The latest issue of India Abroad (Sept.24) seems to have a theme running in its many reports, and that is pluralism Vs fundamentalism, all pertain to the Muslim attitude to the believers of other religions, and mainly the Hindus.
As has been rightly pointed out by Ed Royce, United States Representative from California, Hindus suffer "more discrimination than just about any other ethnic group" in South Asia and ethnic cleansing that had taken place in Pakistan where "the fact that Pakistan was once 25 percent Hindu" indicates the theocratic nature of the state of Pakistan, where even Shias and Ahmedias are treated as non-believers.
Ethnic cleansing has happened a few years ago even in Jammu & Kashmir, a Muslim-majority state of the Indian Union, when about 400,000 Kashmiri Hindu Pandits were forced by the Jihadists to leave their home and hearth and stay in tents in Jammu and New Delhi, thanks to the inaction of the Government of India. The same Jehadists have brain-washed or forced/ bribed urchins to throw stones on Indian security forces to get martyrs for their cause – to merge with Pakistan.
Pakistan was created as a homeland for Muslims of the British India, and all the kings were given the right to accede to one or the other state, India and Pakistan. Jammu & Kashmir ruler decided to join India which has adopted a republican constitution assuring equality, liberty and fraternity to all its citizens irrespective of their caste and creed. While India has been one of the most successful democratic experiments in the world, Pakistan has mired itself in theocracy, now fundamentalism and terrorism.
Can there be a civilized modern state and society based only on fundamentalism? Expansionism finished fascism. Totalitarianism killed communism in spite of is humanistic ideals. It is renaissance and reformation that saved Europe and Christianity from fundamentalism. A similar process can revive the glory of Islam. Hindus are blessed with a pluralistic philosophy since the Vedic times, and there have been many reformers throughout the ages beginning with Buddhism and Jainism.
Those liberal Muslims who feel that their religion has been mis-represented in the world should highlight the pluralistic and liberal values in their religion. Holy Koran says, for example: There is no compulsion in religion and the ink of the scholar is holier than the blood of the martyrs.
The liberal Islam of the Middle Ages ( mid-8th century to mid-13th century) created the Islamic Golden Age which promoted art, architecture, mathematics, science, philosophy, poetry and many other human endeavors in the far flung regions of Asia and Europe in centers such as Cairo, Damascus and Cordoba. These centers preserved and translated the Greek, Roman, Indian and Chinese books and became the repositories of knowledge of the world.
Liberalism and fundamentalism are the two choices before the Muslim. First choice would lead to glory, and the second would most likely to lead to wars and destruction. The time has come for the liberal Muslims to make the right choice and lead their community.
http://www.indiaabroad-digital.com/indiaabroad/20100924/?pg=7&pm=1&u1=friend
Sept.22,2010.
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