Arun
Shourie on History
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A case in which the English
version of a major book by a renowned Muslim scholar, the fourth
Rector of one of the greatest centers of Islamic learning in India,
listing some of the mosques, including the Babri Masjid, which were
built on the sites and foundations of temples, using their stones
and structures, is found to have the tell-tale passages censored
out... more
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At first, the demand-cum-assurance
was, "If you can bring any proof showing a temple had been
demolished to construct the mosque, we will ourselves demolish the
mosque". A host of documents -- reports of the Archaeological Survey
of India going back to 1891, Gazetteers going back to 1854. Survey
reports going back to 1838 were produced which stated unambiguously
that a Ram temple had been demolished to construct the mosque"...
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Of course, he said, Hindus who
became Muslims must be taken back into the Hindu fold. Otherwise our
numbers will keep dwindling- we used to be around 600 million by the
reckoning of Ferishta, the oldest Muslim historian, now we are just
200 million. "And then", he continued, "every man going out of the
Hindu pale is not only a man less, but an enemy the more."... more |
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The depths to which society had
pushed sections of its own induced the latter to convert to Islam,
for them the conversion was a liberation, and the people who even
today do not see this are "lunatics", says Swami Vivekananda...
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On January 2, 1937 a Professor of
Philosophy from Poland, Krzenski came to see Gandhiji. Krzanski told
Gandhiji that Catholicism was the only true religion... more |
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The traditions of India were rich
as can be. They had attained insights of the first order. A person
who has reflected on what the Buddha has to say on the workings of
the mind for instance, one who has even a little acquaintance with
Buddhist works on psychology will find the writings of, say, Freud
to be high-school level reductionism... more |
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But have we no rights to proclaim
our faith, to preach Gospel? You are the editor of such a large
news-paper. You express your views on issues. Do we not have the
same right? It was Bishop George Anathil, of Indore, the Chairman of
the Commission for Proclamation of the Catholic Bishops Conference
of India... more |
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But in looking at the ritual, at
the idol, at the concept, why not start with the opposite
assumption? Why start by assuming that they are empty, that they are
the remnants of superstition? They had occurred to, they had been
devised by seers, by persons of great insight... more |
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'It is a miracle... can be likened
to the building of the Gothic cathedrals of Europe... There is no
doubt that London has acquired a significant new building of
traditional Indian beauty and interest... We can be grateful that
this has happened in a part of London that needed transforming'...
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The super-speciality hospital
which Satya Sai Baba has set up in Putaparti, the water schemes
which have been inaugurated in Anantpur district to mark his 70th
birthday will, of course, make the difference between life and death
to vast numbers. The other point about projects undertaken at the
direction of these teachers is their managerial excellence. The
projects are invariably completed on schedule: it took just three
years from the permission being granted for the temple in London to
its being opened for worship..... more |
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All sorts of lessons are being
propounded from the events of fifty years ago. But, as usual,
political correctness is keeping commentators from facing up to the
fundamental lesson. The fundamental premises on which the country
was partitioned were that (i) religion defines nationhood; (ii)
though they do not have a common language, though they are separated
by a thousand miles, the Muslims of East and West India are a nation
because of their common adherence to Islam; (iii) moreover, Muslims
are a separate nation from the rest who inhabit the sub-continent;
(iv) they can never get justice in a united India for they will be
swamped by the Hindu majority; (v) once they are given a country of
their own, prosperity, justice, fraternity and all else will flow
automatically; (vi) as Islam is a religion of tolerance, brotherhood
and equality, as it places human dignity above all, people of all
beliefs, creeds, races, languages will enjoy equal rights, and live
in liberty and fraternity.... more |
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No one in the twentieth century
has done as much to rid us of untouchability than Gandhiji. He
attached more importance to ridding Hinduism of this accretion than
to attaining Swaraj. He brought upon himself the hostility of
orthodox opinion in western India, in the South by his
uncompromising stand on the matter. But the other day, speaking
during the commemorative session of Parliament, Kanshi Ram asserted
that abolishing untouchability was never on Gandhiji's agenda. Not
one person stood up to contradict him... more |
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"Rational vs. National," screams
the headline of the new pall-bearer of secularism, the magazine
Outlook. "Tampering with history," proclaims the old pall- bearer,
The Hindu. Having been educated by The Hindu that the "nodal
ministry" for the matter is the Ministry of Human Resource
Development, I ring up the Secretary of that Ministry. Has the
Memorandum of Association of the ICHR been changed?, I ask. No, he
says. It has not been changed, he says... more |
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Answer by the Ministry for Human
Resources Development to Unstarred Question number 3466 in the Rajya
Sabha : "Professor Bipin Chandra was sanctioned a sum of Rs.
75,000/- during 1987-88 for the assignment entitled 'A History of
Indian National Congress'. A sum of Rs. 57,500/- has been released
to him till 23.6.1989. The remaining balance of Rs. 17,500/- is yet
to be released because a formal manuscript in this regard is yet to
be received... more |
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As we have seen, the explicit part
of the Circular issued by the West Bengal Government in 1989 in
effect was that there must be no negative reference to Islamic rule
in India. Although these were the very things which contemporary
Islamic writers celebrated, there must be absolutely no reference to
the destruction of the temples by Muslim rulers, to the forcible
conversion of Hindus, to the numerous other restrictions which were
placed on the Hindu population... more |
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Writes Tasneem Ahmad, "I express
my profound sense of gratitude, very personal regards and respects
to Professor Irfan Habib, who encouraged and guided me at every
stage of the work. In spite of his very pressing engagements and
pre-occupation, he ungrudgingly spared his valuable time to examine
with care every intricate problem, arising out [sic.] during the
course of work." When the entire manuscript has been lifted word for
word from the work of Dr. Parmatma Saran... more |
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The pattern of these textbooks
thus is set in stone : concoct a picture of pre-Islamic society of
Indian history as a period riddled by discord, tensions, inequity
and oppression -- evidence or no evidence; on the other side,
concoct a picture of the Islamic period as one in which a "composite
culture" flowered, one in which, in spite of the errors of few who
acted out of normal, non-religious motives, there was peace and
harmony -- evidence or no evidence... more |
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Arun Shourie is not a historian.
He is a mythologist of Hindu communalism. He is a political
pornographer," declared one of these eminent historians, K N
Panikkar, in Kerala the other day. He had been asked for an answer
to the facts I had set out in Eminent Historians. And he was giving
reasons why it was beneath his dignity to give one... more |
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Namboodiripas' fusillade was just
the opening salvo, it turned out. The Communist Party of India
published a series of pamphlets - Arun Shourie's Slanders Rebutted
History has indicated the Communists, 1942 August Struggle and the
Communist Party of India... Translated into several languages, these
were distributed far and wide. Today, they are prophylactics anyone
who reads them will be immunised against the abuse of these 'leading
intellectuals' and their parties... more |
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"You have said that this is a
historic visit, that this is a defining moment in the history of
South Asia, but what is the substance in these declarations?," asked
the correspondent at the joint press conference of the Indian and
Pakistani Prime Ministers in Lahore -- the usual European or
American correspondent, with the usual condescension and derision...
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"Why do you keep doing this?", I
keep asking. Another press conference has been held, another
statement reprimanding Government has been issued, another "massive
demonstration" protesting against the Government's "failure to
extricate India from the clutches of the WTO" has been announced.
The difference is that in the public eye the organizations for which
they speak, issue statements, announce morchas and the rest, are
part of the same parivar as the Government... more |
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Hostilities have but to commence
and a rash of strategists erupts: indeed, it seems that everyone,
except the ones actually running it, knows how to run the war. Just
as suddenly, intelligence agencies start planting stories: every
agency, it seems, knew what was going to happen, every agency sent
warnings, but every other agency scuppered its reports; every paper,
every commentator suddenly seems to know what which top-secret
agency has told Government... more |
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To attribute the occupation by
Pakistanis of such extended stretches in Kargil to "an intelligence
failure" is too facile. It is an evasion -- an evasion of the basic
cause, an evasion of responsibility... more |
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"India has massacred 60,000
Kashmiris, but the people of Kashmir will never rest till they have
won freedom;" "India has deployed 700,000 soldiers in the Valley,
and yet the Kashmiri mujahidin are inflicting heavy losses on them
every day;" -- such "facts" are repeated ad nauseum in
Pakistani papers. We tend to dismiss such assertions as the usual
lies. Public Opinion Trends, are so inured to these concoctions that
they excise them from their reports! In fact, the concoctions
deserve attention... more |
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"The secret of success is
sincerity," reads The Cynic's Lexicon, "Once you can fake that,
you've got it made." How hard Sonia Gandhi is trying to reach
success by that route. A flood in Assam? Visit the area. Have
yourself photographed. Pronounce: Government's relief measures are
wholly inadequate. An earthquake in Kumaon? Visit the area. Have
yourself photographed. Pronounce: Government's relief measures are
wholly inadequate. Cyclone somewhere? Visit the area. Have yourself
photographed. Pronounce: Government's relief measures are wholly
inadequate. Fighting in Kargil? Visit hospitals at a safe distance.
Have yourself photographed with injured soldiers. Pronounce... more |
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The war in Kargil has ignited an
intense reaction across the country. War does. War that results from
aggression by the other does even more. This time round two factors
have caused the reaction to be even more intense. There is the
element of betrayal: India had extended the hand of trust and
friendship; Pakistan, it now turns out, merely pretended to
reciprocate. And then there is the effect of television. This is the
first war which has been brought into our living rooms: we see the
extreme conditions in which our soldiers are defending our country,
we see the majesty and beauty of our sacred mountains which the
enemy has violated, we see the bodies arrive, we see and hear the
valour of the bereaved parents and wives... more |
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Aap log jis jazbe aur walwalese
Jihad karten hain, vo Bharati kutton, muaf kijiye, faujiyon ko apni
bandookein uthane ka mauka bhi nahin milta''- the passion and
fervour with which you wage Jihad does not leave the opportunity for
these Bharati dogs, pardon us, these Bharati militarymen to even
pick up their rifles. ''Agar aap isi tareh Bharati faujiyon ko makhi
macchar ki tareh jahanum ki vaadiyon mein dhakelte rahe, to ankareeb
Bharat ka koi bhi kutta muazarat fauji Kashmir ka rukh nahin
karega''- if you continue to push them into hell in this way, like
flies and mosquitoes, no Indian dog, begging you pardon, no Indian
militaryman will dare look towards Kashmir... Serious analysis in Khabarein, a leading paper of Lahore,
of 10 July, 1999... more |
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"Congress insists PM ignored I-B
reports on Kargil," ran the six column heading of The Indian Express
on 16 September. Other papers too gave much prominence to the
allegation. This time the Congress spokesman had used as his peg a
front-page story in The Tribune of that morning about a "strategy
backgrounder" which the paper said the Army had prepared and
circulated... more |
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"Not one paisa has been taken from
the Trust," declared the Congress spokesman with a show of righteous
indignation. He was declaiming on the Indira Gandhi National Centre
for the Arts. But the charge had been altogether different -- that
the Trust had been a Government-trust, that it had received Rs. 134
crores of Government money and 23 acres of invaluable land, that it
had been converted into a private Trust by fraud, that the
conversion had been sanctified by collusion between a trustee and
the President of the Trust, Sonia Gandhi. Not one of these facts had
been disputed by the Congress... more |
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As Mr I K Gujral proceeded with
his "Gujral Doctrine," a friend in RAW said, "He will rue it by
September." As we returned from Lahore, he said, "When Pakistan goes
so far out to seem friendly, it is planning something big." As Nawaz
Sharif kept bringing one institution after another under his heel --
he enacted a version of our anti-defection law which made
legislators his bonded men: they stand disqualified the moment they
defy the party whip on any matter; he had the President resign; he
removed the Chief Justice; he did away with the Council for Defence
and National Security thereby curtailing the Army's role; he put a
pious cipher into the presidency -- my friend said, "He will go on
rushing forward till he bangs his head into a brick wall. It is his
nature... more |
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From our experience over the last
20 years the following emerge as self-evident axioms. The technology
of inflicting large-scale violence is becoming easier to obtain, and
- per quotient of lethality - less and less expensive. This in turn
yields three lemmas. The target country has to be equipped to
counter the entire spectrum of violence: to take the current
examples from the United States-from aircraft being used as missiles
to anthrax; It is almost impossible in an open society to block a
determined lot from acquiring the technology they want by blocking
the technology itself-the only practical way is to be a leap ahead
of the technology the terrorist acquires... more |
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'A State that's patronising
terrorists should wake up to the consequences; in any case its
immediate neighbours must'. Corresponding to the four ''don'ts'' are
six ''do's'': Believe what the ideologues and organisations of the
terrorists say. The one thing for which ideologues and organisations
can be credited is that they are absolutely explicit about their
aims and objectives. The fault - the fatal fault - is that of
liberal societies: to this day they continue to shut their eyes to
what these organisations proclaim to be their aim: domination,
conquest, conversion of the ''land of war'' into the ''land of
peace,'' that is the land which is at peace because it is under
their heel - exactly as they had shut their eyes to Hitler in the
1930s and to Stalin later. Read their press, reflect over their
books and pamphlets, and act in time - that is, before they have
wreaked the havoc they proclaim they will... more |
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What is the VHP? Whom does it
represent? What is its locus standi?, the Supreme Court asked the
other day - and it seemed to have done so in a tone that triggered
much delight among secularists. The Bench did not ask, as the
Constitution Bench had not asked, ''Who is Mohammed Aslam, alias
'Bhure'? Whom does he represent? What is his locus standi?'' It did
not ask, ''What is the Babri Masjid Action Committee? Whom does it
represent? What is its locus standi?'' It did not ask, ''What is the
'All India Muslim Law Board'? Whom does it represent? What is its
locus standi?'' How is it that doubt assailed it only in regard to
the Vishwa Hindu Parishad? ... more |
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In the sense American intellectual
activity has been built on foundations. Agar aap koi bhi ek
American scholar ko dekhen, he is one of the great psychologists
today. They work the most on the physiology of the mind on
consciousness. If you read any book of his, in its first five pages
aap yeh dekhiye ki woh kin-kin ko acknowledge karte hain. The
unknown foundations and it has been one of the great omissions of
the Indian tax system that we have not allowed, not made it
profitable for business houses and other people to set up
foundations for intellectual activity. I also feel in the sense that
we underestimate, what Ramswarup Ji used to call, the seed value of
ideas... more |
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"Now, Sir," the member said, "we
have inherited a tradition. People always keep saying to me : 'Oh,
you are the maker of the Constitution. 'My answer is I was a hack.
What I was asked to do, I did much against my will." He ridiculed
the "notions of democracy" the country had acquired because of its
hatred of the British, like the notion that to leave any
discretionary powers with the Governor is undemocratic. "We have
inherited the idea that the Governor must have no power at all, that
he must be a rubber-stamp," the member explained. "If a minister,
however scoundrelly he may be, if he puts up a proposal before the
Governor, he has to ditto it. That is the kind of conception about
democracy which we have developed in this country," he continued.
The member? B.R. Ambedkar, of course. The occasion ? The debate in
the Council of States, as the Rajya Sabha was then known, on 2
September, 1953, regarding the Bill for establishing the state of
Andhra... more |
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For a year and a half you keep
issuing statements to the press, and writing ostensibly scholarly
articles, and holding forth in interviews that the Babri Mosque was
not, most definitely not, built by demolishing or even on a site of
a temple. Documents of the other side are sent to you. You are
nominated by the All India Babri Mosque Action Committee as an
expert who will give his assessment of them. A meeting is scheduled.
Before that you meet the then Director General of Archeology who had
supervised the excavations at the site. The day the meeting is to
begin the newspapers carry yet another categorical statement from
"intellectuals", again asserting the line convenient to the AIBMAC.
You, of course, are among them... more |
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"This is an old charge which keeps
surfacing now and then," wrote one of those "eminent historians", K.
N. Panikkar, in an vituperative response to an article of mine - -
the charge that close to two crores had been spent on the "Towards
Freedom" project of the Indian Council of Historical Project, and
little had been achieved. "About a year back the historians had then
clarified through a public statement, that they have not drawn any
money from the ICHR and that they worked for five years purely in an
honorary capacity. When he gets the information, I would
normally expect Shourie to tender a public apology. But given the
intellectual honesty and cultural level reflected in his article, I
do not think it would be forthcoming. The alternative of suing for
defamation the likes of Shourie is below one's dignity. But I do
expect at least the ministry to make a public statement. Strong
stuff, and definitive, one would think. It turns out that on 17
July, 1998, in answer to a question tabled in the Rajya Sabha, the
Ministry stated that only one part of the project has been completed
and published since the original volume of Dr. P. N. Chopra. This is
the volume -- in three parts -- by Dr. Partha Sarthi Gupta covering
1943-44. In answer to another question, the Ministry has reported
that "After publication of the Volume he was paid an honorarium of
Rs. 25,000/- in September, 1997." ... more |
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"We must at present do our best to
form a class," Macaulay wrote in his famous Minute of 1835, "who may
be interpreters between us and the millions whom we govern; a class
of persons, Indians in blood and colour, but English in taste, in
opinions, in morals, and in intellect."... more |
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The US campaign of bombing
erstwhile Taliban positions in Afghanistan had not been on for 10
days, and our experts began pronouncing it a failure: "Osama bin
Laden is still at large, the Taliban have just dispersed into the
hills, the Northern Alliance is stuck where it was, Bush's Grand
Alliance is coming apart... The winter is about to set in," they
said. "The Afghan is a hardy fighter, they said. He will just tie an
onion and a roti (bread), fling his blanket over his shoulder, and
disappear into the nearest mountain; and these American GIs - they
cannot fight without their Coca Colas, their hot meals... Just look
at them on TV - they are loaded with so much equipment, they have
difficulty just walking. These jokers are going to fight the
Taliban? Secure on the mountaintop, the Taliban Jehadi will pick
them one by one as they try to clamber up the mountain. Remember
Kargil? These slopes in the Afghan mountains are even steeper than
the ones our soldiers had to scale."... more |
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"Zee News at 9.40 p.m. on Saturday
(August 21) showed clipping of Vajpayee addressing an election rally
at Thiruvananthapuram," declared the spokesman of the Congress (I)
in a written statement on 24 August. "He declared that the building
of Ram Mandir, abrogation of Article 370 and bringing in the uniform
civil code were an intrinsic part of the BJP's manifesto." In fact,
Vajpayee had addressed no public meeting at Thiruvananthapuram at
all. But hardly one to be deterred by facts, the Congress (I) went
on to describe Vajpayee as "a habitual liar," as one who was making
a "completely ridiculous" statement when he expressed surprise at
what Govindacharya, a General Secretary of the BJP was reported to
have said... more |
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"There can be no doubt that the
fall of Buddhism in India was due to the invasions of the
Musalmans," writes the author. "Islam came out as the enemy of the
'But'. The word 'But,' as everybody knows, is an Arabic word and
means an idol. Not many people, however, know that the derivation of
the word 'But' is the Arabic corruption of Buddha. Thus the origin
of the word indicates that in the Moslem mind idol worship had come
to be identified with the Religion of the Buddha. To the Muslims,
they were one and the same thing. The mission to break the idols
thus became the mission to destroy Buddhism. Islam destroyed
Buddhism not only in India but wherever it went." The writer? B. R.
Ambedkar. But today the fashion is to ascribe the extinction of
Buddhism to the persecution of Buddhists by Hindus, to the
destruction of their temples by the Hindus. One point is that the
Marxist historians who have been perpetrating this falsehood have
not been able to produce even an iota of evidence to substantiate
the concoction... more |
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The first thing that strikes one
upon reading the books of these eminent historians, of course, is
the double standard. Recall how, without an iota of evidence, our
eminent historians advanced the most far-reaching assertions about
ancient India -- about its having been a period riddled with
tensions, inequity and oppression. And how, in cases such as
Aurangzeb and the Sultanate, these very historians shut their eyes
to what stares them in the face. In a word, their approach is set to
a formula : pre-Islamic India must be presented as a land of
discord, a land in the grip of a social and political system marked
by injustice, extreme inequities and oppression; and the Islamic
period must be presented as a period in which "the composite
culture" flowered, a period in which the norm was a policy of "broad
toleration"... more
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