahar Lal Nehru, who as the new president declared that the parliament will independently decide matters in the session by majority. The Congress Committee did not reject its president’s statement. This meant a clear move to shed us away as a load which they thought would suck more than serve. They could have kept us if they wished. Time could have weakened our resolve for separation, but that could be then. As for now, after what we have made of ourselves, a perfect hornets’ nest, a paranoid crowd of self-righteous militants, it seems highly improbable for any sane planner of India to annex Pakistan.

This strategy of load shedding by Nehru, Patel and their like could at best be called clever. It was not wise as many humanists warned. Division based on hate is not diversity but disorder. Diversity is individuality in harmony with its world, while disorder is a dismissal of harmony. That clever move made the “Two Nations” waste their trillions on weapons of mass destruction, leaving their teeming millions in abject misery. It brought several wars to the subcontinent and pushed our part to the brink of one civil war after another till it reduced us to diverse tribes of a mythical ummah where no national identity exists.

Do we inherit the sins and liabilities of our ancestors? Yes, because we inherit their virtues and their assets. Like other conquerors, our medieval ancestors ruled their subjects against their will. Hindus never went out of the subcontinent to invade or rule others, while invasion and domination were genetic to Muslims. They preferred to dominate rather than befriend. Conquest and killing leaves lasting scars. Those who are disgraced and defeated pass their memories of pain to the posterity, that breeds new conflicts. Only an admission of misdeeds opens the path to redemption. The contemporary descendants of Vikings, Romans and Mongols do not take pride in the violent history of their ancestors. In contrast, the boastful pride of our past makes us crudely unique and alienates us from the world. An honest admission instead can work as the recipe for coexistence. Such civilized attitudes are not humiliating; they can win us respect among nations. But that is not possible without a strong dismissal of the terrorists who represent the darkest aspects of our psyche.

http://dawn.com/2013/02/26/coexistence-with-india-iii/

by Idéfix Wed Feb 27, 2013 3:12 am

I read all four parts of his blog. This is my favorite passage, from part 2:

Disastrous ambitions of political Islam to rule this region and the world must be exposed as merit-less and suicidal. Islam must be redeemed as a soft and kind path to ethical goodness and humility. Its role must end as a weapon in the hands of an aggressively pretentious but totally uncreative mullah. But that will start only when our leaders realise the threat and discard their strategic assets. It is disturbing to hear that ambitions of strategic depth and parasitic blackmail persist; no redemption is possible if that is true.

Coexistence with India – III

Coexistence with India – III

Re: Coexistence with India – III