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Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the media both missed a good opportunity to corner Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari on the persecution
of Hindus in Pakistan. Shortly after Mr Zardari returned, the chairman of the fabled Hinglaj temple in Baluchistan, one of the 52 Shaktipeeths located throughout the subcontinent, including Nepal and Sri Lanka, was reportedly kidnapped. This occurred two days before the annual pilgrimage, associated with the shrine, begins.
Maharaj Ganga Ram Motiyani’s abduction was clearly not for ransom, since he is poor. Every year in April, thousands of pilgrims, some from India, travel to the temple for the purpose of worship. Many Muslims from Pakistan and elsewhere also come to India to Sufi dargahs and camp here. But there has been no report of desecration, abduction of a religious functionary, extortion of money or the like.
Motiyani’s kidnapping is possibly meant by hardliners to signal that their contempt for the timeless and great Indic ethos remains unabated despite the show of bonhomie by Pakistan’s President and his entourage, and the Indian side’s reciprocation. The Congress-led UPA regime is evidently not serious about confronting the neighbouring country on continuing human rights abuses in contravention of international laws, especially those guaranteeing minority rights.
Instead, the focus remained on ‘dish washings’, to quote the 19th century essayist Thomas Carlyle, whose famous term for some writing well sums up the overriding preoccupation with the sumptuous feasts laid out for the visiting dignitaries and inane Twitter entries of the heir apparent Bilawal Bhutto. The Zardaris’ invitation to Congress’s heir apparent Rahul Gandhi to visit Pakistan had a section of the fourth estate in raptures, as if this was the magical panacea for the ills of terrorism and Hindu-bashing. Try explaining this to the criminalised financiers of terror.
One recalls similar reactions to Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar’s visit last July, with ringside witnesses to the lady’s arrival and further moves gushing over her fashion style and appearance. Contentious issues were forgotten in an instant as glamour eclipsed politics and reason.
Noting the grave memory lapse, some commentators termed her elevation to the Minister’s post as well as her visit a master-stroke. Like the Zardaris, she too visited the Ajmer dargah to offer prayers. She also stopped by at the Nizamuddin dargah in the capital. And this aspect of their visit is particularly important in light of recurring reports of vandalising of Hindu shrines.
It is time to take a forceful stand on this issue on the basis of the principle of quid pro quo. Nothing less will suffice. India has numerous Sufi shrines that command the respect of the dominant Hindu community as much as others. The Rs 5 crore donation given by Mr Zardari at the Ajmer dargah will remain in the safe custody of the caretakers, who thrive on devotees’ largesse, even though their counterparts at Hinglaj and other Hindu shrines in Pakistan have been hemmed into a corner and live in fear. Reports of the impending destruction by contractors of a Ma Durga temple atop a hill last April in Sindh district never made it to TV channels’ ‘breaking news’ or newspaper headlines here.
What happened thereafter is not known. In 2006, a Hindu temple in Lahore was demolished in order to make space for a commercial building constructed by a jeweller. The Evacuee Property Trust Board is charged with having deliberately hidden the true nature of the structure. That seems a whitewash effort to shrug off blame. The board maintains minorities’ property. Yet, numerous Muslim foreign nationals, taking advantage of the Person of Indian Origin rule, have reclaimed forbears’ property in India. And India remains expansive, embracing all who come to her, including those who wish to secede.
At home, philistines have reportedly destroyed over 170 temples in Kashmir Valley in the past two decades of Islamist militancy. It may be noted that Indian history books contain the fallacy that such depredations were peculiar to the middle ages! But activists, who was eloquent on the rights of Kashmiri separatists, and are feted in the West as litterateurs, human rights icons and the ilk, seem oblivious of the fact.
If only the same concern could have been displayed for the plight of Pakistan’s minorities, with Hindu girls being abducted and converted to Islam through acts of ‘love jihad’, if such conduct can be dignified by its association with a sublime human emotion. The relatives of Rinkle Kumari of Mirpur Mathelo, abducted and converted before marriage to a Muslim, are still awaiting justice, though the girl seems to be reconciled to her situation. The cases of Lata of Jacobabad and Pooja Devi of Larkana are also in the news.
The press corps here clearly felt that such abductions were too insignificant to be raked up as human rights abuse cases during the Zardaris’ pilgrimage. After all, Pakistan Tehrik e-Insaaf leader Imran Khan, who hopes to rule his country in the future, had stirred disgust some years ago by his reported comment that Pathan men had historically conquered women in the southern part of the subcontinent.
Since he is not known to have issued a clarification in the wake of angry reactions here, one assumes that the remark was correctly reported. And with Hindu apologists routinely engaging in self-flagellation, justifying every lapse in the cause of Islam, there is little hope that India will actually intervene to help cornered minorities in Pakistan.
Source : Daily Pioneer
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the media both missed a good opportunity to corner Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari on the persecution
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Maharaj Ganga Ram Motiyani’s abduction was clearly not for ransom, since he is poor. Every year in April, thousands of pilgrims, some from India, travel to the temple for the purpose of worship. Many Muslims from Pakistan and elsewhere also come to India to Sufi dargahs and camp here. But there has been no report of desecration, abduction of a religious functionary, extortion of money or the like.
Motiyani’s kidnapping is possibly meant by hardliners to signal that their contempt for the timeless and great Indic ethos remains unabated despite the show of bonhomie by Pakistan’s President and his entourage, and the Indian side’s reciprocation. The Congress-led UPA regime is evidently not serious about confronting the neighbouring country on continuing human rights abuses in contravention of international laws, especially those guaranteeing minority rights.
Instead, the focus remained on ‘dish washings’, to quote the 19th century essayist Thomas Carlyle, whose famous term for some writing well sums up the overriding preoccupation with the sumptuous feasts laid out for the visiting dignitaries and inane Twitter entries of the heir apparent Bilawal Bhutto. The Zardaris’ invitation to Congress’s heir apparent Rahul Gandhi to visit Pakistan had a section of the fourth estate in raptures, as if this was the magical panacea for the ills of terrorism and Hindu-bashing. Try explaining this to the criminalised financiers of terror.
One recalls similar reactions to Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar’s visit last July, with ringside witnesses to the lady’s arrival and further moves gushing over her fashion style and appearance. Contentious issues were forgotten in an instant as glamour eclipsed politics and reason.
Muslim extremists in Pakistan |
It is time to take a forceful stand on this issue on the basis of the principle of quid pro quo. Nothing less will suffice. India has numerous Sufi shrines that command the respect of the dominant Hindu community as much as others. The Rs 5 crore donation given by Mr Zardari at the Ajmer dargah will remain in the safe custody of the caretakers, who thrive on devotees’ largesse, even though their counterparts at Hinglaj and other Hindu shrines in Pakistan have been hemmed into a corner and live in fear. Reports of the impending destruction by contractors of a Ma Durga temple atop a hill last April in Sindh district never made it to TV channels’ ‘breaking news’ or newspaper headlines here.
What happened thereafter is not known. In 2006, a Hindu temple in Lahore was demolished in order to make space for a commercial building constructed by a jeweller. The Evacuee Property Trust Board is charged with having deliberately hidden the true nature of the structure. That seems a whitewash effort to shrug off blame. The board maintains minorities’ property. Yet, numerous Muslim foreign nationals, taking advantage of the Person of Indian Origin rule, have reclaimed forbears’ property in India. And India remains expansive, embracing all who come to her, including those who wish to secede.
At home, philistines have reportedly destroyed over 170 temples in Kashmir Valley in the past two decades of Islamist militancy. It may be noted that Indian history books contain the fallacy that such depredations were peculiar to the middle ages! But activists, who was eloquent on the rights of Kashmiri separatists, and are feted in the West as litterateurs, human rights icons and the ilk, seem oblivious of the fact.
If only the same concern could have been displayed for the plight of Pakistan’s minorities, with Hindu girls being abducted and converted to Islam through acts of ‘love jihad’, if such conduct can be dignified by its association with a sublime human emotion. The relatives of Rinkle Kumari of Mirpur Mathelo, abducted and converted before marriage to a Muslim, are still awaiting justice, though the girl seems to be reconciled to her situation. The cases of Lata of Jacobabad and Pooja Devi of Larkana are also in the news.
The press corps here clearly felt that such abductions were too insignificant to be raked up as human rights abuse cases during the Zardaris’ pilgrimage. After all, Pakistan Tehrik e-Insaaf leader Imran Khan, who hopes to rule his country in the future, had stirred disgust some years ago by his reported comment that Pathan men had historically conquered women in the southern part of the subcontinent.
Since he is not known to have issued a clarification in the wake of angry reactions here, one assumes that the remark was correctly reported. And with Hindu apologists routinely engaging in self-flagellation, justifying every lapse in the cause of Islam, there is little hope that India will actually intervene to help cornered minorities in Pakistan.
Source : Daily Pioneer
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