Sandhya Jain

Colombo shows the way

In a world that dithers in the face of minority separateness and secessionism, Sri Lanka has demonstrated lion-hearted resoluteness in crushing the three-decade-old Tamil insurgency, refusing to surrender to minority unreasonableness in order to maintain national unity. For India, which made its armed forces fight with one hand tied, first at the Golden Temple in Punjab, and later by limiting the theatre of action to Kargil, there are many lessons to be learnt.

Once President Mahinda Rajapaksa decided to take on the Tamil insurgency, he refrained from imposing either a political agenda or impossible constraints upon his armed forces. Ignoring international (especially Indian Tamil) concerns about civilian casualties, he allowed the progress of well-coordinated air, sea and ground operations. In barely three months of intense action, Colombo has successfully uprooted the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam from their Kilinochchi stronghold, forcing them to flee to the jungles of Wanni and Mullaitivu.

This is more than a symbolic victory, as Kilinochchi was the ‘capital’ from where the LTTE functioned as a virtual state. Flight has down-sized it to a guerrilla force whose days are numbered. It will retain nuisance value for a while, but the Tigers’ aura of invincibility is gone.

Doubtless Colombo was supported by the JVP, the Buddhist Sangha, and the majority Buddhist Sinhalese who have been concerned at the threat to their country’s civilisational ethos, territorial integrity, and the LTTE’s external links, especially with the West-based diaspora groups. Political parties in Tamil Nadu often project Lankan Tamils as ‘Hindus’ to get Indian sympathies or as ‘ethnic’ Tamils to garner local support; but Tamil Lankans are equally Christian and Muslim.

Mr Rajapaksa also received support from civilian Tamils fed up of the murderous LTTE. It is pertinent that two-thirds of the Lankan Tamil population has, since independence, lived in areas controlled by the Government and in close proximity to the Sinhala majority. Much of the Colombo business and social elite is Tamil, though Tamils are otherwise concentrated in the north, east, central and western parts of the country.

It would be safe to say that a separate Tamil Eelam is now as distant as Khalistan, once an Indian nightmare. Vellupillai Pirabhakaran and his Tamil Tigers are now fighting for their very lives. Soon Lankan forces will move to regain Elephant Pass, the entry to Jaffna peninsula, and reopen A-9 Highway which connects the nation with Jaffna city, capital of the Northern Province, which was recaptured by Ms Chandrika Kumaratunga’s Government in 1995.

Having already retaken the LTTE naval bastion, Pooneryn, in November 2008, Colombo has virtually neutralised the LTTE threat to the Jaffna peninsula and cut off its supply lines. Thanks to effective naval action, the Tigers are experiencing serious difficulties in moving troops, obtaining supplies, and launching attacks. Now, with Kilinochchi in hand, the Sri Lankan forces have secured an unbroken link from the south up to Pooneryn, near the neck of Jaffna peninsula.

Action will now shift to Mullaitivu on the north-eastern coast, which the Tigers captured in 1996. The Mullaitivu jungles are reputed to be a deadly maze of booby traps, but it is impossible to defeat a determined Army which is already pressing in from the east, south and west. Going by precedent, Pirabhakaran may meet the fate of Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale; certainly he will prefer death to capture and trial. This moment in Sri Lanka’s troubled history vindicates Mr Rajapaksa’s decision to formally abrogate the ceasefire with the LTTE in January 2008; it also establishes the reputation of Army Chief Sarath Fonseka as one of the great Generals of the 21st century.

It is now imperative that Sri Lanka does not lose at the table what the sweat and blood of its soldiers have won on the battlefield (like India lost in 1972). Regardless of Indian and international opinion, Sri Lanka has no reason to negotiate a political solution with the LTTE; that criminal organisation must be decimated in totality.

But once the military action is over, Colombo must consider a devolution package for its Tamil-majority areas, the modalities of which should be negotiated with Tamil parties that have participated in its political life. Indian Tamil politicians have no locus standi in Sri Lanka, and need not be entertained. A pan-Tamil sentiment is as dangerous to Sri Lanka and India as pan-Islamism and Christian evangelism. In any case, the DMK’s ‘resignation drama’ of October 2008 was only to placate LTTE cadre that might be hiding in southern India’s jungles. This non-event saw Mr M Karunanidhi’s daughter Kanimozhi and other MPs send their resignations from the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha to the Chief Minister — where the buck stopped, predictably. DMK members of the Union Cabinet simply stayed put.

However, New Delhi does have a legitimate role in the peace process. It must ensure that a victorious Colombo does justice to the Tamils of Indian-origin who were sent to Lankan tea estates as indentured labour and are denied citizenship even after 60 years of that country’s independence.

India also has much to learn from Sri Lanka’s successful military offensive against the Tamil insurgents. Geo-politically, it was India’s responsibility to take care of the security of its neighbourhood, but scandalous abdication of its natural leadership compelled Sri Lanka to turn towards Iran, Pakistan, and China. President Rajapaksa used his November 2007 Tehran visit to signal that Colombo was not dependent solely upon India or the West. In contrast, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh deliberately misbehaved with a friendly Tehran at Washington’s behest, until Mumbai 2008 made him realise (at least momentarily) that Iran is a natural pillar of India’s political stability.

The overture to Islamabad was clearly to send a message to a somnolent South Block, which slumbered away. It will, however, be interesting to see if the Muslim-dominated Amparai province gets a better deal than other Tamil areas.

The Sons of Heaven, or the Celestials, as Amitav Ghosh dubbed them in his celebrated Sea of Poppies, could hardly wait to be asked, and are now the bosom pals of the nation at the tip of India’s sensitive coastline! Beijing will doubtless use this relationship to challenge American hegemony, enjoy deep sea fishing rights, and forage for marine wealth on the ocean bed. It is a winner in every sense of the term.

Dark shadow of jihad

Afzal Guru of India, convicted for his role in the attack on Parliament House on December 13, 2001, and Ajmal Amir Kasab of Pakistan, seen striking terror at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus on November 26, 2008, are the symbols of 21st century jihad against India.

Besides a common commitment to jihad, their separate acts of aggression against an India perceived as Hindu, establish the reality of a universal ummah determined to subjugate all to Islam. This is why Pakistan and Bangladesh — given a share of Hindu ancestral territory after bloody violence in the mid-20th century — have failed to evolve as viable states and have repeatedly returned to unleash mayhem on a non-threatening mother country, despite persistent failures to win overt or covert wars.

The Afzal-Ajmal cases prove partition was no solution to the British Raj-instigated communal formula, and that the spectre of 1947 will remain with us until we assert our identity as a vibrant Hindu nation that can shrivel its oppressors. A viable Indian riposte will, therefore, have to await the rise of a political leadership that recognises ‘secularism’ as a dirty word, and does not kowtow to the Western masterminds of our current woes.

No words can adequately condemn the UPA’s shameless outsourcing of the task of chastising Islamabad to Washington and London, or BJP’s acquiescence in this surrender of sovereignty. The revelation of Mr Amar Singh’s generosity towards the Clinton Foundation — a sharp contrast to the dud cheque he gave late Inspector MC Sharma’s family —completes the picture of a supine India where secular and minority-communal forces readily collaborate to hurt Hindu sensibilities.

Poignant instances of this partnership today centre round some of the most flagrant instances of jihadi strikes in recent times — the Parliament House attack, the Batla House encounter, the Mumbai massacre; a thread of perversity pervades all.

Secularists were quick to recover from the shock of the attack on Parliament House, and mounted a puissant defence of those accused in the conspiracy. The judicial process that followed saw the release of Delhi University lecturer SAR Geelani (hailed by the human rights jholawallahs), but conferred death penalty upon Afzal Guru. This was loudly reviled by Hindu-baiters, who lamented the ‘inadequate defence’ given to the convict, and even published a tome with articles by leading legal luminaries, faulting the entire judicial proceeding.

This eminently un-saleable book featured prominently in a current affairs programme on television. I made just one point — when leading jurists were convinced of his innocence, there was no bar on any of them coming forward to defend the accused to their satisfaction. They cannot sit on the fence and later castigate the legal process.

Now, seven years later, Afzal remains unrepentant, and the Indian state cannot find the courage to hang him due to vote-bank considerations. Grief-stricken families of police constables who sacrificed their lives to defend Parliament House have returned the gold medals of valour to the Government in anger; this scandalous regime has kept the medals, and refused to hang the jihadi.

Hindus, enraged after Mumbai, are clamouring for justice. Activists have collected over 1,200 signatures on a petition to the President regarding public sentiment that terrorists be shown no mercy; to date Rashtrapati Bhavan has not granted them an appointment. The President was quick to meet a Christian delegation after the murder of Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati in Kandhamal, Orissa, earlier this year, but never tried to meet his orphaned bhaktas. The Hindu Jagruti Sabha had previously submitted 18,000 signatures to then President APJ Abdul Kalam regarding Afzal Guru.

Meanwhile, after the bombings in Varanasi, Faizabad and Lucknow two years ago, public opinion asserted itself in the form of local bar associations refusing to defend the accused in these trials. This compelled Muslim lawyers to come forward to defend those accused of jihad, and face the attendant public odium.

A piquant situation currently prevails over the defence of Ajmal Kasab, Mumbai’s lone surviving terrorist. The most distinguished jurists, with status in international human rights circles, would not like to defend him personally because corporate clients may melt away due to a desperately-brewing sense of victimhood among the rich and affluent. Some of these advocates have loftily condemned local bar associations for roughing up accused in emotionally sensitive cases.

Kasab killed three of Mumbai’s top police officers before he was captured; he was engaged in an act of war against the Indian nation. While there can be no dispute that he must have an advocate to represent him, an inflamed public opinion is determined to ensure that no non-Muslim lawyer defends him. Many are of the view that the Mumbai commando attack should be treated as a war crime against India, because all terrorists were Pakistani nationals, trained, armed, and sent across by the ubiquitous ISI. In other words, the state of Pakistan used non-state actors to wage aggression against unarmed civilians in India.

Jihad is a foreign ideology; its objective is world dominion. Islam made impressive strides in the early centuries of its birth. But in the modern period, most Muslim nations lack the ability to defend themselves, and modern jihad has been a tool whereby the West controls both Muslim and non-Muslim societies. The ISI’s Western patrons are well-known; its local cells in India are part of the same axis that once partitioned the country. Only an overtly conscious Hindu Rashtra can tackle this menace. This applies equally to the issue of conversions, which remain a foreign policy objective of the Christian West.

Minority Affairs Minister AR Antulay’s questioning the martyrdom of police officers Hemant Karkare, Ashok Kamte and Vijay Salaskar continues a trend begun in October, when even the death of Inspector MC Sharma in the Batla House encounter in Delhi’s Jamia Nagar did not deter West-looking viragos from making wild allegations against the deceased. Immediately, the Jamia Millia Islamia Vice-Chancellor espoused the cause of students accused of involvement in the encounter; many community and secular voices supported the ‘fake encounter’ theory. Jamia thus marked the emergence of a dangerous trend among a section of India’s articulate Muslim elite — to deny violence; to confront the law; and, to affront Hindu sentiment. The atmosphere is reminiscent of 1947, only this time Hindus will not heed the peddlers of non-action.


Tragedy made into a farce

On September 20, 2008, when Islamabad’s Marriott Hotel was gutted by a massive suicide bombing that killed 62 people and injured over 120, I recalled with a shudder that barely two weeks prior to that grisly devastation, my sister-in-law, her son and father, had enjoyed a brief stay at that very hotel. At home in Delhi, similar feelings of blessed escape rose when bombs exploded in frequented markets like Lajpat Nagar, Sarojini Nagar, Connaught Place.

When normalcy was restored, we returned to the old haunts quite unselfconsciously. It was, therefore, a bit jarring to find the ‘luminous people’ making social and political cachet out of having patronised Mumbai’s Taj Mahal Palace and Oberoi-Trident Hotels (especially the former) before tragedy struck, and pompously promising to return the day they reopened. As barring its solid façade the Taj is all but gutted, this seems superficial and supercilious.

Notwithstanding Mr Ratan Tata’s brave demeanour during the crisis, his support to and defence of his staff who conducted themselves with admirable fortitude, the Taj is a long way from restoration in this era of global meltdown which has already shaken the Tata empire to its foundations in view of the costly overseas purchases made in recent years. Servicing those loans is headache enough; raising formidable millions to virtually rebuild the Taj may not make sense if global business is going to take a hit.

The Taj is beautiful, as we all saw on television, and I am somewhat embarrassed to say that I just never noticed during the few visits I made there. For me, going to a hotel has simply meant a place to stay when out of town, a place to meet someone staying there, a place with a restaurant one wants to eat in. Like others, I have enjoyed the hospitality of some of the finest hotels in the world, but for me a hotel could never compare to home.

It was a cultural shock to find some of the country’s well-heeled citizenry, many of them Mumbaikars with their own homes in the city, bemoaning the loss of what it became fashionable to call ‘second home’. For the record, I myself got married at the Taj Mansingh in Delhi, and in my younger days often landed up at Machan; but I would never think of it as anything but a once-frequented haunt, at par with the now favoured India International Centre and the more homely Indian Women’s Press Corps. And it would offend me no end if my son started saying that the places he hangs out in with his friends are a ‘second home’.

The most striking aspect of media coverage of the Mumbai tragedy was the special positioning of the rich and famous as the city’s representative voices and faces. Worse was the fact that they all seemed to have a particular political alignment. One channel allowed actress Sharmila Tagore to dominate a particular telecast to the near exclusion of other guests, and her well-rehearsed and eloquent performance was remarkable for its sheer partisanship.

Ms Tagore ranted against politicians and positioned herself as distant from that tribe; she even read out a BJP advertisement issued with an eye to the elections in six States to express disgust at the attempt to politically encash the tragedy . This is disingenuous as her family is closely aligned with the ruling Congress — her mother-in-law was an MP for a couple of terms; her husband Mansoor Ali Khan contested but lost from Bhopal on a Congress ticket; and she herself became chairperson of the Censor Board due to her party affiliation.

More importantly, in all the verbiage, Ms Tagore never once expressed regret or apology for the murder and mayhem unleashed on the city by fidayeen in the name of the religion she now professes. She did tell us that the Taj was her “second home” as she lived there for a good four years when she first came to Mumbai (now we know why the then film media was full of stories about her starry tantrums and demands!). As someone who probably lived in the family home in Calcutta during the Great Calcutta Killings of 1946, I can only say she has a very funny way of relating to tragedy.

The electronic channels had gone very far with these fake rudalis (professional mourners) by the time public revulsion reached their ears. Mercifully they made a quick transition to the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus where live RDX was recovered a few days ago, to the operator of the public address system whose presence of mind alerted the public and cleared the platform before an even greater tragedy could take place; to the police constables and Army jawans who came out of the crisis injured but alive; to the ordinary men and women affected by the carnage; and baby Daulat, born of a mother who tried to delay childbirth so that the injured coming into the hospital could be attended to first.

Mumbai’s political class, however, was as craven and crass as its rich and beautiful people. Even after a disaster of such magnitude, then Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh gave top priority to saving his chair. When he did arrive at the Taj, he had actor son Ritiesh and film-maker Ram Gopal Varma in tow, giving the impression that he was busy discussing film scripts or budgets when he decided to undertake the formality of the visit. In the uproar that followed, it remains unclear if he visited all the spots struck by the terrorists, and the victims in hospital.

The push and shove that accompanied Congress’s change of guard — which caused many days of delay and suspension of the disgruntled Narayan Rane — was shameful. I was only surprised that no one thought of Sanjay Dutt, accused and sentenced to five years in jail for his role in the 1993 Mumbai bombings, but merrily out on bail, enjoying a glorious film career. As he seems unlikely to return to jail, and is even actively eyeing a political career, and as both he and his wife Manyata successfully lectured the international glitterati at the recent annual Leadership Summit of a media house, he seemed a natural choice for Chief Minister.

A thing of beauty, a joy forever

Archaeology of Fatehpur Sikri: New Discoveries
Author :DV Sharma
Publisher:Aryan Books International
Price: Rs 3500

Archaeology of Fatehpur Sikri: New Discoveries is a meticulous work of excavation and discovery in an area once regarded as confined to the medieval era, with no new surprises to captivate art lovers. The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) had no idea at all that any pre-Akbar ancient civilisation or habitation could be found in the area, much less that exquisite Jaina and Hindu relics would surface in the villages around Sikri.

The idea of excavating Fatehpur Sikri goes back to 1972, when Dr Nur’ul Hasan, then Education Minister, directed Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) and the ASI to excavate the ruins with a view to determine, one, the original boundary of the palace area under Emperor Akbar, and two, the habitation area of the construction labourers. On account of this limited agenda, the excavations were confined to the medieval era and the Akbar township (1572-85) alone, and the framework was outlined by Dr SAA Rizvi in a national seminar on Fatehpur Sikri in 1972.

The excavations at Fatehpur Sikri, which lasted a decade from 1978 to 1988, were overseen by Dr RC Gaur, chair, AMU history department. Being limited in scope, these essentially involved merely the removal of debris, as they had no archaeological objective in mind. Interestingly, this excavation exposed a Jaina temple near the south in 1982-3, but this was neither excavated nor reported. It was left to Dr Dharam Vir Sharma, Superintending Archaeologist, Agra Circle, to later discover the purpose of the massive structure in the mound and further probe if Sikri was the nucleus for architectural activities during the 8th to the 11th centuries AD.

In December 1999, the remains of an ancient Jaina temple were unearthed near the Fatehpur Sikri palace compound, in a mound known as the Bir Chhabili ka Tila — mound of the Gallant and Graceful Devi. Here, in a man-made pit of red sandstone slabs, mutilated sculptures had been stored and the pit covered up in what is probably the first archaeological discovery of a visarjana (religious burial) of desecrated images.

The historical record suggests that the iconoclasts who visited the region, demolished temples and plundered their wealth included Mahmud Ghazni (1000-30); Muizuddin Muhammad Ghori (1192-1206); Delhi Sultans like Iltutmish (1211-36), Alauddin Khilji (1296-1316), Firuz Shah Tughluq (1351-88) and Sikandar Lodi (1488-1517). There is even today an Alauddin Khilji mosque in Sikri village, and Sikandar Lodi’s presence is recorded in a Persian inscription at Chuyari.

Among the ruins of Bir Chhabili ka Tila was recovered the most breathtakingly beautiful murti of a Jaina Saraswati, firmly dated 1010 AD from the inscription at its base. Also in the same visarjana pit were a number of exquisite Jaina Tirthankara icons, most dated between 977 and 1044 AD. There were many Svetambara sculptures, and one Digambara Tirthankara in kayotsarga (standing yogic posture), headless with no hands and feet. All 34 Tirthankara icons were mutilated; five were in the kayotsarga posture. Sharma has recorded his findings in painstaking detail and the quality of the reproductions make the jaw-dropping cost of the production worthwhile.

The Sikri-Nagar area of Agra district, where the Sikarwar Rajputs of Rajasthan originated before Turk invasions in the Sultanate period drove them to other places in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, was rich and flourishing from the 8th to 11th century. The cultural sequences unearthed show the region was inhabited in the Neolithic period (6th to 9th century); late Gupta period (9th to 12th century; the Jaina temple belongs to this era); and after a brief desertion was reoccupied from the 12th to the 18th century.

Sharma believes that the Pratiharas possibly dominated the region in the ninth and tenth centuries, though no epigraphical records have been found. However, one inscription shows that the Kachhapaghatas ruled Gwalior in the 10th and 11th century. The ancient highway from Mathura to Gwalior passed through Sikri, Bari and Muchkund, and was much shorter than Agra route. It was the main trade route and was also followed by invaders like Mahmud of Ghazni. It was preferred because all trade from prosperous Gujarat passed through Sikri, which was the meeting point of traders from north to south, east to west.

Given its proximity to Akbar’s famous though abandoned township, the excavations at Fatehpur Sikri became instantly controversial, as they were enveloped in the then debate over the writing of history textbooks. Although the ASI made no claim that the demolitions of the Jaina and Hindu temples was the handiwork of the Great Mughal, all sorts of wild allegations were flung, forcing the chief excavator, Sharma, to showcase his findings at the India International Centre and defend his work. It was a formidable corpus of work, and the book does full justice to it.

What agitated the outraged secularists and Marxists was the fact that the destruction of the Jaina temple, and the pathos associated with the finding of the visarjana chamber, could not be justified in terms of an equal Hindu aggression! Although Jains are valiant warriors, second to none on the battlefield, the community has an entrenched reputation for ahimsa, which could not be undone at a moment’s notice!

Much of the problem in the handling of the public discourse on the matter stems from the fact that for far too many years now the ASI has been headed by a string of non-professionals from the IAS who have no understanding of the discipline. Guided by political exigencies (or political masters), the organisation has been embroiled in controversies over the historicity of the Ram Setu, and the need to excavate the sites associated with the River Saraswati.

Sharma’s brief but explicit texts throws light on what happens to archaeology when politicians call the tune — ten years of nothingness. It is to be hoped that Srutidevi Saraswati, revealed Vedic goddess and Jaina Devi par excellence, will enlighten the minds of all who invoke her. The book is a must have for those who love beauty and worship knowledge.


Time to halt this farce

As terrorist charges against Sadhvi Pragya, Lt Col SP Purohit, and an endless list of others become increasingly surreal, the possibility of their being substantiated in a court of law also appears more remote. Rather than struggle daily with new sub-plots, the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad would do well to release the accused and abort its nascent career as a pulp fiction-writer.

Even if the tale of ‘Hindu terror’ had initial plausibility, it fell apart as the arrests degenerated into a fishing expedition of anyone who knew anyone, and the list of their ‘successful crimes’ became truly incredible. The allegation that Lt Col Purohit supplied RDX for the Samjhauta Express bombings blew the case to smithereens as those explosions were caused by incendiary devices; the Army does not stock RDX; the impugned officer had no access to any explosives nor knowledge of bomb-making; and, there is simply no way an Army officer could be involved in so much covert activity without being detected.

Political analysts feel the case was contrived for political reasons, and the Prime Minister’s decision to speak to Mr LK Advani and depute the National Security Adviser and Intelligence Bureau Director to meet him suggests unease at the affair. There are whispers that regional players have driven the crisis to retain their power base, and forced coalition partners into acquiescence. If this is untrue, the sooner the Union Government moves to dissipate this impression the better, as the crisis is having a deleterious impact on the morale of the defence forces.

Mr KPS Gill, the nation’s most valiant police officer, led a citizens’ delegation to the National Human Rights Commission last Friday, where he said that never in his career had he seen such a prolonged police remand for any woman, let alone a sadhvi. Lt Col Purohit has also mentioned maltreatment, but as only Sadhvi Pragya’s affidavit is public so far, it would be worthwhile to note some of its salient points.

Sadhvi Pragya became a sanyasin in January 2007 and was living in a Jabalpur ashram when the Maharashtra ATS called her for interrogation in October 2008 as a vehicle that belonged to her was allegedly involved in the September 29 Malegaon explosion. After she said she had sold it to one Sunil Joshi in October 2004, and the police discovered the latter had been murdered in 2007, matters should have ended there.

Instead, Sadhvi Pragya was illegally detained and interrogated for 13 days from October 10 to 23, with no woman constable ever present. She was beaten by police officers, who also assaulted her disciple, Bhimbhai Pasricha, when he refused to physically abuse her. She was subjected to obscene language and psychological torture, and felt depressed enough to contemplate committing suicide. She was moved from place to place, including being lodged in a hotel, again without women constables. The ill-treatment necessitated hospitalisation for nearly six days, after which she was formally arrested on October 23.

Details of Sadhvi Pragya’s narco-analysis and polygraph tests are well known. It is pertinent that a supplementary interrogation technique — used to cover missing links in criminal cases like the Telgi stamp paper scam — was used as a primary tool of investigation, repeatedly, even though it failed to unveil any hint of crime.

This suggests misuse of the ATS by its political masters. A narco-analysis of Swami Dayanand Pande last Friday caused him to lose his senses; he regained consciousness only after eight hours! It is pertinent that media photographs have revealed that both religious persons arrested in this case have been forced to wear civilian clothes during custody, a terrible abomination and a religious insult that should be actionable under Section 495-A of the IPC.

Sadhvi Pragya has rightly asked that narco-analysis and polygraph tests be conducted on the ATS officers who handled her detention and interrogation to unravel the truth about those who masterminded the conspiracy behind her arrest, and that of others, destroying lives and reputations in a disgraceful attempt to equate ‘Hindu terror’ with jihad.

Indeed, the story was so malleable that when the Samjhauta-to-Malegaon plot began to collapse under the weight of its own contradictions, the scriptwriters twisted it to incorporate a plot to kill top RSS leaders, most notably general secretary Mohanrao Bhagwat. VHP leader Pravin Togadia has rightly said the Maharashtra ATS deserves the Man Booker for its narrative! Seriously, however, the Malegaon accused could have plotted to kill either innocent Muslims or Hindus; not both. Hence, this is clearly a witch-hunt.

In this context, it may be pertinent to know if Lt Col Purohit, during his tenure in Military Intelligence in Jammu & Kashmir, had submitted information that impacted adversely upon the ruling party’s political vote-bank, or hurt some other political interests of the powers-that-be. Certainly, the sudden decision to invoke MCOCA even when no credible prima facie case could be established against the accused suggests that there is a desire to hold them in custody at all costs, at least until the current round of Assembly elections, and possibly also the general election, are over.

The Congress-dominated regime’s decision to use MCOCA is invidious also because the UPA at the Centre revoked POTA on the plea that existing laws are adequate to tackle terrorism, and more stringent measures are not needed, either at the Central level, or in States like Gujarat, where the police have a good record of unearthing crime. The known terrorist Abu Salem, extradited from Portugal, was removed from MCOCA coverage by a generous State Government, though spiritual leaders and Army officers are being subjected to hideous defamation by selective media leaks.

Some of the purported evidence is truly extraordinary. Photographs of women have allegedly been found in the swami’s computer, and one is at a loss to connect them to the Malegaon bomb blast. There are audio recordings of mobile phone conversations that could mean anything, as the word ‘bomb’ or ‘blast’ is never used; and there is a witness who has heard both sides of a telephone conversation! Photographs of public functions where media was present are being projected as evidence of a private conspiracy, and overall, the investigation is degenerating into a travesty of justice. It is time to call a halt to the farce.

UPA’s sinister shenanigans

In a move fraught with danger, the Congress-dominated Central and Maharashtra Governments have unleashed a sinister plot to undermine the institutions of the police and the defence forces. These two grids literally hold the nation together, particularly in these troubled times when internal and external threats savage the citizenry so remorselessly.

By using the Maharashtra Anti-Terror Squad to target, arrest and malign certain retired and serving Army officers, whose only crime is alleged or real links with reputed nationalist families like the Savarkars, the UPA is deliberately demoralising and communalising the security agencies. If honourable and nationalist Hindus serving in the armed forces can be subjected to witch-hunts, then all serving police and defence officers will automatically become conscious of their personal religious affiliations in a manner that could override the solidarity for which the all-India services are justly renowned. This will corrode morale and efficiency, to say the least.

At the risk of sounding offensive, this could be viewed as the UPA’s revenge against the services on at least two counts. One was the firm refusal of both the police and the defence services to furnish the UPA Government with religion-based data on serving personnel. The second was the protest by the police and the three service chiefs against the recommendations of the Sixth Pay Commission. While the police had to pipe down, the service chiefs have proved difficult to tame.

A third reason is that senior Army officers have become vocal on strategic issues, and like some foreign office experts, have reservations about the peculiar twist given by the UPA to India’s foreign policy. Besides an unwarranted proximity to America, which resulted in the dubious nuclear deal, there is an inexplicable indifference to the plight of Iraq, coldness towards Iran, and a complete inability to assess the dangerous implications of increased US-Pakistan tensions on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. India’s interests in Nepal have been compromised; and political hype against China upgraded for no obtainable end. It seems likely that senior defence officers have made their reservations known to the Government.

Certainly there has been a great vengefulness in the Maharashtra Government’s leaks about the so-called confessions of some accused persons. First, it claimed to have made arrests on the basis of confessions made by Sadhvi Pragya (who must have been targeted after she made waves during the Amarnath agitation in Jammu earlier this year). Then it admitted it had nothing tangible on her and submitted her to narcoanalysis, polygraph, lie detector, et al, and claimed that her skill in meditation had enabled her to dodge its trickery in trying to make her incriminate herself! BJP president Rajnath Singh has rightly accused the Maharashtra Government and police of harassing the Sadhvi, as no terrorist has been subjected to so many tests.

Currently, Lt Col Srikant Purohit is the focus of media leaks regarding his ‘confessions’. According to these fables, the 37-year-old officer planned the conspiracy and provided the RDX for the September 29 Malegaon attack which killed six persons. More serving officers could be indicted for their association with Lt Col Purohit.

The armed forces, however, in sharp contrast to the manner in which they were caught unawares in the cooked-up Samba spy case, have decided to refute these baseless allegations against serving and retired officers. They have, anonymously of course, countered that Lt Col Purohit could not have been involved in planning the blast and supplying RDX as no Army unit, let alone an officer, has access to this explosive. The RDX used for manufacturing shells is directly handled by ordnance factories and an officer working for Army Intelligence cannot access it.

More pertinently, Lt Col Purohit was studying Arabic at the Army Education Corps, Pachmarhi, Madhya Pradesh, for the last 18 months. He thus completely lacked the mobility required to plot or procure RDX or any weapon, as alleged. Furthermore, as he was deputed by Army Intelligence to learn Arabic, it was doubtless so he could do cyber-intelligence on Arabic Websites reputedly used to transmit messages to jihadi cells in India and other places. An officer working fulltime to legitimately combat terror had no logical reason to plot to kill innocent Muslim civilians. Not unless the ATS can prove that he is a psychopath.

It seems fairly certain that he has been selected for indictment because of his association with Abhinav Bharat, an organisation linked with Veer Savarkar’s family. This is an asinine, yet vicious, attempt to taint all nationalist Hindus as communalists, and to tell Muslims in the States going to the polls that the ruling Congress will delink Islam from the jihad tormenting India by guzzling hundreds of innocent lives every year.

That is why, while exulting in the treatment meted out to Sadhvi Pragya and our defence officers, the Congress has rushed to condemn ABVP activists for spitting upon SAR Geelani, an accused in the terrorist attack on Parliament House at a recent seminar. Sadly for the Congress, this was terribly ill-timed.

Last Friday, Kerala Police informed the Kerala High Court that it had recovered DVDs featuring SAR Geelani from the homes of youth who had participated in the August 15, 2006 SIMI camp at Panayikkulam near Aluva (The Pioneer, 8 November 2008). This establishes a link between the notorious SIMI and Geelani, much-feted by lib-left jholawallahs and invited to speak at Delhi University on ‘Communalism, Fascism and Democracy: Rhetoric and Reality.’

The SIMI meet reportedly prepared the schedule for the training camp held at Vagamon, Idukki, which Gujarat Police claims made preparations for the Ahmedabad bombings. The Kerala Police took five of the 15 participants into custody, but had to release them after high-level political intervention. They are now belatedly searching for possible links between the Panayikkulam camp case accused and those behind the attack on Parliament House.

The prevalence of terror modules in Kerala was accidentally exposed when two jihadis from the State were killed in an encounter with security forces in Jammu & Kashmir in October. Some accused in the Panayikkulam camp case have links with persons arrested for ties with the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Tayyeba. Lt Col Purohit was developing the skills to detect and unearth these terror modules; he did not need to indulge in pointless violence to save or avenge the nation.

Man-eaters turn tail in Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka, which gave the 20th century its first elected woman Prime Minister, may now be taking the lead in asserting the primacy of the civilisational ethos of its native majority. It is a lesson of special significance for India, whose Hindu majority has been struggling for legitimacy in the public domain since the tragic betrayal at independence.

Misplaced sympathy for Sri Lanka's Tamil minority should not mislead India to pander to the separatist and murderous Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam at the cost of the island's Sinhala-Buddhist majority. As Buddhism belongs to India's religio-cultural spectrum, a more rewarding initiative would be to foster dialogue and amity between the two groups, shunning the ethnic divide that is a colonial legacy. The Tamil and Sinhala religious and political leaderships have a responsibility in this regard, and the forthcoming eclipse of the LTTE is the best time to unite the ravaged nation.

For Sri Lankan Tamils, this should be a moment of introspection regarding the LTTE's aims and objectives, religious make-up of its leadership, and its penetration and manipulation by outsiders. While many issues have been fudged, it is undeniable that the movement's chief ideologue, late Anton Balasingham, was a Christian. His widow, Adele Ann, an Australian, is now settled in Britain; it is inconceivable that she had no other connections.

The LTTE's links with Pakistan's ISI are well known. It has had links with gun-runners and drug-peddlers, whose back-connections are not difficult to trace. And now, Pakistan's patron, America, according to Mr Robert Blake, its envoy to Colombo, wants a political solution without the military defeat of the LTTE. He argued in Chennai recently that a solution would negate the LTTE claim to being the sole representative of Sri Lankan Tamils; improve the human rights situation; and persuade Tamils overseas to stop funding the LTTE.

Surely America knows that whether it is the Sikhs in Britain or Canada; or Tamils in Britain, Norway, South Africa, Australia, Canada and the US, separatist movements funded by religious or ethnic diaspora are always funded at the instance of the host country. That is how the huge sums of money involved move smoothly across borders. An Indian expert notes a CIA estimate that expatriate Tamils are raising $ 450 million annually to train and arm terrorists; they will most likely be trained in Britain and smuggled into Sri Lanka via Tamil Nadu.

Western training and arming alone explains the LTTE's unexpected acquisition of air power, whereby it attacked the Vavuniya military complex with a plane, artillery, and suicide commandoes, and the Sri Lanka Air Force base at Anuradhapura last October. These attacks justify President Mahinda Rajapaksa's determination to decimate the LTTE. Rather than submit to American pressure to negotiate with the LTTE, Colombo should use international laws to detect and seize LTTE funding, and arraign Western nations providing training and arms to the Tigers at The Hague.

Colombo is on the verge of a decisive victory at Kilinochchi. The Tamil Tigers are in fact so unnerved that they are begging Indian Tamil political parties to take up their cause with New Delhi, and negotiate some kind of truce with a resurgent Sri Lankan regime. There are many reasons why New Delhi should not do so.

One, India suffered enormously under the Khalistan movement, which had the backing of Pakistan's ISI and the fulsome protection of Britain and Canada. Two, India is suffering jihadi terrorism, and cannot pander to terrorists who target civilians with impunity. Third, India has experienced a painful partition and cannot countenance armed minorities using murder and mayhem to divide a nation in the name of self-determination. In this connection, New Delhi should ask Ms Jayalalithaa to explain the meaning of her support for self-determination for Sri Lankan Tamils, and how this is compatible with her opposition to the LTTE as a terrorist organisation.

The crux of the matter is that the LTTE, initially armed and trained by Mrs Indira Gandhi's Government, maintains a formidable presence in the jungles of Tamil Nadu; fear of the barrel of the gun turning their way is making Tamil politicians support the lethal Vellupillai Prabhakaran. Ordinary Tamils, however, are indifferent to the LTTE, as evident from the poor response to last Friday's DMK-led 'human chain' protest against the alleged genocide of Tamil civilians in Sri Lanka.

Yet political compulsions forced the DMK to call an all-party meeting (boycotted by ADMK and others) to press New Delhi to intervene with Colombo for a ceasefire. National Security Adviser MK Narayanan did request the Sri Lankan Deputy High Commissioner to advice Colombo to exercise restraint in military operations against the LTTE; he conveyed India's concern for civilians suffering in aerial bombings in the area, and dismay over the alleged shooting of Indian fishermen by the Sri Lankan Navy.

As this was not deemed adequate to placate the LTTE, the DMK launched a 'resignation drama' -- Mr M Karunanidhi's daughter Kanimozhi and other DMK MPs sent their resignations from the Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha to the Chief Minister. Ms Jayalalithaa derided the gesture by challenging Mr Karunanidhi to make DMK quit the Union Cabinet. That all posturing was purely political and aimed at the forthcoming general election was proved by the arrest of ADMK ally Vaiko for making a 'seditious' speech while defending the Lankan Tamil cause. The irrepressible Jayalalithaa forced Mr Karunanidhi to arrest his own followers in the film industry under the same clause!

It bears reiterating that India cannot forget the LTTE's role in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in May 1991, even if we agree that the decision to send the IPKF to Sri Lanka was a mistake. New Delhi must also remember that the LTTE systematically eliminated moderate Lankan Tamil leaders and scuttled all chances of a peaceful solution to the island's problems as its goal was not the welfare of the Tamil people, but a separate Eelam with the LTTE as sole upholder of the Tamil cause.

Mr Karunanidhi has confessed that he personally begged the LTTE not to assassinate TELO leader Sabarathinam, but the latter was nonetheless murdered in 1986. India owes nothing to that vicious bunch; it should, however, caution Colombo that a military victory over the LTTE is not a mandate for Sinhala chauvinism in the island-nation.

Tribal Jagannath as a Hindu deity

A 24-feet-tall Hanuman statue, installed at Sunset Point, Kanyakumari, on September 21, 2008, was surreptitiously removed by the Tamil Nadu administration in the wee hours of September 30 after alleged complaints from local fishermen.

The task was directed by Kanyakumari district collector Jyothi Nirmala, who claimed, “The trust which installed the statue had only obtained the permission of the panchayat and this was insufficient.” The panchayat had permitted Chaitanya Mahaprabhu Nama Bhiksha Kendra to create a ‘Hanuman Park,’ but, said vice-president S Pushparaj, “My wife Felicity, elected head of the panchayat, did not understand the difference between a simple park and the installation of a large statue in a public place, and allowed the installation. She wrote to the collector and withdrew her permission.”

There cannot be a greater example of religious intolerance than this peremptory removal of an image of India’s most popular deity. The incident is also indicative of the extent to which the country’s sensitive coastline has been turned anti-Hindu through evangelisation. This raises the question: Why are monotheistic traditions unable to live in peace in pluralist societies?

It is precisely this kind of de-nationalisation that tribals are doggedly contesting in the remote jungles of Orissa, where Christian missionaries are trying to tell them that they (tribals) are not Hindus! Orissa is a State whose spiritual-cultural landscape explicitly reveals the deep symbiotic relationship between tribals and non-tribals from ancient times. Tribal gods have always dominated the Hindu pantheon and in Orissa this has coalesced into a regional tradition centred around Jagannath, one of the foremost deities of the all-India Hindu pantheon.

Jagannath was first worshipped by the Sabara (Savara, Saora) tribe, and ‘miraculously’ appeared in Puri much later. Till today, Daita (Daitya) priests, descendants of the original tribal worshippers, alone have the right to dress the god, move him, and regularly renovate his wooden image. Similarly at the Lingaraj Temple in Bhubaneswar, tribal Badu priests alone are allowed to bathe and adorn the deity.

Orissa is equally famous for the legend of Narasimha, the Vishnu avatar who burst out of a pillar to kill the asur Hiranyakasipu. The pillar is a uniconical image worshipped in tribal areas and to this day Orissa abounds with Narasimha images on wooden pillars symbolising Khambheshvari (Goddess of the Pillar). Narasimha is believed to derive his power from the shakti residing in the pillar. The pillar motif became so popular in Hindu tradition that Shiv as Bhairav was said to have emerged from a pillar.

The girija or hill-born aspect of Narasimha reinforces the tribal roots of Hindu dharma. An aboriginal god in the form of the head of a lion or tiger was worshipped in the caves and mountains of Orissa and Andhra Pradesh. Orissa has instances of Narasimha being worshipped as a saligram stone.

Jagannath, Vishnu as ‘Lord of the World’, shows the metamorphosis of a tribal god into a pre-eminent deity of the classical Hindu pantheon. The god’s icon is even today carved out of wood (not stone or metal), and the tribes whose rituals and traditions were woven into his worship are still living as tribal and semi-tribal communities in the region. This tribal god took a fairly circuitous route to his present pinnacle, via absorption of local shakti traditions and merger with the growing popularity of the Narasimha and Purushottam forms of Vishnu in the region in the medieval era.

Queen Vasata in the eighth century built the famous Lakshman temple in brick at Sripur. The temple plaque opens with a salutation to Purushottam, also titled Narasimha, suggesting a trend in Vaishnav tradition to stress the ugra aspect of Vishnu. This culminates in Puri where Jagannath, widely revered as Purushottam until the end of the 13th century, had close connections with Narasimha who became popular in Orissa in the post-Gupta period.

But who exactly was this wooden god? After the death of Anantavarman Chodagangadev, who reputedly commissioned the Puri temple, his chief queen, Kasturikamodini, built a temple in his homeland in Tekkali (present Andhra Pradesh), east of his first capital Kalinganagar, in 1150 AD. The temple was dedicated to the god Dadhivaman, and the inscription reveals that the image installed was of the ‘Wooden God’, and not the famous Puri Trinity of Jagannath-Balabhadra-Subhadra. Scholars say this means that Chodagangadev was a devotee of this god, and as the god’s name is preserved in Tekkali in this early period, it seems likely that Dadhivaman (or the tribal form of this Sanskritised name) was the original name of the ‘Wooden God’.

As the original ‘Wooden God’ was a unitary figure, temples for the single deity continued to be built even after a Trinitarian image emerged at Puri. Even today there are 344 Dadhivaman temples in Orissa, which perpetuate the original state of the god. The Kondh continue to practice a ritual renewal of wooden posts.

There is also something striking about the figures comprising the Jagannath triad. Subhadra’s image consists of only a trunk and a head, but Jagannath and Balabhadra are larger, with a trunk, over-dimensional head, and arm stumps. But while the heads of Subhadra and Balabhadra are oval with almond-shaped eyes, Jagannath’s head is curiously flat on top and is dominated by enormous round eyes.

Scholars explain this in terms of Narasimha’s association with wooden posts representing tribal deities. In the Andhra village Jambulapadu (Anantapur), Narasimhasvami is worshipped as a pillar to which a sheet shaped in the form of a lion’s head is attached. This lion-head explains Jagannath’s large round eyes, typical of Narasimha on account of his fury (krodh). The head of the Jagannath image makes sense when perceived as a lion’s head, where the emphasis is on the jaws, rather than as a human head.

If, as missionaries allege, classical Hindu tradition was different from the tribal, why would tribal deities rise to become the dominant figures in the Hindu pantheon? As this has been a regular pan-India phenomenon, it seems reasonable to deduce that tribals were never culturally subordinate in their interaction with non-tribal (caste Hindu) communities, but were rather the fountainhead of the Hindu cultural evolution.

Conversion kills cultural identity

According to a widely circulated invitation on the Internet, a 'massive demonstration rally' will be held on October 4, 2008 in front of the UN office in New York, to protest against a 'small group of misguided fascist ideologues and caste supremacists' who are corrupting Indian civilisation. Perusing the stentorian note of warning about 'possibly the start of genocide,' one is left admiring the Church's ability to successfully annihilate faiths and cultures across countries and continents without introspection or remorse, while projecting themselves as martyrs when resisted by their hapless victims.

The decision of Indian Christians to run for aid to the supreme Christian military power in the world, the United States, makes sense when one considers that even during the British Raj it was American evangelists who had greater success in converting natives in South Asia than the Europeans. So overpowering was their intellectual dominance over formally unconverted upper castes that to this day the products of Forman's Christian College, Lahore, solemnly swear that they learnt their moral codes from missionaries.

Twenty-first century Hindus, however, are far less diffident in the protection of their faith and civilisational ethos than say, 60 years ago, when the sub-continent was partitioned because even nationalists like Bhagat Singh and Subhash Chandra Bose failed to see the intimate connection between dharma, motherland, and national integrity. The Left under Mr Prakash Karat is making the same mistake; even America's success in dividing Leftist ranks over the nuclear deal and sharply curtailing Leftist exposure in Indian media thereafter, has not caused a rethink. Without a swim in the sea of Hindu nationalism, the Left is doomed to extinction; Hindu groundswell will give the BJP a lift as a Hindu party in spite of itself.

Conversion is political conquest, which is why faith and empire have always gone hand-in-hand. Currently, the National Association of Asian Indian Christians in the USA, Inc, Indian Christian Forum and Gujarat Christian Federation have joined hands to invite Western Christian intervention to facilitate conversions in India. Already Pope Benedict XVI, and the Italian and American Governments have expressed themselves against the Hindu reaction to the murder of Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati last month.

Yet surely the violence is a symptom of deep-seated Hindu resentment over missionary conduct. Certainly the growing arc of violence against Christian prayer halls, from Orissa to Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and even isolated incidents in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, supports the contention that unmonitored foreign funds are being used for conversions and that the true extent of Christian population is not reflected in the Census.

What is indefensible here is that the Indian state, despite so much known societal resentment, has done nothing to monitor missionary activity among vulnerable sections of the people. When it is known that evangelists target the chronically ill, hungry, and socially backward, why is there no immediate and statutory inquiry the minute a conversion takes place? If faith is being exchanged like a market commodity, does the missionary have the licence to conduct such a transaction?

And when the Church (and its secular advocates) claims that conversions happen when it renders services Hindu society has failed to provide, doesn't that debunk the myth of 'voluntary' conversion? If the argument of social service can justify religious conversion -- the rejection of one's natal faith -- can such facile pleas also justify treason against one's country? Can an official sell sensitive secrets and claim immunity from prosecution on the pretext that he felt discriminated by the Pay Commission?

India is fully aware that barring France, almost all Western Governments provide generous funding to evangelists; this has a political and not a religious objective. Israel was created by dumping European Jews on Palestine; East Timor was created by almost full-scale conversion of the Muslims in that part of Indonesia. Despite awareness of the Baptist activity in the North-East, the Indian elite's slavish attitude towards the West inhibits an adequate response to the nature of the threat. Foreign missionaries visit the country with impunity, and very few are identified and deported; so far no funds of converting agencies have been seized. Henceforth, district authorities must be asked to suo motu investigate any unnatural rise of converts in any area.

In the specific context of Karnataka -- where the Bishop displayed shocking manners when visited by the Chief Minister -- it bears stating that the incidents took place in the context of a booklet profaning Hindu gods and goddesses distributed on behalf of a cult not officially recognised by the Catholic or Protestant Church. Some years ago, such a booklet by a Kerala-based group had caused much distress in Kota, Rajasthan, so there is clearly a pattern behind such provocations.

What is pertinent here, however, is that after formally dissociating with the booklet and the cult, the Christian groups proceeded to act in tandem. They not only organised themselves at the national level, but even at the international level, as witnessed by the Vatican, Italy and America rushing to interfere in India's internal affairs. This underlines the political nature of conversions, a point that simply cannot be over-emphasised.

As conversions are often justified on grounds of freedom of religion, it is pertinent to ask whether an individual -- embedded from birth in family, religion, cultural tradition -- can simply cut anchor and roll away. The Sanatan Dharma is a religion and a civilisation; conversion to any monotheistic faith involves an immeasurable loss of culture, tradition, and multiple levels of religious belief. One does not merely travel from Krishna to Christ or Kaaba, as is glibly insinuated. One loses a civilisational landscape -- ishta deva (personal deity), kula deva (family deity), grama deva (village god), sthana deva (god of the area) -- and the culture and traditions associated with it.

This assumes threatening dimensions when conversions target whole groups or villages, through well-orchestrated mind-control techniques that involve physical threats and economic inducements. Tragically, the poor, who are the most devout and committed to their gods and faith, are left unprotected when missionaries corner and pressurise them to convert in lieu of small favours. A self-respecting and vigilant state would be more active in protecting the religious, cultural, and civilisational heritage of its citizens.

Can't trust the Americans

In the heat and dust raised by the manner in which India secured a questionable waiver at the Nuclear Suppliers Group meeting in Vienna on September 6, many opponents predicted the nuclear deal would mean only what the Americans said it would mean. A former Ambassador of India to Turkey revealed that a Deputy Prime Minister of Turkey, a NATO ally of the US, used to say, "Mr Ambassador, you cannot trust Americans on even what they have given in writing."

That pretty much sums up the situation, for there seem to be myriad words and meanings as Americans expound upon the deal. In the process, the India-US nuclear deal has acquired an admirable plasticity hitherto witnessed only in our famed plastic arts (dancing, singing), a kind of Hinduisation its worst critics could hardly have imagined.

Thus it comes as no surprise that Washington has quietly diluted the fuel supply assurances contained in the 123 Agreement in President George W Bush's formal message to the US Congress, which avers that all American commitments to India are not "legally binding". Mr Bush is seeking the Congress's support to rush through the legislation necessary to implement the deal, for which he submitted the text of the 123 Agreement with a covering note and a separate memorandum with seven 'determinations' that India has conformed to non-proliferation commitments made in July 2005.

In the covering note, Indian journalists discovered a 'sting' on the question of fuel assurances, which India has long projected as an essential component of an interlocking set of commitments and obligations undertaken by both sides since 2005. Mr Bush's statement to the Congress made a mockery of mutuality: "In Article 5(6) the Agreement records certain political commitments concerning reliable supply of nuclear fuel given to India. (The) Agreement does not, however, transform these political commitments into legally binding commitments because the Agreement, like other US agreements of its type, is intended as a framework agreement."

This triggered an 'explosion' in the Indian nuclear establishment, where officials struggled to insist that the assurances were intended to be legally binding, though in the absence of an arbitration clause, 'legally binding' has no enforceable meaning. Still, officials persisted with the now obvious lie that the deal cannot be treated like "other US agreements of its type", as only the Indian agreement includes fuel supply assurances. Legally binding fuel assurances were needed because India, which is not obliged to place all reactors under safeguards or withdraw them once placed, unlike other countries with which the US has agreements, was voluntarily accepting IAEA supervision.

These arguments amount to the stirring of spittle. It is evident that the Bush Administration has taken the Indian ruling establishment for a massive ride, and the country will suffer incalculably if Prime Minister Manmohan Singh persists on this ill-fated road. His Government has lost its legitimacy on account of the cash-for-votes scam, he himself has lost the aura of being 'a good man on a hard seat,' and the vocabulary of this contentious deal means completely different things to both sides. The Union Cabinet, Parliament, and the people of India have been denied basic information about what he is colluding with the Americans, and Washington daily denies what New Delhi claims about the nature of the deal.

In these circumstances, Mr Singh would do well to cancel his proposed visit to the US on September 23 to sign the deal. Both regimes are lame ducks, and should ideally leave the matter to the respective administrations that will actually implement it. Moreover, as the Congress has less than one-third seats in the present Lok Sabha, Mr Singh owes the nation an explanation why National Security Adviser MK Narayanan and External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee assured Washington that it would get its share of nuclear commerce with India.

Even as Indians ponder why this regime is rushing to complete the deal, Americans are clear that economic manna is coming their way. The Washington Post has urged US lawmakers to hurry with the legislation so that American business houses can rake in the moolah. It specifically warned against French and Russian competition. It would seem that in the post-World War II era, America has not only taken over Britain's role as the leading colonial aggressor, but also its identity as a nation of shopkeepers!

Countries like North Korea, Iran and Pakistan will continue their nuclear journeys. Though Pakistan has been guilty of proliferation (late Benazir Bhutto reportedly told journalist Shyam Bhatia that as Prime Minister she carried the know-how CDs to North Korea), Islamabad received the initial know-how through the magnanimity of the CIA. North Korea has stopped unwinding its nuclear programme, and will doubtless get help from Beijing. Similarly, Moscow has increased its presence in Tehran, and the sharply declining crude oil prices indicate that US aggression on Iran has been averted.

New Delhi has failed to resume talks on the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline, which was to extend to China, thus eliminating fears of possible Pakistani sabotage. Natural gas can meet our energy needs on an immediate and abiding basis, yet India is neglecting viable energy options for pie-in-the-sky options like the India-US nuclear deal.

India's current power generation is 127 gigawatts (GW), and we need 337 GW by 2016-17 to sustain the current GDP growth rate. Nuclear energy was only 3.9 GW in 2006, and can rise to a maximum of 20 GW by 2016 at prohibitive costs. The large power deficit would still have to be met from indigenous thermal, hydro, gas, wind or solar energy generation.

Contemporary debate has ceased to mention our indigenous thorium-based nuclear programme. Our known thorium reserves can generate 400,000 MW annually for the next four centuries. India alone has the technological expertise for thorium-based reactors and a 300 MW reactor is under regulatory clearance; production can begin in just seven years.

In these circumstances, India urgently needs a constitutional amendment to ensure parliamentary ratification of international treaties as the era of one-party dominance is over and coalition (even minority) Governments are becoming the norm. Yet a ruling coalition with no moral authority is denying Parliament a say on a treaty governed by US laws, which stipulates several conditions binding upon India.

Call the bluff of Kashmiriyat

Ignited Hindu men, women and children, who sustained a 61-day agitation for the restoration of land allotted to create temporary facilities for pilgrims to Sri Amarnath shrine, and the very thought of a blockade-that-never-was had Jammu & Kashmir's majority population in visible sweat. Fear showed in the eyes and voices of 'ordinary' traders fearing for the remuneration from their annual fruit harvest, and the hysterical pitch of politicians trying to consolidate votes in anticipation of an Assembly election unlikely to be held in the near future, hardly improved matters.

For Muslims, that is. Hindus from neighbouring States rushed to support the cause of the pilgrims; three persons sacrificed their lives to the cause, even as the so-called 'popular' Kashmiri leaders agitated against the land transfer from the safety of Delhi's television studios. The Centre should call their bluff by telling them to ask their own benign community to take care of their security needs; this will introduce a dose of realism into the public discourse.

The unexpected murder of Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati on Janmashtami in Orissa brought Hindu rage to the fore in several districts of the State, and showed effete politicians everywhere that Hindus can no longer be expected to remain mute in the face of grim provocation. And if Jammu was no small irritant to the hitherto patient Hindu community, then Kandhmal was pure aggravation. The subsequent trade union style bandh by Christian organisations in Delhi, the unwarranted interference of the Vatican and the Italian Government, only underscored the organised nature of Christian offensive against Hindu dharma. For let there no be misunderstanding -- a monotheistic religion can expand only by annihilating native faiths everywhere.

In these circumstances, the Centre would do well to allot the 99 acres of forest land at Baltal to Hindu pilgrims in perpetuity, and not only for two months during the annual yatra. The land must be given free, not leased at the exorbitant Rs 2.5 crore initially mooted, not because Hindus are unwilling to pay, but because Kashmir is the abode of Rishi Kashyap, protector of gods and people, and Shiv, the special god of the Himalayan range.

Sri Amarnath Shrine Board can be asked to erect permanent pilgrim facilities at the site, to be used when pilgrims come. For the rest of the year, the place is uninhabitable, but there is little sense in making huge investments every year. More pertinently, while the yatra may be seasonal, Hindus are not a nomadic (banjara) community whose tents and poles will be uprooted every season.

As for the Muslim-dominated Valley, it is time to call the bluff of Kashmiriyat and end the mindless appeasement. If a minimal demand for pilgrim facilities can trigger 'passions' in the Valley, this means Kashmiriyat was only the total banishment of Hindu culture from the public arena. There was never a composite culture -- the so-called Sufi Nund Rishi was always backed by Muslim political power, and Hindus sought reconciliation at whatever price it could be achieved. That era of 'apat-dharma' (dharma in times of distress) is now being brought to a close by self-motivated men and women in vast swathes of the nation.

Threats of a backlash in the Valley must be treated with the contempt they deserve. The shameless advocacy of separatism by some rootless writers has not cut any ice anywhere. If at all, the sight of Jinnah's posters and the Pakistani flag being waved with impunity by the azadi-walas, while suffering Hindus raised the Tiranga in Jammu, has inflamed Hindu sentiment nation-wide. Reports of the Indian Army refusing to confront Tricolour-waving crowds in Jammu suggest deep unhappiness with the way politicians have conducted themselves on the issue.

The mysterious murder of Sheikh Abdul Aziz of the All-Party Hurriyat Conference while leading a mob towards Muzaffarabad in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir suggests all is not well in the separatist camp and that it is time to stand firm. National Security Adviser MK Narayanan has said the death was not caused by police firing (Aziz was shot in the back), and is possibly due to rivalries in the separatist camp.

Muslim politicians, including Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Omar Abdullah, Sajjad Lone and Mehbooba Mufti, are vying for the status of the 'most fundamentalist' leader. Geelani openly advocates merger with Pakistan, while the so-called 'moderates' speak of 'independence'. The moribund UN Military Observers Group has been revived, and its attitude shows that India needs to urgently talk to Russia and China about curtailing the Western colonial agenda pursued through the United Nations.

The Congress is clueless where to go. Its fairly decent Chief Minister made mistakes after being betrayed by Mehbooba Mufti, one of the most venomous public figures in the country, and lost both his Government and control over the issue. In the violence that followed, the party's former Deputy Chief Minister Mangat Ram Sharma nearly lost his life, though his vehicle was torched. The Congress's leaders, as also Hindu workers of the National Conference and the People's Democratic Party, in Jammu joined hands with the Sangharsh Samiti, a fact whose significance cannot have been lost on the parties concerned.

Finally, a word is in order about the role of women in the current agitation. In Jammu, young and old Hindu women came out in support -- the Reuters photograph of an ethereal eight-year-old clasping a naked sword is certainly the movement's most enduring image.

The presence of women on the battlefield is a very Hindu phenomenon. Centuries ago, Alexander's historians noted with astonishment the presence of Hindu women grabbing the shields or feet of Greek soldiers to frustrate their movements. Centuries later, the British were amazed to see tribal women standing beside Birsa Munda's men and loading rifles for the men to fire.

This was not the case in traditional Islam. Hence the presence of Muslim women in Srinagar, covered head to toe, shouting "Raghda! Raghda!" (Crush! Crush!) and stamping the ground beneath their feet to indicate the trampling of Mother India, cannot be condoned. Muslims who want to live as orthodox Muslims must keep their women out of the war zone. As for the Government of India, it cannot project pusillanimity as chivalry -- the women should have been rounded up and released miles away -- a long walk home would have sobered them all.

An Olympian mistake

As gushing media acolytes crowed that Congress president Sonia Gandhi and her entire family had secured the coveted invitation to the Beijing Olympics in defiance of diplomatic protocol wherein the President or Prime Minister represents the nation, it was overlooked that an aspiring regional superpower was publicly upstaged at the century's greatest spectacle by a naturalised citizen! A friend commented that Ms Gandhi had failed to comprehend that her action humiliated her own Government -- she is the UPA chairperson.

Mercifully, the karmic retribution has been almost instantaneous. As all Governments, more especially the Chinese, stick to protocol at such major international events, Ms Gandhi and her family could naturally not be accommodated in the same stands as other national leaders at the Games. Even selective television footage and media reportage could not cover up the fact that the only 'famous personalities' she managed to meet in Beijing were the children of Pakistan's former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.

Minister of State for External Affairs Anand Sharma obsequiously promoted this as continuing the friendship between Rajiv Gandhi and Benazir Bhutto, actually just a couple of official meetings that amounted to nothing, as the late Benazir Bhutto did the most to vitiate the atmosphere in Jammu & Kashmir. Certainly this cannot be projected as politically rewarding, as Mr Bilawal Bhutto has just begun college and the younger girls are probably in school. Obviously, in the heightened atmosphere of the Olympics -- which coincided with Georgia's foolish action against South Ossetia followed by the resounding Russian riposte - the Ministry of External Affairs could not drum up more notable encounters for Ms Gandhi.

One does not know when she returned to New Delhi, because it must necessarily have been a quiet homecoming. It does seem evident, however, that the UPA chairperson was not around to share and savour India's greatest moment at the Olympics -- when shooter Abhinav Bindra won the gold against all odds. Hence he was made to call on her on his return, when he naturally visited President Pratibha Patil and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Had Ms Gandhi refrained from front-page photo-ops in the Bindra case, she would not have underlined her Beijing fiasco. She went in haste and returned prematurely, missing the golden moment!

If Ms Gandhi wanted to show the world that she had no compunction in upstaging the Indian President and Prime Minister, she succeeded admirably. But having thus humiliated the symbols of the nation, she could not secure for herself the seats at the high table that were necessarily reserved for them, and had to settle for second-fiddle status. Had she and her acolytes only stopped to recall the protocol issues that arose when the then unmarried Ms Carla Bruni thought to visit India with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, she would have realized that even the well-connected can get away with just so much.

Ms Gandhi would have behaved differently if she had been a natural-born citizen (not an Italian-born naturalised one). This is therefore an appropriate occasion to revisit the issue of her foreign origin and soaring political ambitions. Moreover, in a recent interview, National Conference MP Omar Abdullah declared that the passport he holds is no one else's business, thereby hinting that he might be holding more than one passport, which is illegal. India should further debate if children born of foreign parents should hold political office, especially given the stubborn silence of all concerned in the face of sustained queries on the issue of dual citizenship or double passports. Surely opposition to foreigners contesting elections in India cannot be confined to Nepali-born aspirants only!

The issue of secret dual citizenship is relevant in every country, as demonstrated in the flight of former Peruvian President Albert Fujimori to his native Japan, when faced with charges of corruption and allegations of having sanctioned death squad killings during his presidency. A larger and more relevant issue is that of true allegiance -- one can formally renounce a country's citizenship, but serve its interests through marriage in another country. In the current turmoil in Georgia, it seems most pertinent that Mr Mikhail Saakashvili, who came to power on the crest of the US-funded 'Rose Revolution', is married to an American.

This may also be the time to undo the laxity in the matter of allowing diplomats (or Government servants) to marry foreign citizens. Hitherto this permission has been granted capriciously to those who could swing it, and denied to others without assigning reasons (actually there can be no reason for giving permission; it must be routinely denied and officers with foreign wives denied top posts). Diplomats getting involved with foreigners should be helped find alternative employment as they could easily compromise national interest by falling into a trap laid by a foreign intelligence agency. This ban should be extended to all those who aspire to or hold elected office, from panchayat level upwards.

To return to Beijing, the presence of Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and US President George W Bush was enough to eclipse the absence of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk. The French President signalled the traditional Norman pragmatism; other leaders seeking Beijing's friendship included Israel's President Shimon Peres, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, Japanese Prime Minister Fukuda Yasuo, President of the Republic of Korea Lee Myung-bak, Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

Simply put, Beijing did not need Ms Gandhi to overcome any so-called embarrassment over Tibet, instigated by the same forces that 'advised' Mr Saakashvili to undertake his foolish adventure in South Ossetia. On that glittering stage -- aptly labelled China's coming out party -- her presence was neither needed nor sought. She remained in the shadows. Strangely, the dominant voices in the Bharatiya Janata Party resolutely refuse to condemn this deadly one-upmanship.

Jammu stands up to Kashmir

Jammu continues to burn as Hindu nationalists struggle alone but undaunted against sabre-toothed partisans of Allah who seek to efface all vestiges of civilisational heritage from the land of Rishi Kashyap. Backed by a de-nationalised media and a shameless political dispensation at the Centre, the events in Jammu & Kashmir must be seen in the context of a perverse drama enacted in Parliament on 21-22 July 2008, when the UPA won a tainted trust vote to pursue a subordinate alliance with Washington.

We shall never know if the Islamic political theatre witnessed in Parliament was scripted or pure ad-libbing; certainly it was impressive. The backdrop was the warning by the Left and Bahujan Samaj Party that Indian Muslims were opposed to the nuclear deal with the United States. This gave the erroneous impression that Hindus favoured surrendering national sovereignty to the US, a falsehood abetted by an effete BJP leadership that coyly endorsed the substance of the deal and strategic alliance, while siding with the Opposition in the matter of the trust vote. This absurd stand left the party with egg on its face; the un-exposed sting operation on cash-for-abstention increased its discomfort; and the 'dominant faction' had to take full responsibility for the fiasco.

The brouhaha over the Muslim vote, however, pushed the ruling coalition to prove that Muslims in Parliament were on its side. Mr Salahuddin Owaisi of the Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen shrewdly defended his decision to side with the Government by enumerating the enormous financial outlays made exclusively for Muslims. This set the tone for the unwholesome projection that the Muslim community alone could legitimately endorse or oppose Government policy. Ms Mehbooba Mufti's shrill ranting about the Babri Masjid and Gujarat riots, and demand that Jammu & Kashmir be treated with extra sensitivity, augmented the view that the UPA needed to pamper Muslim leaders alone.

But it was Mr Omar Abdullah -- much celebrated since by the anti-Hindu media as the 'star' of the trust vote -- who took the cake, raging against the aggrieved Amarnath pilgrims and claiming to speak as a "Muslim and an Indian". Now, the first thing a bona fide Indian would know is that Hindustan has a hoary Hindu ancestry, and that it is impossible to be truly Indian without having some kind of 'Hindu face'. Interestingly, Mr Farooq Abdullah takes care to make nominal obeisance to Bharat Mata, Sri Ram, and often visits Tirupati Balaji.

Mr Omar Abdullah, however, pretending shock at the allegation that Kashmiri Muslims want to stop the Amarnath Yatra, raged against himself for staying put in the NDA Government during the Gujarat riots -- a pure drama scripted for a communal constituency in the coming State Assembly election. This pandering to a communal vote-bank was completed with the astonishing question: "Why does the land need to be transferred (for Amarnath pilgrim facilities)?"

One good reason is that Kashmir was an ancient Hindu kingdom with a living Hindu civilisation, until centuries of religious persecution and systematic ethnic cleansing reduced it to a cultural wasteland where politicians can shamelessly ask why Hindus should be given a toehold in land so carefully purged of their presence. It is irrelevant that ordinary Muslims en route serve the pilgrims and make a living out of this service. What is relevant is the political ethos of a State that declares Hindu pilgrims to be 'guests', not citizens equally at home in another part of the same country!

Far from being ashamed of his intransigence, the MP went on to defend persons born of foreign parents, an allusion to his British, and Christian, mother. He spoke vaguely to the media about "the passport that I carry", and it is unclear if he meant that he avails of 'dual citizenship' laws in other countries. What we do know however, is that Mr Omar Abdullah married a Hindu girl who naturally had to convert to Islam, and that, unable to resist pressure from more fundamental political rivals in his State, he has joined the bandwagon of competing for communal votes at a very base level. This is what propels him to talk of strengthening Article 370, when everyone knows it is in the interests of even Kashmiri Muslims to throw it into the dustbin.

Jammu has understandably been in flames since the so-called impassioned speech. The very next day, a young man, Kuldeep Kumar, who was participating in a chain hungerstrike against revocation of the land transfer to Sri Amarnath Shrine Board, died after consuming poison. Several persons were injured in the protests that followed; curfew had to be imposed in Kathua, Samba and Udhampur towns.

The situation took a turn for the worse when thousands of protesters assembled at Bishnah town, Samba district, and seized Kumar's body from the police who were trying to cremate it with old tyres and kerosene oil. Armed with swords, sticks and rods, the protesters injured half-a-dozen policemen and marched towards a police station, pelting stones. The Prime Minister and Home Minister have remained mute spectators; and nothing should be expected from the supine Governor. Since then, a collaborationist media has not even reported that angry Hindus have been blockading the Kashmir national highway! Renewed clashes between protesters and the police have now let the cat out of the bag.

One does not have to subscribe to the foolish view that the serial bomb blasts that took many lives in Bangalore and Ahmedabad, with Surat narrowly averting a similar tragedy, were the handiwork of the Centre to avert attention from the cash-for-votes scam. What cannot, however, be avoided is the perception that the blasts were intended to inform a Hindu audience (hence BJP-ruled States) that others will decide the moments of peace and the hours of anguish.

E-mails to news channels revealed it was jihad -- being waged to fragment the ancient unity wrought by the tapas of 12 Vedic seers from whom all Hindus claim descent. Media has noticed the targetting of centres of traditional and emerging economy (diamonds, IT), but the aim is to frighten Hindu business and professional middle classes; to convince them of jihad's awesome power; and persuade them to fall in line behind the pusillanimous political class. Developments in Jammu should convince Islamists that Hindus can think on their feet.

Satyarth Prakash not for banning

Sandhya Jain

As Delhi courts grapple with a petition seeking a ban on the publication and distribution of Arya Samaj founder Swami Dayanand Saraswati's magnum opus, Satyarth Prakash, it may be pertinent to recall Sri Aurobindo's tribute: "In the matter of Vedic interpretation I am convinced that whatever may be the final complete interpretation, Dayananda will be honoured as the first discoverer of the right clues. Amidst the chaos and obscurity of old ignorance and age long misunderstanding, his was the eye of direct vision that pierced to the truth and fastened on that which was essential. He had found the keys for the doors that time had closed and rent asunder the seals of the imprisoned fountains."

While acknowledging that there is much that even Hindus and Jains, not to mention Muslims and Christians, could legitimately dispute in Satyarth Prakash, Aurobindo's homage hits the eye of the fish. The lasting legacy of Swami Dayanand Saraswati (1825-1883), for which he deserves the undying gratitude of succeeding generations, is that he told an enslaved and demoralised Hindu society to seek inspiration and rejuvenation in its Vedic civilisational roots. Whatever the merits of his own rather literal style of interpreting religious texts, the call to return to the Vedic Gangotri was sheer genius.

It is a timely warning for our age, when westward-looking sanyasis are conniving to erode the Vedic roots of Hindu civilisation by forcing a peculiar monotheism upon society, with the Bhagwad Gita serving as a sort of 'Hindu Bible' This undermines the primacy of the Vedas and destroys the pre-eminence of Sri Ram.

Gujarat-born Dayanand Saraswati had crystal clarity in this regard: "I hold that the four Vedas-the repository of knowledge and religious truths -- are the word of god. They comprise what is known as the Samhita-Mantra portion only. They are absolutely free from error, and are an authority unto themselves... they do not stand in need of any other book to uphold their authority. Just as the sun (or a lamp) by its light, reveals its own nature as well as that of other objects of the universe, such as the earth, even so are the Vedas. The commentaries on the four Vedas, viz., the Brahmanas, the six Angas, the six Upangas, the four Up-Vedas, and the eleven hundred and twenty-seven Shakhas, which are expositions of the Vedic texts by Brahma and other great rishis -- I look upon as works of a dependent character... they are held to be authoritative in so far as they conform to the teachings of the Vedas. Whatever passages in these works are opposed to the Vedic injunctions I reject them entirely."

This is a precise summation of the Hindu quest in the colonial period for the true meaning of its tradition, depressed under centuries of Muslim rule. President S Radhakrishnan said Swami Dayanand would occupy pride of place among makers of modern India: "At a time when there was spiritual confusion in our country, when many of our social practices were in the melting pot, when we were overcome by superstition and obscurantism, this great soul came forward with staunch devotion to truth and a passion for social equality and enthusiasm, and worked for the emancipation of our country, religious, political, social and cultural... Swami Dayananda Saraswati was one who was guided by the supremacy of reason and he made out that the Vedic scriptures never asked us to take anything on trust but to examine everything, and then come to any kind of conclusion... So he was a social reformer who had a crusading zeal, a powerful intellect and a fire in his heart when he looked at the social injustices. He tried to sweep them away with a drastic hand. This is also what the country requires today... In that way he emphasized the rule of reason and pointed out that there is one Supreme god. He also gave freedom of conscience."

Currently, Mr Usman Ghani and Mr Mohammad Khalil Khan of Sadar Bazar, Delhi, are seeking a perpetual injunction against Satyarth Prakash on grounds that it hurts their religious feelings. Their specific objections pertain to paragraph 143 and 159 (English edition). To expound upon the merits of their pleas would be to unilaterally engage in comparative religion, which may polarise communities without resolving the issue scripturally or academically. This is not the first attempt to ban this 135-year-old text; hitherto courts have given short shrift to attempts to communalise established texts.

Instead of misusing contemporary constitutional provisions to ban a text that has played a major role in India's historical and political awakening, inspiring freedom fighters like Lala Lajpat Rai to lay down their lives for the country; it may be rewarding to understand the context in which Satyarth Prakash was written. Religious scholars generally agree that Swami Dayanand did not have a complete understanding of the religious traditions he critiqued, though there was some merit in the faults he found therein, including Hindu dharma. Arya Samajis have not sought a ban on religious texts containing passages abhorred by Swami Dayanand (and many lay citizens); nor have other Hindu groups sought a ban on Satyarth Prakash for finding flaws in their religious practices.

One may specifically mention Swami Dayanand's critique of image worship, once zealously embraced by a generation of Hindus in north India, as renunciation of image worship negated the colonial-missionary attack on 'idolators' and revived collective self-esteem during the freedom struggle. However, as the need for such dissimulation is now over, Arya Samaji women coyly admit that moorti-pooja is no longer frowned upon so vigorously, and practices like nazar (warding off the evil eye on children) are making a quiet comeback. I mention this because many Hindu spiritual leaders with foreign disciples are defensive about 'idolatory' in the Hindu tradition and even today seek to interpret dharma in terms consistent with monotheistic traditions.

The petition against Satyarth Prakash is not a technical issue of freedom of speech (Article 19) of either side. Indeed, there are no sides here, because the intention of the author was to critique with a view to energise a half-dead people to national consciousness, and not to wound religious sentiments. It is in this context that the petitioners should understand the book and withdraw their petition.

Muslims lost an opportunity

The current explosion of violence, politics, and religious sentiment over the allotment and subsequent cancellation of land for civic amenities to Hindu pilgrims to Amarnath in Jammu & Kashmir should convincingly establish that religion is here to stay in the nation's public life. Religion and its associated culture and civilisational ethos have a large and legitimate role in forming the national character of a people, and need honourable acknowledgement, not concealment.

In India, the time has come to end the 'invisibility' of its Hindu face, and affirm the primacy of Hindu dharma in national identity and national life. Hindu dharma is the faith of India's native and majority community; it cannot cede its status to guest faiths which came here seeking solace from persecution, or to faiths that rode on the back of colonial conquest.

If Ayodhya was the first significant milestone in the Hindu quest for civilisational comeback, Amarnath is the next turning point. In Ayodhya, the Muslim failure to perpetuate the 400-year-old appropriation of the Ram Janmabhoomi was given a semi-fig-leaf of 'victimhood' by anti-Hindus appalled at the fall of the decrepit Babri structure. But Amarnath is pure provocation, a scandalous demonstration of intolerance by groups and parties that take their cue from external sources.

It is absolute tripe that the six PDP Ministers in the coalition Government were in the dark that the Sri Amarnath Shrine Board had sought land for facilities for pilgrims; PDP's alliance with the incendiary Hurriyat in opposing the transfer may have improved its cachet in the forthcoming Assembly election, but bodes ill for the future. It was politically and emotionally ill-timed as the State Government was making overtures to the ethnically-cleansed Kashmiri Hindus to return to the Valley. The promised safety of the persecuted Pandits has now been proved to be a chimera even before the first family could return.

Amarnath is different from Ayodhya. For all its resonance in the hearts of the people, the Ram Janmabhoomi movement could be misrepresented as raking up past issues and provoking a communal reaction. This is, of course, not true, as the dharma of India is a living entity and the gods actually reside in the temples built for them; the structures of monotheistic traditions are mere congregation halls for the faithful, and thus secular rather than divine.

What makes the Amarnath issue so potent is that it does not concern the hapless Kashmiri Hindus, whose pathetic situation is an embarrassment to all political parties and, therefore, purged from memory. The Amarnath yatra attracts Hindus from all over the country. The challenge to an innocuous move by nationalist Governor Gen SK Sinha, coupled with Mirwaiz Farooq's specious claim that an attempt was being made to change the demographic character of the Valley (incidentally the land of Rishi Kashyap), brought sword-wielding middle-aged women into the streets of Jammu. This is an indication that 21st century civil society is beginning to rear its Kshatriya head again.

The shocking and unexpected intolerance towards Hindu pilgrims is widely perceived in India as an attempt to put an end to the yatra itself, as Gen Sinha has been replaced by a supine bureaucrat who obediently 'requested' the State Government to cancel the land allotment and take over the arrangements for the pilgrims. India now has to face the religious identity-cum-civilisational issue head-on. The so-called Nehruvian consensus (actually imposition) is dead and cannot be restored.

At the root of the problem are the linked issues of secularism and Article 370; both are crying for a legitimate space in the dustbin of history. Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru bypassed the civilisational issue at independence and imposed a peculiar version of secularism upon the country, with profound, unseen consequences. Nehruvian secularism did not mean tolerance of religious diversity, or even the separation of religion and politics, both of which find resonance in the sanatana dharma.

Nehruvian secularism denied Hindu dharma a seat in the public arena, but legitimised the role of religion in defining the character of minorities in the public realm. This gave minorities a tremendous affirmation of religious identity; Hindus, in contrast, suffered a powerful sense of religious denial and humiliation. As a natural corollary, secularism and votebank politics promoted minorityism at the expense of the majority community, as manifested in state patronage for haj, separate personal laws; tolerance of illegal immigration affecting religious demography and even national security; and carelessness towards the growth of a fanatic underworld which threatens national security.

Hindu dharma is now compelled to assert its natural dominance in its homeland, as Amarnath has demonstrated that Muslims have discarded an opportunity to adjust to the nation's foundational ethos. It needs to be asserted here that every nation has a core culture and identity based on its ancient and native traditions; all groups position themselves around this core. This does not imply that later entrants or minority groups become second-class citizens; but in no country do minorities dictate the nation's identity and ethos.

Abrahamic faiths are vastly different from non-monotheistic traditions because they begin with a human founder at a specific point in history. He launches an exclusivist religious mission which involves the quest for a people and the conquest of an external (and ever-expanding) territory for those 'chosen' people. This necessarily involves the takeover of land peopled by others and the annihilation of the existing religion and culture; often, the original occupants of the land are simply exterminated en masse. The Old Testament testifies that this is what happened at Jericho, "land of milk and honey," when Moses' disciple Joshua set its walls tumbling down. The genocide of Native Americans in North and South America is another grim example of the logic that drives exclusivist religious traditions. In India, we have the Kashmiri Hindu story.

Modern Islam lacks the synergy of political, economic and military power that makes nations autonomous, and political and military glory possible; its halcyon days are over. This awareness has prompted truly conservative Muslims to seek a truce with Hindus. Even on Amarnath, the Imams at Reasi district supported the land allotment to the shrine and condemned the fundamentalists for creating communal disharmony. Deoband has already signalled a desire for peace; today those fomenting violence and unrest have clear links with Pakistan and its Western patrons.

Wandhama's endless night

Jammu & Kashmir's minuscule Hindu community, victim of severe religious persecution and ethnic cleansing over the past two decades, once again lost hope of an improvement in the political climate, which might have facilitated a return home, with the quiet closure of one of the worst massacres of the past decade. Last month, the community was shocked to learn that the Jammu & Kashmir Police had quietly closed the 1998 Wandhama massacre file, claiming "untraceability of the killers", though Indian law does not allow the closure of unsolved murder cases.

Actually, there was never any serious investigation of the massacre. The massacre saw the cold-blooded killing of 23 Hindus in Wandhama village in Ganderbal, the constituency of then Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah, on the night of January 25, 1998, the eve of Republic Day. One of the worst instances of ethnic cleansing, the victims included four children, nine women and 10 men; 14-year-old Vinod Dhar was the sole survivor. The Union Government had declared inability to help with the investigation in any respect, no doubt on account of Article 370.

Dhar revealed that masked gunmen entered the homes of the four Hindu families around 11.30 pm. They spoke Urdu, not Kashmiri, and asked for tea, which was served by his mother. Suddenly, firing broke out in all homes; the boy hid upstairs; the men set the house on fire before leaving. Vinod came down and saw the bodies of his family; the three other Hindu homes and a temple were also burning. Most Muslim neighbours were at the mosque for the holy night of Shab-e-Qader, and learnt of the killings when their women alerted them.

The State police said an unknown organisation, Intikaam-ul-Muslimoon, had left a letter on one of the bodies, claiming responsibility for the killing and warning of forthcoming attacks to avenge killings in Handwara. Villagers from both communities blamed the massacre on the "unwise" decision to shift an Army camp from the area seven months ago. Understandably, the slaughter triggered a fresh flight of Hindu families from Jammu & Kashmir.

Worse, the tragedy went virtually uninvestigated despite several pleas by Kashmiris. Instead of asking a superior investigating agency like the CID or CBI to help identify the killers, an incompetent or indifferent police callously closed the case on the grounds that no one had been identified as the killer of the Pandits. This is an ominous form of exoneration.

Though Wandhama shook the nation, agitating Kashmiri Hindus had to break down police barricades in New Delhi to get a hearing with the politically correct National Human Rights Commission. Panun Kashmir convener Agnishekhar fell unconscious when hit by a water cannon and had to be hospitalised. This compelled NHRC chairman Justice MN Venkatachaliah to order an on-the-spot investigation and issue notices to the Union Home Secretary, the State Chief Secretary and Director General of Police, Jammu & Kashmir, regarding the safety of citizens in the Valley. It sought an action-taken report from the State and ordered special care for the upkeep of sole survivor Vinod Dhar.

But the problem of Kashmiri Hindus, then as now, can be summed up as 'studied neglect'. On January 28, 1998, even as people mourned the tragedy, then Prime Minister IK Gujral celebrated the inauguration of the National Winter Games at Gulmarg with Mr Farooq Abdullah and Union Environment Minister Saifuddin Soz. This struck such a jarring note that the CPI(M) state general secretary felt forced to say that "as a mark of respect to the carnage of the innocent Pandits, the Government should have at least cancelled the colourful cultural programme, keeping in view the gloom that has engulfed the Valley people".

The Wandhama massacre marked the second stage of Hindu killings in the Valley; the first targetted individuals or males in groups of two or three. Wandhama saw the concentrated killing of entire families in chosen villages. By this time, the militancy was controlled by jihadis from Pakistan, products of Dawat-ul Irshad at Muridke, or madarsas affiliated to the Jamaat-e-Islami or Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Islam (which spawned Taliban). They were doctrinaire in their commitment to global Islamic resurgence and determined to wrest Jammu & Kashmir.

Scanning Press reports of the massacre, one found grieving Muslim neighbours reporting having advised the Hindu families to seek safety in Jammu, which the Hindus resisted, saying they loved the village. While respecting the sorrow of local Muslims, India must demand more from its Muslim citizens in the face of its unending suffering at the hands of jihadi outfits trained and sponsored by Pakistan and Bangladesh. For a start, Kashmiri Muslims must appreciate that the land of Rishi Kashyapa has a rich and hoary Vedic tradition which they must venerate and preserve if they truly believe in a composite Kashmiri culture, called 'Kashmiriyat'. The State language should be Kashmiri, not Urdu.

Ganderbal district presented a grim sight: 23 funeral pyres were erected; a lonely child lit each in turn. There was no one left, he said, to look after him, his fields, orchards, cattle. What an inheritance. The Wandhama massacre exposed the claims of the Centre and the State Government that the Valley was returning to normal. In fact, the return of an elected Government witnessed three massacres of Hindus -- Sangrampura (March 1997); Gul Gulabgarh (June 1997); and, Wandhama (January 1998). Kashmiris who fled naturally rebuffed Mr Abdullah's calls to return, as he failed to admit or mitigate their security concerns. The Centre was a mute spectator.

Currently, in election year, political parties are frantically calling Kashmiri Hindus back to the Valley, announcing sops and financial incentives to regain international credibility. The objective is to restore the shattered myth of composite culture, a euphemism for Hindu acquiescence in the politico-cultural domination of Islam. Subordination induced by centuries of oppression led Kashmiri Hindus to adopt a peculiar self-apartheid and insist on having a distinct identity from other Indian Hindus; the price was a chilling Hindu indifference to their predicament.

But the wheel turned full circle when the flight of Hindus weakened the position of Kashmiri Muslims vis-?-vis Pakistan on the issue of independence. Recognition has belatedly dawned that Hindus are a bulwark against outright absorption into the 'land of the pure'. As the Prophet inducted Arabs into his new faith tribe by tribe, Islam failed to eradicate tribal-ethnic identities, though it cannot admit them. Kashmiri Muslims cannot submit to Punjabi domination in Pakistan.

Deoband's Dar-ul Islam

Deoband's May 31, 2008, fatwa against terrorism marks official Islam's most significant departure from the phase of unproductive violence adopted by this beleaguered faith since the advent of Western colonialism, particularly in the last two centuries. Though slow in coming, the decision by Indian Islam's leading seminary to repudiate terrorism as a "most inhuman crime" was not unexpected; it may mark modern Islam's first decisive move towards demarcating the religious sphere from the polity, thereby facilitating believers to live without mental discomfort in non-Muslim societies.

Regular readers may recall that I have been expecting a dilution of Islamic fervour since Saudi Arabia itself experienced jihadiviolence, viz, the May 12, 2003, car-bomb attacks and the November 9, 2003, suicide attack on Muhaya compound, both in Riyadh. Then US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage rightly concluded that the real target of the attacks was the Saudi monarchy, sponsor of the puritanical Wahhabi Islam that is wrecking havoc in Muslim countries and the world. As radical Islam began creating a crisis of political legitimacy for Muslim regimes, they were forced to seek a religio-political response to counter the corrosive appeal of Osama bin Laden and his ilk.

The first hint that King Abdullah, keeper of Islam's two holiest shrines, intended to steer the faith away from extreme violence came during his 2006 Republic Day visit to New Delhi: He ignored the Hurriyat. I wrote then that the King would work to protect Islam's flanks in the emerging third crusade with political Christianity by giving predominantly Hindu India relief from the jihad sponsored by Pakistan and ISI-controlled Bangladesh. Such a wise strategy would inhibit India from joining the so-called clash of civilisations against Islam, as the conflict is essentially an intra-Abrahamic affair.

The evidence was Indian Muslims refraining from violence when Danish newspaper Jyllands Posten published cartoons insulting the Prophet in September 2005 and thereafter some European journals re-published these in March 2008 as a deliberate provocation. Realising they could not stage a terrorist strike in Europe, angry jihadis attacked the Danish Embassy in Islamabad on June 2, 2008, unaware that Denmark had withdrawn its citizens from the mission.

Deoband's fatwa is certainly part of the Islamic world's plan to move cautiously away from Western, especially American, dominance. This distancing is being calibrated with the emerging multi-polar economic order led by Russia, China, Central Asia and Latin America, which validates the concept of sovereign wealth (state control over natural resources), as opposed to private corporate monopolies. The Islamic world is wary because Iranian Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadeq was assassinated for nationalising oil; Saddam Hussein paid the price of attempting a non-dollar oil bourse; and Iran is demonised for opening a Euro-based oil bourse.

The decision that Deoband would host an 'Anti-Terrorism Conference' in New Delhi is a tacit admission by the ummah that India alone has been victim of sustained jihad for over a century, not for sins of Hindus, but to serve a colonial agenda. Though India was not complicit in the humiliation of Islam in Palestine or other places, Hindus alone suffered the brunt of blind Muslim rage, which did not cease even with Partition in 1947.

India was chosen for jihadi terror because it was, and remains, the key politico-geographical territory that needs to be controlled in order to dominate the world. Viceroy Curzon said as much in his October 1908 speech to the Philosophical Institute of Edinburgh: "It was the remark of De Tocqueville that the conquest and Government of India were really the achievements that had given Britain her place in the world... Consider what would happen were we to lose India...for it is inconceivable that India could stand or be left alone. We would lose its unfailing markets... almost the only formidable element in our fighting strength; our influence in Asia would quickly disappear... Remember, too, that India is no longer a piece, even a king or queen on the Asiatic chessboard. It is a royal piece on the chessboard of international politics."

To an India bleeding from the war of a thousand cuts, sponsored by America's Pakistani protectorate, the fatwa that "Islam rejects all kinds of unjust violence... and does not allow it in any form... The religion of Islam has come to wipe out all kinds of terrorism and to spread the message of global peace" synchronises too closely with the Jaipur bombings. Though BJP president Rajnath Singh rightly appreciated Darul Uloom's "seeking to dissociate Muslims from terrorism," he must also insist that Indian Islam de-link itself from the ummah in the matter of Muslim grievances which do not originate on this soil, and to put its best foot forward on the issue of combating terrorism in this country.

Instead of nitpicking with the lame duck UPA Government over an anti-terrorism law and the hanging of Parliament attack convict Mohammed Afzal, Mr Rajnath Singh should call upon Muslim leaders and citizens to actively dissociate with Pakistani and Bangladeshi terrorists by denying them refuge or recruits, and help the security agencies to identify and arrest them. Those with knowledge about the laundering of funds for terrorist purposes, especially the use of the stock markets for pumping funds into the economy, should assist enforcement agencies in exposing these frauds.

On the issue of illegal Bangladeshi immigration, the BJP should ask the Muslim community to help identify and deport the unwanted aliens. Whatever the economic compulsions, Bangladeshis entering India illegally are mostly Muslims practicing hijrat (flight) from a Muslim majority country into a predominantly Hindu country. Unlike their persecuted Hindu and Buddhist brethren, Muslim Bangladeshis are indulging in an un-Islamic activity by quitting Dar-ul Islam (land of the pure). If they do not view India as Dar-ul Harb (land of war), they should return to Sanatan Dharma when they enter the original motherland. Dhaka must admit the failure of the logic of partition and contemplate its own return.

For the present, however, the BJP should co-operate with the Prime Minister in setting up a federal investigating agency to deal with terrorism; the federal law will inevitably follow. However, the party is right to insist that Congress-appointed Governors immediately assent to Acts against organised crime passed by its Governments in Gujarat, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh.

Saving the mangroves

India's eastern coastline and regions east of India have been suffering serious environmental degradation without any sincere efforts at mitigation. The Orissa super-cyclone of 1999 smashed through huge tracts of land, taking countless lives and wrecking incalculable damage to crops, cattle and property. The 13 coastal districts along Tamil Nadu's 255-km long coastline are regularly exposed to cyclonic fury, and the terrifying tsunami of 2004 is still fresh in public memory.

Summer 2008 has been kind to India; Hurricane Nargis, which shattered the lives of untold thousands in Myanmar, has spared this land; it could so easily have been otherwise. A grim earthquake has devastated China, raising the toll of human tragedy manifold. Delhi's unseasonal rains have also taken some lives, and the weather has been inexplicable enough for experts to seriously consider it a consequence of global warming and environmental degradation.

Resurrecting the mangroves, now almost extinct in our part of the world, can even now end this continuing legacy of human misery, this horrible haemorrhaging of the earth itself. Mangroves, literally dense forests on the shore, tolerate the salinity of sea water and protect inland water sources and soil from salinity and erosion; above all, they mitigate the impact of cyclonic winds. There is no more ecologically sensitive and cost-effective measure of saving the seacoast and continental shelf than mangroves; yet, we have seen least action in this direction.

Given the pulsating environmental instability in our region, it is astonishing a debate still persists regarding the desirability of the Rs 2,400 crore white elephant called the Sethusamudram Shipping Canal Project (SSCP). The plan to dredge a 300-metre wide channel through the land-link between India and Sri Lanka, to reduce the distance between the western and eastern coast ports, is opposed by environmentalists, economists and security analysts. Colombo has raised an alarm fearing human intervention on Ram Setu could threaten its very existence in the event of another tsunami, already predicted by Nature magazine (December 2007).

The historical-civilisational significance of Ram Setu is obvious. Sinhala scholar Prof Tissa Kariyawasam, former dean of the University of Jayawardenapura, Sri Lanka, says most probably Emperor Ashoka's son Mahendra and daughter Sanghamitra came to the island by walking across the Ram Setu. It symbolises the establishment and protection of dharma; the Skanda Purana prescribes worship of the Ram Setu and the Shivalinga installed in its middle with appropriate mantras. It is a popular place for offerings to pitrs (ancestors).

The proposal to hack a channel was publicly welcomed by the LTTE in Sri Lanka and Tamil politician Vaiko. The Indian Navy and Coast Guard warned of the possibility of facilitating militant groups! Capt H Balakrishnan (retd) of Chennai made an in-depth study of the SSCP's viability, particularly the claim that it would save ships nearly 424 nautical miles (780 km) and about 30 hours of sailing time, with commensurate savings in fuel, thereby becoming self-sustaining over time. An estimated 3,055 vessels were projected to use the canal annually.

But its economic viability alone is questionable from a study of the Information Memorandum of the UTI Bank (now Axis Bank), wherein dredging costs alone are pegged at Rs 200 million in the first year. This will actually be higher as the open sea will constantly bring sand, which may keep the channel effectively closed much of the year. It is pertinent that the Suez Canal was cut through land, though it too has to be annually desilted. Many international shipping companies have already stated that using the canal would involve reducing speed, switching fuels, and incurring extra costs like canal charges and navigation assistance to negotiate it; hence, it made better sense to go around Sri Lanka! With news reports suggesting cost escalation up to Rs 4,000 crore, the argument for economic viability of the project is certainly over.

The Kochi-based Centre for Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI) has warned about the adverse effect on marine bio-diversity in the protected Gulf of Mannar Biosphere Reserve, if the SSCP is implemented. Director NGK Pillai has affirmed that the 3,600 species in the biosphere would be endangered if the Gulf of Mannar was linked to the Bay of Bengal, in the manner in which the Kochi shipyard had caused loss of nearly 60 per cent biodiversity in the Kochi estuary. Worldwide, the phenomenon of vanishing wildlife is reaching endemic proportions, and unless strict measures are taken, biodiversity loss could touch 60 per cent to 70 per cent in the next three decades. In this regard, the practice of trawl fishnets needs an urgent rethink, as they cause immeasurable damage to non-edible biota.

The National Institute of Ocean Technology has affirmed that the Ram Setu is a man-made structure, dating back to antiquity, a view shared by the National Remote Sensing Agency of the Ministry of Space, which has even been tabled in Parliament. This is why, once it was forced to withdraw the controversial affidavit denying the existence of Sri Ram, the Union Tourism and Culture Ministry insisted only an archaeological investigation could determine if the Ram Setu is man-made, and a legitimate heritage site worthy of protection under the Ancient Monuments Preservation Act, 1904. With monsoons ruling out an early investigation, the project is virtually in a limbo for the present.

But the danger is far from over as the forces behind SSCP are resourceful and powerful, as reflected in the ingenuous argument of protecting the Ram Setu while continuing with the project through a different alignment! It needs to be understood that the Ram Setu is a single, somewhat winding, land track between Sri Lanka and India, wide enough for an army to cross over. Over the centuries, natural erosion in the turbulent waters there has cut natural channels into it, wide enough for shallow boats to cross over to either side.

Any move to preserve the pristine glory of the Setu must envisage filling these passages and restoring the 'Ram path' between the two countries. Stopping SSCP vandalism at a spot where dredging is difficult and attacking the structure at a more vulnerable point, in the name of realignment, is desecration in disguise. It is pertinent that the southern sands are rich in thorium, our nuclear future. India does not need unnecessary activity in this area.

Ram bridges our history

The current controversy over Ram Setu presents an ideal opportunity to probe the reality of a god whose human incarnation is central to Hindu faith. The deity who inspired a footbridge wide enough for an army to cross the Palk Straits poses a powerful challenge to historians who hold that India's first political states were the 16 mahajanapadas that fought to control the Ganga valley in the sixth-fifth centuries BCE. The kings of Kashi, Koshal, and the Vrijji confederacy succumbed to Magadh under Bimbisar (c 543-491 BCE). Much later, after Alexander's retreat, the Mauryan Empire (322-185 BCE) rose by deposing the Nanda dynasty.

Can history accept that Koshal (which included Ayodhya) was an older kingdom; that a prince banished after a palace coup could raise a formidable force and cross an ocean to recover his abducted wife? Closely linked is the veracity of Valmiki Ramayan as 'itihas', not kavya; the existence of a temple in the Janmabhoomi; and the evidence of human intervention at the Setu.

Chandragupta Maurya's mentor, Kautilya, treated Ramayan and Mahabharat as familiar history. In the Adhikarana dealing with discipline, the author of Arthasastra advises shunning the vices of lust, anger, greed, vanity, haughtiness and excessive joy, for Ravan perished because he was too vain to restore a stranger's wife; Duryodhan because he would not part with a portion of his kingdom.

Ram's life resonated in art from the time image-making began. Kausambi, Uttar Pradesh, has the earliest terracotta depiction of a Ramayan scene, datable second-first century BCE, which shows Ravan abducting Sita and the latter throwing her ornaments on the ground to help Ram to trace her (described in Aranya Kand, 54th Sarga, Slok 2, 3). This coincides with the period when Buddha's life began to be portrayed in stone, notably at Sanchi and Bharhut, Madhya Pradesh. If the latter are accepted as true episodes from the Sakya Muni's life, it follows that the real story of Ram was being depicted in the Hindu art of the same period. Los Angeles County Museum has a terracotta sculpture of Ram from Nachara Khera, Haryana, with an inscription saying "Ram,' in Brahmi script of the third century CE.

Scholars believe an earlier narrative formed the kernel of the written Ramayan, which was completed between third century BCE and third century CE. The Buddhist Jatakas are almost contemporaneous with Valmiki; possibly both drew on an older source. The earliest Tamil Sangam literature, dating a couple of centuries before the CE, mentions the exploits of Ram. A verse in the Purananuru collection says that when Ravan was carrying Sita away, she dropped her ornaments as clues to her whereabouts (depicted very early in art).

Three Buddhist Jatakas which form part of the Khuddaka-nikaya, third century BCE, deal with the Ram story, with minor variations. The Dasarath Jataka is set in Varanasi, not Ayodhya; however, Ram gives his sandals to Bharat to rule the kingdom on his behalf. The Nidana of the King of Ten Luxuries is lost, but survives in a Chinese translation by Kekaya in 472 CE. Similarly, the Anamaka Jataka or Jataka of the Unnamed King is preserved in Chinese translation by Sogdian monk Kan-Seng-hui in 251 CE.

The Jain Ramayans are in Sanskrit, Prakrit, Apabhramsa, and Kannada. The canonical second century Anuyogadvara lists many works, including Ramayanam; but Vimala Suri's Pauma-chariyam , fifth century, is the earliest version, along with Vasudevahindi. There followed Ramayan of Svayambhu in Apabhramsa (eighth century); Mahapuran of Pushpadant in Prakrit (tenth century); Pampa Ramayan by Nagachandra (11th century); and Jina Ramayan by Chandrasagar Varni (19th century). Nagachandra records a tradition that the ancient inhabitants of Kishkinda were not monkeys but a tribe whose banner carried the insignia of a monkey.

Sri Lanka is integral to the story; this calls for a credible explanation if a north Indian poet was imagining events from a jungle haven. Sri Lanka has many sites associated with Ramayan. Its literary texts include Janaki-harana by Kumaradasa, 7th century. As Janaki (Sita) was abducted to Lanka, this is of natural interest to a Lankan poet. Ram's travails made their way to China, Tibet, Mongolia, Japan, Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Cambodia, and found representation in the visual and plastic arts.

Archaeology has yielded much since Prof BB Lal began excavating the 'Ramayan Sites' in 1972. The demolition of 6 December, 1992 yielded valuable material from the walls of Babri Masjid, including three inscriptions. Deciphered by renowned epigraphist Prof Ajaya Mitra Shastri of Nagpur University, the largest, in classical Nagari script of 11th-12th century, said a temple of Vishnu-Hari was constructed in the temple city of Ayodhya, Saketamandala. Supreme Court mandated excavations of 2002-03 indicate that the earliest habitations at Ayodhya go back well before 1000 BCE (possibly 1980-1320 BCE).

So what are the true credentials of the 30-km chain of sandbanks, underlain by coral reefs and limestone shoals, from Dhanushkodi in Tamil Nadu to Talaimannar in Sri Lanka? In the 11th century, Alberuni noted: "...Setubandha means bridge of the ocean. It is the dike of Ram, the son of Dasarath, which he built from the continent to the castle Lanka. At present it consists of isolated mountains between which the ocean flows." A 16th-17th century map shows a land-link between India and Sri Lanka; Ramanathapuram Gazetteer refers to Sethu Palam. The 13th century Venetian, Marco Polo, speaks of 'Setabund Rameshwara', bridge related to Ram. Coins by Tamil kings of Nallur in Jafna (Sri Lanka), who ruled between the 13 th and 17th centuries, affirm the existence of Ram Setu.

A cross-section of the setu with present sea level as datum-line shows many sandbanks above sea-level. The last glacial period ended 10,000 years ago; subsequently sea levels rose by a conservative two metres per 1,000 years. Microsoft Encarta 2006 says melting of ice sheets in Flandrian Transgression caused separation of Ireland from Great Britain; and of Great Britain from mainland Europe.

Ayodhya excavations suggest Ram's era fell around 1,000 BCE, when the sea level was probably six metres below current levels, exposing the entire land-mass near Dhanushkodi to Talaimannar. The odd stretch underwater could easily be filled up to create a ford to cross over. A close up of the setu shows firm edges on both sides (to prevent erosion), suggestive of human agency.

Caste with etiquette

Caste is once again the main menu on the professional middle class table, with the Supreme Court clearing 27 per cent quota for OBCs in education. There is heartburning over whether educational backwardness ends at the graduate or post-graduate level. This time, however, caste identities and animosities are definitely muted, with the rise of a tacit consensus to affirm the legitimacy of merit without casting stones at reservationists. This is a positive development.

In this backdrop, Mr Buta Singh's decision to take up the issue of Mr Mahendra Singh Tikait's casteist slur against Ms Mayawati triggers emotional ambivalence. As chairman, National Commission for Scheduled Castes, Mr Singh is duty-bound to uphold his constitutional mandate; he made dogged efforts to secure a copy of the FIR filed by a police inspector who allegedly witnessed the event. Ironically, this has displeased the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister, who had decided to heed the advice of BJP president Rajnath Singh and Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh to defuse a possible caste confrontation in the State.

Certainly Mr Tikait should have conducted himself with decorum, and not used language tolerated only in an era in which Scheduled Castes were denied the right to cast their votes. Mr TN Seshan's spectacular leadership of the Election Commission ended this menace, and after two short coalitions, Ms Mayawati is Chief Minister in her own right. As one who has risen from the bottom to break the proverbial glass ceiling, the BSP leader has no patience with the humility and gentility that characterised far more intelligent and capable SC leaders like Babu Jagjivan Ram. She is a warrior-politician, and one who may have acquainted herself with the Arthasastra during her stint in the wilderness.

Hence, when Mr Tikait's loose tongue raised hackles in Ms Mayawati's core constituency, she responded with a studied show of force married to unusual restraint. A 7,000-strong armed police force, including commandos, arrived at Sisauli village, but held the peace for three days to allow the Jat leader to surrender in court, where he promptly secured bail. Ms Mayawati ensured no untoward incident occurred in this period, and made a subdued statement that had the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act been implemented properly all these years, no one would have dared to use undignified language against a person holding the office of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister. This astonishing maturity is in sharp contrast to her last tenure as Chief Minister, when all Jat Superintendents of Police in western Uttar Pradesh were removed after one Jat SP allegedly misbehaved with her father!

The show of force chastened Mr Tikait, who apologised for his 'slip of the tongue' and said the BSP leader was "like a daughter" to him. This is the Hindu way of resolving conflict -- to accept someone as a member of one's family, fully deserving of the love and affection mistakenly denied so far. This sense of speeding reconciliation among groups, rather than promoting strife, prompted Mr Rajnath Singh to risk springing to the Kisan leader's defence by urging a policy of forgive and forget. Ms Mayawati conceded this to avoid eroding her new 'sarvajan' constituency, and fobbed off the NCSC request for a copy of the FIR. So when the NCSC succeeded in getting a politically ignorant SP to fax a copy of the FIR, the latter was promptly removed the same day and replaced by an officer from the Jat community!

Such deft manoeuvres will take Ms Mayawati far. Mr Tikait, however, must learn moderation. I was at the Shamli power station in the mid-1980s when Mr Tikait first burst into the limelight demanding power and irrigation for farmers; he then called Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi "dilli mein driver" (an allusion to his previous profession as an airline pilot). Possibly the Kerala MP recently in the news was unconsciously inspired by this when he called an airline pilot a "glorified driver". In Hindu tradition, Ved Vyas recruited Ganesh as stenographer to transcribe the Vedas; as a nation we must overcome the tendency to use legitimate professions as terms of abuse.

Mr Tikait later called Ms Mayawati "Chengis Khan" and blasted the Government's indifference to farmers' interests. This was probably no more than "saving face", and hence rightly ignored, while articulating the legitimate concerns of farmers. The BJP intervention also serves the farmer constituency it embraced in a very timely manner with the Vidarbha padyatra. Farmers span myriad lower, middle and upper castes, and offer a constituency to counter Ms Mayawati when disillusionment with her rule sets in. With Congress in disarray and the Samajwadi Party leaning towards it, the BJP needed a distinct identity; Mr Tikait's iconic status as a farmer leader can help.

But the BJP must understand that, unlike secular parties, it cannot disown the institutions of jati, kula and varna, which are the millennia-old ordering and organising principles of Hindu society. These were lumped together as 'caste' by colonial officials who gave caste a bad name when they realised it was the bulwark against evangelical success. For Hindus, however, kula and jati are intimately linked to familial and social identity in a hoary past, and are intrinsic to self-respect. The Purush Sukta (Rig Ved) accords simultaneous divine origin to all varnas; it does not even remotely allude to untouchability or lowliness in any being. When jati and kula were fitted into the varnas as an organising principle of society, the varnas alluded to a hierarchy of values. This ensured that intellectual-religious, military-political, commercial, and other wealth-generating orders were not monopolised by any family or social group, a far more egalitarian and just system than that prevailing in Western countries.

While jati, kula and varna are linked to Hindu dharma, untouchability is a social invention to punish transgressors. It has no dharmic sanction, particularly as practiced from the medieval era onwards, when non-Hindu groups entered the land and came into conflict with an otherwise homogeneous society. Today, it is high time we ended social disabilities associated with jati and varna. Interestingly, Ms Mayawati blames Mahatma Gandhi for fostering social divisions by coining the term "Harijan", thus freezing Scheduled Castes in a distinct and inferior ranking. Mr Buta Singh rightly directed the States to stop using the term 'Harijan' as only the term 'Scheduled Caste' has constitutional validity.

DMK's bogus Tamil New Year

Tamil Nadu's DMK regime could easily win the prize for the most original intellectual initiatives in the country. First it rewrote the history of Indian civilisation. Sri Rama is a figment of the imagination of Aryan Hindus, superimposed upon the Dravidian culture of Tamil Nadu. He never built the Setu erroneously named after him; it is a sandbar created by nature so that cronies of the current regime can make a fortune dredging it.

Tamil Hindus have lived with so much humiliation since the tirades of EV Ramaswamy Naicker that they don't know how to combat continuing insults to ancient reverences and traditions. The arrest of the Kanchi Acharyas on trumped up charges was the most frontal attack on Hindu civilisation since the assassination of Guru Tegh Bahadur four centuries ago.

Now a more insidious assault has begun to break the unity and continuity of Hindu tradition by vivisecting its civilisational concord. Hindus celebrating Baisakhi this year will be astonished to find their Tamil brethren culturally marooned as Chief Minister M Karunanidhi has decreed that the State will no longer observe Baisakhi as the Hindu New Year. Seventy million Tamils in India and Sri Lanka are afflicted by this move, as the forces behind the Indian innovation are trying to scuttle the Tamil New Year holiday in Sri Lanka as well.

Kalaignar was inaugurating a cultural festival organised by his daughter, Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi, on January 10, 2008 when he unilaterally announced that the Tamil New Year would henceforth be celebrated on the first day of the Tamil month Thai (Pongal, Makar Sankranti) instead of the first day of the month Chithirai. In a pre-planned move, he piloted a Bill on January 29, 2008 changing the Tamil New Year from April 14 to Pongal (14 January), and had it passed on February 1, 2008.

Baisakhi is observed as the Hindu New Year in Haryana, Punjab, Assam, Tripura, Manipur, West Bengal, Orissa, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Myanmar, Kampuchea, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand. It marks the first day in the Hindu solar calendar dating back to Aryabhatta and the Surya Siddhanta (fourth century CE). Hindu seers calculated the earth's distance to the moon, sun and other planets at a time when most of the world was unaware of the value of the integer zero; an atheist politician has no locus standi to tamper with tradition. Kalaignar claims to have consulted Tamil scholars and cultural experts before ordering the switch; this suggests a conspiracy against the Tamil-Hindu ethos. The academic credentials of these scholars must be revealed immediately.

Tamils say the 'Karunanidhi New Year' coincides with January 1 in the Julian calendar (January 14 of the Gregorian), and the whole exercise may be an attempt to move closer to the church year. Kalaignar reportedly also proposes to change the names of the Tamil months and weekdays to remove pan-Indic terms; a so-called Tiruvalluvar era commencing in 31 BC has already been introduced.

A word on Tiruvalluvar is in order. Jains have contributed vastly to the shaping of Tamil history and culture, especially Tamil literature and its most important ethical text, Tirukkural of Tiruvalluvar. The Jain poet-monk Ilankovatikal wrote the classic Silappatikaram (fifth century); the Sivakacintamani was written by Digambara Muni Tiruttakkatevar (ninth century). Important Tamil grammars, dictionaries and technical treatises were written by Jains, such as Pavananti's Nannul (12th century), the standard Tamil grammar; these were all appreciated by Saiv and Vaisnav scholars.

I say this to emphasise the shared nature of our civilisation and reject the new sectarian-racism being injected into the country from various quarters. Regarding the Tiruvalluvar era, there is no evidence he was born in 31 BC. V Pillai (History of Tamil Language and Literature, 1956) felt the internal evidence of Tirukkural suggested Tiruvalluvar lived around 600 AD.

As for the new Tamil month-names, they are simply the signs of the zodiac in Tamil (Capricorn, Aquarius, Aries, etc). But each month of the Indic solar calendar, Aadi (Ashaada), Purataadi (Bhadrapada), Markazhi (Margasirsha) has special rituals and fasts attached to it. Hence people perceive an attempt to erase the entire underpinnings of Hindu observances in rural Tamil Nadu.

A private news channel has reported that the HR&CE department has issued instructions to all temples to prohibit the sacred 'Panchangam Reading' ritual and other New Year celebrations on Baisakhi. This atheist offensive to diminish a living civilisation is consistent with what has long been happening in Tamil Nadu. Temple land and funds are routinely appropriated by the state with impunity; if Hindu society hopes to recover autonomy and self-esteem, it must begin by fighting for the rights and inalienable dignity of the temples. Hindu dharma has survived centuries of iconoclasm only because Hindu warriors and civilians did not shirk encounters, but rushed in thousands to defend their gods and temples to the last drop of blood. Come to north India and count the graves of sadhus at contested religious spaces.

Yet the civilisational challenge remains equally grim in the north. In 1999, Sikhs were asked to disown the ancient Hindu lunar calendar for a new Nanakshahi (crypto-Gregorian) calendar invented in Canada by one Pal Singh Purewal. Traditionally, the Sikh New Year falls on Baisakhi, when Guru Gobind Singh created the Khalsa. Purewal's calendar incorporates Gregorian features such as 365 days, five hours, 48 minutes and 45 seconds with a leap year every four years! It aims at detaching Sikh identity from its pan-Indic roots, a move already quite advanced given Sikh infatuation with minority status.

The Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee accepted the Nanakshahi calendar in 2003, but the Akal Takht refused, upset at the arbitrary fixing of birth and death anniversaries of the Gurus. There is no historic evidence that Guru Gobind Singh was born on January 5; likewise with other Gurpurabs. Under a compromise formula, Baisakhi, Diwali, Guru Nanak's Birthday, Holi and Lohri (Makara Sankranti, Pongal) continue according to the Hindu calendar; events like Guru Arjun Singh's birth anniversary and the martyrdom of Guru Tegh Bahadur and Guru Gobind Singh are fixed according to the Nanakshahi calendar. A casual walk through Sikh mohallas shows the growing presence of evangelical churches. Custodians of the Sikh faith must wake up to the reality that loss of Hindu moorings may capsize the tradition itself.

Roof rights of the world

On October 26, 1947, Hari Singh, Maharajadhiraj of Jammu & Kashmir and Naresh Tatha Tibbet adi Deshadhipathi, executed the Instrument of Accession to India, which was accepted the next day by Louis Mountbatten, Governor-General of India. Its most remarkable -- and unspoken -- aspect is that it pertains exclusively to Jammu & Kashmir and maintains inexplicable silence on Tibet.

Apparently, when the ruler merged the state with India, he created a "strategic vacuum" whereby Mountbatten could help the West regain control of the roof of the world, won by Francis Younghusband with the most brutal massacre of Tibetans four decades ago. Strangely, I have never seen any version of Indian history, diplomatic memoir or strategic analysis that could explain how Hari Singh became 'Tibet Naresh'. But it now seems apparent that Pakistan was created not merely to give the West a foothold to overlook the oil-rich Gulf and Afghanistan, but to provide access to the Tibetan plateau to checkmate the Soviet Union and Communist China.

Like Pakistan, Jammu & Kashmir was also a pawn in this game. It was not given to Mohammed Ali Jinnah as a large Pakistan would be too independent for British comfort; hence two wings, dependent on the West. The issue of Accession was wrenched from Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel and deliberately waffled by the omission of Tibet. Some months later, Pakistan invaded Jammu & Kashmir and India was 'persuaded' by Mountbatten to take the dispute to the UN; this facilitated Pakistan's retention of the Northern Areas, vital for control of Tibet.

It was only when the UN Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan was found altering posts along the ceasefire line that Jawaharlal Nehru realised he had been taken for a ride and ruled out plebiscite in Jammu & Kashmir. Nehru's tragic awareness that colonialism had made way not for freedom but neo-colonialism, may account for his otherwise inexplicable swerve towards the USSR and China.

Western neo-colonialism would have been perceived in other world capitals also; hence Kremlin's rush to bring the Baltic and Balkan nations under its sway. Non-alignment was the brainwave of Yugoslavia's Josip Tito, though he generously shared authorship with President Nasser of Egypt and Nehru to accommodate non-Communist nations in a non-Western orbit. Chairman Mao, possibly prodded by Moscow, probably decided to avert Western presence in Lhasa by occupying Tibet.

It was a wise precaution. Tibet is a large nation, with borders touching Myanmar, Bhutan, Nepal, Sikkim, India; its boundary with China is gigantic. No Government in Beijing, regardless of ideology, could risk the presence of troops of hostile civilisations in such close proximity. Beijing built the Karakoram Highway courtesy Pakistan, not merely to outflank India but to also reach out to the West-oppressed Gulf and Afghanistan. Its friendship with Iran is also a reason for the unrest in Lhasa.

I think once Nehru realised that loss of critical Kashmiri territory made it impossible for India to access, let alone protect, Tibet, he acquiesced in a civilisational sister assuming this responsibility. It was realpolitik -- the holding of Asian territory by Asian powers. Whatever the demerits of such occupation, the 'Sons of Heaven' are more acceptable than the sons of Abraham.

Analysts say the current violence by Drepung Monastery monks coincided with the regular session of the All-China Assembly of People's Representatives, embarrassing Beijing and compelling it to use force. Simultaneous eruptions in Tibetan dominated regions of Gansu, Sichuan and Qinghai show the protests were coordinated. Andrei Areshev notes a parallel with the way Western media covered Kosovo in 1998, before the NATO aggression -- information comes from Tibetan ?migr?s in neighbouring countries and Western human rights NGOs.

Interestingly, India has permitted two Israelis, Yahel Ben David, a Silicon Valley technocrat with Mossad training, and Michael Ginguld, with a background with international development agencies, to settle in Dharamshala and create in 2005 a Wi-Fi network connecting over 2000 computers with broadband internet access, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) telephone services, and video conferencing. News about the unrest was disseminated through Tenzin Norgay, Personnel for UN Affairs at the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, Dharamshala.

Tibet must be seen in the backdrop of the Dalai Lama accepting the Gold Medal of US Congress in October 2007. This parallels the award of the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize to East Timorese Catholic Bishop Carlos Belo and secessionist ?migr? leader Jose Ramos Horta. The US Catholics Bishops Conference in 1998 asked Bishop Belo to make the promise of the Peace Prize a reality and sent a copy of this missive to US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright! A few months later, riots broke out and the UN announced a referendum on autonomy for East Timor; riots intensified and the August 1999 UN-sponsored referendum voted for independence.

Now, the Dalai Lama has obliged his American friends by calling for an international inquiry into the "cultural genocide" and accusing New Delhi, his host for nearly five decades, of timidity towards China! Washington's involvement goes back to CIA's "secret war" after the annexation of Tibet in 1949 and Hamand and Amdo in 1956. In October 1957, Tibetans trained by the CIA were airlifted to Lhasa from Dhaka to make contact with local insurgents. The Lhasa uprising started soon afterwards and the Dalai Lama fled.

Hundreds of Tibetans were trained in Colorado. From 1958, CIA flew in weapons, ordnance and trained militants from a secret base in Thailand. By the early-1960s, CIA annually spent $ 1.7 million in Tibet, and $ 180,000 for the Dalai Lama's personal needs. If Washington succeeds in landing troops in Tibet, Moscow expects it to exert further pressure on China's unity, notably in Xiangyang-Uighur and Inner Mongolia.

Reports suggest the 'Friends of Tibet' met in Delhi in June 2007 and proposed a march of Tibetan exiles in India and Nepal to Lhasa to coincide with the opening of the Olympic Games. US Under-secretary of State Paula Dobryansky, involved in the coloured revolutions in former Soviet republics, met the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala last November. Recently, US Congress Speaker Nancy Pelosi met him. As he is functioning as a politician and engaging in politics on Indian soil, he should be asked to leave along with his people.

A race that's all about race

In a fundamental sense, the Democratic Party's dilemma between race and gender has been settled firmly in favour of race. It no longer matters whether it is Mr Barack Obama or Ms Hillary Clinton who secures the Democratic presidential nomination for the November 2008 election. Thanks to tactless shoving by the Clinton co-presidency aspirants, Democrats will have to consciously decide if they want to help a Black man win a job coveted by a White woman. It's as basic as that.

This was partly inevitable because gender is too artificial to sustain; you can't delink a woman (or man) from family and social group identity. But race is intrinsically segregationist; indeed, White colonialists and slave traders in Europe and America devised the concept of race precisely because of its potently divisive appeal. Colour may be only skin-deep, but it's too in-your-face to be missed.

That is why former President Bill Clinton could effortlessly suggest to a public fed on the clash of civilisations and apprehensive of creeping Islamic influence among Afro-Americans that the Illinois Senator play second fiddle to his wife. He sugar coated the insulting suggestion that Mr Obama was not good enough to be President by calling the Hillary-Barack team "an unstoppable force," adding that Ms Clinton could win rural voters and Reagan Democrats, while Mr Obama could attract urban and upscale voters.

The New York Senator was quick to second the motion. Unacknowledged 'friends' had already released a photograph of Mr Obama in traditional African gear while on a trip to Kenya, and made much of his middle name 'Hussein' to raise the 'Muslim' bogey. So much for American pluralism and 'melting pot' culture; the message of the Clinton campaign clearly states that Blacks can become Christians, but they can never become White. Sadly, Hindu Americans of African origin have failed to speak for racial equality and dignity.

Mr Obama has done well to dodge the deadly race trap and resist the urge to prove pure Black or half-White credentials. The studied silence of his wife shows this is deliberate. Concentrating on charm and rhetoric, Mr Obama has deftly put the Clinton campaign on the back foot by pointing out: "I don't know how somebody who's in second place (in delegates and popular votes) is offering the vice-presidency to somebody who's in first place." He underlined his resentment to this unsolicited patronage by declaring: "I am running for President of the United States of America, I am not running for Vice-President." This is wise, for as David Broder has warned in The Washington Post, coping with Mr Clinton's ego in the event of his wife's victory "would truly be (a) cruel and unusual punishment for Obama".

Ironically, the running-mate issue has created confusion in the Clinton camp as well. While military supporters attest to Ms Clinton's ability to be commander-in-chief, an aide has questioned the sagacity of projecting Mr Obama as Vice-President while claiming he was unqualified to be the commander-in-chief. American Vice-Presidents are expected to have the ability to be C-in-C of the US armed forces in case circumstances propel them to the Oval Office, a la Gerald Ford. The Clinton campaign made things worse with the 3 am telephone advertisement, which many saw as naked racism and hate-mongering.

Then, as public opinion began to get edgy, the Clinton camp had a fit of verbal diarrhoea. America was treated to the spectacle of Ms Geraldine Ferraro giving an interview suggesting Mr Obama was successful only because of his ethnicity. Previously also, Ms Clinton's friends had complained that the media was kind to Mr Obama because of his colour, but this was a little too stark for American public discourse. Ms Ferraro had to quit in the furore that followed, though she tried to hang on; Ms Clinton tried to suggest both sides has made such mistakes, which is simply untrue.

As Democrats spar, Republican candidate John McCain is trying to consolidate his position with a visit to Israel later this month to firm up his American-Jewish support base. The Arizona Senator is reputed to be popular in Israel and with the Jewish Diaspora for his hard-line foreign policy. An unwritten rule of American foreign policy is that support to Israel helps and opposition hurts.

Mr McCain has already hinted he will favour continuity in the White House. Thus, despite his record of hostility to torture in military camps, he supported President George W Bush's recent veto of legislation prohibiting the CIA from using physical force in interrogations, particularly the gruesome technique of water-boarding and other inhumane and degrading methods of extracting confessions from prisoners.

It bears stating that the near-invisible men who actually control both political parties, work to ensure the continuity of respective party administrations and policies. Although Mr McCain's staff would not release the names of his advisers, a list compiled by The Washington Post last year included two former Secretaries of State, Mr George Shultz and Mr Colin Powell; retired Lt Gen Brent Scowcroft (National Security Adviser to Presidents Gerald Ford and George HW Bush); Mr James Woolsey (former CIA director), and Mr Richard Armitage (Mr Bush's former Deputy Secretary of State, famous for leaking the identity of CIA agent Valerie Plame and causing the imprisonment of Scooter Libby, Vice-President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff).

The Democratic Party has been equally coy with names. Press reports suggest Ms Clinton's advisers are mostly the old boys and girls of Mr Clinton's White House years. They include former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright; Mr Samuel Berger (Mr Clinton's National Security Adviser); Gen Wesley Clark (NATO commander in Yugoslavia); Mr Richard Holbrooke (Mr Clinton's envoy to the UN); Mr Martin Indyk (former envoy to Israel); former Ambassador Joseph Wilson (Ms Plame's husband), and Representative Joseph Sestak (a retired Vice-Admiral).

Mr Barack Obama has also received a share of Clinton Administration veterans, namely Ms Susan Rice (Mr Clinton's Africa specialist at the State Department); Mr Anthony Lake (National Security Adviser); Mr Dennis Ross (chief West Asia negotiator); and Mr Robert Malley (West Asia envoy).

Obviously the more things change in Washington, the more they remain the same. Mr Clinton began the unjustified NATO bombing of Yugoslavia; Mr George W Bush initiated the ugly war in Iraq and upped the ante on Iran's nuclear programme. He has also recognised the 'independence' of Kosovo. Whoever succeeds him at the White House this winter is sure to maintain the continuity of America's imperial quest for world dominion.

Enslaved by freedom

Kosovo's scandalous 'independence' has driven another nail in the coffin of a deeply discredited United Nations and proved its complicity in the return of naked 18th century colonialism. Nations with oil, gas, or other prized commodity may gear up for 'free trade' exclusively with Western corporates; Western military presence to protect freedom as in Iraq; or, self-determination of the kind that carved Christian East Timor out of Muslim Indonesia to become a virtual colony of Australian oil majors.

Muslim Kosovo, wrenched out of Christian Serbia, has both oil and gas. Further, Catholic-Protestant imperialists have triumphed over Eastern Orthodox nations that once took to Communism; hence also Moscow's anger. China has shown its displeasure by rebuking Taiwan for recognising Kosovo; India's shameful silence is explicable only by the dominance of UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi over the present regime. This will nullify Congress's efforts to woo the Muslim community for, as former envoy MK Bhadrakumar says, only three of the 60-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference have recognised Kosovo.

The Islamic world is becoming conscious of its continuing humiliation and exploitation by Western imperialism, which has an unmistakable racist edge. None of the non-White peoples who converted to Christianity to the extent of becoming Christian nations (The Philippines, South Africa, East Timor, to name only a few) enjoy genuine sovereignty or status in the international community.

Kosovo is a link in a 737-strong chain of American military bases in 130 countries. Journalist Pepe Escobar says, in an Asian Times article, Kosovo's tragedy has its genesis in the trans-Balkan AMBO pipeline and Camp Bondsteel, the largest American base in Europe after the Vietnam War. It exposes how ugly corporates ensure compliance with their interests across successive administrations.

It was Democrat President Bill Clinton who falsely demonised the Serbs and used NATO to get over the lack of a UN mandate, just as Republican President George W Bush later leapfrogged over the UN to colonise Iraq. The Euro-Americans moved to fragment Yugoslavia with the fall of the Soviet Union in the early-1990s. During the 1991 bombing of Iraq, Mr Clinton sponsored separatist movements in Croatia, Slovenia and Bosnia; imposed crippling economic sanctions on Yugoslavia; and, pushed NATO forces into the region.

The US also armed the Right-wing UCK (Kosovo Liberation Army), though Kosovo was not a Yugoslav republic, but part of Serbia. Washington's 'free' Press carried grim (fairy) tales of Serbian genocide against Albanian Muslims (remnants of the Ottoman Empire). The UCK controlled the opium and heroin trade from Afghanistan-Pakistan through the Balkans to Western Europe, earning over $ 1.1 billion for weapons. There is also a rich trade in prostitution. British intelligence trained the UCK in northern Albania, while Turkish and Afghan instructors taught them guerrilla tactics. Al Qaeda, too, had links with the UCK and Osama bin Laden visited Albania in 1994.

As nationalist Yugoslavia resisted Western pressures, America unleashed 78 days of intensive bombing, including the use of depleted-uranium bombs. On June 3, 1999, NATO occupied Kosovo. President Slobodan Milosevic was kidnapped and taken for trial to The Hague, where he died in March 2006, apparently of a heart attack. Meanwhile, Ms Carla Del Ponte, chief prosecutor, International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, assisted by forensic experts of 17 NATO countries, discovered that there was no genocide, no mass graves, only 2,108 bodies belonging to all nationalities and mostly victims of NATO bombing!

Unashamed, Serbia's tormentors placed Kosovo under a UN mission in 1999, through Security Council Resolution 1244. Real power vested with the mission of the European Union -- NATO was security guarantor; it slept over the hideous ethnic cleansing of 250,000 Serbs and Romas (gypsies). The regions' rich industrial resources were forcibly privatised and sold to giant Western multinationals. Halliburton took over the strategic oil and transportation lines of the entire region along with the security of Camp Bondsteel, the American military base.

Ms Sara Flounders, co-director, International Action Center, says the UN played a shameful role in Kosovo. In June 2005, then UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan appointed ex-Finnish President Marti Ahtisaari as special envoy to negotiate Kosovo's final status. He was also chairman emeritus of the International Crisis Group, a private body funded by multi-billionaire George Soros, who sponsored the 'coloured' revolutions in former Soviet Baltic Republics. The ICG favours NATO intervention and open markets for the US and the EU; its board included two key US officials complicit in bombing Kosovo: Mr Zbigniew Brzezinski and Gen Wesley Clark, then NATO supreme commander and now military adviser to Ms Hillary Clinton.

The Ahtisaari report submitted to new UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in March 2007 was understandably a command performance. It proposed an International Civilian Representative (read viceroy) appointed by US-EU to oversee Kosovo, with power to overrule any actions or annul any laws by local authorities. The Representative would control customs, taxation, treasury and banking. The EU would set up a European security and defence policy mission and NATO an international military presence, which would control foreign policy, security, police, judiciary, all courts and prisons. Mr Bhadrakumar says the deployment of NATO forces without a UN mandate is equivalent to projecting NATO as a global political organisation. It is pertinent that Security Council Resolution 1244 kept Kosovo within Serbia.

But Kosovo is ultimately about the $1.1 billion Albanian Macedonian Bulgarian Oil Corp pipeline, to be completed by 2011. Registered in the US, the firm will get oil brought from the Caspian Sea to a terminal in Georgia and then by tankers through the Black Sea to the Bulgarian port of Burgas, and relay it through Macedonia to the Albanian port of Vlora. Mr Clinton's NATO war was to secure Vlora's strategic location.

The oil is to be shipped to Rotterdam in The Netherlands and refineries on the US west coast, avoiding the congested Bosphorus Strait and Aegean and Mediterranean seas. The AMBO project conforms to US Vice-President Dick Cheney's American energy security grid. Halliburton via subsidiary Kellogg, Brown and Root, built Camp Bondsteel near the Macedonian border in southern Kosovo. It is also a place where prisoners can be held indefinitely without formal charges or lawyers.

As things now stand, Yugoslavia is destroyed; Iraq seems headed the same way. Sectarian religious violence is endemic, and Turkey is playing along with the US for a share of Kurd oil (Kirkuk).

At the cost of Hindus

Secularism has evolved into an odious fast-track for the disproportionate ascent of religious minorities in the top echelons of Indian polity, and their hijack of the state and its resources to pander to sectarian fundamentalism. Ever since Rajiv Gandhi's craven surrender in the Shah Bano case, there has been an insidious chipping away at the nation's secular edifice in a manner tailored to crystallise and partition minority identities. This is a departure from the original constitutional tolerance of religion-based personal laws in personal spaces that did not affect larger social interests and the desired separation of state and religion.

Now, the Sonia Gandhi-dominated Centre and Congress State Governments are doggedly pandering to minority sentiments in a manner calculated to affront majority opinion. Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Samuel Rajsekhar Reddy, a member of the evangelical Seventh Day Adventists sect, recently used the Governor's address to slip in a scheme to subsidise Christian pilgrims to Bethlehem and Jerusalem. The statement that the Andhra Government will "extend the Haj pilgrim scheme to Christian minorities also for their religious visits to Christian holy lands in Israel" is laughable as Israeli annexation has not been internationally recognised.

Moreover, the suggestion that Haj subsidy is being extended to Christians suggests Christianity is a sub-sect of Islam, though it is an older and distinct faith. A religious subsidy for Christians can only involve a fresh outlay exclusive to Christians; it is not cut out of the exclusively-Muslim subsidy. This raises questions about the perversion of Indian secularism, which was premised upon distance from religion, and the legitimacy of state funding pilgrimages for any faith.

Justifiable state intervention in the internal affairs of a religious community must derive from notions of higher justice and contemporary social needs for the good of a larger citizenry. The Shah Bano divorce and Imrana rape case show that the Indian state is incapable of standing up for poor and wronged Muslim women. Instead, it promotes obscurantist orthodoxy by extending the quantum of Haj subsidy which, ironically, is haraam according to the tenets of Islam.

In every religion, pilgrimage is a matter of personal devotion and not the duty of the state, not even a theological state. Islam enjoins the faithful to try to make the pilgrimage to Mecca once in a lifetime from their legitimately earned savings. There is no compulsion for those who cannot afford it. The Prophet did not even imagine a non-Muslim state would steal the resources of its Hindu citizens to subsidise Haj - against the letter and spirit of his teachings.

It bears stating that the misguided attempt to placate Hindu opinion with a Kailash Mansarovar subsidy by some States is an affront to dharma. Nowhere in Hindu tradition is the state supposed to subsidise a pilgrimage, though it is duty-bound to provide civic amenities en route. Many facilities are provided by the pious and the authorities of pilgrimage centres.

The Mecca-Jerusalem subsidies are political, not religious, subsidies. Both Islam and Christianity are political religions with an agenda for world-conversion and world-dominion. Hindus suffer double injustice as rich Muslim and Christian nations promote conversions, while secular India funds pilgrimage to Muslim and Christian lands outside India. India's politico-religious subsidies thus reinforce both fundamentalisms at the cost of the native Hindu civilisational ethos.

Residents of small towns have already experienced to their dismay that Muslim neighbours return from Haj with a disconcerting degree of fundamentalism. Indian villages are already experiencing a forced cultural separatism practiced by converts to Christianity at the behest of local padris, and tensions can only rise with Indian Christians visiting the holy lands.

It is pertinent that despite massive funding for conversion, the social and economic status of converts remains unchanged, though a sense of grievance and separated-ness is fostered through intensive religious indoctrination. The lack of social and economic mobility for converts, indeed the perpetuation of old caste inequalities with the tacit consent of the religious hierarchy, has recently come to be admitted by both faiths, though ironically, as an additional grievance against the Hindu community!

As the UPA chairperson was keen to snatch the rights of depressed Hindu castes and pass them on to Muslim and Christian converts, the National Commission for Religious and Linguistic Minorities was created with a pre-set mandate. Last year, it delivered according to its brief and recommended extension of Scheduled Caste reservation benefits to Christian and Muslim converts. Justice Ranganath Mishra even suggested a quota-within-quota for OBC minorities.

Justice Mishra proposed 15 per cent representation for minorities in educational institutions and all cadre and grades of Government employment, of which 10 per cent would be for Muslims and five per cent for others (read Christians). Claiming that minorities are under-represented in Government, he argued that they should be regarded as 'backward' according to Article 16(4), but without the qualifying distinction of "socially and educationally backward".

This is deliberate mischief as Justice Mishra knows that minorities are not educationally and socially backward. Besides, this is constitutionally untenable as it tampers with the basic framework of the Constitution. Para 3 of the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order 1950 limits SC status to Hindus, Sikhs and Buddhists, as caste is a Hindu phenomenon and cannot be delinked from religion. To do so is to facilitate conversions.

The NCRLM mooted earmarking 15 per cent Central development funds for minorities, an idea being pursued by the Planning Commission. Actually, as Islam and Christianity promote conversion with the promise of non-discrimination between believers, both deserve punitive legal action for discriminating against 'low caste' converts.

What stands between India and the deluge is the sagacity of Mr Buta Singh, chairman, National Commission for Scheduled Castes. Mr Singh has cautioned State Governments against using the word 'Dalit' in official documents as it is "unconstitutional" and only 'Scheduled Caste' is notified under Article 341. The de-legitimising of 'Dalit' (meaning broken, crushed) is a blow to the evangelical industry which has been promoting the term to forge separatism among Scheduled Castes. Mr Singh rightly insists that Dalit converts do not suffer the same maladies as their Indic counterparts; hence, Christianity and Islam must prove they practice untouchability and that it exists in their religious theology, before claiming ameliorative measures. This is a timely warning against wilful appropriation of Hindu concepts. It is now up to Hindu India to resist minority aggression.

BJP prepares for poll

Having sleep-walked to defeat in 2004, the BJP seems determined not to be caught napping again. Thus, despite the Congress's poor showing in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh making a premature general election unlikely, the BJP's recent National Council meeting unveiled its main electoral planks. The unstated constituency remains the Hindu majority, and the call to address the agrarian crisis, terrorism and insidious minorityism is designed to address multi-caste and multi-class constituencies.

Mounting agrarian indebtedness and unending farmers' suicides in several states present a grim picture. In villages, all castes are directly and indirectly connected to land. Indian culture and festivals are agrarian in origin and are intimately linked to the seasons of cultivating or harvesting. It is thus surprising that it was only with Mr Rajnath Singh's recent Vidarbha yatra that the BJP paid more than lip service to the plight of farmers. Its Andhra Pradesh unit was unmoved by daily suicides by cotton farmers during the reign of Mr Chandrababu Naidu -- an insensitivity that affected the national election.

It is shameful that we live with starvation deaths and farmers' suicides when India is so well endowed with fertile land, great rivers and abundant sunshine. We need to admit the failure of modern technology and chemicals in agriculture. Sadly, even now farmers are being lured into buying high-priced pest-resistant seeds which fail; fertilisers and pesticides that are poisoning the soil and groundwater and further affecting productivity. The murderous impact upon public health is beginning to show in Punjab.

The BJP should advocate a transition to genetically-rich agriculture and crop diversity which will keep India out of the trap of intellectual property rights. Traditional agriculture relied on genetically sturdy seeds. The Green Revolution exotic seeds are so delicate that the crop can be destroyed if irrigation is delayed a few days or a minor pest attacks.

We must also stress upon traditional minor irrigation systems to increase foodgrain output. Indian villages had different kinds of reservoirs to cater to village needs and recharge groundwater. Yet despite the emphasis on modern technology, as we enter the Eleventh Plan, we have failed to irrigate over one-third of our cultivated land. Decline in agriculture also affects cattle population intimately. Agriculture has suffered steady decline in public investment from the highpoint of 1980-81 when it touched 15 per cent of all outlay. Yet it is the Government's responsibility to feed over one billion people, and without food security we cannot enjoy true independence.

Closely linked to the agrarian crisis today is the persisting threat of crony capitalism in the form of Special Economic Zones (SEZ), whereby the Centre is gifting large tracts of valuable agricultural land to industrialists. As the land being allotted is far in excess of the actual needs of a specific industry, huge profits are built into every SEZ at the cost of toiling farmers and the nation's precarious food security.

The BJP would do well to fine-tune its anti-SEZ strategy carefully. Given that farmers remain insecure in both Singur and Nandigram in West Bengal, and given the irritating intransigence of Ms Mamata Banerjee, the BJP should independently position itself on farmers' issues here. Further, in States where allies tend to rely overly upon Muslim votes, the BJP should subtly position itself as the pole around which the Hindu community can consolidate itself. Given time and unwavering commitment, the gains can be exponential.

It is worth recalling that the Congress first took the murky SEZ route in Haryana where Mr Mukesh Ambani received an inexplicable bonanza. Heady with its new victories, the party punished its own MP, Mr Kuldip Singh Bishnoi, for opposing this crony capitalism. Sure of his ground, however, Mr Bishnoi charted his own future and is now the rising star of Haryana politics; the BJP would be wise to arrive at an understanding with him. The Congress has, meanwhile, been forced to modify the original SEZ, the final status of which is unknown. Other Congress Chief Ministers have drawn appropriate lessons, as exemplified in Goa's retreat from setting up SEZs, including the cancellation of three for which land had already been handed over.

So precarious is Indian agriculture that former President APJ Abdul Kalam has urged farmers not to sell their land for SEZs or any non-agricultural activity. Given the threat posed by Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati's Ganga Expressway project, which will desecrate almost 50,000 hectare of fertile agricultural land, the BJP should consider joining hands with the Samajwadi Party and the Congress to oppose it in the national interest.

Terrorism remains a scourge no party can defend. Yet when tragedy struck the CRPF camp in Rampur on New Year's day, Ms Mayawati responded with a heartless taunt that the CRPF should be able to take care of itself. The anti-terrorism rallies Mr LK Advani and other leaders plan in Rampur, Lucknow, Faizabad and Varanasi should emphasise the continued presence of jihad in our midst, and the failure of the Congress-led regime to hang Afzal Guru who masterminded the attack on Parliament House.

But the most dangerous policy of the UPA regime under Ms Sonia Gandhi is the excessive stress upon minorities, especially the Sachar Report and Eleventh Plan attempt to allocate 15 per cent of all development funds to minorities. In most parts of the country this will mean Muslims, but it is likely that in substantial pockets it will mean missionaries cornering benefits for Christian converts.

It is relevant to ponder the terms majority and minority. The Indian Constitution never used the term 'majority,' as this would have involved admitting that India is a Hindu-majority land, which would have given rise to calls for protecting this Hindu status in the wake of a bloody partition. Under the domination of Jawaharlal Nehru, it only spoke of minorities and vested certain special rights for them in the controversial Articles 29 and 30.

Yet, given Hindu sensitivity after partition, the Articles were careful to de-emphasise religion while identifying a minority. Article 29 spoke of 'sections of the citizens' with a distinct language, script or culture they desired to conserve, and non-discrimination on any ground, including religion. Article 30 dealt with the right of religious or linguistic minorities to establish educational institutions.

The BJP should denounce the UPA's tendency to define 'minority' purely by religious affiliation and crystallise it into a distinct economic and political category.

Caliphate of Pakistan

The assassination of a charismatic but flawed leader has disguised the reality of a Pakistan that is emerging as a critical geo-political hub in an increasingly multi-polar world. So far unrecognised, the 'Caliphate of Pakistan' is adroitly positioning itself in an uncomprehending world. Mercifully, India has recognised the security implications for itself.

In a concerted strategy, initiated at least since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, sections of the Pakistani clergy and Islamised Army (including ISI) have coalesced to give Islam a nation ruled by sword and shari'ah. Pakistan has impressive military credentials and the 'Islamic bomb'. More pertinently, the American failure to hold Afghanistan post-September 11, 2001, and the near collapse of the Hamid Karzai regime, has gifted Islamabad the strategic depth it craved to its west. Radical sections in Jammu & Kashmir are dying to form its eastern hinterland.

None of this would have been possible but for the millions of dollars and petro-dollars dexterously extracted by successive Pakistani regimes from the United States and Saudi Arabia, which have helped Islamabad jump out of the squalor of underdevelopment to the pinnacle of jihadi irredentism. Both have funded the Pakistani journey for reasons of their own -- motives that diverged more than they converged -- and thus bear some responsibility for the terrible denouement that climaxed in the cold-blooded murder of Benazir Bhutto.

Washington and Riyadh have multiple agendas, which they are pursuing with varying levels of success; and, it is no one's case that there were no other players in the world's most valuable piece of strategic real estate. Hence it is difficult to say which ball was being juggled in which hand when bombs detonated in Liaquat Bagh. A credible sequence of events is impossible to create without full disclosure in several capitals; still, some points are in order.

In the weeks prior to Bhutto's assassination, Russian President Vladimir Putin led his United Russia Party to a resounding victory, and is set to get his nominated successor elected in March 2008. Kremlin's leadership of the Central Asian gas and oil-rich economies has given it a lead in the emerging world economic order where the strength of nations will lie in sovereign resources, a fact understood by China. Uzbekistan's Islam Karimov, an important Russian ally, returned to power in December 2007.

Press reports reveal that prior to Bhutto's murder, there were secret talks between the Afghan Taliban and Britain. Given the obvious inability of the US-led alliance to hold the ground in Afghanistan or Iraq, and the growing reluctance of native armies to die for private corporate interests, it seems fair to surmise that a deal was being struck to permit a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, in return for protection of Western strategic assets in the region.

As the Taliban was conceived and mentored in Islamabad, this would have elated the radical sections of the Army-ISI, which disliked the half-stitched deal between President Pervez Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto. The grant of amnesty against allegations of corruption to Bhutto, whose two terms as Prime Minister were dogged by corruption charges against her husband, Mr Asif Ali Zardari, and whose enormous assets abroad defy rational explanation, would hardly have pleased these groups. In the circumstances, her shrill rhetoric against the jihadis, particularly her promise to allow hated American troops to hunt for Osama bin Laden in Pakistani territory and let the International Atomic Energy Agency interrogate nuclear scientist AQ Khan, would have rendered her immediately expendable.

The Saudi role in the tragedy seems more indirect. Saudi polity is schizophrenic on account of the absence of credible military power; most Gulf leaders are forced to rely on the US for security. Riyadh's quest for modern janissaries led it to fund Pakistan's nuclear ambitions and radicalisation via madarsas. Saudi money kept Islam Janus-faced in its jihad against Jews, Crusaders, and Hindus (for Jammu & Kashmir). While incidents east of the International Dateline help stave off pressure on the West, Islam recognises its true oppressors, and it is only a matter of time before it feels emboldened to turn fully westwards.

The murder of the Washington-endorsed 'democrat' served multiple ends. It reinforced the universal belief that friendship with America is the kiss of death. It nullified the White House attempt to broker democracy through Bhutto and Mr Pervez Musharraf. It told Washington that the disliked mullahs and madarsas still called the shots in Pakistan.

To return to the Saudis, it is pertinent that unlike Bhutto's family that prides in its links with Oxford University and the Western elites who acknowledge them only when convenient, Mr Nawaz Sharif is a conservative politician wary of America. The former Prime Minister chose Saudi Arabia as his country of exile when ousted by Mr Musharraf; and returned to Riyadh when denied entry in Islamabad in September 2007. But following Bhutto's successful homecoming on October 18, 2007, Mr Sharif insisted on returning to ensure a genuine election. Mr Musharraf made a sudden dash to Riyadh, and in November, Mr Sharif returned. But soon afterwards, possibly owing to American pressure to honour the deal with Bhutto, the regime had Mr Sharif banned from contesting elections for life.

It is now uncertain how the February election will play out in Pakistan, if held. What is certain is that the bickering in the Pakistan People's Party and the Bhutto clan has only begun; and, that the rise of Mr Sharif will enhance Saudi clout in the region and the Islamic world. Washington, Riyadh and Islamabad have common interests in containing Shia Iran, but it remains to be seen how long the Muslim world will tolerate continued Western military presence on its soil along with subservience to Western geo-eco-strategic objectives.

Whichever way the situation develops, the Army is sure to stay at the helm of affairs in Pakistan, a temporary reprieve for America which has invested heavily in this institution. The suspiciously silent new Army Chief, Gen Ashfaq Pervez Kayani, bears watching. Despite the rallies, hartals, and street violence, it bears remembering that monotheism creates institutions that determine the course of the nation. In Pakistan it is the Army, in America the corporates. Weeks ago, some of us told the na?ve Indian Americans that Ms Hillary Clinton would lose the Iowa primary.

UPA trying to divide India

If the British used communal electorates to secure Partition in barely four decades, the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance may succeed faster in eating the fruit of its desire to allocate 15 per cent of the funds for development and welfare schemes exclusively for minorities. BJP president Rajnath Singh has done well to oppose this divisive munificence, which may or may not salvage the Congress's shrinking minority vote-bank, but will certainly intensify communal competitiveness and friction nationwide.

Such dangerously disruptive minority appeasement will not merely alter the definition of secularism, whose traditional meaning is state disinterest in the denominational affiliations of its citizens. France, father of Western secularism, later extended this principal from Christianity to all religions. In Nehruvian India, secularism began as apathy to the majority Hindu faith and solicitude towards Islam. Over the decades, this extended progressively to excessive minority appeasement and hatred of all things Hindu. Now, under the UPA dispensation, secularism is synonymous with a 'Muslim first' policy, making it difficult to distinguish India from neighbouring Islamic countries

The BJP rightly fears that the Centre's special 15-point programme for minorities in the 11th Plan draft paper could trigger competitive communal demands for budgetary allocations. Worse, it may stimulate caste-based demands for resource allocation, with consequences one does not dare dwell upon. Not only will this overturn the traditional holistic approach to national development, it may unravel the nation itself. The pre-programmed Sachar Committee report on the socio-economic conditions of Muslims, pretext for this dangerous step, militates against constitutional injunctions against discrimination on grounds of religion, and is a fit subject for public interest litigation.

Given these high stakes, the BJP States did well to oppose 'communal budgeting' at the recent National Development Council meeting. Pointing to the threat to the social fabric, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi wisely suggested that funds for various schemes and programmes be allocated solely on the basis of socio-economic criteria, leaving execution to the States. Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh also insisted that rather than caste or religion, economic criteria alone should determine allocation of funds for welfare schemes. With the challenge of poverty intact, the 11th Plan should resist the lure of a communal shortcut to development.

Amid the UPA's bid to heighten communal sensitivities, the National Commission for Scheduled Castes' chairman, Mr Buta Singh, has defused a high-voltage issue with finesse. An old Congressman, Mr Singh must have been under considerable pressure to endorse the recommendations of the Justice Ranganath Mishra National Commission for Religious and Linguistic Minorities. The NCRLM had on May 15, 2007, recommended that Scheduled Caste status, hitherto restricted to groups among Hindus, Sikhs and Buddhists, be de-linked from religion by amending the Constitution (SCs) Order, 1950, and extended to "Dalit Christians" and "Dalit Muslims".

Possibly anticipating the Ranganath Mishra Commission's recommendations, the National Commission for Scheduled Castes had declared in February 2007 that the basic parameter for classification as Scheduled Caste was "untouchability", which does not exist in the theology of Christianity and Islam. In October 2007, the NCSC said the proposed reservation for "Dalit Christians" should not poach upon existing reservation for Scheduled Castes. Finally, on December 7, 2007, it declared there was no evidence that "Dalit Christians" and "Dalit Muslims" suffered "untouchability"; hence, they were not entitled to Scheduled Caste status.

This flawless reasoning will make it difficult for the UPA to extend quota benefits to Dalit converts to Christianity and Islam. Any attempt to grant additional quota for 'minority Dalits' could violate the Supreme Court's 50 per cent ceiling on reservation. The remaining option of carving Dalit converts a share out of the 27 per cent OBC quota is fraught with political danger; indeed, neither SCs nor OBCs will agree to share their quota pie. Mr Buta Singh's opinion is critical because a PIL in the apex court is seeking SC status and quota benefits for converts to Christianity.

Conversion lobbies in Christianity and Islam will find it difficult to overcome this roadblock. In order to procure a share of the coveted reservation quota for neo-converts, they will have to admit that Christianity and Islam practice untouchability in India! It will be difficult to do this without attracting penal provisions under the law for discrimination on grounds of caste or race (applicable to Islam). This will knock the bottom out of the moral high ground on which these two faiths stand and berate Hindu dharma and varna-jati for inegalitarian practices, violative of human dignity.

More importantly, it would have a deleterious impact upon both religions world-wide if they admit practicing and institutionalising discrimination in faith in any country. It may be pertinent that long before the collapse of the Soviet Union and fall of the Berlin Wall, Stalin rang the death-knell of Communism with his proclamation of "socialism in one country". This may have been pragmatic and necessary to consolidate his hold upon Russia, but it militated against the very ethos of a totalitarian, millenarian ideology. After that, it was only a matter of time for Marxism to be recognised as the monotheist god that failed.

Christianity and Islam should be cautious about leaping into this well without application of mind. Any further insistence on a quota for Dalit converts should be met with a nationwide ban on religious conversion as such conversion is admittedly promoting communal ill will and caste discrimination! Indeed, the demand for SC status for Dalit converts should be taken as a tacit admission of the wilful presence of untouchability in Islam and Christianity, and the conversions declared breach of trust, illegal, violative of human dignity, and detrimental to religious and cultural freedom. All converts suffering discrimination should immediately revert to their native traditions.

Interestingly, the Poor Christian Liberation Movement has condemned this church conspiracy to push 'Dalit Christians' into the Scheduled Caste list. PCLM president RL Francis says Dalits converted to Christianity to preserve their dignity, for which they sacrificed reservation benefits under the Constitution. Indian church authorities betrayed them on both counts and are guilty of collective sin, aggravated by the pernicious attempt to promote casteism in Christianity. Mr Francis's call for compensation for the 20 million 'Dalit Christians' who have suffered economic loss by converting deserves consideration as a class action suit by the apex court.

Émigré of Ayodhya

One of the most compelling yet overlooked themes of Hindu civilisation is that the gods themselves are prone to dislodgement from their celestial heights, to suffer exile and humiliation at the hands of upstarts who have inveigled fancy boons out of them, and then defeated them in battle. The gods return to the heavens through a long process of rebuilding their stamina, often creating new and potent energies to take on the asuric forces.

Asuras in Hindu tradition are persons or entities who do not leave space for others to live in honour, denying freedom to worship a la Hiranayakashipu, making off with other men's wives in the manner of Ravan, or defeating the gods to rule over the three worlds like Vali. The rule of dharma is restored only after much violence and bloodletting, and the defeat and decimation of the violator of dharma. Hindu bhakti is thus legitimately concerned with the power dimension of the celestial and human worlds, that is, the lawful and rightful exercise of authority to uphold the moral order.

The faux anger of our secular parliamentarians last Thursday, causing disruption of both Houses on the 15th anniversary of the removal of the Babri non-mosque, which in terms of Islamic theology 'ceased to be' due to decades of non-worship, demonstrates the Indian elite's continuing discomfort with the Ram Janmabhoomi movement. Sadly, after December 6, 1992, the orchestrated anger of intellectuals, activists, and politicians, the complicit silence of the economic elite, the riots that broke out in some parts of the country, not to mention an unsympathetic judiciary and cold-feet developed by leading players, forced the movement into an eerie limbo.

Mercifully, since then, the lengthening shadow of Islamic jihad worldwide, coupled with an increasingly unmasked face of Christian evangelism in India (though still hiding behind the façade of human rights), has once again placed the issue of the civilisational base of Indian nationhood firmly at the centre of the political agenda. The re-Hinduisation of the polity is now a civilisational imperative. The distinguished journalist, late Girilal Jain, suggested that the proper translation of Hindu rashtra is Hindu polity, not Hindu nation in a Western or theocratic sense.

Possibly this may be emerging on a limited scale in contemporary Gujarat, where the Congress has studiously avoided playing the Muslim card in the current election, and left the issue of minority interests to be handled indirectly by Congress-friendly media, Mr Narendra Modi-baiting secular-Christian activists, and externally-funded NGOs. The 2007 Gujarat election is significant because it is modern India's first election fought consciously by both sides for the majority Hindu vote.

Those embarrassed or uncomfortable with the emergence of civilisational India, those who wish to defer the decisive moment of Hindu affirmation and triumph, must now retire from the public arena, or be banished from it. It is time to separate the men from the boys. A few points are in order.

Hindus are primarily a civilisational and not a territorial people. This is to say that unlike the nomadic Jewish tribes which wrested a 'promised land' from the ruination of an extant civilisation (probably history's first genocide); early Islam which superimposed itself upon the Arab people and their holy sites; and, the Christian fathers who took over the Roman Empire, the driving impulse of the Vedic vision was not land, territory or material wealth, but a quest for harmony with the universe and consciousness regarding its divine origins.

So, though Hindus have a distinct territory in cultural, geographical and historical terms, the proper function of the state is not preservation or expansion of frontiers, but the promotion of Hindu civilisation. A legitimate Indian state must express the Hindu ethos and personality; it cannot be an impartial arbiter between communities as the British conditioned us to believe; much less can it be an instrument of offence against religious minorities, as has been the Hindu experience in Pakistan, Bangladesh and now Malaysia.

India has not discriminated against any religious group seeking its protection since the first historical refugees arrived after the destruction of the Temple of Solomon in 70 AD. Since then, we have given shelter to Christian and Muslim sects, Parsis, Bahai's and Tibetans, all fleeing persecution in different parts of the world. It is this civilisational legacy that External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee claimed was now Government policy, while assuring Parliament of protection to Bangladeshi rebel writer Taslima Nasreen.

The essential spirit of Hindu dharma is inclusivist: It seeks to abolish rather than build boundaries. Hindus do not believe in exclusion in the manner associated with the Christian West and Islam. Muslims and others have been graciously accommodated in the charmed circle of territory and their affinities with Hindus through common language(s) and blood ties generously acknowledged.

The bone of contention remains the acceptance of a common civilisational framework within which the myriad faiths and ways of life can mutually adjust themselves. Any legitimate outcome must recognise the primacy of Hindu civilisation in this land; others must seek space in its nurturing bosom. Like the Jewish community, Abraham's other children must renounce the desire to dominate this land and annihilate its native faiths and cultural traditions. Their refusal to honour the majority faith will meet increasing resentment, and place the onus of communal disharmony upon them and their rich co-religionists in other parts of the globe.

The struggle to restore the Ram Janmabhoomi to the divinity, who is also the exemplar par excellence of the Hindu moral and political universe, is central to the fight for Hindu assertion and affirmation. Its principal opponents include a West-approved intelligentsia and inimical state power; their joint strategy invokes tired clichés of majority communalism and uses judicial and quasi-judicial institutions to discredit all forms of Hindu assertion.

Indian Muslims would do well to reconsider their obedience to this game. Girilal Jain said Hindus cannot sustain anti-Muslim feelings except temporarily, under provocation; anybody who has studied the rapid fizzling out of the economic boycott of Gujarat Muslims after the 2002 post-Godhra violence would appreciate the merit of this view. Hindus have no fight with Islam, not even (past) iconoclastic Islam; Ram Janmabhoomi is intrinsically about civilisational renewal and supremacy over the destructive legacy of Lord Macaulay. Muslims may find a common cause here.

Theology of politics

Having run out of liberal, utopian, Marxist, post-modern, post-religion and post-ideology theories to hypnotise the ex-colonial mind, exhausted Western scholars are turning to Bible and psycho-babble to mesmerise 'Third World' audiences. Incredible as it seems, the University of Chicago's Prof Martha Nussbaum invoked the puerile prattle of Sigmund Freud to lambast the post-Godhra Gujarat violence of 2002 in a talk at India International Centre, New Delhi, to promote her book, The Clash Within: Democracy, Religious Violence, and India's Future (Permanent Black, 2007).

It is striking how all Western views on any subject hark back to the Biblical theory of original sin, human debility and inability to transcend limitations. Ms Nussbaum told a bemused Indian audience that once the human baby realises it is completely dependent on its parents for survival, it is gripped by the pain of imperfection and shame of incompleteness; this shame and revulsion is later projected as hate towards other groups in society (don't ask me how, I'm an ordinary vasudaiva kutumbakam type of Hindu).

Loads of psycho-babble on 'human bad behaviour' was passed off as serious political philosophy. Experimental psychology in the US, she said, shows that fear of differences creates a public culture of dominance and narcissism, driven by a wounded masculinity which hits out at the source of its perceived wound (whatever that means). Western experiments wherein schoolteachers inculcated prejudice in children against those with blue or brown eyes were glibly superimposed upon non-Western, non-monotheistic traditions to 'prove' her point.

One can rebut the allegations against the Hindu Right (read RSS-BJP), or accept barbs against US President George W Bush as levelling prejudice against Hindu society. My critique of Ms Nussbaum rests on her use of monotheistic yardsticks to diminish non-monotheistic traditions. As the sole surviving ancient holistic tradition, India represents a major challenge to monotheistic hegemony in the contemporary era. This inspires awesome fear which steady recruitment of Hindu collaborators to the Western cause cannot overcome.

If one were to condense the difference between monotheistic and non-monotheistic faiths to a single factor, it would be the manner in which they encompass their respective universes. Hindu dharma embraces eternal values cherished over millennia by all natives of the land, excluding no form of worship or belief as too base or insignificant to be worthy of inclusion. External creeds entering the land in the historical period, as refugees, immigrants, or invaders, have been accommodated within the generous breadth of this tradition, which accepts and respects difference of belief and worship.

Thus, though mleccha may be a derisive term for outsider, Turk a synonym for iconoclast, nowhere did Hindu dharma sponsor genocide or cultural repression of other faiths. Modern-day communal violence triggered by local tensions cannot be equated with the theology and history of various monotheistic traditions.

The Sanatana Dharma (eternal tradition) aspires to universal welfare of all. It stresses man's debt to the nurturing earth and the elements that ensure survival of the human race; to the animal world, plants, minerals, indeed, all non-human creation. Far from being the sole consumer of creation, man has the enormous responsibility of ensuring the welfare of all. This is the true meaning of the Hindu grihastha ashram (householder stage of life) and the reason it is upheld as the best stage of life and society in the shastras.

Monotheistic creeds rest on the concept of a sole saviour and solitary path to redemption; and, stretch the theology arising from this belief system to embrace not only the community of believers, but also all humanity in totality, suppressing everything incompatible with this worldview. Religious conflict is thus embedded in monotheism, as is its modern counterpart, pluralism, conceived as an antidote to sectarian wars in Christianity. European Christian countries later extended this concept to other faiths that entered their lands as refugees or immigrants, or survived as remnants of previous religious strife.

Christianity's continuing difficulty with Islam rests on the latter's refusal to accept the doctrine of religious truce, designated variously as pluralism and secularism. Christian and other minorities do survive in Muslim countries, but are largely ignored, marginalised or at times persecuted. The crux of the problem, however, is that both seek to invade each other's geographical spaces through conversions aimed at changing religious demography; so far Islam's success in Europe and America is greater than Christianity's in the Gulf.

But Christianity is tenacious and is making inroads even in troubled places like Afghanistan and Pakistan. The Saudi monarch's recent visit to the Vatican to discuss inter-faith issues suggests the desert kingdom may have more Christian citizens than it dares admit; their presence in the ruling elite could spell serious trouble.

In the contemporary world, religion has moved centre-stage in identity politics. Despite formal adherence to secularism as state policy, there is a concerted move to impose the Christian socio-cultural, economic and political worldview on all nations despite resistance by native populations.

This is why, despite professed state secularism and cultural pluralism, the West is deliberately insulting harmless external symbols of identity that are central to some faiths. Typical instances of Western inability to tolerate cultural practices it does not share include the headscarf and veil of Muslim women in Western countries; nose-studs of Hindu women; and, the turban and steel bangle of Sikhs. Wearing the cross publicly is also disapproved of, but it is pertinent that Christian symbols are an optional form of piety; the turban and headscarf are integral to adherence to Sikh and Islamic traditions.

The Muslim veil has never been an object of hate or ridicule in the Hindu mind, and has recently been condemned only by pro-West Muslims like Mr Salman Rushdie and Ms Shabana Azmi. Claims that the modern West is post-Christian are hollow. The European Union's decision to exclude Christianity from its Constitution does not alter Europe's foundational political and cultural ethos, or lessen its commitment to evangelisation in Asia.

Ms Nussbaum says her Indian students regard religion and symbolic culture as fascist and reactionary, and are surprised when told of the role of liberal (read Christian) religion and pluralist rhetoric in forging America's anti-racist civic culture. So am I: America's African ex-slaves still lack the right to vote -- it is a privilege extended every decade by the President, who has the power to withhold it.

Seeking US intervention

Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto has merely underlined Pakistan's client status by calling upon the US, Britain and other Western nations to give President Pervez Musharraf an ultimatum regarding "democracy or dictatorship with isolation". Inadvertently conceding that India's prodigal child lacks viability as an independent state, she pleaded via The New York Times for the US to "promote democracy which is the only way to truly contain extremism and terrorism by telling Gen Musharraf that it does not accept martial law, and that it expects him to conduct free, fair, impartial and internationally monitored elections within 60 days under a reconstituted Election Commission".

Ms Bhutto favours FBI and Scotland Yard help in forensic investigations of the blasts that killed 140 people in her procession last month, and criticised the regime for disallowing this. Imploring Western democracies to demonstrate in their actions "and not just in their rhetoric, which side they are on", she said over $ 10 billion American aid to Pakistan after September 2001 had abjectly failed to defeat the Taliban and Al Qaeda. Osama bin Laden remains free and the opium trade continues.

Clearly, Ms Bhutto still hopes for fruition of the half-baked deal Washington tied up prior to her return home, which won her immunity from corruption cases while Gen Musharraf got elected as President, though the superseded Supreme Court has not ruled on either action. After five days of damning silence against the General's second coup, she breezed from Karachi to Islamabad to ostensibly plan a strategy with other Opposition parties. When even a political lightweight like former cricketer Imran Khan had to go underground to evade arrest, the kid-glove treatment extended to Ms Bhutto only confirms suspicions of the US's backdoor engagement with the military dictator.

With her credibility under a cloud, Ms Bhutto naturally ruled out meeting Gen Musharraf, who faces a fractured Opposition and is now removable only by another coup, bloodless or otherwise. The newly-constituted Supreme Court has set aside the judgement of the deposed Chief Justice-led eight-member Bench declaring Emergency illegal and unconstitutional. Pakistani streets are bereft of the kind of popular unrest that forced Iran's Reza Pehlavi or Philippines' Ferdinand Marcos to flee country and office, despite vocal protests by judges, lawyers and human rights activists. Public meetings have been banned on the pretext of terror attacks; Ms Bhutto's phoney house arrest prior to the PPP's Rawalpindi meet on November 9, 2007, only underlines the American hand in her political destiny.

Not surprisingly, exiled leader Nawaz Sharif has refused to take Ms Bhutto's attempted leadership of the fledgling Opposition movement seriously, asking her to renounce the dictator and work with him. This is a wise move as Pakistan's ruling party chief Shujaat Hussain has, despite discounting pre-poll arrangements with the PPP, expressed willingness to meet Ms Bhutto to discuss steps to "improve the political climate and ensure transition to full democracy".

Such talk reinforces public wariness regarding a 'deal'. In response to Ms Bhutto's plea for free and internationally monitored elections under a new Election Commission, Islamabad had the unique experience of American envoy Anne Patterson barging into the commission office and demanding categorical assurances from the Chief Election Commissioner, Justice (retd) Qazi Farooq, that elections would be held as scheduled in January 2008.

This strong-arm but sterile gesture has not fooled world capitals that Washington still hopes to keep Gen Musharraf in power. The Taliban has taken advantage of the turmoil to seize the town of Swat (ancient Udyana), and beleaguered US President George W Bush dares not impose Myanmar-style sanctions to force Gen Musharraf to shed his uniform. After all, sanctions in Yangon aim to bring a pro-West regime to power; harsh action against Islamabad would overthrow a friendly dictator. Double standards, in the circumstances, are par for the course. Still, given the lack of warmth towards UN envoy Ibrahim Gambari in Myanmar, Washington might like to transport him and the eager monks to the Afghanistan-Pakistan region, to struggle to regain the lost Buddhist paradise, surely a cause worth dying for (pardon the pun).

The European Union opposed the coup more vocally, but the old 'mother country' merely threatened suspension from the Commonwealth if Islamabad failed to quickly lift Emergency and hold elections in January. Though British High Commissioner Robert Brinkley met Gen Musharraf, London refused to explain its continuing to prop up the dictator with an estimated £ 480 million, while lecturing him on the virtues of democracy. Sources suggest London will review aid only in concert with Washington, which means political considerations will transcend moral pretences.

In an astonishing move, Foreign Secretary David Miliband appealed to British citizens of Pakistani origin, and even residents from Pakistan, to use their native connections to exert pressure on Gen Musharraf to return his country to constitutional democracy. While exposing the limits of direct official diplomacy with 'rogue' regimes, this direct diplomacy validates the reservations some writers have long held about diaspora populations.

It is an open secret that imperial nations like the UK and the US have encouraged political and other elites from countries in which they have a strategic interest to live on their soil, offering political havens, economic prosperity, international recognition and even citizenship, in return for absolute loyalty. In previous articles, I have alluded to America's use of Indonesian diaspora to split the country and create oil-rich East Timor. The Cuban diaspora clogs Miami streets at the first whistle; recently, Myanmarese diaspora showed its numbers in the UK and the US.

The Hindu-baiting Indian-origin Leftist diaspora in the US is well-known, hence new formations of supposedly pro-Hindu Americans are being promoted to 'objectively analyse' Hindu dharma and tell Indian Hindus how to straighten their act, that is, mould their faith, culture and economy to the wishes of the dollar-euro economies.

Pakistan's UK diaspora, which has renounced its Pakistani citizenship and has no locus standi in that country's affairs, looked incongruous screeching in distant London at the throttling of democracy in a nation born of blood and genocide (of Hindus). Pakistan Human Rights Commission chief Asma Jahangir's appeal to the West to end support to "the unstable dictator" is ironical as that country owes its origin to the obdurate Mohammed Ali Jinnah and the horrendous civil strife he unleashed on the streets of Kolkata.

Betrayal at home

Of all living faiths and traditions in the world, probably only Hindus keep the god of love in their divine pantheon. Kamdev and his wife, Rati, retain a powerful grip on the Hindu imagination on account of their painful association with Parvati's quest for Shiva, and the more joyous link with spring and the stirring of dormant passions among the populace, especially young lovers. More pertinently, despite its known proclivity for compatible caste and status in marriage, Hindu tradition accords recognition to controversial unions such as those by elopement, so as to protect young women.

Recently, however, some rich and irresponsible girls have spoilt the pitch for couples seeking to overcome societal or parental resistance to their union. Some disapproval is grounded in tradition: Same-village or same-jati affairs are viewed as incest, as a village is considered one 'family' even if it is multi-caste; jati implies common ancestry. North Indian villages are facing youth rebelling against these taboos, sometimes with tragic consequences. Opinion is growing for a more measured response, but media propensity to scandalise faith or put guardians of tradition in the dock serves only to muffle voices of sanity.

Currently, two high-society elopements are in the news. In Kolkata, a modest Muslim family is trying to come to terms with the death of a bread-earning son, in circumstances still under investigation. Some points are in order. The heroine of the story limited her relationship exclusively to the man she married, and did not visit the family after his death, much less live a few days with them. Police officers who spoke to her reported she was sad at her husband's death, but wished to remain in the comfort of her natal home and expressed a desire to 'move on' now that he was no more.

This is astonishing. A relationship purely between two persons does not even need to be sanctified by marriage. Marriage is a social institution: One acquires a new family, and gives one's children a father's name, caste, faith, and position in society. One submits to rules and taboos, and enjoys new freedoms. That is why marriage requires witnesses, whether it is a social contract or a religious sacrament.

The publicly-televised elopement and marriage of Telugu superstar Chiranjeevi's daughter, Srija, is scandalous for different reasons. The inter-caste marriage of a rich girl from the powerful Kapu community with a middle class Brahmin boy is unremarkable by itself. What is disturbing is that a mere engineering graduate plotted for a year to elope with another student supposedly under domestic confinement, rather than concentrate upon acquiring further educational qualifications that would have enabled him to support her with dignity a few years down the line.

One does not know what Mr Shirish Bhardwaj's father thinks of funding a Master's degree for a son married to a rich but penniless girl! The humiliated Chiranjeevi family has no reason to come around and provide the couple a lifestyle to which Srija is accustomed. If media reports that the Kapu community intended to field Chiranjeevi to give them a significant political presence in Andhra Pradesh are correct, the actor will not be able to treat the elopement as a purely personal affair. There is also an emotional fan following, upset over the public humiliation of the actor.

With hindsight, the betrayal began at home. Someone trusted by Chiranjeevi played go-between for Shirish during the year Srija was at home under her mother's supervision. Her confinement, however, was loose enough for her to walk out of the house on the pretext of visiting an aunt nearly; she then took a car to the Arya Samaj temple in New Bowenpally, Secunderabad. The painful part of the plot is that an invisible hand was orchestrating the affair with precision, informing a television channel and getting the marriage telecast over all networks the same day, and helping the couple go underground.

Personally, I feel the media owed Chiranjeevi some respect and should have informed him about this turn in his family life. The superstar's humiliation would have deepened when Hyderabad police informed the media a day after the elopement that the groom had a dubious past, having been involved in the kidnapping of a minor girl in 2002, a fact admitted by his advocate father.

Worse, the runaway bride is being tutored to disgrace her father. Benefactors with deep pockets have enabled the couple to travel to Delhi and hire legal aid to seek protection from the Delhi High Court on grounds that the bride's family posed a threat to their lives. The police had been directed to protect them at public expense. Since they specifically cited the Rizwanur Rehman case to buttress their plea, and the CBI is on the verge of establishing that the latter was probably not murdered, it may be appropriate for the court to reconsider police protection and discourage spoilt brats without the ability to stand on their own feet from draining public resources.

The directive that Chiranjeevi appear in court to give his consent to the marriage is uncalled for in my view, as the wedding is fait accompli, and Srija has now to be welcomed into her husband's home, and not take him into her father's house! Already, the virtual allegation has forced Chiranjeevi's brother, actor Pawan Kalyan, to deposit his licensed revolver in the local police station and publicly assert that there was no threat to the couple's lives. The family lawyer informed the court that Chiranjeevi had already issued a statement on television wishing his daughter well.

Still Srija thought nothing of publicly taunting him: "I am very happy that my father's lawyer disclosed before court that he has no hassles about my marriage with Shirish" (The Times of India, October 22). She expressed alarm at the absence of the word 'blessings' in his media statements, and tried to goad him to talk to her in-laws, something she should have ensured before the wedding. Far more audaciously, she wants Chiranjeevi to produce a film starring the couple (surely a financial demand?). The young lady needs to be made to finance her own rebellion and lie on the bed she has made with so much fire and brimstone. The judiciary should stop pandering to rich ill-bred youths.

UPA shrewd on Suu Kyi

After hectic advocacy by Christian Solidarity Worldwide and Burma Campaign, UK, British MPs John Bercow and Baroness Caroline Cox met a Chin group on the India-Myanmar border last month, while Prime Minister Gordon Brown urged an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council. Earlier in May 2007, the House of Commons International Development Committee called for cross-border aid to Myanmar's internally displaced people. As Britain does not share a border with Myanmar, presumably this meant using Indian territory for British purposes.

The focus on Myanmar, arrogantly called Burma (maybe Zimbabwe is Rhodesia), months before the current unrest wherein organised bands of Buddhist monks and students took to the streets, is suspicious. Last year, rented mobs brought Nepal to a standstill. A Seven-Party Alliance took office, was conned into co-opting Maoist goons with a Christian leadership, and is now being forced to declare a Republic without Constituent Assembly elections, even as Nepalis are revising their hostility to the monarchy.

In Myanmar, despite restrictions by the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), foreign journalists and missionaries have smuggled themselves in and met Ms Aung San Suu Kyi, leader of the National League for Democracy (NLD), under house detention since 1990. Christian Solidarity Worldwide reports Ms Suu Kyi told a foreign missionary her favourite verse in the Bible is John 8:32, "You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free." She regularly asks Christians around the world to pray for Burma (not Myanmar).

At a time when India is under calibrated international and domestic pressure to denounce Myanmar's military rulers, at the cost of strategic and energy concerns, one notices striking facets in the political careers of Congress president Ms Sonia Gandhi and Ms Suu Kyi. There maybe some significant lessons here.

Ms Gandhi, an Italian-born Roman Catholic, hails from a family loyal to Benito Mussolini. She married Rajiv Gandhi, son of the then Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi; he became Prime Minister after her assassination in 1984. In 1991, Congress failed to win enough seats to form its own Government, so PV Narasimha Rao was asked to cobble a working majority, while the widowed Ms Gandhi bided her time. By 1998, she felt strong enough to physically takeover the party from president Sitaram Kesri, but in 2004, despite overt support, was denied premiership and forced to make way for Mr Manmohan Singh.

She now hopes to groom her son, Mr Rahul Gandhi, for leadership of the party and country. The citizenship status of Ms Gandhi and her two children has never been clarified; she is a naturalised Indian and under Italian law, she and her offspring are eternally entitled to Italian citizenship. This was how she took her husband and children to the Italian embassy in 1977 after Mrs Indira Gandhi lost the elections.

Ms Gandhi's long and privileged stay in this country was lucrative to her native country and friends. The Italian public sector Snam Progetti won extravagant and regular fertiliser contracts in India, and her personal friend Ottavio Quattrocchi even doubled up as a middleman in the Bofors kickbacks scandal. The Congress president had enough political cachet to help friends evade justice after the scandal broke, and as UPA chairperson ensured that the Bofors monies, frozen in two London accounts, were released to Mr Quattrocchi, and that he walked free after detention in Argentina!

More recently, she struggled hard to impose the controversial India-US nuclear deal on the nation, despite its crippling financial, technological and security implications for India. The covert but firm opposition of coalition partners to premature elections appears to have scuttled the deal, but it is too early to celebrate. Observers expect Congress to somehow 'buy' Left compliance.

Ms Suu Kyi, daughter of a respected leader, married an Englishman, lived abroad for several years, and is almost certainly a Christian, even if born a Buddhist. Her two sons hold British passports and live abroad. Despite public nostalgia for her late father, she has weak roots in Myanmar and really cannot be trusted to lead a resource-rich nation for which Western multinationals are lusting.

If Senior General Than Shwe seriously intends to negotiate with her, a legitimate precondition would be abdication of Myanmarese citizenship and NLD leadership, and return to the land of her husband and sons. British-style conditions on the religious affiliations of rulers may also be in order. Since NLD claims popular support, it should manage to field native leaders in future elections.

Interestingly, Ms Suu Kyi supports Western sanctions against Myanmar, though these hurt the ordinary people and not the regime. Worse, she maintained a complicit silence over the selective nature of sanctions imposed from 1990. Indian analysts furious at Army chief Gen Deepak Kapoor's advocacy of a "close relationship" with Myanmar counterparts and dismissive of India's quest for energy security, may be unaware that Washington exempts oil giant Chevron from the sanctions regime.

The reason, of course, is that Mr George Bush Jr, Mr Dick Cheney and Ms Condoleezza Rice have powerful links with the American oil industry. Oil was the reason why the US had to 'secure' the Iraqi oilfields, and why it is preparing to bring 'democracy' to Iran. Wall Street barons protest that if Chevron does not do business with SPDC, non-American companies will (read China, India, Thailand, Russia, Japan, Sri Lanka, Singapore and South Korea). Total of France, which daily extracts over 17 million cubic meters of natural gas, enjoys similar immunity. In the circumstances, Petroleum Minister Murli Deora was wise to keep his appointment in Yangon, and External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee to oppose sanctions as futile.

India needs Myanmar's cooperation to tackle insurgencies in the North-East. The thick jungles provide refuge to the Isak-Muivah and Khaplang factions of the National Socialist Council of Nagaland, United Liberation Front of Asom, three major Manipur militant groups, United National Liberation Front (UNLF), People's Liberation Army and Kanglei Yawol Kanna Lup. Cooperation was withdrawn in 1995 when the Narasimha Rao Government conferred the Jawaharlal Nehru Award for International Understanding on Ms Suu Kyi. The Vajpayee regime repaired ties in November 2000, but confidence-building is not a linear road. Having once burnt its fingers, India cannot sacrifice vital national interests to duplicitous Western rhetoric; the UPA is acting shrewdly.

Jayalalithaa shows the way

Tulsidas marvelled "it is impossible to keep count of the Ramkathas in the world" (Ramkatha kai miti jaga nahi). Valmiki's account of the evolution of Indian society's moral and cultural codes, notions of kingship and the limits of political power, and above all, integration of land and people into a civilisational matrix that enduringly transcended the multiplicity of political authority, is enmeshed in the psyche of every Indian. There is literally no one, not even adherents of other faiths, unfamiliar with the narrative.

Having massively influenced the entire Asian landmass, there are probably as many versions and interpretations of Ramayan as there are Ram-bhakts. All variants are legitimate, like myriad paths in quest of the Ultimate Truth. From Sangam poetics to the bhakti of the Alwar saints, the classical rendition of Kamban, the grand philosophy of Ramanuja, the soulful depths of Thiagaraja, and the sheer energy of Therukuttu (street theatre), 'what was built forever is forever being built.'

So deeply has the epic and its hero-god impacted the Damir (Tamil) mind that major episodes, such as the tethering of Lord Ram's aswamedh horse by his unknown sons and the location of Valmiki's ashram, have been identified with this land. The state is home to some of the grandest Ram temples. The great Chola dynasty (Chola is the Tamil form of Sanskrit 'Surya') claimed kinship with the Suryavanshi kings of Ayodhya. Rajaraja I's inscriptions (10th to early-11th century) trace the family tree from Vijayalaya whose son Aditya was famous as Kodanda Rama. Their early ancestors were Surya, Manu, Ikshvaku, Kakutsth, Mandhata, Sagar, Bhagirath, Dilip and Ram.

This devout land suffered grievously under colonial rule, when a little understood divide-and-rule policy pitted various groups against each other with the objective of making Madras Presidency the first Hindu region to break away from Bharat. Notwithstanding the social ugliness that saw the flight of Brahmins from the State, a deep reservoir of culture and common sense prevented the final brinkmanship. The British did manage to hive off the Muslim-majority wings into East and West Pakistan.

Tamil Nadu's steady return to the political mainstream received a rude shock with the triumphal abuse of Lord Ram by Mr M Karunanidhi. Upset at the prospect of vanishing gains from an ill-conceived shipping channel, the Chief Minister dealt a savage blow to the identity, pride, and self-respect of Tamil Hindus. Coming in the wake of a backlash against an offensive Central affidavit challenging the existence of Lord Ram, it froze the ruling UPA into petrified silence. Media reports suggest Mr Karunanidhi was sharply rebuked and asked to clam up; Shipping Minister TR Baalu claimed a supportive telephone call from Ms Sonia Gandhi; but the Prime Minister and UPA chairperson decided discretion was the better part of valour.

Former Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa showed great political acumen in accusing the Chief Minister of dereliction of constitutional responsibility for hurting the sentiments of millions of Hindus with his derogatory references to Lord Ram. This is a modern enunciation of the ancient Hindu concept of the ruler accepting the dharma of the people as his rajdharma (upheld powerfully by Lord Ram); a subtle snipe at the reigning orthodoxy of secularism as anti-Hindu populism.

Ms Jayalalithaa capped this by demanding the dismissal of the Karunanidhi regime and the DMK Ministers at the Centre. Despite considerable media blackout of the ADMK's State-wide protest on September 26, 2007, the massive popular response would have sent powerful signals across the political spectrum. The BJP has energetically supported its former ally, and received vocal support on the issue of violent attacks by DMK cadre on party workers in Chennai and other districts.

In what may be a brilliant overture to the Maran brothers, estranged from Mr Karunanidhi, Ms Jayalalithaa used the attack on Sangh Parivar offices in the State to recall the attack on their newspaper, Dinakaran, in Madurai some months ago. Mr Karunanidhi's son, Mr MK Azhagiri, was widely perceived as instigating the assault, in which three persons died. Ms Jayalalithaa has thus mixed a powerful political cocktail to attack the regime: Respect for Lord Ram and Hindu sentiments, maintenance of law and order and upholding constitutional propriety.

Change is in the air, and the fragile UNPA has decided to give respect and space to popular sentiment. Yet, a realignment of political forces around the ADMK seems inevitable. Popular actors Vijayakant (DMDK) and Saratkumar (AISK) have condemned Mr Karunanidhi's remarks on Lord Ram; MDMK leader Vaiko visited the BJP office after it was ransacked and expressed support. Even the PMK, being a predominantly Vanniar-dominated party, may abandon the DMK ship; the Vanniar Sangam has already protested. The Congress's bold maverick MS Bitta pitched in with a visit to Rameshwaram where he dramatically took an oath to sacrifice his life to protect Ram Setu.

Ms Jayalalithaa had the prescience to grasp the importance of Ram Setu and Lord Ram for all sections of society, indeed for the entire nation. The ADMK has also filed a spate of cases against the Chief Minister for his abusive remarks against Lord Ram, and it will be interesting to see how the local courts handle these petitions. The party also succeeded in getting the Supreme Court to void the DMK's proposed October 1 bandh, leaving the Chief Minister with the lonely device of a hunger strike to ram through the virtually defunct Sethusamudran Shipping Channel Project.

Unsurprisingly, scholars hostile to the Hindu faith have rushed to the rescue, scouring the Ramayan corpus to proclaim that there is no definitive version of the story; that Valmiki rested an older oral tradition; and, that in less-famous versions, the Lanka king was not a bad sort. No such exercise has ever been undertaken in Sri Lanka, which is anxious to save Ram Setu for protection against a future tsunami. Actually, Ramayan spans at least a whole yug; characters like Rishi Durvasa lived into the Mahabharat age. Valmiki himself credited the kernel of the tale to Rishi Narad, who answered his question about the ideal man (purushottom) of that age.

Ms Jayalalithaa is seeking resurrection in public life, but the path of a righteous ruler must be consecrated by a living sage. The road to Chennai would be doubly triumphant via the Kanchi matham.

Hindu dharma humiliated

Tulsidas's seminal rendition of the Ram story makes no mention of the Lakshman rekha in the episode dealing with Sita's abduction. The line surfaces only later, in distant Lanka, when Ravan's wife, Mandodri, advises him to give up his obstinacy and refrain from fighting the illustrious Raghus. She points out that Lakshman had drawn a protective line around Sita in the forest, which Ravan couldn't even cross! Sita could be abducted only after she was tricked into breaching it; the Lakshman rekha has since become the ethical standard of Hindu self-restraint, discipline, and sense of limit.

This moral dimension was shaken when a Union Government-approved affidavit claimed before the Supreme Court that there is no 'historic' or 'scientific' evidence of the existence of the maryada purushottam. This contemptuous attitude towards Hindu civilisation's greatest moral exemplar has caused shock all over the Hindu universe, from Jammu & Kashmir to Kanyakumari, to Trinidad & Tobago, Fiji, Guyana, Mauritius, Myanmar, Kampuchea, Indonesia, Bali, Malaysia, Nepal, Java, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand; regions whose national culture has been shaped by the benign presence of Lord Ram.

Originally a dispute over a sand and coral formation uniting the Indian mainland with its island neighbour, Ram Setu has catapulted into a bridge of India's Hindu identity and nationhood, straddling centuries of collective sloth and amnesia. The Tamil Kings of Jaffna (13th to 16th centuries AD) once called themselves "Sethu Kavalar", protectors of Rameshwaram and the surrounding seas; south India principally reveres Lord Ram as Kodanda-Rama, deity with the bow.

The military career of this armed god, born to defeat the forces of darkness and tyranny and uphold dharma, was a saga of successive triumphs. He was invincible before the Rakshas and Asurs who were inimical to Vedic dharma. Even prior to the first century BC, Lord Krishna identified Lord Ram as the highest example of a warrior (Bhagavad Gita, X 31).

Significantly, of the multifarious roles of this divinity - ideal son, ideal brother, ideal husband, ideal human being - post-independence India has most valued the ideal king! This is precisely what is sought to be demeaned by the Archaeological Survey of India's audacious affidavit, duly vetted by the Union Law Ministry, declaring Lord Ram a non-historic figure. For Lord Ram was a king deeply concerned with his subjects' judgement of his way of living, and anxious to measure up to their expectations of him.

The backlash over the Ram Setu affidavit may yet teach modern India's foreign-born and native-secular rulers that in the Hindu civilisational ethos, rajdharma (duty of the king) means embracing and upholding the dharma of the people. There are no exemptions; Ashok's decision to make Buddhism the state religion and propagate it through state-appointed missionaries is perceived as an undesirable aberration. The quest for Ram rajya is the search for an ideal realm where people are happy, prosperous, well-behaved and contented; poverty and social ills are rare. India is thus the only country in the world where a ruler may not impose his dharma upon the people (convert them); he must honour the dharma of the people.

Even if Lord Ram was a figment of the collective Hindu imagination, he cast an enduring spell over subsequent epochs. The Harivamsa, a second-third century AD work on Lord Krishna, lauds Lord Ram's rule as the most righteous age on earth. The Vayu Puran, dated not later than fifth century AD, says Lord Ram had a long reign and in his kingdom the chants of the Rig, Yajur, and Sam Ved were heard ceaselessly and people gave and ate to their hearts content. Kalidas, himself a Shaiva, honed his poetic skills glorifying the Iksvakus and Lord Ram. The Gurjar-Pratihars who worsted the Arabs in the ninth century AD, trace their genealogy to Lakshman, brother of Lord Ram, as revealed by the Gwalior Prasasti of Mihir Bhoj, seventh king of the dynasty. Tukaram extolled Shivaji's reign as Ram rajya in which ruler and subjects were all equal and there was all-round welfare.

Interestingly, the first tsunami of 2004 came soon after the arrest of the Kanchi Shankaracharya on specious grounds of conspiracy to murder. The second warning, when the ocean literally growled and tremors measured eight on the Richter scale, came within hours of the Centre declaring there was no historic evidence of Lord Ram and the Setu was a mere sandbank.

Retreat was equally swift. With mid-term election looming threateningly on the horizon, the official dogma reinvented itself: Certainly there is Lord Ram. Till recently a mythological hero, the god metamorphosed into "an integral part of Hindu faith" whose existence can never be doubted. In the three months reprieve sought to 'study' the feasibility of the canal, there may finally be a Ram Setu as well. Popular belief (astha) is nothing; but popular vote surely counts!

The tsunami warning is not a secular matter of environmental degradation. For Hindus, also at stake is our panch-tatva (debt) to the panch-tatva that make the universe: Earth, water, fire, air, ether, and all creatures within. Contrary to the Western world-view, man alone is not the measure of all things, and we have no right to desecrate nature. The Gulf of Mannar is an indivisible water body which impacts the coasts of India and Sri Lanka. Any dredging here can trigger the fault-lines and the heat-flow zone, causing incalculable damage to the coast and aquatic resources. Yet, tsunami effects and tsunami protection measures were not included in the Sethusamundram Shipping Channel Project report, though this affects coastline security. Hopefully, this lacuna will be addressed in the three month review period.

At stake is a rich and endangered marine life and the sensitive ecosystem in the Palk Bay and Gulf of Mannar, including Dugong sea turtles, dolphins and sea horses that thrive in the coral reefs. Under UNESCO's Man and Biosphere Programme, the Gulf of Mannar environs were notified as a Marine Biosphere Reserve by the Government of India. The 10,500 sq km area, with 21 islands with continuous stretches of coral reef, is home to over 3,600 rare species of flora and fauna. Five coastal districts depend upon this marine resource.

The ASI affidavit was a shameful attempt to humiliate Hindu dharma by belittling a defining feature of Hindu tradition. Unsurprisingly, this flagrant violation of the Lakshman rekha roused the languorous Hindu elephant to protest. Let it now trumpet the regime's fall.


India doesn't need 123 pact

A course correction in Indian historical and political discourse is long overdue. To begin with, if all we achieved on August 15, 1947, was Dominion Status, it is time to stop berating the Left for not participating in the questionable freedom movement led by the Indian National Congress. Second, even if Left objection to the India-US nuclear deal is driven by animus towards Washington, this country owes it a word of thanks for stalling - if not yet scrapping - a pact certain to impose a punishing price on our economy and indigenous nuclear programme.

One of the most specious arguments proffered by proponents of the deal is that it will vastly augment our energy resources. The truth, as CPI(M) MP Sitaram Yechury has argued, is that India's current power generation is 127 giga watts (GW), which needs to rise to 337 GW by 2016-17 to sustain the current GDP growth rate. Nuclear energy, which was only 3.9 GW in 2006, cannot fill this gap. Even if the deal takes off, nuclear energy can grow to a maximum of 20 GW by 2016, and that too, at a cost of thousands of crores of rupees in external investment.

This will leave a huge power deficit; our resources would be better utilised on indigenous thermal, hydro, gas, wind or solar energy generation. Disproportionate investment in America's obsolete uranium-based reactors would certainly revitalise the US economy, but it could adversely impact our indigenous thorium-based nuclear programme. India cannot reasonably surrender its futuristic technology and long-term energy security simply to keep Western corporate czars afloat on the French Riviera. It is pertinent that the proposed deal does not guarantee complete access to civilian nuclear technology; the 123 Agreement forbids transfer of dual-use technologies, and assurances of uninterrupted fuel supplies end if it is terminated.

Opponents of the deal have a better case in claiming that it draws India into the American orbit and seeks drastic changes in its foreign policy, without commensurate benefit in the phantom war on terror. Washington remains closely in touch with its old protégé, the Taliban, as evidenced in the safe release of South Korean missionaries captured in Ghazni, and has no intention of abandoning faithful Islamabad. If the Vajpayee regime was forced to keep full-alert troops idle on the border for a year after the attack on Parliament, the Manmohan Singh Government was compelled to respond to growing terrorist transgressions with a Joint Terror Mechanism!

Unfortunately, Mr Singh obliged America by voting against Iran in the IAEA, though Tehran has never sponsored terrorist activity against India and in fact plays a major role in its energy security. Astonishingly, BJP's former president LK Advani projected his support for India's vote against Iran as a major achievement and displayed unseemly anxiety to distance himself from the Left's anti-American bias!

Major political parties, including the Congress, however, are clearly rethinking the anti-Iran issue in the nuclear pact, and it would be churlish to dismiss this as minority appeasement. External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee's admission to Parliament that Washington sought New Delhi's support to isolate Iran over its nuclear programme, only to be told that national interests will guide our foreign policy, indicates a necessary course correction. India would do well to abstain from further voting on this issue and revert to the tradition of friendly relations with West Asian nations, including Iran.

The benefits of the forthcoming joint-military exercises with the US, Japan, Australia and Singapore are questionable, but they cannot now be called off. Still, we would do well to refrain from mindlessly teasing China by embracing America too closely. Strategic experts warn the deal could worsen our regional situation by hardening attitudes in the immediate neighbourhood. In fact, the Left should reconsider its attitude towards Nepal Maoists to stabilise the region.

Meanwhile, the UPA's decision to accommodate Left concerns by setting up a political committee to scrutinise the nuclear deal in detail and defer negotiating safeguards at the IAEA has brought considerable relief to nationalist sentiment in the country. But this is not enough. The nuclear deal is between two nations, not between their ruling parties. In America, it requires ratification by both chambers of Congress. India must consider a constitutional Amendment to ensure Parliamentary ratification of international agreements and treaties as the era of one-party dominance is over and coalition (even minority) Governments are the current norm.

The ruling coalition cannot insist Parliament be excluded from a say in an agreement governed by American law which stipulates several conditions binding upon India. The White House built up bipartisan support for the deal and its enabling legislation, the Hyde Act. The US Congress reserves the right to attach conditions to nuclear deals, and the exercise of this right in 1985 delayed implementation of a nuclear agreement with China for 13 years.

The BJP-NDA and UNPA are rightly insisting that the 123 Agreement is not a Congress-Left bilateral affair, but concerns national security and sovereignty. They must persist with their legitimate demand for a Joint Parliamentary Committee to analyse the treaty, and stall Parliament till the demand is met. Else, the BJP should revive the idea of a no-confidence motion. Suggestions to re-negotiate the deal or amend the Atomic Energy Act of 1962 should be deferred till the JPC meets. Political parties may like to consider alternatives if the US is unwilling to amend or re-negotiate the deal. Can India, for instance, make such a pact with another more reasonable P-5 country? And how many years will it take to operationalise our thorium reactors so that we eventually don't need the Nuclear Suppliers' Group?

Finally, former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa recently lashed out at the foreign citizenship of close kin of the Prime Minister while lambasting the deal. In contrast, some BJP admirers feel the "middle class constituency" comprising families that want their children to migrate to the US will be upset if the deal falls through. Actually, the deal is being peddled by those who have accepted foreign jobs and citizenship, and regard their original motherland as an economic stomping ground to exploit for personal and corporate enrichment. Such persons cannot be equated with citizens who sweat and struggle in this country; nor can those lining up for foreign visas dictate public discourse in India.

Deal dilutes autonomy

The India-US civil nuclear deal has exposed our worst kept post-colonial secret - there is dyarchy in New Delhi with UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi calling the shots and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh executing her designs, even at the cost of national security and sovereignty. Ms Gandhi has said the deal was close to her heart without revealing why; delivered her overarching seal of approval at the Congress Parliamentary Party meet a day after Mr Singh's address to Parliament; and, skipped the public arena once Washington unveiled the emasculating nature of the deal, leaving the Government to cope with the political fallout.

What is most disturbing, however, is the manner in which domestic anxiety has degenerated into a Government-Opposition squabble. The UPA's denial of the US State Department's claim that the deal stands "terminated" if India conducts a nuclear test is unconvincing. Instead of using this to scrap or rework the deal, which explicitly provides for "return of all materials, including reprocessed material covered by the agreement", the UPA has opted to lie to its own people.

It is sadly evident that Ms Gandhi is manipulating the UPA to subordinate India to the US-dominated world order. The nuclear deal strips India of nuclear autonomy and makes it a pawn in Washington's contests with China and Iran. It targets India's right to procure enriched uranium; reprocess fuel in fast-breeder reactors; and, eventually switch to thorium as fissile material. The first two stages of our nuclear cycle are visibly under attack; informed sources say Ram Setu is intended to destroy our thorium sources.

Scientists like former President APJ Abdul Kalam believe thorium is the route to energy independence; our known reserves can generate 400,000 MW electricity annually for the next four centuries. India alone has the technological expertise for thorium-based reactors and a 300 MW reactor is under regulatory clearance. If launched in the 11th Plan, it may be ready within seven years. Thorium produces up to 10,000-times less long-lived radioactive waste than uranium or plutonium, sharply reducing radiation hazards. Where is the need for India to grovel before the Nuclear Suppliers' Group for purchasing uranium?

A less-known fact is that over a thousand Americans will enter India under the deal, and enjoy access to sensitive information regarding the quantum of our thorium and other natural resources. Hence, it would be appropriate for Parliament to ask if there is any other unwritten component in the treaty. Indeed, barring the Congress, which negotiated the sell out, all political parties should unequivocally declare that future regimes will not be bound to secret clauses inked by regimes that cannot face their own people.

The Left's anger cannot be trusted completely given its extreme reluctance to divorce the UPA. It is heartening that the BJP has woken up to the seriousness of the threat to national sovereignty and decided to move a no-confidence motion against the Government. While the NDA and the UNPA are obvious allies in this enterprise, minority-sensitive UPA allies like the Bahujan Samaj Party, the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the DMK and even the Left will have no choice but to take an unambiguous stand on the issue.

Early national election is now looming; the BJP must atone for previous sins. The BJP should also explain why its top leaders initially approved the deal after meeting the Prime Minister; Mr Yashwant Sinha's subsequent denunciation suggests internal revolt at this unilateralism. Worse, the leadership tried to help the UPA by giving an inadmissible notice about Parliament ratifying the deal, and seeking discussion under Rule 184 (rejected by the Speaker) only after in-house wrangling.

Former Atomic Energy Research Board chief A Gopalakrishnan avers that Section 106 of the Hyde Act enjoins US to end nuclear cooperation if India conducts a nuclear test; Section 104(a)(3)(B) denies the President power to waive Section 129 of the US Atomic Energy Act, which envisages similar termination. Hence, on testing, India has to return all material, including reprocessed material, covered by the agreement. Mr Gopalakrishnan stresses that both the 123 Agreement and the Hyde Act deny India assured nuclear fuel if Washington terminates or suspends the deal, which is known to negotiators in the PMO and the Foreign Ministry. Australia's linking uranium sales to India's "legal commitment to abandon nuclear testing" validates this view.

Thus, if a nationalist Government needs further tests, all reactors, material, fuel stockpiles, reprocessed fuel, spares and technology will have to be returned to the US (possibly without a refund). In monetary terms, a direct investment of Rs 250,000 crore in imported power reactors and Rs 800,000 crore in downstream industries relying on this power will go down the drain. No Government could withstand such an economic shock.

It is pertinent that we could be blackmailed even for refusal to obey US diktat in areas impinging on our sovereignty and national dignity, which is why Iran's nuclear programme has been smuggled into the deal. Former BARC director AN Prasad thinks the 123 Agreement was a bogey to 'fix' the language of the deal. The controversial issue of testing was not directly mentioned, and the Government of India hid the fact that such areas of silence are governed by the Hyde and US Atomic Energy Acts.

The Hyde Act enjoins the American President to determine that India has provided the US and the International Atomic Energy Agency with a credible plan to separate civil and military nuclear facilities, and that India and the IAEA have completed all legal steps required prior to signature of an agreement requiring application of IAEA safeguards in perpetuity. The US President has to report to Congress about India's adherence to a strict non-proliferation regime; copies of the separation plan and agreements with IAEA and the Nuclear Suppliers' Group; and, specific measures taken by India to actively participate in US and international efforts to dissuade, isolate and if necessary sanction and contain Iran.

Shamefully, the UPA is willing to enter into an agreement against a friendly sovereign country. One shudders to think if the UPA would also insist on providing America military bases to enforce 'regime change' in Tehran. The UPA has outlived its welcome; it must go.


Uruguay backs J&K separatists

By the twitching of my thumbs, fresh mischief is brewing over our northern frontier. The signs are ominous: There is renewed violence in Jammu & Kashmir, including an attack on Amarnath pilgrims. There is Ms Pamela Mountbatten's titillating leak that her father used Edwina Mountbatten to manipulate Jawaharlal Nehru and subvert Indian national interest in the border State. There is US pressure on Ms Benazir Bhutto to cut a deal with President Pervez Musharraf, and Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama's threat of direct action against terrorists in Pakistan.

Hizbul Mujahideen has asked non-Kashmiri (read non-Muslim) workers to quit the Valley, triggering an exodus. Around this time, Uruguay hosted a Kashmir Conference (July 31) to discuss resolution of the India-Pakistan dispute. Organised by Washington-based Ghulam Nabi Fai of the Kashmiri American Council, the conference proceedings leave little doubt it was backed by the US State Department.

According to the South Asia Terrorism Portal, Mr Fai funds Hizbul Mujahideen, which has close links with the Jamaat-e-Islami in the Kashmir Valley and Pakistan. Hizbul was close to Afghan Mujahideen groups like Hizb-e-Islami (which received arms training against the Soviets) and has cordial links with Pakistan's ISI and United Jihad Council. Mr Fai is reputedly friendly with the Hurriyat's Yasin Malik.

The meet was largely ignored by the international media and India, but Pakistan's national television and Islamic websites reported it extensively. Seventeen Uruguan senior Army officers attended; 11 were in uniform and, significantly, had served in Jammu & Kashmir as part of the infamous United Nations Military Observers Group for India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP). India remembers UNMOGIP for trying to alter the boundary-markers in favour of Pakistan, a fact which embarrassed Nehru and made him give up ideas for a plebiscite in the State.

Gen Ricardo Galarza of Uruguay, former Chief of UNMOGIP, made the astounding claim that Maharaja Hari Singh's Instrument of Accession (to India) was accepted by Lord Mountbatten subject to the reference of the people! He reiterated Uruguay's support for the 'right of self-determination of the people of Kashmir' (whatever that means). This is a gross intrusion in our internal affairs and New Delhi should take it up with the Uruguan authorities.

In India, few Kashmiri refugees have even heard of Mr Jatinder Bakshi of the Committee of the Return of Kashmiri Pandits. Yet this worthy pontificated that a lasting solution was possible only through peaceful dialogue between India, Pakistan and the People of Jammu & Kashmir (read separatists). Indians are more familiar with Dr Angana Chatterji, darling of the separatists; she demanded demilitarisation (naturally) to improve the 'human rights situation'.

The conference adopted a pompously-worded Montevideo Declaration, beginning with a demand to recognise the inalienable right to self-determination of the people of Jammu & Kashmir. It bears emphasising, therefore, that the Instrument of Accession is final and non-negotiable; foreigners have no locus standi to speak of self-determination for Indian citizens.

The declaration calls for a "new beginning and manifested sensible approach to resolve the Kashmir dispute through a peaceful negotiated settlement" keeping in view the sensitivities and wishes of the Kashmiri people. This is probably a certificate to the participants and organisers as the only competent persons to handle the issue. New Delhi should unequivocally inform Uruguay that Kashmiris have expressed their political mandate through free elections, which even international busy-bodies have acknowledged as fair. The Montevideo Conference appears to have a distinct bias towards the Hurriyat.

Irritatingly, the declaration calls for making Kashmiris an integral part of the 'peace process' of which they are primary stakeholders, in order to facilitate a "permanent, durable and honourable settlement of the Kashmir dispute". Kashmiri migrants, however, question the repetitive use of the word 'dispute', and point out that elected representatives of Kashmiris are already sitting in the State Assembly and Indian Parliament. Even more brazenly, the declaration states that the "ceasefire line as an option is totally unacceptable". The Indian view is that Pakistan must vacate Occupied Kashmir so that we can regain control of our 1947 border.

The Uruguay Conference favours an "intensive and comprehensive dialogue between different opinions and regions of the State on both sides of dividing line", so as to "improve the level of trust and confidence... to develop consensus in conflict resolution". It calls upon the Governments of India and Pakistan to provide travel documents to such participants. This vacuous opinion has been repeated ad nauseum in so many forums that it reflects the intellectual bankruptcy of the participants.

Surely, it is pertinent that while New Delhi is going all out to ensure travel documents to Pakistani nationals wishing to visit Jammu & Kashmir, not a single Kashmiri Hindu has received documents to visit the sacred Sharada Peeth in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, despite thousands of applications for permission. Even more telling is the fact that Pakistani nationals who entered India on tourist visas to watch cricket matches (for example, at Mohali, Punjab) or visit Sufi shrines, have simply melted into the night. It is certainly risky, therefore, for India to mindlessly keep an open door policy for infiltrators.

The conference has demanded an end to "all types of human rights violations". These West-funded jholawallahs should tell us why they don't speak about human rights violations against Hindus of Jammu & Kashmir, especially the genocide and ethnic cleansing intended to further a pan-Islamic agenda. India must make it clear that in internal or external discourse, we will not allow talk of Gujarat riots without acknowledging Godhra, or discussion of Jammu & Kashmir without admitting who began the selective killings and why.

The final mention about the return of all displaced persons, including Kashmiri Pandits, is polite piffle. The declaration favours Kashmir-specific confidence-building measures, demilitarisation to promote peace and reconciliation, and release of prisoners. Yet, demilitarisation can only augment the terrorists' ability to strike at will, and unsavoury characters like Yasin Malik and Bitta Karate have already been released.

Probably Uruguay and its American mentor want a Pakistani walkover in Jammu & Kashmir to placate Muslim rage over what is happening to the community in the Gulf and the Western world. Pakistan itself was a compensation for the creation of Israel, just as Israel was compensation to the Jews for European racism and religious bigotry. We are walking the same terrain again.

'Dalit' twist to textbook row

India's internal affairs are increasingly witnessing an interventionist American nexus. Even as the Supreme Court asks the Union Government to justify giving so-called 'Dalit Christians' a share in the quota for Scheduled Castes, it may be instructive to see how US policy has inveigled itself into our domestic discourse, while maintaining severe pressure upon its own Hindu citizens of Indian origin.

The manner in which these issues play out is enlightening. Harvard professor Michael Witzel's supporters in the California textbook battle include two evangelical bodies: Dalit Freedom Network and Dalit Solidarity Forum in the USA. DFN president Joseph D'Souza also heads the All-India Christian Council; he appealed to a US Congressional Committee to get 'Scheduled Caste' status for India's 'Dalit' Christians.

This utilisation of converts by overseas co-religionists for covert agendas fuels Hindu anger against conversions. The DFN's mission is to partner Dalits in their "quest for religious freedom" (obviously these are non-Hindu Dalits), and includes upholding the "legacy of Mother Teresa who showed god's love in word and deed... and to follow the command of Jesus Christ who called us to be 'the salt of the earth' and 'the light of the world'." Its board of directors includes only two Indians, both Christians: Mr Joseph D'Souza and Mr Kumar Swamy. The rest are white Americans, namely, Ms Melody Divine, a former adviser to anti-Hindu Arizona Congressman Trent Franks; Mr Peter Dance; Mr Bob Beltz, Ms Nanci Ricks, Mr Richard Sweeney, Mr Cliff Young, Mr Ken Heulitt and Mr Gene Kissinger (chairman).

The DSF-USA is run by the Rector of St Alban's Church, Oakland, New Jersey. It works closely with Christian Aid, which sent a fax to the California State Board of Education (SBE) from the Church premises, but tries to conceal the fact that it is a proselytising group. Mr Lars Martin Fosse, a signatory of Prof Witzel's letter to the SBE, appealed to Mr John Dayal of the All-India Christian Council for assistance in their fight with the Hindu community that is demanding proper representation of its faith in American textbooks. Sure enough, DFN and DSF-USA jumped into the fray.

California Parents for the Equalisation of Educational Materials (CAPEEM), which is challenging Prof Witzel's role as content-review expert in the history-social science textbook review and adoption process, has discovered his deep involvement with evangelical groups like DFN, which can be proven through a trail of e-mails. Prof Witzel was active in erasing information about DFN's missionary nature on the free Internet encyclopaedia, Wikipedia. DFN director Nanci Ricks said she did not want the agency to be known as a 'missions' organisation.

CAPEEM learnt Prof Witzel advised DFN how to intervene in the public hearing on the textbook adoption process in California. Here DFN directors misrepresented themselves as a group of Dalits by suppressing their Christian identity. Prof Shiva G Bajpai, the independent expert engaged by the California SBE to debate every Hindu edit/correction with Prof Witzel in a private meeting on January 6, 2006, found that Prof Witzel and his cohorts in the US and India did not want to rectify the depiction of India and Hindu dharma in textbooks.

As Witzel and his friends are firmly entrenched in American academia, few established scholars dared challenge their version of Indian history and culture. Prof Bajpai could wrestle more than 75 per cent of the desired changes solely on the basis of his professional acumen and status as the only historian of ancient India in California. Prof Bajpai now believes that winning the war against the demeaning portrayal of India and Hindu dharma necessitates the rise of a new class of academics sensitive to the mission of reclaiming agency over Hindu studies and early Indian history and culture. This also involves cracking the formidable nexus between the establishment academics and publishing industry and media, which has hitherto been virtually immune to criticism and reform.

America's Hindu community has been dissatisfied with the final changes approved in 2006 as these have failed to rectify material errors about Hindu religion, culture and history. After inputs from myriad sources about Prof Witzel's biases, CAPEEM approached the courts to subpoena him to place on record his letters/e-mail exchanges with textbook publishers about the (textbook revision) Adoption Process; with the California Board; with Stanley Wolpert, James Heitzman, Shiva Bajpai, or Steve Farmer about the adoption process; postings to the Indo-Eurasian Research List; exchanges with third parties (like DFN) about the adoption process; exchanges with racial purist Roger Pearson or anyone associated with the Journal of Indo-European Studies; exchanges with Arun Vajpayee (the mysterious 'student' who asked Prof Witzel to stop the acceptance of changes in the textbooks); communications passing on edits/revisions of Hindu groups; transmitting textbooks (or portions) revised as part of the adoption process; exchanges with Harvard University regarding the adoption process; communications about the purpose of the Indo-Eurasian Research List; and so on.

CAPEEM believes Prof Witzel's conduct during the adoption process is central to its case as he (and others) were 'hostile' academic advisers and engaged in secret manoeuvres. A full disclosure of the records sought could reveal procedural improprieties by them. While the California Department of Education (CDE) barred Prof Bajpai from any contact with publishers, Prof Witzel enjoyed this freedom.

His exchanges with DFN are relevant to show anti-Hindu bias as many of its key figures are unabashedly antagonistic towards Hindu dharma. Prof Kancha Ilaiah, who signed a DFN letter to the CDE, claims he "hate(s) Hinduism" and calls it "a cult of worshipping certain violent figures... Hinduism is basically a spiritual fascist cult". Prof Witzel's exchanges with Roger Pearson, in whose journal his article was published, and certain Internet postings also establish deep prejudice.

The flip side of the California debate is a misconceived effort to associate American perceptions of India with the fabulous wealth of the Indian-American community, which is "buying protection" in its adopted land through bankrolling candidates for congressional and presidential elections; and the desire of corporate America to invest in India's blooming economy. This could be the thin edge of the wedge. Any attempt to accord primacy to secular education and employment (Mammon) is counter to the Hindu ethos wherein the hierarchy of values (varnas) ranks mercantile and wealth-generating groups (Vaishya varna) as third, well after spiritual preceptors (Brahmin) and those who uphold the power of the state (Kshatriya).



Islam in crisis? Blame ulema

Far from expanding the aura of Islam, the recent Glasgow Airport attack only underlines the shrivelling of the sphere of influence of jihad and Muslim rage. This may seem surprising to those easily alarmed by media overkill about terror cells lurking in every locality, but a brief pause would show that Islam's disunity and absence of strategy to face its Western 'tormentors' have led it into the proverbial chakravyu from which exit is unknown.

This may sound harsh, but the truth is that Islam is in peril because it is ideologically at sea. Islam appeared ascendant after the 1979 fall of the hated pro-American Shah Reza Pehlavi, and Muslim societies everywhere clamoured for orthodoxy to protect their culture from perceived Western decadence; but the Iranian Revolution exposed resurgent Islam's inability to cope with the modern world.

Post-1979, moderate regimes like Egypt and Jordan enhanced their Western ties to survive threats from radial clerics, while anti-West regimes came under greater pressure. Libya caved in after prolonged defiance and Iraq is a virtual colony; its laws are being rapidly changed to convert it into an American corporate paradise. Pakistan, linchpin of international terror, is in a bigger mess than Afghanistan; and Indonesia, the largest Muslim country, is weak and has lost its oil wealth through the creation of East Timor. Iran is already on the radar of oil-thirsty Texas majors; Saudi Arabia and Turkey are hardly stable.

This highlights Islam's true crisis: Not a single Muslim country is politically, economically, militarily and intellectually viable. Politically, most regimes rely on the West to survive the hatred of their own people. Then, they are interlinked with Western economies even when they have rich resources like oil. Militarily and technologically, not a single Islamic country can manufacture its own weaponry or contribute to world technology in any sphere. This is the reason why I insist that no matter how many terror attacks happen (they appear to be declining in India), Islam is the loser. It cannot secure sovereign control over any non-Muslim society.

But the greatest vacuum is in the realm of thought. In its conflict with the West-dominated world, Islam has failed to contribute thinkers who can articulate the Muslim quest in terms acceptable to both orthodox and modern-contemporary believers. No important and independent Muslim thinker resides in a Muslim country. Modernising Muslims live in the West and speak an idiom unacceptable to the masses. This is Islam's true dilemma.

One reason for this crisis, in my view, is the insistence of today's ulema that their interpretation of the Quran be fully accepted by the faithful if they wish to escape the charge of apostasy. This gives Islam an absurd rigidity its intellectuals say did not exist in the past, and internally fractures Muslim society into 'flocks' controlled by the ulema of different mosques. Obsession with the small picture - witnessed in India in the denial of alimony to Shah Bano and the forced return of Gudiya to a husband she had forgotten, and in the stoning of 'adulterous' (often raped) women in other parts of the world - have forced the community to shrink, rather than grow. Self-confidence is undermined by the ulema who, ironically, are the only leaders Muslims recognise.

I hesitate to indulge in comparative theology, yet, the Vedic Hindu arrangement is worth offering for the consideration of monotheistic traditions. Hindu tradition is divided into two streams: Sruti, revealed divine word, and Smriti, actual practice. Sruti and Smriti may converge at times, but more often they diverge. Hence, the Hindu hierarchy of values where the ideal is placed above the actual, but the actual is tolerated though exhorted to strive for the ideal. My point is simply that the Hindu ability to accept the reality of the 'Imperfect Man' is the source of the unique Hindu mental agility to cope with an ever-changing world.

In monotheistic traditions, however, emphasis on perfection through driving the human herd to attain impossible attributes inevitably gives totalitarian power to religious or political vanguards, denying genuine liberty and autonomy to the masses. The Christian world tried to resolve this crisis by attempting a division of the spiritual and political authority. But the American experience in particular shows that corporates and other institutions continue to wield disproportionate power in society; nor is the Church entirely bereft of political leverage.

There are some lessons India should draw from the current international brouhaha over the Glasgow-Bangalore link. We must tackle our home-grown or Pakistan-trained terrorists firmly, and shun a propensity to suffer vicariously for the West. We need not refuse cooperation to Western countries attacked by terrorists, but we must sharply rebuke interference in our internal affairs. Britain wants help in probing the Bangalore links of the UK bombers, but why did the European Union, of which it is a member, ask President APJ Abdul Kalam not to hang Mohammed Afzal, prime accused in the attack on Indian Parliament?

It was Western propaganda that not one Indian has been found linked to the dreaded Al Qaeda, when the fact is that all Islamic terror cells have internal connections and arrangements with each other, and this fact is highlighted when it suits the investigating agencies. I am suspicious that Britain found the Al Qaeda link with Indian Muslim doctors precisely at a time when it was keen to repatriate Indian doctors (Hindus and Muslims alike) whom it had invited to settle there.

India has no legitimate reason to be sympathetic to Britain. Modern Islamic jihad came to our shores at the instance of the British, in whose hospitable clime Choudhary Rehmat Ali conceived the idea and the boundary of Pakistan. British officials facilitated the Great Calcutta Killing of 1946, which forced Congress to accept Partition, by removing Hindu officers from all affected police stations. Louis Mountbatten 'advised' Jawaharlal Nehru to take the Jammu & Kashmir dispute to the United Nations, and we have since suffered a jihad that has slowly spread from Kashmir Valley to each and every State.

All international discourse since the New York attack has been West-centric. And the West has used it to launch its own 'holy war' to cleverly reoccupy lands once held by Christendom. India was never one of them: Let the religion of love grapple with the religion of peace.


She fits the Congress bill

Even before runaway skeletons made her India's most controversial presidential candidate, Ms Pratibha Patil earned fame as the most lustreless aspirant to this high office. Barring the slavish Congress, none could whip up any enthusiasm for this 'gender rabbit' pulled out of the hat by the domineering UPA chairperson. Political parties supporting her nomination simply said the post belonged to the dominant coalition partner. A deafening silence greeted announcement of her name; in the furore that erupted after serious scandals grabbed national attention, Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar made a formal defence, largely because the vanguard led by Mr Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi hugely offended public sentiments.

In the circumstances, the Gandhi family's diminutive satellite was forced to speak for herself. As she boasted she was not a rubber stamp, aides revealed she had twice refused to sign the Rajasthan anti-conversion Bill (winning accolades from Pope Benedict XVI). As she denounced purdah as a consequence of Mughal atrocities while imitating the sartorial elegance of Mrs Indira Gandhi's election time attire, one wondered if she was truly a dark horse or a Papally preordained contender for whom the path was cleared by clever manipulation.

Among the early names 'sounded' was Harvard academic Amartya Sen, who won the Nobel Prize for obsolete intellectual posturing, the Bharat Ratna for getting the Nobel, and the gratitude of the Nehru-Gandhi clan for protecting the secrets of Mr Rahul Gandhi's academic status. But Prof Sen's greatest asset proved his greatest liability - his wife is a Rothschild and the presence of a foreigner in Rashtrapati Bhawan would aggravate hostility towards Congress's northern Italian supremo.

After serious thinking while falsely projecting Mr Pranab Mukherjee and Mr Shivraj Patil, Ms Sonia Gandhi decided she couldn't take the risk, especially if she plans to get rid of Mr Manmohan Singh and assume power directly, as the Uttar Pradesh election has shown that the dynasty is unlikely to get so close to power again. Interestingly, the British committee that decided Mr Salman Rushdie's knighthood - rightly perceived as an insult by the Islamic world - was also headed by a Rothschild. With hindsight, it is obvious that after World War II, the West quickly reorganised its intellectual, diplomatic and political-military arsenal to continue its quest for world dominion.

To return to Ms Pratibha Patil, her USP is that she has no nationalist credentials and no empathy for India's foundational ethos and native culture. Her sensitivities extend only to the faith of her Roman Catholic leader, to please whom she denied assent to the anti-conversion Bill, despite strong provocation by the Immanuel Mission in Kota and evangelists in Dangs. Ms Patil was aware that similar laws have been passed by Congress regimes, the latest being Himachal Pradesh where conversion sprees and drug-laced moonlight parties by Western tourists are polluting the environment. Her anti-Hindu act elevated her status with the Vatican and New Delhi.

Although the issue of Maharashtrian pride, originally mooted for Mr Shivraj Patil, is being invoked for Ms Patil, Shiv Sena leader Bal Thackeray would do well to consider if she has any regard for Maratha yug purush Chhatrapati Shivaji and Sant Ramdas. As one facilitating an evangelist agenda, how can she receive Mr Thackeray's affections?

The issue of the veil has many dimensions. As a vestige of Hindu accommodation of and subordination to Islamic rule, it is an intra-Hindu affair. In south and east India, where Islam did not rule too long, Hindu women neither veil themselves nor cover their heads. Purdah or ghunghat survives in the north where Islam was either dominant or where Hindus reluctantly came to terms with it.

The Muslim veil is rooted in Islamic culture, and has to be tackled by Muslims themselves. It has never been a problem in India, even among advocates of Muslim women's rights in sensitive matters like divorce and rape. It is Europe, especially Britain and France, that has made the veil an international political issue. As Muslims feel politically cornered and culturally humiliated, the veil is being adopted by increasingly younger girls as part of identity politics. The controversy touched India when Ms Shabana Azmi raised it after receiving an award from the British House of Commons. She was seconded by Mr Salman Rushdie, who has now been knighted. As the only Hindu woman to raise the issue, Ms Patil has demonstrated an amazing tactlessness.

Such insensitivity is not new to her. Way back in 1975, after the Emergency was imposed and family planning became the national mantra, Ms Patil told agitated Muslim leaders to keep their religion at home and make family planning their public creed.

Of course, one can guess the mantra invoked when the Shri Sant Muktabai sugar factory she founded received a Rs 5-crore loan from the Mumbai Central District Cooperative Bank in 1994-95. It does not appear as if Ms Patil made any effort to repay the same for over a decade; when she quit to become Rajasthan Governor four years ago, the accumulated interest and non-repayment had swollen to a staggering Rs 17.70 crore. She was sufficiently family-minded to hand over the cooperative to her brother GN Patil, and the default may never have become a public scandal but for the fact that Ms Gandhi chose her for President just a week after the bank moved to recover bad debts. Bad luck!

Worse, Mr GN Patil is accused of the murder of Jalgaon District Congress Committee president VG Patil in 2005. The alleged assassin, Raju Mali, reportedly confessed that he was hired by Mr GN Patil before dying in mysterious circumstances earlier this year. It was this that prompted VG Patil's widow to write to Ms Sonia Gandhi in March 2007 and follow it up with a meeting. Ms Gandhi now owes the nation an explanation for fielding a candidate with such a dubious family background. This is doubly shameful because the Jalgaon district and sessions court has allowed the CBI to file a supplementary chargesheet involving Mr GN Patil.

It boggles the mind that the Congress should reject the much-respected Mr APJ Abdul Kalam for a non-entity like Ms Patil, unless the objective is to have a pliant President. It is time for all political parties to rise above partisanship and come to the aid of the beleaguered nation.


Challenge to social stability

Never in modern India has caste been such a conundrum. If Bahujan Samaj Party leader Mayawati's varna amity forged a truly elephantine electoral constituency, the narrow jati-vad displayed at Dausa represents a grim challenge to social stability and political-constitutional order. Traditionally, jati has been mobile, mutable, yet resilient; simultaneously, the brick and mortar of the versatile architecture of native Indian society.

Reservations in the colonial and post-colonial era, however, have slowly transformed caste from social capital to politico-economic equity. The danger that reservations could reduce jatis to splintered socio-cultural entities was averted in the nascent republic as groups consensually regarded as 'depressed' or 'tribal' were placed in broad categories called Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. Even the perpetuation of the special 10-year reservation given to them did not prove disruptive so long as the quantum remained below 25 per cent (it was 22.5 per cent), a figure civilisationally acceptable to the Hindu majority as the State's maximum share of revenue/produce (or jobs/seats). The ideal State share is one-sixth.

Caste acquired the volatility of a Molotov cocktail when Mr VP Singh imposed the Mandal Commission proposal of 27 per cent reservation for OBCs in Government jobs upon an unsuspecting nation, forcing political parties to fall in line or face electoral oblivion. But even the 50 per cent ceiling fixed by the Supreme Court could not mitigate society's profound unease as politically and economically assertive castes rushed to corner Government employment in the name of social and educational backwardness.

Mr Arjun Singh's attempt to extend the OBC reservation to elite educational courses without the fig-leaf of a commission report has temporarily come a cropper. But other UPA initiatives - to give converts access to SC/ST quotas; to give Muslims job quota and special access to financial resources - have aggravated disquiet over repeated political attempts to split society down to its tiniest constituent units, so that its unity is fractured and its diversity twisted to hostility.

This is the savage harvest we reaped at Dausa. I am unable to delink the sudden but highly organised explosion of Gujjar wrath from the political fortunes of sitting MP Sachin Pilot, who may suffer if Dausa becomes a reserved ST constituency while his Gujjar community is listed as OBC. When the mobs had the upper hand, Mr Pilot glibly demanded the resignation of Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje; it was only the unplanned spread of violence to Congress-ruled Haryana and Delhi and BSP-ruled Uttar Pradesh that forced the Centre to signal an end to the mayhem. The young MP beat a tactical retreat by visiting BJP president Rajnath Singh in the shadow of his mother, Ms Rama Pilot.

Some salient features of the Dausa stir deserve mention. It was organised by educated, employed, financially sound, and politically savvy Gujjars: Retired Army officers, lawyers, doctors, landowners. Their sense of deprivation was proportionate to the success of another community (Meena) and not an objective reality (such as below poverty line status). This political sectarianism led to the creation of a Samyukta Arakshan Morcha by Congress MLA Govindsingh Gujjar after Lt Col KS Bainsla withdrew the agitation by the Gujjar Arakshan Sangharsh Samiti. The Congress's attitude towards the new front is unclear; its meeting was attended by MLA Ramchandra Saradhana though Mr Sachin Pilot kept publicly distant.

After the Supreme Court took suo motu notice of the mayhem that left 26, including two policemen, dead, and crores worth of public property damaged, police cases were filed against high-profile movement leaders. The Samyukta Arakshan Morcha is now demanding withdrawal of criminal cases against the protesters and jobs for the relatives of Gujjars who died in their own inferno. The Morcha is seeking hefty compensation for the dead, at par with police victims. Above all, citing caste-based vindictiveness, it is demanding the transfer of all Meena officers in Gujjar-dominated pockets.

This is not on. No administration can run on such narrow casteist principles; Gujjar leaders and their Congress backers bear full responsibility for turning the peaceful Meena community against them. Rather than aggravate this artificial divide, they should let tempers cool and try to restore the old amity of centuries. They would do well to ponder Ms Raje's call for a change of mindset on reservations in view of the economy's growing privatisation.

The Supreme Court can lead the way as politicians are unlikely to find the courage to say or do what is necessary to undo the scourge of reservations, which compels more and more people to fight for a share of an increasingly smaller pie. This is akin to the inmates of Nazi gas chambers fighting each other for a breath of oxygen, when the very air they were breathing was poisonous: The consequences were equally lethal for all.

The Supreme Court can resolutely move in to declare reservations unconstitutional and fling them out of the window in toto. If, as the apex court has previously maintained, the Preamble is a legitimate part of the Constitution and its statement of intent, then all citizens are equally, simultaneously, and unconditionally entitled to "Justice, social, economic and political," as well as "Equality of status and of opportunity".

Yet equality of status is contradicted by the Constitution categorising groups as Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, even if the latter grouping is now being coveted by others for economic or political reasons. Similarly, political, economic or educational reservations deny equality of opportunity to all, and meritorious youth across the country are demanding genuine equality in increasingly louder voices. Political indifference to their aspirations is a denial of the dignity of the individual and a denial of "Justice, social, economic and political". Conflict similar to that witnessed in Rajasthan for perceived advantages from the system are an open assault on the unity and integrity of the nation. In other words, some key Articles of the Constitution violate the letter and spirit of the Preamble. A review of the Constitution is the order of the day.

Finally, citizens must note that the Gujjar violence targeted the police, a nationwide tendency since Punjab Police defeated the Khalistan insurgency. The brutality with which Dungar Singh Shekhawat of the Rajasthan Armed Constabulary and Babu Lal of Barmer district police were lynched by instigated mobs is shameful. Western-funded human rights activists can pretend not to notice; we cannot afford this luxury.


Saudi Arabia at crossroads

Recent developments in Saudi Arabia, from the suspiciously timely unveiling of a plot against the royal family, oil wells and Army bases, to a revived demand for constitutional monarchy and electoral democracy, suggest something is rotten in the desert kingdom. Some years ago, US President George Bush trained his guns at a sitting duck called Afghanistan before nimbly shifting them to Iraq and helping fellow oilmen enrich themselves with its alluring oilfields. But given the Iraqi people's legendary ingratitude for the Free World's gift of democracy, and the stiffer resistance expected from a defiant Iran, one wonders if the rhetoric aimed at Tehran and the threat to Persian oilfields is not a decoy for the takeover of the Saudi Arabian oilfields that Uncle Sam once virtually owned for six long decades.

It makes sense because unlike Baghdad, where the US never found unconventional weapons but got bogged down in an unconventional war owing to lack of ground level human intelligence, the average American GI really knows Riyadh and the Arabian desert. For years the Saudi royals have depended upon America for security for the royal family, for running the oil rigs and flying their planes, manning the military installations, et al.

Further, the social-diplomatic circuit has helped them enter the plusher residential precincts and identify the potential civilian collaborators they failed to find in Baghdad and are unlikely to discover in Tehran. The social-military costs of such a coup are certainly affordable, and Saudi oil is as good as Iranian.

In this context, it bears noting that the Muslim world is in agony. There is no truly powerful Islamic state in the world, Saudi wealth notwithstanding. Even Tehran does not manufacture its own military equipment; the Pakistani N-bomb is a Chinese gift and cannot be deployed against Islam's Western tormenters. Libya has caved in, Syria is in crisis, Egypt and Jordan are US-client states, and no other Muslim state even enters the reckoning in the power stakes.

Jihadi rhetoric notwithstanding, Islam is in pain; the inability to extract even token punishment for the offensive cartoons against Prophet Mohammed exemplifies this powerlessness. Islam's successful and prolonged strikes in India should be viewed in the context of the West's geo-strategic need to contain us, and Indian Islam maybe entering a quiescent phase in order to ponder its attitude towards the West and the sponsored Shia-Sunni divide that is currently tearing Muslim society apart.

Developments in Saudi Arabia are interesting. The 'discovery' of an Al Qaeda plot against the royal family will naturally ensure the compliance of all friendly (puppet) regimes while putting Islam on the defensive. The supposed threat to the oil wells located in the Shia-dominated region is of 'concern' to the US. As the West-inspired Shia-Sunni fratricide has failed to reach critical genocidal mass, Washington has no choice but to further humiliate its Sunni collaborator regimes.

The huge weapons haul has resulted in the arrest of 172 Al Qaeda terror suspects, including foreigners whose nationalities have not been disclosed. Saudi Interior Ministry spokesman Mansour al-Turki said they intended to carry out "suicide attacks against public figures," which suggests assassination and/or a coup against the royal family. It is intriguing that this should happen at a time when King Abdullah is distancing himself from Washington and the former Saudi envoy to the US, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, is said to be keen to become king of Saudi Arabia.

The timing of events is significant. The dimensions of the coup/terror plot suggest some weeks of planning, making it simultaneous with the February 2007 petition by 99 educated people demanding King Abdullah introduce economic, social and political reforms in the kingdom.

The petitioners have called for an elected Parliament instead of the appointed Shura Council, laws to reduce inequality, and a just distribution of resources. The insinuation that some persons are cornering a disproportionate share of national resources is a thinly veiled attack upon the royal family. The demand for freedom of opinion, expression and association, along with the legal formation of NGOs, is a Western Christian giveaway (consider what happened to the erstwhile Soviet Republics). Hence the Saudi King may do well to scrutinise the presence of covert Christians in his administration, else he may face a Nepal-like situation where social unrest brought down the monarchy, but the Kingdom cannot survive without a monarch to unite it.

While putting some of the top signatories in jail may provide immediate relief, Riyadh will have to devise more efficient means of combating the threat to its independence. King Abdullah realises that excessive dependence upon the US could prove the proverbial kiss-of-death. In February, he sabotaged Secretary of US State Condoleezza Rice's plans for a peace summit between Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas by brokering a power-sharing agreement between Fatah and Hamas, wherein the latter was not required to recognise Israel or give up violence. Washington was shocked that the Saudis were not for isolating Hamas. The King also ruled out direct engagement with Israel, which the White House wanted in order to promote Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

Worse, he recently told Arab Heads of State in Riyadh that the American invasion of Iraq was "an illegal foreign occupation". Once, coaxed by Prince Bandar, the Saudis gave the Americans the use of Prince Sultan Air Base at Al Kharj, outside Riyadh, to attack Afghanistan and Iraq; they are now livid at the deteriorating situation in Iraq.

King Abdullah moved to restrict American influence in Riyadh by visiting India and China last year. He indicated a desire for peace inside India, whatever the state of Indo-Pak relations. In the long-term, however, he would do well to review Saudi adherence to the puritanical Wahaabi Islam that is increasingly finding disfavour with his own citizens and making them vulnerable to Western machinations against the Kingdom. It is not enough for the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) to warn the West against identifying Islam with terrorism, especially in the wake of September 11, 2001; Muslims must demonstrate that the two are distinct entities. Otherwise, the lesson of history is that from the time of the Patriarch Abraham, the sons of Ishmael have been easily outwitted by the sons of Isaac.



Same stroke for all folks

Recent years have seen the jaws of justice open and spew out the indigestible guilty, rich, and powerful. The killers of Jessica Lall and Priyadarshini Mattoo initially walked free. The BMW driver who mowed down five pavement dwellers got bail, a degree from America's Columbia University, and a celebrated business in India; the status of the case is dubious. Public outrage against the first two verdicts ensured a re-trial and justice for the young women cut down in their prime by spoilt brats with no respect for human life.

Now, to nationwide consternation, justice has tilted in favour of Alistair Pereira, who killed seven Mumbai pavement dwellers and injured another eight, under the influence of a substance that could not be established in court. Whatever the status of evidence presented, it is inexplicable that a judge who gave Pereira six months imprisonment for rash and negligent driving could not direct the police to rework the case and award punishment more respectful of the human lives lost.

At a time when the nation is pondering the limits of judicial review as opposed to judicial overreach, it is pertinent to ask if the judiciary is adequately sensitive to the need to protect the lives and dignity of poor and ordinary citizens from the arrogance of the rich and the complicity of the administration. Is justice only for organised citizens? Are the voiceless condemned to eternal victimhood? And, is justice only what judges decide is just or desirable?

The last question is relevant because of a trend among a section of the judiciary to extend and privilege itself in a manner inconsistent with democracy. Simultaneously, a section of industry wants to leverage power and status to muffle ordinary citizens on the pretext of development, and has commandeered a section of the political class to serve its ends (Gurgaon, Nandigram). Should a similar synergy develop with the judiciary, India will deteriorate into an oligarchy of rich, powerful, privileged and networked people.

What is particularly disturbing is the new impatience with the middle class which is increasingly assertive about rights and services, as witnessed in the Delhi citizens fight against unjust power hikes following privatisation. There is a grim determination to cut this class to (acceptable) size, and to maintain a distance between it and the class that travels in official vehicles. The rich are already insulated by their wealth.

This article is Delhi-centric, but the trends observed can be readily transposed all over the country; hence the need to nip evil in the bud. My first objection is to the strenuous effort to perpetuate what Vijay Parshad calls the Untouchable Past, in the form of a monstrosity called the Lutyens Bungalow Zone (LBZ). A class of 'Heritage Jholawallahs' projects LBZ as a great colonial legacy deserving preservation, and even Left party MPs lobby for above-entitlement bungalows. The judiciary, too, is concerned that its 'quota' of bungalows may be decreased.

This zone was built for colonial officials; it perpetuated the ugliest aspects of the caste system, adding colonial hauteur and snobbery to create the most unaesthetic architecture India has ever seen. The first thing that strikes one visiting a bungalow is the sheer number of doors, which are totally at variance with modern housing designs. Closer scrutiny reveals that many are intended as exclusively servants' entrance doors. Each toilet has a separate door so the cleaner (now an unparliamentary term) could enter and leave without entering the main house. Within the house itself, there are doors for the master and doors for staff. Colonial snobbery comes in the form of the shuttered façade and the sprawling back garden where the family could relax away from prying native eyes.

Readers would share my distaste for the judiciary's move to develop LBZ as a China-style Forbidden City with no access for ordinary citizens. This has been done through the simple ruse of forbidding citizens to park their vehicles on the roads in LBZ, ostensibly to prevent traffic snarls. Citizens with business in the area have been ordered to use park-and-ride facilities.

This is outrageous. What Delhi needs is the complete demolition of LBZ and rationalisation of land usage. There is no justification for any civil servant, Rajya Sabha MP or judge occupying a bungalow; they can be accommodated in multi-storey apartments. Only Lok Sabha MPs accountable to the people should be given bungalows, which should be rebuilt to equal size. Freed up space should be converted into public parks to provide Delhi genuine green lungs; there should be adequate parking so that people can enjoy a break.

Delhi's roads are choking with vehicular traffic, yet one must decry the attempt to force private citizens off the roads through punitive parking fees and arbitrary withdrawal of parking facilities. Ordinary citizens have to run several kinds of chores daily, and travel in different directions; public transport is not always possible or convenient, and everyone cannot walk in the sweltering heat.

Paid parking for each stop can be prohibitive; what Delhi needs is short-duration free parking at or near local markets. Shopping malls should provide free parking, as is customary all over the world; it is scandalous to pay Rs 15 for parking on Baba Kharak Singh Marg - this affects both footfalls and sales.

More pertinently, if fewer vehicles are desired on Indian roads, isn't it unethical to make people buy what the state will not let them use? The sudden ban on tinted glasses in the Delhi summer is a similar case of non-application of mind. Tinting should be permitted on the front and back windscreens to protect drivers from the glare; side windows can be see-through to prevent crimes against women. And in the interest of fair play, the privilege of tinted glasses should not be extended to any judge or civil servant; it can be reserved for the President, Governors, Prime Minister and a few others with genuine security issues.

Judicial activism is welcome to the extent that it curbs executive excess or the superciliousness of the rich. If the judiciary joins one or both in a quest to entrench privilege and banish ordinary citizens from public spaces, democracy will be in peril.


Yearning for Ram rajya

Independent India's failure to base its polity and Constitution on the core values of Hindu civilisation has long invoked surprise or disdain from intellectuals and observers, depending upon their respective worldviews. Most analysts tend to privilege Western democracy as the only legitimate form of Government in the modern world; the Hindu ideal of 'Ram rajya' as a possible model for the modern nation invites derision as being non-inclusive of non-Hindus, or at least not applicable to them, and worse, as resting upon uncertain principles.

It has taken the ruthless State-sponsored massacre in Muslim-dominant Nandigram to expose the untruth of this anti-Hindu polemic. Nandigram demonstrates the urgent imperative of establishing Ram rajya as the nation's foundational ethos, especially as a surreptitious new political 'consensus' is being manufactured to make India 'the republic of the rich.' Under the mind-numbing slogan of globalisation, a pernicious move is afoot to exclude the poor and the less affluent sections of the middle class from full citizenship.

Nandigram, where greasy multinationals and their well-heeled minions tried to grab the land of toiling farmers and sharecroppers, exposes the naked face of this shameless conspiracy. A political culture of angry impatience with the general masses is being nurtured insidiously and a secret yardstick of affluence established and privileged. 'Adequate compensation' is floated as the mantra justifying the attempt to dispossess unwilling owners of land held for generations, and teeth are gnashed in frustration over the failure of force to overwhelm the humble might of the people.

Ironically, the retreat by the state raises hopes for validating the concept of Ram rajya. The Hindu kingdom, as opposed to the Semitic state, exists for the happiness and well-being of the people, and not to establish God's will upon earth, or otherwise treat subjects as objects. In Ram rajya, the state, as the sole legitimate agency wielding power (force), imposes limits upon its exercise of power, either for the greater happiness of the people, or to evade a greater tyranny that could be caused by moral outrage or self-righteousness.

Thus, the moral exemplar of Hindu society relinquished his legitimate claim to the throne in deference to his step-mother, and thereby established the principle that state power must not be used to crush a woman's will (stri-hath). He abandoned his beloved wife because common folk found it difficult to accept her after the abduction to Lanka, and thus founded the principle that a ruler's duty is the satisfaction of his people (raja-dharma). He submitted to the defiance of Luv and Kush when they captured the royal horse during the ashwamedha, and instituted the convention that the state must bend to the tantrums of youth (baal-hath). Superimposing might and right in these cases would have been just, but victory would have been as sweet as vinegar. Maryada Purushottam Ram avoided this bitter aftertaste through self-restraint and surrender.

Nandigram did not become India's Tiananmen Square because the Hindu culture of those manning the Marxist-Semitic state could not roll bulldozers upon the people once it became apparent that they would rather die than surrender their land. Subsequently, the CPI(M) regime scrapped the Nandigram Special Economic Zone (SEZ) and promised that no land anywhere would be acquired against the wishes of the people.

I challenge all West-funded activists to show me a similar instance in the West where people's unarmed resistance forced a reversal of unjust Government policy. Can the American people make Washington withdraw from Iraq and rescind oil contracts extorted from a stooge Government? The US will retreat only when it is financially unrewarding to remain, because its much-touted checks and balances only insulate the President and his coterie of financial sharks from Congress and the people. This system of corporate banditry with zero public accountability is being introduced in India through the backdoor, in the name of globalisation, development, and the ubiquitous Foreign Direct Investment.

India's elites are hell-bent upon making it the back office of the West. The burgeoning BPO industry ensures that while the Western world sleeps, India awakes to drudgery and servitude. I cannot imagine a self-respecting nation allowing its youth to work graveyard shifts so a corporation in London or New York can ruin local people and pay unconscionable salaries to some top executives. More shocking is that the Hindu conscience can live with this displacement of disempowered people in those countries.

Not long ago, Mahatma Gandhi told the Lancashire mill workers that their work was ruining the lives of ordinary Indians; they gave him a respectful hearing. Today we have surrendered all social and economic initiative to the West; indeed, there are indications that even spiritual inputs are being outsourced through the agency of globe-trotting gurus working to make Hindu dharma conform to Christianity so that the Hindu mind can serve the Christian-Western world better. Those who have renounced Indian citizenship for dollar paycheques are avidly fuelling this drive for the second colonisation of India by a West hungry for cheap labour and mineral wealth. We must immediately stop privileging these self-ejected Indians, mistakenly called Non-Resident Indians, and treat them as predatory foreigners with an eye on the main chance.

Meanwhile, it appears that the threat from Special Economic Zones is by no means over. There is much doublespeak by the Centre and the State Governments, which indicates the extent of pressure from those who were promised these islands of affluence where the writ of the state would not run. The Centre has promised it will stay aloof from land acquisition for industry, and will ensure compensation for both landholders and sharecroppers. But it has remained shy of banning alienation of fertile agricultural land, notwithstanding its possible impact on long-term food security and people's livelihood.

The Centre has also refused to limit land acquisition to an industry's actual needs, to prevent conversion of cheaply acquired land into realty deals. Gurgaon farmers are now resisting this form of crony capitalism. At Singur, acquired land has been leased for 90 years. Why wasn't a cooperative of landholders and sharecroppers set up, so land could revert to their families on expiry of the lease, thus bringing fresh benefits in terms of a new lease or a realty deal if the company withdrew? A people-oriented approach to so-called progress is imperative.

Left caught red-handed

Nandigram has emerged as the symbol of what a soulless state leviathan driven by an imported ideology can do to unarmed natives resisting its grand design of social deconstruction and corporate engineering. Nandigram showcases how native India combats 'foreign' tyranny - with blood, bones, and the raw courage of men, women, and children. Nandigram shows that people's power can melt the barrel of the gun. At least two women have been raped, yet it is the Government that has lost honour.

For West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, it must be an unexpected lesson in the dialectics of dharma. As a saga of state-party jugalbandi to grab village land for foreign capitalists, Nandigram surpasses the betrayal at Plassey and reaffirms the hierarchy of values enshrined in ancient India's varna vyavastha.

Varna gave order, legitimacy and rules of conduct to the aspirations of the myriad jatis comprising Hindu society. The Brahmin as spiritual preceptor and scholar expounded and upheld dharma, but it was the king who established order and made it possible for traders, agriculturists and other groups to practise their trades and flourish. These were the wealthy groups in ancient India, and their prosperity contributed to the wealth of the kingdom and the king. All were restrained by dharma; the Hindu model of state did not permit varnas to gang-up against other varnas and disrupt social harmony.

It was only in its relationship with Islamic and Christian-Western rulers that Hindu society encountered the ruler as sheer appropriator of native wealth. The impoverishment of the Indian countryside as a result of these successive colonialisms, and the accompanying perversion of the social order, is well known to historians and sociologists. The post-Independence licence-permit-quota raj saw the birth of varying shades of what is now called crony capitalism, but farmers were spared the burden of unjust taxes and some kind of land reforms were attempted in the States with different levels of sincerity and success.

Nandigram, however, is a double sin. First, the state and armed goons of the dominant ruling party unleashed a reign of terror that saw at least 14 persons shot dead (dozens missing, presumed dead and buried) and nearly 50 injured (and two confirmed rapes) in order to forcefully vacate private agricultural land for a foreign capitalist venture. Thus, instead of protecting the people and facilitating their legitimate activities, the state lent its muscle to a rich business conglomerate (Indonesia's Salem Group).

The sheer havoc wrecked by this Kshatriya-Vaishya marriage - mercifully reined in by the prompt intervention of Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi, among others - is precisely why the Hindu social order did not permit wealth-generating classes to subordinate the state to their purposes. The Hindu state was a facilitator, not a collaborator, because Hindus do not view property as theft. Like merit, wealth, too, is earned.

Even worse, the attempt to alienate fertile multiple-crop yielding land for industrial purposes strikes at the root of Hindu reverence for land, the mother earth, and the humble farmer. Under the doctrine of debt(s), Indians owe a debt of hospitality to the entire universe, both human and non-human; they must respect and nurture the earth that nourishes them, and care for animals, elements, indeed, all creation. We have, of course, fallen far from these ideals, but that is no reason why we should wilfully acquiesce in the move to render fertile land barren.

Nandigram's proximity to the Haldia port would benefit its proposed foreign masters by way of reduced transportation costs. That the CPI(M) should, therefore, attempt to depopulate the area is reminiscent of the worst excesses of White colonialism in Africa. There is no comparable example in Stalinist Russia, and in any case, Marxism is a Western philosophy deeply rooted in Christianity; some scholars even call it a Christian sect.

The U-turn of a section of Indian Marxists from populist anti-industry attitudes towards economic reform and globalisation is part of a larger move (directed by external forces) away from positions that gave them the high moral ground two decades ago. From being avid supporters of the cause of the environment (witnessed in the fervent support for Chipko and other movements), the Left has shied away from taking up the graver cause of global warming and its deleterious impact on the ice caps, sea levels, ozone layer, et al.

Unfortunately for the Marxists, Nandigram has caught them red-handed in the public square, doing the capitalist U-turn. It will be difficult to live down the resultant loss of face. The Muslim factor in the area can only compound their misery, and the graceless anger against Governor Gandhi attests to this sense of impotent rage. The vanity of the vanguard has been ripped, stripped and whipped.

This is divine justice. The Special Economic Zone (SEZ) is no small scandal. It is officially designated as a duty-free enclave, to be treated as foreign territory for trade operations, duties and tariff. The Indian people have had no say in the formulation of such a policy, which is creating autonomous enclaves of wealth controlled by multinational corporations. In other words, the Indian state is creating mini-states (read colonies) within India, where the writ of foreign, Indian, or mixed corporates will run. This undermines national sovereignty and territorial integrity and, as Mr S Kalyanaraman, former director, Asian Development Bank, points out, is tantamount to colonialism by invitation.

This view is vindicated by the revelation that favoured industries need not even risk their own capital for projects. At Singur, according West Bengal Industry Minister Nirupam Sen, Tata Motors will receive a loan of Rs 200 crore at the rate of one per cent interest per annum from the West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation; WBIDC will raise this loan from the market! The small car project will further receive incentives on land, a soft term loan and refund of VAT for the first 10 years of a 90-year lease. The Government has already acquired 997.11 acres, of which 645.47 acres have been handed over to the company on a 90-year lease. The remaining 290 acres have been earmarked for an ancillary unit or vendor park.

Karl Marx said the state would wither away; none realised it would do so in favour of the corporate robber baron.



Runaway Romans

UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi's obvious complicity in the Government's appalling 17-day silence over the arrest of Italian fugitive Ottavio Quattrocchi is far more serious than ordinary suppression of information or contempt of the Supreme Court. Now that so much is known about the two-decade-old scandal, it is apparent that Bofors is not a simple saga of corruption in high places.

It cuts to the heart of national sovereignty, and exposes the fact that Italian intruders have been playing games with the polity from the time Ms Sonia Gandhi landed in the household of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. This calls for a thorough inquiry into the activities of Mr Quattrocchi throughout his 25-year stint in India as representative of the Italian public sector Snam Progetti, as he did not just suborn the Indian tendering system to get lucrative contracts; he penetrated the top political, bureaucratic and even defence circles, and was entertained solely for his proximity to a foreigner married into a powerful family.

Since Mr Quattrocchi's relationship was always with Ms Gandhi, and he never became personally close to Mrs Indira Gandhi, it stands to reason that Ms Gandhi was a covert but active player in the politico-economic life of the nation in her so-called housewife years. This sheds new light on Rajiv Gandhi's entry into politics after the death of his brother, and explains Ms Gandhi's dogged determination to be politically relevant after her husband's assassination.

Some of Snam Progetti's contracts generated great controversy and ruined several political and bureaucratic careers. We need to know if Mr Quattrocchi used his eminence to secure contracts for other Western companies. This is pertinent because Bofors has revealed that this employee of an Italian Government agency, basically engaged in construction work, became one of the biggest recipients of kickbacks in a defence purchase deal.

Strangely, this purely private transaction by Mr Quattrocchi has not raised eyebrows in his native land in the decades since the scandal broke. Senior journalist MJ Akbar has pointed out that after spending some years in Malaysia, Mr Quattrocchi returned to Milan and lived there undisturbed, though Italy is presumably a member of Interpol and would be aware of his wanted status in India. This suggests that both Mr Quattrocchi and Ms Gandhi were crucial to certain Western corporate and perhaps even political interests in India, and this gave him his otherwise inexplicable immunity. It is also likely that the Vatican nodded to Italy to ignore the Red Corner notice. None of this bodes well for India's status as a sovereign republic, and a commission of inquiry is clearly the need of the hour.

According to Mr BM Oza, Indian envoy to Sweden between 1984 and 1988 when the Bofors controversy erupted, the tender for buying the Howitzer guns was opened and evaluated barely a week before Mrs Gandhi was assassinated on October 31, 1984. At that time, the French Sofma gun was judged best in terms of price and some extra incentives; yet, Bofors was unethically allowed to alter its bid without re-tendering the contract. Subsequently, the murder of Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme came to be widely linked with his knowledge of the Bofors truth; hence it may be pertinent to ask if India should re-examine the larger circumstances in which Mrs Gandhi came to be assassinated by men who had once been removed from her inner security cordon.

This brings us to the abiding reality of Ms Gandhi's foreign origins, her enduring allegiance to her Western friends (or masters), and her misuse of her mother-in-law's and husband's office to bestow unwarranted favours upon Western corporate entities. Her current abuse of her status as Congress president to ensure Government silence over the arrest of Mr Quattrocchi merely continues a habit spanning over two decades. With most security experts and political analysts of the view that India will fail to procure Mr Quattrocchi's extradition, there can be no doubt that Ms Gandhi represents a serious threat to India's sovereignty and national security. In the fitness of things, her citizenship should be re-examined, and the issue of whether naturalised citizens should be allowed to contest parliamentary elections and offer themselves as candidates for high office, debated afresh.

Both Ms Gandhi and Amethi MP Rahul Gandhi, who have maintained a deafening silence since the controversy broke out, should inform Parliament if they are the ultimate beneficiaries of the Bofors kickbacks. If not, why was the entire Government machinery compromised to give the contract to this company? Why was Bofors asked to dismiss representative Win Chadha and appoint instead AE Services, a Britain-based company fronting for Mr Quattrocchi? Finally, and most pertinently, since Mr Quattrocchi had no expertise in the armament business, whose idea was it to make him the 'unofficially Government-sponsored middleman' in the deal? Whose hand steered this brainwave to its ultimate fruition?

Whose hand guided Additional Solicitor General B Dutta when he met the Crown Prosecution Services (CPS) officials in London on December 22, 2005, and conveyed Government permission to defreeze Mr Quattrocchi's accounts, and let him run away with Rs 21 crores? What was Mr Quattrocchi's son, Missimio, doing in Delhi when his father was in detention in Argentina? He claims to have been a part (albeit invisible) of the Italian Prime Minister's delegation, and to be a frequent visitor to India for legitimate business interests which have nothing to do with his father. An enterprising journalist has revealed that his firm's website lists his father as a business adviser!

In these circumstances, it may be appropriate to ask Congress heir apparent, Mr Rahul Gandhi, some pertinent questions. To begin with, his true educational qualifications remain an enigma; he has not responded to questions about his Italian citizenship under old Roman law, nor revealed if he has an Italian passport.

But most worrying is his relationship with a girl from a dubious Latin American family. Three years ago, the lady had a vacation with the entire Gandhi-Vadra family, a highly unconventional action. Since then, she has been spotted often enough for questions to be raised about the MP's marital status. Does the lady serve any corporate interests and nurture political ambitions? What was her role in Mr Gandhi's shameful detention at a US airport some years ago? These questions must be answered.

Shifting the goalposts

The stoning of King Gyanendra's cavalcade on the auspicious occasion of Shivaratri, supposedly by egalitarian Hindu devotees objecting to the custom of royal precedence, suggests growing Maoist fears that the forthcoming election to the Constituent Assembly may not give them a winning mandate. Reports from Nepal indicate that the institution of monarchy continues to exert a mesmeric influence over ordinary people in the Himalayan kingdom, and the prospect of its abolition may be eroding the Maoist grip over popular imagination.

Certainly the ground reality has changed sharply since the so-called peace accord gave Maoists almost a third of the seats in the interim Parliament. Despite such a precipitous political tilt in their favour, Comrade Prachanda has not felt confident of surrendering arms as per the accord, and wishes to join the interim Cabinet without adhering to his part of the bargain. His people are now claiming that they see no need to fulfil any precondition set by the Government, and are threatening to 'delay' the June election unless immediately accommodated in the interim Cabinet. Government sources are dismayed at the delay in arms surrender and legitimately fear that arms may play a role in the forthcoming election.

During a visit to New Delhi last week, Nepali Congress leader Sujata Koirala complained that the Maoists have gone "out of control" and are an obstacle to her country's transition to a full-fledged democracy. She claimed the Maoists have resiled from all promises, have not surrendered all arms or returned lands seized previously. Indeed, she said, the Maoist cadre is still threatening the people, the police and even foreign diplomats. Even former Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba has charged the Maoists of breaking their promise to return seized public property; he fears this could affect the Constituent Assembly election (The Rising Nepal, February 8, 2007).

Although Ms Koirala was too polite to express dissatisfaction with the UN's handling of the arms issue, in the light of India's sad experience with the UN mission on the Indo-Pak border, I can only surmise that a devious international game is afoot to give an unrepresentative bunch of thugs the control of this strategically vital nation. Not surprisingly, Ms Koirala, who is known for her political candour, has asked India to perceive the Nepal situation as a "fire in the neighbourhood", and take appropriate action before it engulfs us in turn. Given the grim situation in States battling Naxalite violence, not to mention ISI presence in both countries, the warning is apt. It remains to be seen if it has been well received; it is not clear which UPA leaders she succeeded in meeting during her stay.

Ms Koirala revealed that Nepal's greatest problem is law and order and that Home Minister KP Sitaula is widely perceived as being 'too friendly' with the Maoists, and hence unable to act decisively against them. She took public opinion by surprise when she defied her father, Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala, and openly demanded Mr Sitaula's resignation on the issue of the Terai violence. It appears that many political parties in Kathmandu are waking up to the reality of the 'coup' that has gifted the Maoists a major share of the interim Parliament, without any proven ability to truly represent the people. With arms surrender inadequate, and suspicions about UN collusion with the Christian leadership of the Maoists rampant (even if unstated), the constituents of the Seven-Party Alliance have found a heaven-sent escape route in the Terai flare-up.

The trouble in Terai broke out unexpectedly on January 19 this year, when the escort of Maoist leader Ram Karki shot at and killed Madhesi Janaadhikar Forum activist Ramesh Kumar Mahato in Lahan district. The situation deteriorated when the Maoists seized the dead body and forced the family of the deceased to immediately cremate the body. The resultant public anger boiled for three weeks, taking at least 38 lives and leaving several injured in police action, before a truce was called.

This brought international spotlight on the Terai's gross under-representation and forced Prachanda to agree to a draft Bill to amend the interim Constitution. Once approved by the interim Parliament, Articles 134 and 154 of the interim Constitution will be amended to provide a federal state structure and new constituencies in the Terai, as also additional seats for proportional representation according to the percentage of population growth. It is thus envisaged that 20 constituencies will be added in Terai and four in the hill regions. An additional 20 seats will be increased for proportional representation.

According to The Kathmandu Post, this means that the 20 southern districts, which comprise 48.4 per cent of the population, will receive 49 per cent seats in the Constituent Assembly. The remaining 51 per cent seats will be divided among the 55 hilly and Himalayan districts, which constitute 51.6 per cent of the population. This appears to be an equitable distribution, and it is to be hoped that the aged and sick Prime Minister will be able to execute the delimitation exercise properly.

Political empowerment of the aggrieved and anti-Maoist Madhesis, however, is unlikely to go down well with Prachanda, who is again busy shifting the goalposts, violating the spirit and substance of the November 21, 2006, accord. Indeed, less than a month after declaring peace, Maoist goons had resorted to large-scale violence and intimation in Kathmandu on December 18, 2006, to force the Government to cancel the appointment of Ambassadors to 14 countries, including India. Now they are trying to muscle their way into the interim Cabinet without surrendering arms.

Given their unreliable nature, the original seven parties of the interim Government would do well to seize the political initiative, rather than let Prachanda dictate the national agenda. The SPA should dissociate from the plan to abolish the monarchy, and emphasise a truly federal polity. It should support retention of Hindu supremacy in the Himalayan kingdom, with safeguards against fraudulent conversions currently being pushed among border and marginal communities; already a major portion of Nepal's Buddhist community has been converted to Christianity in the past few years. The SPA should also call upon the Nepal Army to ensure free and fair elections in June, as it is virtually certain that the UN will fail to control the murderous People's Liberation Army.

American pie in Nepal

On January 28, Delhi's unpretentious Paharganj locality played host to thousands of Nepali Maoists, almost half of whom crossed over from the neighbouring country, while the rest were already residing in India. Held under the banner of the Nepali Jan Adhikaar Suraksha Samiti (Bharat), the 4700-strong gathering included representatives from each of the Himalayan kingdom's 75 districts, most being the cadre of the Nepal Communist Party (Maoist).

Hitherto reliable sources report that the chief guests who blessed the gathering were two White men, respectively introduced as Comrade Peter and Comrade Mangoli, both from the United States. The Indian VIPs included Prof Vijay Sharma of Delhi, Ms Ravi Varvar (Andhra Pradesh), Mr Prakash of the People's War Group (Jharkhand), Mr Manohar Lal Tiwari (Delhi) and Mr Fateh Anwar (Jammu & Kashmir).

The Nepali contingent was led by Gaurav, better known as Mr CP Gajurel, missionary preacher, gun-runner, and ideologue of the Nepali Maoists, not to mention 'guru' to Comrade Prachanda. He was recently released from a Chennai jail by the ruling UPA dispensation, for reasons unrelated to the Indian national interest. Mr Gajurel descended on New Delhi specifically to attend this conclave, the purpose of which was to win over every Nepali resident in India to the Maoist cause, and ensure that they return to the country to vote for Prachanda's party in the forthcoming June election. He did not, as media reports would suggest, come here to whine about alleged RSS-BJP activism among Terai Hindus.

Other important Nepali delegates included Mr Mohan Baid (Kiran), Mr Raju Nepali, Ms Rekha Sharma and Ms Sushila Biswakarma, one of the new Maoist MPs in Parliament. The meeting, convened by Mr Laxman Pant, was inaugurated by Mr Ishwari Bhandari, a well known Nepali missionary preacher. Its purpose was avowedly political, focusing particularly upon fund-raising for the forthcoming election for a new Constituent Assembly, and mobilising public support for the polls. In the closed session, organisational elections of the Nepali Jan Adhikaar Suraksha Samiti were held and tasks allocated.

Essentially, four zonal chiefs were elected, and entrusted with the responsibility of wooing the Nepali population in their respective regions. Delhi has been assigned to Mr Shankar Biswakarma, the person in-charge of church-Maoist links in India. Mr Vinod Dhakal has been sent to Punjab and it is said that his job is to take care of the Maoist weaponry which is not going to be surrendered to the United Nations. Mr Amrit Thapa has been given charge of Kolkata, and he is reputedly responsible for the tickets and transportation of Nepalis in India to the country in June. Mr Dilip Kesri has been deputed to Bangalore to maintain links with the Andhra Maoists.

Given such an overtly political agenda, to be implemented on an all-India canvas with the explicit involvement of foreign agencies, it needs be asked if the Delhi Government and the ruling UPA had officially permitted such a meeting to take place on Indian soil. The State Government cannot plead ignorance, since the meeting was held in the immediate vicinity of the Paharganj police station, and the Nepali delegates were also housed in buildings nearby. And while it is true that Mr Gajurel probably does not require a visa to visit India, the Centre must explain how the American visitors entered the country and what kind of activity they were permitted to engage in against their visas.

The question is particularly relevant in the light of the anti-Hindu activity the guests (who are probably Christian missionaries) reportedly indulged in. Sources say that Comrade Peter blessed the gathering and gave a clarion cry: "Brahmanvaad, Hinduvaad, Murdabad" (down with Brahmin and Hindu values). Since Nepali politics has long been dominated by Brahmins and Kshatriyas from the hills, the slogan seems to indicate a missionary bias against the Hindu ethos of the till-recently Hindu kingdom. A comprehensive anti-conversion law, on the lines of Sri Lanka's aborted legislation, is clearly the need of the hour.

Interestingly, a banner displayed at the meet proclaimed: "Bharatiya vistarvaad murdabad" (down with Indian expansionism). This is also the title of a book written by Ms Hisila Yami, the Christian wife of Maoist ideologue Baburam Bhattarai, and a new MP in the interim Parliament. The writing on the wall clearly suggests that an open assault upon the cultural and civilisational values of Nepal is already underway.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh owes the nation an explanation if the ruling UPA endorses these vicious anti-Hindu and anti-Indian views of the Nepali Maoists and their Western patrons, and if New Delhi is going to permit their political activities on Indian soil. Is that the reason why the Government of India extended the red carpet for a supposedly private visit by Comrades Prachanda and Bhattarai to New Delhi recently?

At a more fundamental level, India needs to know why the Sonia Gandhi-dominated regime has thrown the Himalayan kingdom to the mercy of the American church and its Maoist collaborators. What is India gaining from severing historical and civilisational ties with Nepal and promoting a phony democracy movement that is intolerant of genuine people's power and seeks to deny agency to nearly 40 per cent of the population living in the fertile Terai plains?

Within Nepal, it is becoming increasingly apparent to the intelligentsia that the rent-a-crowd movement that succeeded in ousting the monarchy is actually a coup against democracy. There is growing awareness that the interim Constitution, implemented from January 15, excludes all political parties from power, barring a privileged group of eight (Seven-Party Alliance plus Maoists), and seeks to repress the legitimate aspirations of myriad ethnic and regional groups in the country.

India must lend moral support to the Madheshi Janadhikar Forum, which is seeking a federal set up in the proposed new Constitution, with proportional representation for the Terai in the new Constituent Assembly. South Block's silence at the death of at least seven people in police firing on this issue is shameful. What is more, India will be a loser if more parties refuse to kow-tow to Prachanda; the Nepal Sadhbhavana Party has already quit the interim Government over the Terai question. There is no way India can permit an emerging political structure in a sister civilisation to ignore legitimate regional and ethnic aspirations.


Republic of the dynasty

Is it time for regime change in India, for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to walk into the sunset? Uncle Sam, ever anxious to rearrange the world with friendly dictators and pliable democrats, seems to have woken up to the grand potential of Mr Rahul Gandhi, whose scintillating 30-month-old stint as Amethi MP has set the Potomac on fire.

In the best traditions of American journalism, a leading newsweekly has run an effervescent cover story on the Indian "crown prince" (their phrase, not mine). This certainly suggests Congress 'queen' Sonia Gandhi is planning a major political manoeuvre. It is hardly coincidental that the party suddenly withdrew support to the Mulayam Singh Yadav regime in Uttar Pradesh, setting the ball rolling for the Assembly election, which is bound to impact the Centre.

Sadly for the friendly Americans, the eulogistic write-up which exhorts Indians to look up to Mr Rahul Gandhi on account of his lineage rather than his ability to lead, has upset the family retainers. Much like the since-denied Tehelka interview of September 24, 2005, the Newsweek story has been deemed embarrassing to the family and party because it refers to Mr Gandhi's qualifications with unflattering matter-of-factness. It speaks volumes for the clout enjoyed by the Gandhi-Maino clan in Washington DC that Newsweek could be made to eat crow.

In a prompt and unprecedented retraction, Newsweek apologised for "several inaccuracies" in the story, mainly the claim that Mr Rahul Gandhi failed to earn a degree and did not stick to his job with the Monitor Group for long. The magazine now asserts that Mr Gandhi has an MPhil degree in Development Economics and had worked with the Monitor Group for three years. Crawling when asked to bend, the magazine said it erred in stating that after a year of college in Delhi, Mr Gandhi took economic courses at Cambridge and Harvard, but failed to earn a degree. It said his father, former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, was assassinated while he was at Harvard in 1991, and that "serious, immediate and life-threatening security concerns" compelled him to transfer to Rollins College, Florida, from where he graduated in 1994. He went on to receive an MPhil from Trinity College, Cambridge University, after which he joined the Monitor Group, a leading, global-strategy consulting group in London.

Congress spokesman Abhishek Singhvi feels "deeply satisfied" with the apology, though personally I feel it raises more issues than it answers about the so-called "crown prince", because America's hugely irreverent media does not normally defer so abjectly to even the tallest giants of the First World. Obviously, larger forces are at work to build a mythology around India's most unremarkable political phenomenon.

It is, therefore, necessary to look closely at the leader Uncle Sam has so lovingly anointed for us lesser mortals. The irrepressible Mr Subramanian Swamy, who not long ago forced Ms Sonia Gandhi to admit that she had not been to Cambridge University but only to Cambridge town, scoffs the belated claim that Mr Rahul Gandhi dropped out of Harvard undergraduate studies due to "security reasons" after Rajiv Gandhi's assassination. Mr Swamy says that hitherto Mr Gandhi had inspired the Indian media to write that he had a Harvard undergraduate degree. It now transpires that he "graduated" from "some Rock and Rollins College" in Florida. Mr Swamy adds, with some justice, that the Harvard campus is one of the most protected in America, and as a recipient of Z-security cover for figuring on the LTTE hit-list, he faces no difficulty visiting Harvard every summer.

It is pertinent that regardless of from where Mr Gandhi graduated, there is even today no evidence that he undertook post-graduate studies anywhere. As such, his MPhil degree requires credible explanation. Mr Swamy has demanded that Mr Gandhi make public the department from which he secured this degree and disclose the thesis he wrote to qualify for it. The demand is not unreasonable because in the affidavit submitted to the Election Commission, it appears that he did not mention graduation from Rollins College, Florida, but only gave his educational qualifications as High School and then MPhil. Some Indians have now written to the President of Rollins College to clarify matters, as the Alumni Records and also Alumni & Friends list of 1994 fail to mention Mr Gandhi, and some persons in the 1994 alumni list could not recall such a prominent personality graduating from there.

It is equally curious that the Monitor Group, where Rahul Gandhi supposedly worked in London, has clamped up about his three-year stint there. It is also not known how the "serious, immediate and life-threatening security concerns" lessened in London. All this suggests careful White Western management of Mr Rahul Gandhi's academic and professional qualifications and public projection of the same, which does not augur well for Indian democracy. This may, therefore, be an appropriate occasion for former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee to clarify reports about the mysterious detention of Mr Gandhi at an American airport during his premiership, and his role in having him released.

Further, given the concerns of many Indians about his mother's nationality and religious affiliations (which caused her to associate with discredited Western evangelists like Ron Watts), it would be in the fitness of things for Mr Rahul Gandhi to clarify if he possesses an Italian passport (and nationality) besides his Indian ones, and what faith he practices. I specifically wish to know whether or not he is a Hindu like the late Indira Gandhi, the grandmother in whose house he was born and raised.

Finally, there is a need to explain the spectacular performance of the little known Backops Engineering, which is constructing the International Airport Terminal Building at Mumbai, container freight station for Maersk Sealand, Training Centres for RBI, headquarters of Wochhardt Ltd and Wockhardt Hospital in Mumbai, IPCL township at Nagothane, meditation hall at Osho Commune of Pune, among others (Deccan Herald, May 29, 2004). Though based on Arthur Bunder Road opposite Taj Mahal Hotel in south Mumbai, hardly anyone in the construction industry had ever heard of this company, which managed to grab such prestigious projects without creating an overt ripple in the market. Eighty-three per cent of the firm's shares are owned by Mr Rahul Gandhi, according to his election affidavit; the turnover and profits should be impressive.

Anti-India axis in Nepal

Nepal Prime Minister GP Koirala must be ruing the day he allowed his Seven-Party Alliance to be conned into negotiating with Maoist leader Prachanda. Mr Koirala has given respectability to a bunch of armed thugs, agreeing to bring them into an interim regime and allowing them to dictate an interim Constitution along with the timetable for the election of a new Constituent Assembly to decide the monarchy's future. Unease over the implications of such fundamental changes in the Nepalese civilisational template are now spreading, as evidenced in the rise of pro-monarchy sentiment.

The suspicions are not misplaced. The December 18 wildcat strike in which Maoists unleashed six hours of terrible violence in Kathmandu to protest against the appointment of envoys to 14 countries, indicates that Prachanda intends to dominate the Himalayan kingdom through the barrel of the gun. Any doubts on this score were settled three days later when 5,000 armed rebels walked out of their camps in Ilam and Morang districts in a show of strength that rattled the aged SPA leaders, who have realised that the forces that instigated them to unseat King Gyanendra have used them like a railway service to reach another station.

Those forces want the political dominance of Prachanda through the 'good offices' of an obliging United Nations, which helped the US break up Indonesia and create Christian East Timor. Their success is likely because of Ms Sonia Gandhi's total commitment to the intrinsically anti-Hindu Western agenda. Thus, a civilisationally Hindu India has abandoned a civilisationally Hindu Nepal, because a White Christian dominates an effete Indian Government and wants to help a covert Christian illicitly ascend the throne of Nepal.

Like India today, Nepal tomorrow will have a ruler who does not share the dharma of the people and does not respect their traditions and culture. Unlike Ms Gandhi, Prachanda is an ethnic Nepalese, but his ascension puts Nepalese civilisation in peril. The Bharatiya Janata Party, which has finally got its national agenda together under the promising leadership of Mr Rajnath Singh, would do well not to neglect developments in our neighbourhood. Prachanda is pressurising Mr Koirala to implement the interim Constitution in just 10 days, dissolve the SPA and form an interim Government with Maoist participation, failing which he will unleash mayhem in the Himalayan nation.

Under the November 21 peace accord, Maoists agreed to confine their cadres to 28 camps and lock up their arms under UN supervision. But the sudden violence of the past few days prevented a UN-Maoist joint monitoring team from beginning inspections, and now reports of extortion and intimidation are pouring in from all over the country. The most bizarre aspect of the truce is the SPA's agreeing to let UN monitor the arms of both the Maoists and the Nepal Army, putting the nation's legitimate security force on equal footing with a gangster mob. There is no justice in the demand to confine the Nepal Army to barracks, and obviously a dubious foreign hand is behind this mischief, which will deny Nepalese village folk the sense of security needed to vote freely in the elections.

Elimination of the Nepal Army from the national scene will give the Western-dominated UN a free hand to do as it pleases in the polls, a situation New Delhi must resist. India's Election Commission will not be able to ensure free and fair elections there unless the Nepal Army or the Indian Army keeps Maoist arms and cadre under lock and key; by current estimates Maoists can win just about 10 out of 205 seats in a fair election. The UN must either be kept out or its mission manned exclusively by adherents of non-monotheistic faiths. As the main Opposition party, the BJP must speak up for the civilisational integrity of Nepal and resist Ms Gandhi's subversion of our traditional foreign policy.

Given the steep rise in conversion activity in India since Ms Gandhi's ascent, the BJP would do well to scrutinise missionary activism among the capital's Nepalese population as well. According to reliable sources, Maoists in New Delhi have close links with Christian groups. In Baljit Nagar, Moti Bagh and Mehrauli areas, secret churches have been established in houses occupied by Maoists. One church, with a banner proclaiming 'World Unification Movement', was visited by an unidentified White man who spoke about the political situation in Nepal.

Sources suggest the gentleman could be from the US-based Republication International Movement (RIM), which is active in Asia. This seems likely because a Meerut school, Thomas Child Academy, which is caring for the orphan children of Nepalese Maoist cadre, is known to display the RIM flag on occasions. Nearly 100 Nepalis have been provided employment in Indian churches and are luring fellow Nepalis to the congregations every Sunday, where the Maoist newspapers, Dishabodh and Dishanidesh, are distributed free.

A Nepali attending a meeting was shocked to see the pujari of the Nepali mandir in Baljit Nagar, Mr Puran Sharma, who is close to the Maoists, leading Christian prayers in Moti Nagar! This kind of subterfuge permeates the movement. While second-in-command Baburam Bhattarai and his family are openly Christian, Prachanda does not proclaim his religious affiliations but his wife's entire family is Christian. His guru, Chandra Pradesh Gajurel, was a Christian preacher. Sources estimate that the 42,000-strong Maoist army would be 30 per cent Christian, but the cadre are kept in the dark that the top leadership is predominantly Christian.

Nepal's temporary Constitution recognises all religions, but Hindus are apprehensive about the changes desired by the rebels. A US-based organisation, Global Recordings, has intensified its conversion activities and is propagating the Gospel in all tribal dialects. Nepalis ask that if the Maoists are not Christian, why would they attack and close down all Sanskrit pathshalas (only a couple survive) and stop compulsory Sanskrit education in school? There is harassment at Hindu festivals and Brahmins have been forced to eat beef; who would kill the cow in a Hindu kingdom? Then there was the attempt to make the rhinoceros the state animal, instead of the holy cow. Unnerved, religious groups want Nepal to be declared a Hindu state again, and to retain the Hindu King, a demand India should heartily support in its own interests.

Periyar and Lord Rama

Fourteen years after the removal of the offending Babri structure at his sacred birthplace, Lord Rama returned on December 6, 2006, to face his greatest modern iconoclast, the late EV Ramasamy Naicker. EVR or Periyar, as he was popularly called, was the most avid native votary of the colonial myth of the Aryan Invasion of north India and its supposed expulsion of the 'original' Dravidian inhabitants to the south.

Tutored well by invasion theorists, Periyar projected Hindu dharma as an Aryan imposition from the north, concentrating his bile especially upon Lord Rama, moral exemplar of Hindu dharma. Interpreting the Ramayana as a text depicting Dravidian subordination, he projected Ravana as more ethical than Lord Rama, Sita and Sugriva. Besides vigorously propagating his retelling of the Ramayana, Periyar openly indulged in vandalism and iconoclasm of the images of Lord Rama, Sita and other Hindu deities. He is reputed to have claimed that the Dravidian movement would attain ultimate victory the day Lord Ranganatha (Mahavishnu) at Srirangam and Chidambaranatha (Shiva) at Chidambaram were blown apart and their temples razed to the ground with canons.

Instigated thus by colonial officials and their missionary cohorts, Tamil society came to accept an invented Dravidian identity and to create a chillingly anti-Hindu polity, which even assumed anti-India separatist overtones. Fortunately, Periyar's Dravidar Kazhagam (DK) movement split as a section of his followers could not digest his marriage to an exceedingly young girl, and though MG Ramachandran later wisely closed the separatist chapter, the corrosive legacy of Tamil particularism is yet to be fully undone.

I believe the current violence in Tamil Nadu, triggered by righteous Hindu anger against an EVR statue furtively placed in front of the Ranganathaswamy temple in Srirangam, symbolises Hindu society's growing confidence in tackling offences by its successive colonial oppressors. Indeed, I view the decision to illegally install the statue in the dead of night on November 21 as a last ditch attempt to force new generation Tamils to retain the movement's atheistic (read anti-Hindu) orientation. This is because in recent times it has become apparent that Tamil youth are wearying of the political culture of atheism and seek anchorage in Hindu dharma and civilisation, symbolised in open visits to temples and reverence for Hindu deities.

The placing of EVR's statue in front of a renowned temple, doubly sacred for its proximity to the footprints of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, was not just a deliberate provocation, but a desperate reiteration of the old missionary Hindu-baiting agenda. It bears noting that though the decision to install EVR's statue was taken in 1973 when the DMK was in power, it could not be implemented due to sustained Hindu resistance. In the 1990s, a law forbade putting up statues without Government permission; hence the Karunanidhi regime is complicit in the statue's illegal installation as it failed to remove it despite a Hindu outcry. Indeed, the regime facilitated inauguration of a bronze EVR statue at the same site on December 10, after violence followed damage to the stone sculpture by outraged Hindus on December 6. This wholesale availability of Periyar statues is suspicious and suggests a deep anti-Hindu conspiracy.

The State Government has been slow to contain organised violence by DK cadres. Hindu devotees complain of attacks on the Sankara Matham at Salem, Sri Raghavendra Swami Matham at Erode, the famous Ayodhya Mandapam at West Mambalam, Chennai and several other temples and mathams. Brahmin priests have been assaulted with dangerous weapons, their top-knots and holy threads cut off, and the murtis of Hindu deities desecrated and beaten with slippers. No political party or leader, either at Central or State level, has condemned this motivated attack upon Hindu dharma and its sacred institutions.

It is pertinent that when police arrested four Hindu Makkal Katchi (HMK) followers for damaging EVR's statue, they found that the principal accused was an OBC (like Periyar himself), while the other three were Scheduled Castes. Shocked, Chief Minister Karunanidhi stated in the Legislative Assembly that those who tarnished the statue did not know that EVR had fought for them, an open hint to large sections of Hindu society to embrace Periyar's divisive and hate-filled agenda. This strengthens my personal conviction that this supposedly intra-Hindu conflict is a carefully contrived stratagem to fragment the growing consolidation of Hindu society. It is bound to fail because atheism has no appeal for society as a whole; it can be imposed as state policy (like Soviet Communism), but its reign cannot exceed the span of two generations; this is what is happening in Tamil Nadu today.

To my mind, it is no coincidence that the Tamil Nadu provocation follows the desecration of statues of BR Ambedkar in some States, causing violence by his followers in Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra. On the surface, the violence has a visibly caste hue, yet it is pertinent that Ambedkar's appeal is not confined to Scheduled Castes and he is widely revered by upper castes as the erudite author of the Indian Constitution. Indeed, upper castes have no political or social scores to settle by disrespecting the Dalit icon; nor is iconoclasm a Hindu characteristic.

Few commentators realise that in an era in which the Indian political template is expanding to encompass more and more groups in an electorally winning combination, the polarisation of upper caste vs scheduled caste is political suicide. Hence there has to be a deeper conspiracy behind the dishonouring of Ambedkar statues; the objective is more than the destabilisation of Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav.

I suspect a link with Bahujan Samaj Party leader Mayawati's avowed ambition to be India's first Dalit Prime Minister, and her refusal to quit the Hindu fold until this goal is achieved. Ms Mayawati's Dalit constituency is under great pressure from the Sonia Gandhi-led UPA, which wants to whittle away the constitutional privileges of Hindu Scheduled Castes and grant parity to converts to Islam and Christianity. At a time when the BSP leader is striving to appeal to all Hindu castes and varnas, a pernicious plot has been unleashed to alienate Dalits from the larger Hindu society through disrespect to Ambedkar. The needle of suspicion points to those with the resources and the freedom to execute such vicious designs with tacit state support.

Of mandarin megalomania

When Chinese envoy Sun Yuxi startled New Delhi by staking claim to the North-Eastern State of Arunachal Pradesh on the eve of President Hu Jintao's visit, he was simply reiterating the Middle Kingdom's practice of never renouncing territorial claims. Chairman Mao had once graphically delineated China's territorial vision with Tibet forming the palm and Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan, NEFA (Arunachal) and Ladakh its five fingers. His successors may have taken the superhighway to super-capitalism, abandoning communism in all but name, but they have not departed from his territorial designs.

India, in the meantime, has abandoned Nepal to the US-dominated United Nations and the goon squads of the dubious Prachanda; closed its eyes to the sudden promotion of 'democracy' by the Bhutan king; and failed to manfully rebuff Chinese audacity in Arunachal. The tragedy is that even six decades after independence, Indians in blood and colour are playing games with the country's cultural and geographical integrity. If there is any continuity in the political culture of modern India, it is in the chasm between the nation's natural strategic concerns and its political actions.

Jawaharlal Nehru relinquished half of Jammu & Kashmir when the Indian Army was within a hairsbreadth of victory, at the instance of Lord Louis Mountbatten, and later claimed to be shocked when UN officials were found shifting border posts in favour of Pakistan prior to the proposed plebiscite. Still later, he tried to brazen through the Chinese aggression in Arunachal, about which he was given ample warning by intelligence. Lal Bahadur Shastri surrendered the hard-won peaks of Haji Pir; Indira Gandhi gave away 90,000 PoWs. And, notwithstanding the ISI's bloody footprints in Punjab's Khalistan movement, the nationwide jihadi network, and the meticulously planned Kargil invasion, Mr Vajpayee offered Gen Musharraf kingly cuisine at Agra. And now, Mr Manmohan Singh has embraced him as a co-victim of his own jihadi terrorists!

Nevertheless, the people of Arunachal Pradesh, home to the kund (pond) of sage Parashuram, must wonder why their civilisational links with the Indian mainland seem to weigh so little with South Block. Notwithstanding the racial-ethnic inventiveness of colonial officials-cum-anthropologists, Arunachalis have no historical or cultural affinity with the Han Chinese. According to scholar B Chakravarti, Arunachalis are Danavas of the Brahmaputra Valley who fled under pressure from Asuras of Mithila. The Kalika Purana says many Danavas departed to countries beyond the ocean (Sagarantam); others withdrew to the northern valley of the Brahmaputra and the hills of the Arunachal Pradesh, where they are known as Mishing, Adis, Apatanis (The Children of Abo-Tani in India, Fiji & Polynesia, Calcutta, 2000).

The Asom Buranji (history of Assam) recorded by the Deodhai priests of the Ahom kings says its earliest king was Mahiranga Danava. Chakravarti believes Mahiranga could be a Sanskritised form of Moirang, the capital of the Danava ruler. Moirang (Mai+rang) means husked paddy, and there are several places called Moirang in Assam's Brahmaputra valley as well as in Manipur. There is considerable evidence that Manipur was home to some Danavas, as also a transit point for other Danavas from the West to the East.

As Mahiranga was designated a Danava, it follows that he descended from people who claimed Tani as their ancestor (Taneh apatyam puman iti Tanavah). Hence they are called 'Tanavas,' or Danava in Sanskrit. Assam had several Danava kings; the Asom Buranji lists them as Mahiranga, Ghataka, Samvara, among others. They ruled the Kiratas of north-eastern India.

The Puranas say around the third millennium BC, the Asuras led by prince Naraka moved from Mithila up the Ganga and occupied Pragjyotispura on the banks of the Brahmaputra. Ghataka led the Danava resistance, but was beheaded by Naraka, who also took over the white elephant of King of the Kiratas and riding it, started trampling and liquidating the Kiratas up to the river Dikrong. The Kiratas sought refuge beyond the ocean. Later, another Asura prince, Bana, travelled further upstream and occupied Sonitapura. The wars with the Asuras caused many Danavas to flee to Thailand and Myanmar; small groups possibly went even further.

While the entire North-East is permeated with stories and traditions related to Indian epics, gods, and holy men, there is no corresponding association with China and the Han people. Not even a trace of Confucianism or Taoism can be detected in the region. The earliest connection seems to be 1950, when China invaded Tibet. Later, it occupied 30,000 sq km of high plateau in Ladakh district (Aksai Chin) bordering Tibet and its own Xinjiang province.

The Aksai Chin road is strategically vital for Beijing, being the only link between Tibet and Xinjiang. Later, in October 1962, China invaded the eastern sector and claimed 90,000 sq. kms. of Indian territory on both sides of the Himalayan watershed. Sadly, neither Congress supremo Sonia Gandhi nor Prime Minister Manmohan Singh shows awareness that on 18 November 1962, the 13th Kumaon took its last stand here and died fighting to the last man.

Intelligence officers say China entered Arunachal Pradesh via Yunnan, moving stealthily across the Putao region of the Kachin state of the Burma Naga Hills, then a virtually unmanned region. It is keen to possess Tawang as it forms the strategic gateway to Tibet in one direction and Assam in the other. Tawang could challenge its strategic control of Tibet; hence India needs to be alert to a lightening attack on Tawang. China is ever enhancing its military presence and access in Tibet. The Qinghai-Tibet railway is likely to further link Lhasa with Shigatse and Yadong, near the Sikkim border. Mercifully, New Delhi has also now decided to build roads along the Sino-Indian border to integrate the border areas in the North-East.

Since envoy Sun Yuxi reopened the Arunachal chapter, there has been intense speculation that China wants to capture the State to harness its potential to provide an estimated 48,000 mw of hydroelectric power. China has denied reports that it plans to divert the Brahmaputra from Tibet to feed the arid Gobi Desert which contains nearly half its landmass but only seven per cent of its freshwater. Experts believe the Gobi offers China the only viable space to accommodate its burgeoning population; the Brahmaputra is close enough for Chinese engineers to envision a daring manoeuvre to nourish the parched Yellow River.


Ambushed in Iraq

The mills of god grind slowly, the Bible says, but they grind exceedingly fine. The inexorability of this process ensured that the perfect timing of Saddam Hussein's death sentence could not check the Republican Party's freefall in America's mid-term Congressional elections. Nemesis is a double-edged sword.

Convicted with two others for the retaliatory killing of 148 Shia's in Dujail for an abortive attempt on his life in 1982, the deposed Iraqi dictator's punishment has drawn Western comparisons with the Nuremberg trials after World War II. This calls for deeper scrutiny. The Nuremberg trials against former Nazis have long been touted as the most exalted example of White Man's Justice, where Adolf Hitler's appalling atrocities against European Jews were dubbed a crime against humanity and meted appropriate retribution.

I have always wondered if this was the truth behind the Euro-American denigration of Hitler. The Inquisition and similar acts of bloody persecution in many 'civilised' European countries never yielded a similar quest for justice. Indeed, Europe's dislike of Jews led many nations to "encourage" their Jewish populations to migrate to the newly created state of Israel in the Muslim heartland, concurrently with the conduct of the Nuremberg trials. Moreover, many high and middle level Nazis who escaped before the Allies landed in Germany found safe havens with Latin American dictators supported by the US. Some circles acknowledge that America made good use of the 'research' that the cold-blooded Nazis conducted on their hapless Jewish victims.

I believe Hitler's boys were punished for what his opponents could legally crucify them with, rather than for his really indigestible, unforgivable sin, which was politically unmentionable. This is that he breached the tacit accord of the White Colonial People (that dog does not eat dog) and practiced imperialism upon the White Christian peoples, bringing France, Austria, Poland, and virtually all of Europe under his heel. His invocation of a mythical non-Christian, Aryan ancestry for the German people must have enraged the epoch's dominant colonial power, Great Britain, which took pride in its Anglo-Saxon (Germanic) origins, which were being undermined by the 'Aryan' hogwash.

The Italian windbag, Mussolini, may have seen profit in going along with Hitler, and the then Pope may have felt comforted by the persecution of Jews, but Western Christians as a whole knew an unacceptable transgression had taken place. The Second World War was fought for the liberation of Europe alone; White Anglo-Saxon Protestant America joined it to stave off a godless communist takeover of the continent which was also the religio-political fountainhead of Christianity. This is evidenced by the fact that after the war, every colonial country tried to hold its non-European colonies for as long as possible. The once-occupied France fought a bitter war in Algeria; Portugal stuck to Goa till 1960, to cite just two examples.

Interestingly, the Teutonic Pope's controversial Regensburg speech makes amends for 'Aryan' Germany by reaffirming Western Christianity's racist core. This is the only meaning of his claim that the convergence of Biblical faith, Greek philosophy, and Roman heritage gave Christianity its historically decisive character in Europe, and forms the continent's religio-cultural foundation. In other words, Christian Europe's White racial ethnicity makes it the dominant face of the faith, despite Christianity's Eastern origins.

Returning to Saddam, he has been punished for the Dujail massacres because trying him for the 1980-88 war against Iran would open the proverbial can of worms. This is because the arms, including chemical weapons, used against Tehran came from Washington. Little wonder that the Bush Administration's kangaroo court, plagued by delays and discredited by the murder of defence counsel, change of judges, courtroom chaos and overt bias, has not inspired confidence in any world capital, must less on Arab street. The external forms of Anglo-Saxon jurisprudence are not enough to convey the spirit of justice, much less erase the international conviction that the trial is a sham to cover the corporate rapacity of oil traders from Texas. It is now to be hoped that the Democratic domination of Congress will quickly expose how America was pushed into war, who profited from it, and how much.

New Delhi's declaration that the death sentence to the deposed President required "credible due process of law" and should not appear to be victor's justice reflects the sagacity of External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee. Although it has been criticised by some for appeasing domestic pressure groups, the truth is that Iraq is an occupied country and the trial was conducted through a collaborator regime. It is providential that as home minister Mr LK Advani failed to send Indian troops to assist the American occupation of a friendly nation.

Pakistan's Mutahida Majlis-e-Amal coalition claims American forces have caused more deaths in the past three years than Saddam did over a 23-year reign. The accusation that Texan oil merchants, including President Bush, are even guiltier of war crimes than Saddam is not without merit. Further, 10 years of UN sanctions have seen an appalling decimation of the Iraqi people, for which Mr Kofi Annan must be held accountable; an independent tribunal should at least record these crimes.

Europe, frozen with fear of its radical Muslim population, has reacted with typical schizophrenia. Britain and Australia stand by the United States. The European Union has welcomed the verdict, but said Saddam should not be hanged. The Vatican's top prelate for justice issues has dubbed the sentence an example of "eye for an eye" justice. Reflecting widening geo-political faultlines in the West over the Iraqi invasion, Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero commented that conditions have deteriorated after the US occupation.

Actually, Saddam's fate is not a Muslim problem, but a problem of America's domestic-corporate political culture, which counts success in dollars and disregards costs exported to other shoulders. The fact that an ally like Egypt has spoken against the hanging, while major capitals like Riyadh maintain silence, suggests a serious re-think among the ummah about its attitude to the West. Russia doubts the sentence will be carried out, especially after the Republican eclipse in Congress. But a judicial reprieve given for political reasons, albeit through the agency of the automatic appeals process, will not assuage international Muslim sentiment because the new Iraqi regime and constitution are illegitimate, the handiwork of occupation leader Paul Bremer.

Karbala to Mecca

Political Islam took its first mature step to recover agency from its Western tormentors by applying a healing touch to the bleeding fields of Karbala, where Mohammed's nascent faith split irrevocably into Shias and Sunnis. While it is too early to gauge the impact of this largely ignored initiative by King Abdullah, the fact that Iraq's Shia and Sunni clerics recently met in Mecca and signed a covenant to end sectarian strife in that tormented nation is momentous. Formally organised by the 57-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), the meeting is an important step in uniting the faithful as a prelude to tackling the new colonial menace in the oil-rich Muslim heartland.

The covenant follows King Abdullah's disapproval of Iraq's growing sectarian violence, and belies Western hopes that Saudi fears of increased Iranian influence over Baghdad's new Shia elite would accentuate Shia-Sunni rifts in other Muslim countries as well. Far from fearing the assertive Shia elites of Tehran and Baghdad, Riyadh has dexterously recruited them as partners in Islam's last battle for dignity on the world stage.

Since King Abdullah's arrival in New Delhi as Republic Day guest this year, some of us sensed a break from the schizophrenic policy of financing fundamentalism while submitting to Western exploitation and domination. The King realises that the third crusade with political Christianity is already underway. The anti-Prophet cartoons; the Pope's attack on Islam as an evil doctrine and his previous call for the conversion of Europe's Muslim population to Christianity; and the deliberate controversy over the veil in Britain, all suggest that Europe is gearing up to push its Muslim population out of its space, even as the Western military-economic corporates rape and ravage Muslim lands.

King Abdullah is custodian of a faith that from its inception gave its followers political agency; something no other religion has done. Yet among the colonised peoples of the 19th and 20th centuries, Muslims have suffered the most enduring humiliation. Their lands have been divided arbitrarily and puppet regimes imposed upon unhappy people, to facilitate Western domination over their lands and resources. If Islam today commands attention in the international arena, it is because the Iranian Ayatollahs resisted this thinly-veiled imperialism. Leaders like Saddam Hussain fell foul of the colonial-corporate mullahs for the same reason.

Today, America's naked aggression in Iraq lies completely exposed. Yet, the Muslim world fears that Washington will not quit gracefully and will use the sectarian violence to push for a tripartite division along Shia, Sunni, and oil-rich ethnic Kurd lines. The Shias and Sunnis would be abandoned, and the oil-rich section would become a Western 'protectorate' (naturally).

As for Shia Iran, the danger remains. America has been waiting to avenge the ouster of its favourite dictator, Reza Shah Pahlavi, who gifted it favourable access to Iran's oil wealth. The excuse is now available with the so-called secret uranium enrichment. Mr Ahmadinejad has mocked these allegations, offering to open Tehran's nuclear sites to tourists! Yet he must be a worried man, as sanctions against his country could literally kill millions of citizens, as happened in Iraq because Saddam Hussain refused to give America a rapacious oil deal on the lines of the 60-year monopoly that President FD Roosevelt forced upon the Saudi royals. Now, a Vichy-type of regime has handed over Iraq's oil to the Texan oil majors linked with key figures of the Bush Administration.

Some recent events have sent warning bells ringing in leading Islamic capitals. At a time when Saudi royals wish to distance Islam from jihad (some of us expect the slow evolution of a Pakistan not so keen to serve America), Washington has told the beleaguered Hamid Karzai to talk to the vicious Taliban in Afghanistan. This suggests that America never broke ties with the Taliban, which it used to engineer the Twin Towers tragedy to provide an excuse to move troops to the region, with the ultimate objective of possessing the oil wealth of Iraq and Iran. So after a brief strategic exile, the Taliban is being resurrected as Gen Musharraf is proving a slippery customer. Thus the ugly face of Islam meshes with ugly America.

At the same time, the Saudi ruling family apprehends increased US support for 'genuine democracy' in the country; a prelude to another puppet regime. Further, Washington's choice of South Korean Ban ki-Moon as next UN Secretary-General has upset the Islamic world, as contrary to popular perception, he is not a Buddhist, but a Christian. The refusal to consider a candidate from the Gulf; the shoddy treatment previously meted out to Mr Boutros Boutros-Ghali; and Mr Kofi Annan's zeal in serving Western interests, has convinced political Islam that continued subservience to Western polity is suicidal.

Presently the West does not even admit the need to politically engage Islam as a legitimate world force. The Pope's Regensburg address makes it clear that Europe supports the American President's evangelical-cum-neo-colonial agenda for the non-Christian world. The Saudi initiative for a sectarian truce in Islam, on the lines of the Catholic-Protestant ceasefire, could checkmate Western unilateralism in non-Christian lands. It could lead to internal reform and change within Islam, and inhibit the non-Islamic and non-Christian world from choosing between Islam and Christianity in the so-called clash of civilisations. As such, it is a deft move, well worth the risk.

Significantly, the Mecca covenant specifically calls for respecting the holy sites of both communities and for defending the unity and territorial integrity of Iraq - a recognition of nation-state which is revolutionary in Islam. It seeks release of 'all innocent detainees,' a reference to Guantanamo Bay and a direct attack on the White House. Further, it forbids "spilling of Muslim blood," kidnapping, incitement of hatred, and attacks on religious sites. This apparent repetition cannot be accidental, so I wonder if it extends to non-Muslim religious sites like Ayodhya, Akshardham, and Raghunath Mandir.

It is plausible that Mecca has inspired the changed voices emanating from Deoband regarding Imrana's marital status following rape by her father-in-law. Interestingly, though the veil has never been an issue in India, Ms Shabana Azmi felt obliged to tear it after receiving an award from the British House of Commons. Secular Islam, like jihadi Islam, is a protégé of Western Christian colonialism.

Need to scrap Article 370

Farooq Abdullah's staggering assertion that the sessions judge who awarded the death penalty to Afzal Guru for his role in 2001 attack on Parliament could be murdered by Kashmiri terrorists carries the implicit threat that the High Court and Supreme Court judges who upheld the verdict could meet a similar fate. This follows fear scenarios raised by Mr Abdullah and State politicians like Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad and Hurriyat leader Yasin Malik that the Valley will burn if Afzal is executed, particularly in the month of Ramzan. These arguments have not merely communalised the crime and punishment of Mohammed Afzal Guru; they have made him the symbol of the obduracy and cussed non-nationalism of Kashmiri Muslims.

It is high time the rest of India looked at the mote in the eyes of its Kashmiri Muslim citizens. Decades of evasion and double-talk have inured us to the duplicity of politicians across the political spectrum, but now, with clemency for Afzal also linked to a possible disruption in the so-called peace process with Pakistan, it is time to ask some hard questions. What is the citizenship of Kashmiri Muslims and what is the purpose of the peace process America has imposed upon New Delhi if not to cede territory to Pakistan at some future date? Is this why the UPA wanted to withdraw from Siachin?

Are Pak-friendly separatists like Yasin Malik complicit in the gameplan to take all of Kashmir to Pakistan, or will a future Pakistani 'occupation' surprise them? Do they really believe an 'independent' Kashmir, one that is not the stooge of the Christian West, is viable and possible? Their dangerous game strengthens my belief that jihadi Islam is only a mercenary tool of Western neo-colonialism. It is no threat to India; our high calibre police and military forces can tackle it any day, provided they are not betrayed by the pusillanimity of politicians who can be browbeaten or blackmailed by external agencies.

As Kashmiri Muslim politicians have made Afzal a case of Kashmir vs the rest of India, the nation has to choose between surrendering or rising to the challenge by abolishing the obnoxious Article 370 without further ado. This is both desirable and possible, as Arvind Lavakare has argued in his thoroughly researched The Truth About Article 370 (Rambhau Mhalgi Prabodhini, 2005). MLAs refusing to vote out the Article may be given the opt-out clause offered to Muslims in 1947. As Jawaharlal Nehru perpetuated Mohammed Ali Jinnah's occupation of a portion of Kashmir at the instance of former colonial Lord Louis Mountbatten, there is no justice in eternally privileging of Kashmiri Muslims, especially after their shameful treatment of the State's Hindu community.

The demand for abolition of Article 370 should logically have come from the BJP, but the continued eminence of its venerable Twin Towers whose acts of omission and commission hang around its neck like an albatross, has wet its ammunition. One of the terrorists involved in the infamous Kandahar hijack was previously released in lieu of the daughter of the then Union Home Minister. Though supporting Mr VP Singh's Government from outside, the BJP did not demand Mufti Mohammed Sayeed's resignation or at least change of portfolio, even after it became known that Rubaiya Sayeed was friendly with her so-called kidnappers.

Kandahar, of course, is an eternal shame for the Vajpayee Government, even if Mr Advani distances himself from the scandal. Yet it was Mr Advani who assured Portugal that India would not award the death penalty to Abu Salem, in return for his deportation. He did this without taking the nation into confidence, and without caring for the manner in which he compromised the dignity of the Indian judiciary.

Of course, the primary responsibility for raising the Afzal issue vests with the Congress party. It is inconceivable that Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad could have demanded clemency without permission from Ms Sonia Gandhi, who has maintained another irritating and duplicitous silence, though the issue is tearing the nation apart. The perception of public revulsion forced the Congress to nudge senior leader Digvijay Singh to oppose the mercy petition, but the party spokesperson and some of its media friends are trying to make a case regarding the morality of the death penalty. Interestingly, given Mr Azad's concerns, should we assume there will be no action against those who attacked the J&K Assembly, as the culprits are certain to be Muslims and denizens of the hallowed Valley?

The Congress is playing with fire. Many bleeding hearts in the post-Godhra Gujarat riots have since been unnerved by Mumbai's second serial blasts of 2006, which killed 187 and injured a thousand. By coincidence, the trial is ending in the 1993 serial blasts which killed 300 persons, and citizens will want stiff punishments meted out to the guilty. Some liberals now see merit in a strong state.

Communal polarisation is an Indian reality, aggravated by the politics of minority appeasement and vote-banks. Lobbying for clemency for an act of high treason against the state on the ground that the accused is a Muslim from the indisciplined Kashmir valley is a new low, and derives from Ms Sonia Gandhi's political ascent and her desire to accentuate Muslim separatism in all walks of life. Even the agony of the families of the martyred policemen has failed to impress her of the need to stand for justice and rule of law. Instead, politicians across the spectrum are being encouraged to demand subversion of the judicial process.

On the issue of terrorist attacks, former Chief Justice of India RC Lahoti opined: "Which penalty is required other than death for this dastardly act? ... We forget the family of those killed, injured and totally uprooted..." He emphasised that the first duty of Government is to enforce the law. "There is no other way to maintain an ordered and moral society. Nothing can destroy a Government more quickly than its failure to observe its own laws or worse, its own disregard of the charter of its existence." To this I would only add that the Prophet himself breached the sanctity of the holy Ramzan for tactical advantage; we would do well to emulate his example. Afzal should hang on the scheduled date.

Sallekhana and suicide

Jains who have compromised their spiritual honour by demanding minority status must explain why 'fellow minorities' did not support 'Jain personal law' when two women recently undertook 'sallekhana', one of whom is alive at the time of writing this piece. Regular readers are aware I place Jains within the Indic fold, as Jains cannot explain their civilisational ethos or history in non-Hindu categories. Jains are a spiritual eminence within the Hindu tradition; they can be equated with the Himalayan peaks but can hardly be detached from the mountain range itself.

I am convinced the current media bias against the Jain custom of proactively embracing death is driven by vested interests seeking to fragment Hindu society by motivating various groups to break away; while simultaneously unleashing motivated propaganda against time-honoured practices in order to annihilate all Indic traditions from this land. Contrary to popular belief, although sallekhana (also called santara) continues in contemporary Jain society, the graceful departure from life is an old Indic tradition.

Greeks accompanying Alexander to India noted with stunned admiration the Hindu custom of surrendering the living body to fire. Childless women accompanied dead husbands on the final journey (sati), and sages bowed out at the first intimations of mortality. Onesicritus has immortalised Kalanos, the philosopher who followed Alexander to Europe before ending his life at Sousiana. Then around 73 years old, Kalanos fell prey to a painful disease and decided to take leave from life "as one who had received the full measure of happiness alike from nature and from fortune". As the entire army assembled to witness this unprecedented event, Kalanos calmly ascended the great pyre prepared for him and wordlessly met the flames. Some Greeks thought it madness, others vanity, but many, including the king, admired his valour and contempt of death.

In the medieval era, Hindu women again took recourse to release by fire to save their honour from molestation by Islamic armies (jauhar). This period also saw widowed women with children opting for sati, which must legitimately be perceived as a social response to the stress of protecting single women in a tumultuous era. The contemporary attempt to redefine socio-historical tragedies as suicide or murder must be firmly discouraged, or even prosecuted, for viciously maligning ancient religions and hurting religious sentiments. The NGO-friendly UPA chairperson, Ms Sonia Gandhi, would do well to advise these professional Hindu-baiters to desist from meddling in the intimate spiritual affairs of India's native communities.

This media-NGO spotlight on Jains has intensified over the past few years as the political decision to grant the community minority status in certain states has facilitated conversions among the lower rungs. Community 'thekedars' have ignored the warning bells in the race to reap financial benefits from running minority institutions, successfully enticing some munis with the lure of a Pope/Maulana type of status among the faithful. It is, of course, a grand folly.

The spiritual goal of exiting the endless cycle of rebirth is common to all Indic traditions. Hindu saints still practice samadhi (death in meditation), but what distinguishes Jains is that even the laity accept life's ebbing with unrivalled equanimity. In 1994, my father's eldest brother, though in good health, heeded an inner voice and departed peacefully after 10 days without food or water. Eleven years later, his wife developed stomach cancer. Asked if she wished to take sallekhana when her end became imminent, she said she was not up to it, and subsisted on milk and water for a few months before passing away.

Sallekhana (literally, thinning one's body and passions) is an ideal way of leaving the mortal coil, but cannot be invoked without an inner call, itself the fruition of a long karmic trajectory. Usually permission is taken from a senior monk to ensure that the concerned individual has the necessary level of spiritual attainment (accumulated over past lives), or is dying from old age or an incurable disease. Permission is denied to those with worldly responsibilities. Sallekhana is not suicide, which is a secret act committed by those driven by mortal anxiety or mental instability.

That is why sallekhana involves a public declaration to society. It is for those who have led an exemplary life, earned the right to die in peace, in full possession of their faculties, freely renouncing worldly ties, including those of attachment to the body. The individual allows life to ebb away, neither desiring to prolong it artificially, nor unduly anticipating his demise.

Enlightened Hindus would do well to view the attack upon the Jain tradition as an assault on themselves, as Jains and Hindus share common civilisational roots. Jain tradition holds that 22 Tirthankaras hailed from the Iksvaku dynasty of Lord Rama; two were from the Hari clan of Lord Krishna. Little wonder that the attack on the Jains has extended to Lord Rama, who surrendered his mortal frame to a river before returning to Vaikunth, but is now accused of committing suicide!

What we are witnessing here is the promotion of Western (Christian) norms as the only legitimate way of thinking and living. Hindus respect life and death and view them as a continuum without end, until the yuga ends or the soul succeeds in merging with the divine. Indeed, all ancient non-monotheistic traditions have had immense respect for death and a desire to give it meaning and honour. The Pharoahs protected their honour with asp bites; the Romans slit their stomachs wide open.

Christianity, however, demeans death by perpetuating life at all costs, as evidenced in the shameful episode of Terri Shiavo, a brain dead accident victim kept alive artificially for 15 years in America, till her husband succeeded in closing the chapter. This monstrous saga repulsed even devout Christians, who feel that lack of respect for death is the reverse side of disrespect for the dignity of life. Indeed, euthanasia is the Western world's attempt to overcome its ancient mania for eternal human life, evidenced in the mythologies of Fedora and Dracula.

In modern India, both Maharishi Ramana and Sri Aurobindo refused to use their spiritual powers to heal their bodies of cancer, pointing out that if they did so, the cost to humanity would be unbearable. This is the common heritage of Hindus and Jains; separatism is civilisational genocide.


TV's cinemascope

Gen-next might not remember an era when DD had channel monopoly and also monopoly on showing feature films on TV. But its monopoly did not protect it from the diktats of film-makers who laid down the law as far as release of their films on TV was concerned: A long period had to elapse before a successful feature film had been released in cinemas: They said that if viewers could see feature films so soon on TV, who would want to go to the cinema? So DD took the easy way out: It started showing all flop films, long forgotten flops which their makers had written off. Their producers were delighted and viewers totally let down.

But times have changed. And those viewers who find cinema tickets too exorbitant are now happy to find that some great classics as well as recent successes are now being shown regularly and the recent successes within a reasonable gap, so that one can keep up with contemporary trends in film-making. Ironically enough, DD is now among the channels which show good feature films. While the makers of the block-busters are happy as long as their stars get coverage on TV and their films are not released on the small screen, makers of small budget, different films in theme and style are happy that the small screen is acting like film societies of earlier days and keeping buffs as well as members of gen-next involved in serious cinema.

In the last few months, one has seen Sholay, Do Bigha Zameen and Golmal, which I am not ashamed to say I saw for the nth time last week. With his new avatar of making films about ghosts and homosexuals one tends to forget the lovely boy-next-door roles Amol Palekar played for Hrishida or the simple themes in Marathi contexts that he directed, so it is good to see his old films again. Gen-next also needs to be acquainted with great actors like Balraj Sahni who worked for the BBC in London but played to perfection the role of a humble rickshaw-puller on the streets of Calcutta. He was back in Chetan Anand's classic war film Haqeeqat last week and viewers must have been grateful for a chance to see this classic.

At one time, the world over, there was a fear that TV would wipe out the big screen. But the two have learnt to co-exist, to the benefit of not only viewers but also producers.

The big events of last week were the Mumbai trial, the hounding of Bina Ramani, and our man in Havana, the PM and his historic meeting with Fidel Castro. Alas, there was no visual of the meeting, but NDTV's Barkha Dutt, filing away like mad, was soon followed by rival channels, not always so well-connected. The Mumbai trial was also meticulously followed even if some excited reporters stuttered and stammered (channels no longer seem to care for trained reporters).

It was the cricket tri-series in Kuala Lumpur, Kolkata's Sunfeast tennis coming a poor second that dominated sports, apart from Mr KPS Gill's classic comment on Indian hockey dropped to 11th place: "One must keep on losing before one can win." One can only say Amen!

If I return to the horrifics of ads obtruding on sport, one must begin with DD, which started it all in its monopolistic days by showing more adverts than sports and cutting in with brutal greed combined with ignorance. Last week, I referred to Ten Sports, coming in late when a tennis game starts, sometimes, near the end, and robbing viewers of vital moments. This time, it was the turn of Zee Sports. Not content with fobbing off viewers with glam girls with forced smiles and diaphanous dresses treating us to quizzes, endless ads and leaving the top cricket commentators smiling if frustrated, we had a new addition to this stupidity: Zee did something which is a record for even Indian TV: It showed ads not only on top of the screen while play was on, but also imposed them on the heads and faces of players while they were actually playing! Ads such as One in a Billion, Cheers to Life and Grab One. This is unforgivable and an insult to viewers. And cutting off the end of an over, depriving viewers of a chance to see the fall of a wicket, let alone hear the experts analyse the play between overs, is nothing short of a crime. But no one, least of all the moralistic I&B Ministry, seems to care.

Pope launches battle for Europe

Pushing the envelope firmly while regretting the 'misunderstanding' caused by his discourse on violence in Islam, Pope Benedict XVI has sounded the battle-cry for Christian domination in Europe. His initiative in a speech supposedly about faith and reason at Germany's University of Regensburg vindicates the Western world's political foresight in making Vatican City independent and giving the Pope the status of a Head of State with membership of the United Nations.

Though in reality a borderless suburb of Rome, formal independence gives the Pope parity with world leaders not available to other eminences, such as the Grand Mufti of Mecca, who is a citizen of the Saudi kingdom. This subterfuge has enabled the West to profess secularism and de-legitimise the role of non-Christian faiths in the public life of nations where these are the dominant traditions, while retaining the political presence of Christianity on the world stage.

It is an admirable arrangement. The secular Italian Government is not obliged to dissociate from the Pope's remarks, yet his statements perfectly suit the political needs of his Western co-religionists. Mr. George Bush has designated jihadi violence as "Islamo-fascism", Mr Tony Blair has lambasted the ideology of evil; and German Chancellor Angela Merkel has supported the Panzer Cardinal's critique of a doctrine feared by a Europe softened by post-Second World War prosperity and deculturised by the phony rhetoric of secularism, multiculturalism and the various hues of socialism.

In the provisional text of the impugned lecture released by the Vatican website, the Pope refers to Prof Theodore Khoury's book on a 1391 dialogue near Ankara between Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologus and a Persian on the truth of Christianity and Islam. They discuss faith in the Bible and Quran, especially the relationship between the Old Testament, New Testament and Quran. The Pope explicitly says he will focus on a marginal point in the dialogue, but of personal interest to him, i.e., holy war.

Pope Benedict XVI quotes the emperor saying Mohammad's doctrine is "evil and inhuman," and that spreading faith through violence is unreasonable as "faith is born of the soul, not the body..." I am at a loss to understand this sudden attack on violent conversion. The Pope is aware that the church uses the most unacceptable forms of violence to convert tribals in several Indian States, most notably Tripura, where gun culture is synonymous with missionaries. Recently, the Catholic-run Loreto Convent in Lucknow called a tantric from Kolkata to conduct a séance in which the spirit of Jesus was to enter his body so he could bless (read baptise and convert) three hundred minors.

Islam is not using the sword in contemporary Europe and America. It is spreading through the population boom among former immigrants; through marriage to European Christians; and by attracting individuals alienated from the West's spiritual vacuum and seeking solace in the structured life of the Islamic ummah. The West cannot overcome its decadence without rolling back the permissiveness with which it is swamping other societies, and so, like secularism and multiculturalism, decadence is a pigeon that has come home to roost.

In this scenario, the West's real dilemma is to retain its ideological, religious and political supremacy in regions where it has been dominant for centuries while denying competing creeds (Islam) the right to challenge this preeminence; and also refusing other faiths the right to remain supreme in their native lands (Hindu dharma in India). It is a tall order, but the political elite of the former colonial countries have decided to pick up the gauntlet.

The Pope indicated as much when he said that the mysterious name of God, conveyed by a burning bush, separated this (Abrahamic) God from all other divinities and created "a kind of enlightenment, which finds stark expression in the mockery of gods who are merely the work of human hands (cf. Ps 115)." Surely this bristles with hatred for non-Christian Gods and peoples. As he proceeds to condemn the "idolatrous cult" of pre-Christian Greeks, it is obvious his version of inter-faith dialogue cannot accommodate image-worshipping Hindus.

According to the Pope, the convergence of Biblical faith and Greek philosophical inquiry gave Christianity, despite its Eastern origins, its historically decisive character in Europe. Coupled with the later addition of the Roman heritage, this is the religio-cultural foundation of what is truly Europe. In other words, the Islamic tradition does not belong to Christian Europe, and is unwelcome there. Interestingly, the Pope decried attempts to move religion and ethics from the collective to the individual domain (out of church reach), though the West constantly exhorts non-Christian communities to keep religion strictly in the private domain.

As in the case of the offensive Danish cartoons, the speech has much to agitate Muslim opinion. Under the chorus of condemnatory voices, however, what stands out starkly is Islam's impotence in taking its Western tormentors to task on any issue critical to its self-esteem and sovereignty. Despite Western military occupation of several Islamic lands, threat of armed action against others, and stooge rulers in most Islamic nations, and repeated provocations against Prophet Mohammad, Europe's radicalised Muslims have failed to compel Western Governments to vacate Islamic lands and treat the community with respect.

One reason is that despite the spectacular massacre of September 2001 in New York (which many Americans say involved administration complicity), Muslims have been unable to terrorise the West with the kind of punishing casualties India has long lived with (eg., Mumbai 1993, 2006). Solitary incidents in Spain (though is affected the election results), Paris, London, or the murder of a controversial film-maker, do not add up to a scenario of psychopathic terrorists on the rampage. Rather, there seems to be a stalemate, with the Euro-Americans uneasy at growing Islamic presence in their hitherto homogeneous societies, and continued Western aggression in Muslim lands.

The Pope sought to end this impasse by instigating European Muslims, to justify a crackdown against them. In India, where Christianity has recruited Islam against the Hindu majority, Muslim leaders are keen to preserve their subordinate status in the crusade. The Congress party fielded a spokesperson to dissociate from the Pope's diatribe, but its Italian Vicerene remained incommunicado. Her Muslim allies need to grill her on her attitude towards the Vatican and Islam.

America and the oil slick

If Iranian President Ahmadinejad is serious about opening a Euro-based oil bourse in Tehran to undermine the US dollar, now is the time to strike. Strategic experts believe that internationally, the mega strategic energy deals are slipping away from corporate America, whose strong arm tactics are alienating growing nationalist sentiment across the world.

Washington's use of the September 2001 New York terror strike to cynically assume a commanding position in oil and gas rich Central Asia has startled the international community, especially after the unwarranted invasion of Iraq and takeover of its economy by cronies of the White House. This has forced a major rethink in world capitals, and resource-rich regimes in the Gulf and Central Asia are responding to Russia and China, who are cooperating to combat America's monopolistic ambitions.

Pakistan is Washington's non-NATO ally in the war against terror, but has turned to China for economic development, as evident in troubled Balochistan. It is keen on an energy deal with Iran, bete noire of Uncle Sam, but the tripartite energy deal with India cannot take off due to Pakistan's status as the epicentre of jihadi terrorism. As a rising Asian economy, India is also engaging with the Central Asian Republics for better energy security, though its anxiety for American goodwill has upset Iran and caused a stalemate over the price of LNG.

Saudi Arabia, however, is moving out of the American orbit by sewing up energy deals with China and India, though Washington has compensated itself with the oilfields of Libya. Yet the unmistakable geo-political trend among oil and gas producing nations of the Gulf, Latin America, Africa and Central Asia is to avoid US oil companies in favour of nations that do not interfere in their internal affairs. America's high comfort levels with dictatorial regimes on one hand, and promotion of puppet democracies on the other, as per its corporate convenience, has diminished its value as a desirable economic and strategic global partner.

Central Asia is alert after the string of 'coloured' revolutions. America currently retains bases in Kyrgyzthan, Tajikistan, Ukraine, Georgia and Azerbaijan. But Uzbekistan asked it to vacate the crucial Karshi-Khanabad (K2) base after the failed Andijan riots. President Islam Karimov was warned by ousted Georgian leader Eduard Shevardnadze against American financier George Soros and West-funded NGOs; he promptly expelled the Open Society Institute, stifled other NGOs, and courted Russian President Putin. A gas deal with Russia's Gazprom is expected to affect America's hydrocarbon pipeline over Afghanistan to the Arabian Sea. Karimov has invited India to share an energy partnership along with Russia and China, a move that makes profound geo-political sense.

Meanwhile, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) is pressing America to wind up its bases in Central Asia, especially as heightened tensions with Iran raise fears of another regional misadventure. Kazakhstan, which has enormous hydrocarbon resources, is also upset with President Bush, and even allies like Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan favour a security relationship with Russia. Tajikistan made the Russian military base there permanent after President Putin's visit in October 2004, while Russia has a base at Kant in Kyrgyzstan.

China is very proactive in the region. There is a thousand kilometre pipeline from Kazakhstan's central Karaganda region to Xinjiang, part of an ambitious three thousand kilometre link to the Caspian Sea. China has also invested heavily in Russia's energy sector, especially Siberia's coal and oil. It is active in Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.

Experts opine that Russia is leading the attempt to marginalise Western multinational oil companies. The move strikes a chord because the White House is dominated by a cartel of the oil and gas industry and some banker-financiers, and the oil-rich nations of Central Asia, the Gulf and Latin America prefer joint ventures with State enterprises rather than these rapacious multinationals. Thus, a very basic economic nationalism drives their tilt towards Russia and China. The West, used to more than a century of de facto imperialism in the oil and gas sector, finds itself on a sticky wicket.

The new oil-and-gas producer States and the key consumer Asian economies (China, India) are joining hands to forge State-to-State joint ventures and arrive at strategic energy security. Analysts say this could eventually diminish the role and status of OPEC in future. Russian leaders had cleverly positioned the Russian Federation to take advantage of global energy trends, and is now emerging as natural leader of the world's key producing and consuming powers.

Washington facilitated this process by its unacceptable oil greed in Iraq. In a path-breaking work, "The Bush Agenda: Invading the World, One Economy at a Time," Antonia Juhasz exposes the US corporate invasion of Iraq. So far, 150 US corporations have received a staggering $50 billion worth of contracts for the failed reconstruction of Iraq, even as a new oil law has opened the oil sector to private foreign corporate investment.

Under the Geneva Convention, it is completely illegal for an occupying power to change the laws or political structure of the occupied country. Yet the United Nations and the international community have been idle bystanders as the Bush Administration has changed all basic economic and political laws, while totally failing in the primary task of providing for the security and basic needs of the Iraqi people. Thus, as many as 30 oil contracts signed by President Saddam Hussein with oil companies from all around the world, except the US, were simply cancelled. Iraq oil is now being guzzled by Chevron, Exxon and Marathon. And when you consider that some geologists believe that Iraq's oil reserves are larger or at par with those of Saudi Arabia, you can envisage a very slow American pullout from the region. No wonder the Central Asian nations with American military bases are no longer keen to play host to Uncle Sam.

America's obduracy has reinforced the global preference for State-to-State long-term agreements and contracts which serve the energy-security interests of nations, rather than private corporate entities. Russia's domination of oil and gas flowing to the West has helped it re-emerge as a global power in concert with its strategic partners. And, surprising as it may seem, Washington lacks the global leverage to refashion events in its favour.


Religion as currency

Archbishop Mar Varkey Vithayathil recently startled India's intellectual elite with his call for more babies to arrest the decline of Kerala's Catholic community. Perturbed at the toll taken by abortion and the small family norm on the Syro-Malabar Church, he insisted the burgeoning national population is no problem and that the State should not try to curb family size.

Kerala's rich and large Christian community constitutes nearly 20 per cent of the votebank, and the Archbishop's call is intensely political. It is reportedly inspired by the fear that the Sons of Ismail may soon surpass the Sons of Isaac in god's own country. In the monotheistic world, allegiance to the Abrahamic cult is not enough; what matters is sectarian affiliation. Naturally our secular media, a subordinate ally of the Church, spared the Archbishop the encomiums heaped upon RSS chief KS Sudarshan last year when he asked Hindu families to have at least three children.

Kerala's Christian population registered a 22.6 per cent growth rate in the decade 1991-2001. Christianity's second highest growth rate was in Gujarat, nearly 56 per cent, and Mr Narendra Modi's sympathy for Hindu alarm in the matter explains the antipathy towards him. Ms Sonia Gandhi's ascent as UPA supremo, coupled with America's muscular espousal of evangelism, has given the Christian community the daring to make Governor Balram Jakhar stall amendments to the Madhya Pradesh Freedom of Religion Act, 2006, which require church officials to pre-notify district authorities before conducting conversions, thus effectively restraining them. Evangelical anger is growing as Chhattisgarh has also moved to toughen conversion by force or allurement, while exempting those returning to their natal faith from the ambit of 'conversion'.

It needs to be stated unequivocally that proselytisation has nothing to do with freedom of religion, conscience, or choice. Like the so-called borderless terrorism plaguing the world, evangelists have territorial ambitions, which they seek to fulfil through domination and control of the human mind and body. Akin to the autonomous jihadi cells, evangelists have a grand design, an international network, and an overarching high command. At least since 1974, the blueprint to evangelise the non-Christian world, known as the Joshua Project, has been conducted under the auspices of the International Congress on World Evangelisation (ICWE). The international network is funded and controlled by Western Christian nations, led by the United States, and is typically insensitive to the physical and emotional violence inflicted on the poor and defenceless when free food, medical aid, money, employment, or outright violence are used to compel conversions.

Prof Arvind Sharma has often argued that the academic discourse on conversions is biased in favour of faiths that convert, as opposed to those that do not. Hindu dharma and the Hindu people respect the religious freedom and choices of non-Hindus. Yet they are subjected to the depredations of theologies committed to their own annihilation through conversions. This, as Swami Dayanand Saraswati contends, is a conscious aggressive intrusion into the religious life of the individual, into his religious core.

Worse, the clan and community of the converted person are deeply wounded. In fact, the convert himself suffers secret hurt, wondering if he has acted correctly in alienating himself from the community to which he belonged for generations, thus sundering ties with his ancestors. Religious conversion is violence; that is why it breeds communal violence. In the Hindu tradition, religion and culture are inseparable and hence the loss of religion invariably amounts to loss of cultural heritage. This can be readily seen in the case of the Greek, Mayan, Roman and other civilisations lost to the sword of Christian soldiers.

Ironically, protests against conversions are dubbed as persecution or the denial of religious freedom. This untruth veils the fact that the intended victim of the evangelist is being denied the freedom to observe his natal faith without physical or cultural assault. It is in fact an intentional insult to the faith sought to be annihilated, and is a cognisable offence. In no civilised society is freedom of religion co-terminus with a planned programme of conversion.

In the post-World War II era, evangelists have benefited from Article 18 of the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), which permits violence against human dignity, reason and conscience, and violates the fundamental declaration in Article 1 that all human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. Since its adoption in December 1948, the UDHR has been perceived as a Christian-centric text with pretensions to universalism. It is, in a sense, the twentieth century version of Emperor Akbar's Islam-centric Din-i-Ilahi, a high-sounding doctrine that failed to make the grade with his Hindu courtiers and subjects.

The world needs a genuine Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Religious scholars at McGill University have made a credible effort to prepare a wholistic document titled, Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the World's Religions, which is now set to be discussed at the forthcoming global congress on World's Religions after September 11 at Montreal (September 11-15, 2006).

Some clauses are exemplary, such as "Everyone has the right to freedom from violence, in any of its forms, individual or collective; whether based on race, religion, gender, caste or class, or arising from any other cause" (Article 2). Interestingly, Article 9 (1) equates proselytisation against the will of a person with arbitrary detention. There is also the right "not to have one's religion denigrated in the media or the academia" (Article 12, 4), along with the corresponding duty of adherents of every religion to ensure that no religion is so denigrated (Article 12, 5).

Article 18 (1) explicitly bars compulsion in religion, giving everyone the right to retain his religion or change it (2). The right to retain one's religion has thus for the first time been brought into the international arena on an equal footing with the freedom to change one's faith. Finally, the document enshrines the right to protect one's cultural heritage and accords world heritage status to everyone's cultural heritage (Article 27, 3).

If adopted by the United Nations, this document could mitigate the burgeoning civilisational strife and blunt conversion as a foreign policy tool of many Western nations. It could facilitate respect for the natural geographical borders of myriad faiths, and check the expansionist drives of crusading monotheisms.

Put NGOs under RTI scalpel

The $50,000 Magsaysay Award was recently conferred upon Arvind Kejriwal, a former Indian Revenue Service officer campaigning for the Right to Information (RTI). Though several Indians have received this prize from Philippines, not many citizens are aware that this is actually an American award for Asians. Set up by the Rockefeller Brothers Foundation, most of the purse comes from the Ford Foundation.

The citation does not say when Mr Kejriwal resigned from service, but mentions his association with Parivartan, an entity campaigning for RTI. Mr Kejriwal was in service when he was with Parivartan, which is not a registered NGO (a Society, Trust, or S.25 Company). Under income tax, it is an Association of Persons (AoP), a coming together of persons with a profit-motive so that members can share its income, unlike in a registered society. The Parivartan website conceals its AoP, barring one Manish Sisodia (part-time volunteer, founder-member and treasurer), and terms of association, yet demands a level of transparency from governmental agencies that is not in vogue anywhere in the world.

In a timely study on some of India's most exalted conscience-keepers, Radha Rajan and Krishen Kak argue for public scrutiny of those who hold society or government to ransom, usually at the behest of foreign sponsors (NGOs, Activists & Foreign Funds. Anti-Nation Industry, Vigil Public Opinion Forum, 2006). Kak's meticulous research shows that in FY 2002-03, Parivartan showed receipts for Rs 2,02,489 (Rs 2,01,889 are donations); the total expenditure is Rs 1,88,164, of which salaries take Rs 1,14,000. The only 'programme cost' is Rs 35,945 on a 'jan sunwai' public hearing), and the rest is standard administrative expense.

However, Parivartan claims its annual fixed costs are approximately Rs six lakh, and programme costs are "partly funded through collections from the community itself including poor people and the shortfall is made good by raising funds from outside". Its website does not say if these funds are included in the receipts statement and if receipts are issued for small sums given by poor people. Yet it wants to make the Government of India accountable to itself on behalf of the "people of India".

Radha Rajan argues that many high-profile NGOs serve America's vision of a post-Cold-War world order. Hence they advocate 'communal harmony' in India even as jihad batters the Hindu community, and promote 'peace' with Pakistan despite its formidable terrorist infrastructure. They are essentially political activists using social activism as a mask for their crusade against an independent nationalist India. Thus they are invariably anti-Government of India, anti-military, anti-police, anti-nuclear, and, of course, anti-Hindu.

America uses the Magsaysay and other awards to legitimise its loyalists. Indian Magsaysay awardees include Mahasweta Devi (1997), Aruna Roy and Martin Macwan (2000), Sandeep Pandey (2002), Nirmala Deshpande and Admiral Ramdas (2005). Then, Praful Bidwai and Achin Vanaik received the Sean Macbride Peace Prize (2000) and Arundhati Roy the Sydney Peace Prize (2004). In neighbouring Nepal, journalist Bharat Koirala got the Magsaysay in 2002 for unleashing the anti-Hindu process there. Today, a Christian Prachanda has taken over the country by terrorising the effete political parties and the king is a virtual prisoner.

Krishen Kak's expose of Harsh Mander (Scoring Against Paganism: Untangling the Manderweb) is a warning to the Government about the monetary subversion of serving officers by foreign regimes. In March 2002, Mander, an IAS officer, became an international celebrity when he attacked the communal violence in Gujarat (after 58 Hindus were burnt alive at Godhra) in an article in a leading newspaper. Feted in the West, he claimed he had resigned from the IAS on moral grounds.

This was a deliberate falsehood, says Kak, as Mander was serving the politico-communal agenda of ActionAid, his British employer. Mander had managed a profitable deputation to ActionAid, getting part payment in pound sterling in return for scuttling a government enquiry into its communal agenda in India.

Managing to ward off moves to end his deputation, Mander took voluntary retirement only on completing pensionable service. He sought retirement benefits to the tune of up to a million rupees; the Government stipulated that he cease working for ActionAid; he refused and continued demanding retirement benefits. When Kak publicly challenged the lie that he had resigned on moral grounds, Mander quickly modified his rhetoric.

ActionAid's communal agenda may well be the inspiration for the UPA's Sachar Committee, and shows how foreign agendas are wormed into the topmost echelons of power. It recently initiated a study to sensitise the public and civil society activists about "the dismal economic, educational and social conditions of the Muslim masses". Of course, ActionAid conducted no similar study about Hindu survivors in Pakistan and Bangladesh.

ActionAid used Mander to connect over 300 voluntary agencies. Its patronage extended to Aruna Roy of the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS) and National Campaign of People's Right to Information (NCPRI). The MKSS takes foreign institutional support in kind to evade reporting its funds under FCRA. The MKSS-approved Lok Shikshan Sansthan states that FCRA money can be sent to its founder-NGO Prayas or to the Roy-connected SWRC Tilonia "and it would be transferred to our organisation's account." Very interesting!

Kak's research has uncovered an hitherto unknown entity patronised by Mander-ActionAid. This is the "unstructured organisation", which solicits public money but does not say if it is registered and how it banks the money. Shabnam Hashmi's ANHAD (with Mander, KN Panikkar and Shubha Mudgal) is one such body. So is the Aman Ekta Manch, Aman Samudaya, Aman Jathas, Aman Pathiks. Mander's Aashray Adhikar Abhiyan, funded by ActionAid, does not reveal the names of the core team of eleven professionals, or its accounts.

The disturbing aspect of these unregistered unstructured organisations is their complete lack of accountability or legal scrutiny regarding foreign donations. Ex-IAS officers and ex-judges often provide respectability and protection to such dubious bodies in return for post-retirement sinecures. It is a vicious and dangerous circle.

Russia learnt the hard way that unmonitored West-funded NGOs triggered the spate of revolutions in the former Soviet Republics and out them under the scanner. The majesty of the Indian state cannot be subordinated to hupny-tupny rabble-rousers funded by the West. The Government should immediately bring all activists under the RTI scalpel; this will literally scalp them.


For an office with profit

It is a well-known maxim that the questions one asks determine the nature of the responses elicited. This is true of the conveniently coincidental 'nation-wide' survey organised by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies-Indian Express-CNN-IBN on two years of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. We learn, unsurprisingly, that ordinary citizens view Mr Manmohan Singh as honest, wise, trustworthy, and are satisfied with his performance despite discontent over his handling of the price rise, farmer's suicides and terrorism, and do not regard him as a strong or charismatic leader.

If you can accept 1,884 respondents across 18 States as representative of the national mood, you would have no problem with the real theme of the survey, which is to boost the "Sonia for PM" campaign launched by co-religionist Ajit Jogi immediately after the Rae Bareli re-election. The key question in the survey is whether Ms Gandhi should replace Mr Singh; the response is 52 per cent affirmative.

The survey timing corresponds with the UPA decision to ask the legislature to pass the Parliament (Prevention of Disqualification) Amendment Bill 2006 unchanged, so that President APJ Kalam is forced to sign it. Two months ago, Mr Kalam had refused to endorse the government's attempt at wholesale retrospective exemption of certain posts from the purview of 'office-of-profit,' thereby impeding Congress president Sonia Gandhi from resuming the chairmanship of the National Advisory Council (NAC), with Cabinet rank.

Ms Gandhi was in the news recently for a midnight trip to Mumbai after the serial blasts. She visited the victims in hospital, and mercifully refrained from announcing largesse on behalf of the state or central government. Perhaps gauging the bristling public resentment under the surface, she kept her mouth shut, as did "I-could-have- become-PM-at-25" son Rahul (recall the quickly denied Tehelka interview). Mumbai's victims and villains are a mere blip on their political trajectory; the priority is an Office-of-Profit. Readers would recall Ms Gandhi's guiding presence in the scandal which gave countryman Ottavio Quattrochi the Bofors kickback millions while poor Mr Singh took the flak. Similarly, Foreign Minister Natwar Singh got the sack in the oil-for-food bonanza, while the principal accused - the Congress party, headed by Ms Gandhi - got clean away.

Acolytes of the Italian-born supremo are determined to humiliate Mr Kalam for failing (or refusing) to swear her in as Prime Minister in May 2004; hence the move to reintroduce the original Bill in defiance of Presidential sensitivities. Mr Kalam's suggestion that government prepare "comprehensive and generic" criteria that is "fair and reasonable" and applicable in a "clear and transparent" manner across all States and Union Territories has been rebuffed in contravention of constitutional and moral proprieties. This will prove counter-productive as the UPA has not been able to convince the nation that the Bill has any intrinsic merit, beyond catering to the whims of the UPA chairperson and the Left parties whose MPs are affected by the controversy, most notably Speaker Somnath Chatterjee.

Still, MPs foolishly holding unprotected offices is one thing; the existence of the National Advisory Council another; and it is high time the nation debated the latters' validity. The NAC was created to give rank and status to Ms Gandhi after Mr Kalam allegedly questioned her nationality on the basis of legal issues raised by Mr Subramaniam Swamy. Set up by an order of the Cabinet Secretariat and financed from PMO funds, it was given the task of monitoring the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) of the UPA coalition.

Thus it is really an apex body of UPA allies and supporting parties. As it is the Prime Minister's job to implement the CMP, the nation should be told why a mini-PMO has been set up with a separate secretariat and all-paid expense account. We should know what the NAC costs the public exchequer and why the PMO funding a body that has no constitutional basis, especially one that would not exist at all if Congress had come to power in its own right. NAC is a party platform; the taxpayer should not foot its bill.

At the risk of sounding unpleasant, it must be said that Ms Sonia Gandhi is addicted to what the Supreme Court has memorably termed the "receivables" of office. When the NDA came to power we learnt that typists employed at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts were stationed at her residence. Senior IAS officers have been deputed to the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation from the time of Prime Minister Narasimha Rao; senior IAS officers were reverted to their parent ministries when she resigned as NAC chairperson.

When Ms Gandhi resigned to avoid sacking by the Election Commission, the nation was told she had quit all NGOs and government bodies she was heading, but the complete list of organisations was concealed. So was information on the remunerations she received, and patronage she exercised through these bodies. As Parliament discusses the OoP issue, it would be in the fitness of things if the people of India were told which offices the Congress president intends to resume once they are exempted from the punitive provisions of the office-of-profit, and the nature of "receivables" from the same.

It needs be said that the Election Commission has disappointed the people for submitting to Left Front bullying on the issue of MPs holding offices of profit. Given the long parliamentary recess and the President's return of the Bill, the Commission could have given West Bengal a firm deadline to furnish the details it required, failing which it should have presumed the MPs guilty and disqualified them. As things stand, the Commission has helped Comrades ideologically committed to the withering away of the state to stick to offices of profit like limpets, to borrow Rajiv Gandhi's immortal expression.

Ironically, the bells for Ms Gandhi are tolling in distant Chennai, where PMK's infamous 'tree-cutter' S Ramadoss is furious at the UPA failure to protect 'baby' Ambumani, who is now likely to be dismissed from Parliament. The Government's decision not to modify the Office-of-Profit Bill has compromised the Health Minister who is under High Court and Election Commission scrutiny for holding an office-of-profit as President of the governing body of All-India Institute of Medical Sciences. Ms Gandhi's inability to look beyond her narrow self-interest may prove her undoing.

Ascent of the anti-Hindus

Barely a month after his visit to New Delhi for support in rebuilding his Maoist-ravaged country, Nepal's appointed interim Prime Minister GP Koirala has delivered his unhappy nation into the hands of its worst tormentor and retired to a hospital bed. Whispers from Kathmandu suggest that Prachanda, would-be President-King of the former Hindu kingdom, is a Christian. There is little reason to doubt these voices, as similar murmurings about LTTE supremo V Prabhakaran proved correct, and Sri Lanka's Tamil Hindus admit that the organisation does not serve their political, economic or cultural interests in any way. Its objective is to provide its covert Western backers a foothold in the region.

With Prachanda's ascent in India's hinterland, the West has executed a far greater coup than the secession of East Timor from Indonesia. If South Block is unmoved, it is only because an Italian Roman Catholic has successfully subverted the national ethos and subjugated the country to American geo-strategic interests. It is truly shocking that New Delhi has refused to react to the fact that an aged politician, appointed for an interim period in the wake of a popular agitation, has inaugurated the most audacious changes in Nepal's polity without any mandate from the Nepali people.

Instead of supporting Hindu Nepal, its civilisational ally, the Sonia Gandhi-dominated UPA regime is shamelessly working to accomplish the West-sponsored Maoist agenda. The centuries-old Hindu character of the country has been tossed aside, and the monarchy and the Royal Nepal Army which symbolise the nation discredited. Though the supposedly popular uprising (the cognoscenti say the streets were crammed with paid lumpens) aimed at electing a government and restoring the democratic process, it now transpires that Nepal is going to be subverted through a new constituent assembly, which was never on the people's agenda.

It is true that King Gyanendra is not respected like his late brother. Yet realisation is beginning to dawn in some quarters that the political parties that constituted Nepal's fractious democratic process have been rendered completely irrelevant by plans for a new constituent assembly. This is because the Seven Party Alliance (SPA) regime is being blackmailed by Maoist threats of renewed violence and bloodshed, and this threat may impact upon the results whenever elections are held. Prachanda, dreaming of the Nepali version of the Imperial Presidency, is advocating United Nations supervision of the polls, when everyone knows that the UN is an agent of the West, especially under Kofi Annan.

America is seeking to enthrone Christian stooges wherever it has strategic interests. Ideology is a ruse, mere washable distemper. This will become apparent when the new constitution officially abolishes the Hindu nature of the State and espouses minority rights, despite the fact that there were no minorities in Nepal until the West and the ISI jointly evangelised the region as part of a policy of containing India. Nepal's new constitution will offer freedom of religion (sic), a euphemism for the freedom to convert Nepalis to Christianity.

Eradication of the Hindu character of Nepal is the sole raison d'etre for the present de facto regime change, and its instigators are the American-led West, operating through anti-Hindu communist groups in both India and Nepal. Notwithstanding their pretended anti-imperialist rhetoric, there should be no misunderstanding that Communists serve any power other than the West. Russia is officially non-Communist and China is Communist in name only. Left radicals enjoy untold luxury and wealth solely in America, populating its elite universities and NGOs. They are Christian America's natural allies in hurting the native civilisational ethos in non-Christian countries targetted by the West, and are doing a thorough job in Nepal.

The great Pashupatinath mandir, as critical to Nepal's cultural traditions as India's Vishwanath temple at Varanasi, has been singled out for secular assault. It has been asked to submit its accounts for scrutiny by unelected unbelievers. This is an outrage, an act of iconoclasm as grave as the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas by the American-trained Taliban. If Nepalis fail to respond to this insult with the ferocity it deserves, they should be prepared to witness the cross replacing the shikar over the sanctum sanctorum.

Prachanda has made several revealing statements. Last year, he told Time magazine that when he launched the so-called people's war in 1996, he did not have a single modern weapon or any trained armed cadres (April 18, 2005). Anybody who has observed the insurgency in India's North-East would readily identify the religious affiliations of the international sponsors of such 'people's movements.'

More importantly, Prachanda is determined to keep his arms and armed cadres intact even after elections to the proposed constituent assembly are over. This is obviously to secure an advantage (sic) which the elections might deny him. He could then emulate Lenin and enact a Winter Palace-style of coup against the country's effete politicians, who have so far behaved with sheep-like stupidity. This has emboldened him to suggest that his Maoist insurgents could join and take over the Royal Nepal Army (RNA)!

Ms Sonia Gandhi's supremacy having ensured an unfriendly India, it is not known what kind of cards the King and Army still retain to defeat this virtual colonisation of Nepal. But it is almost certain that they cannot beat back this challenge alone. Nepal's notoriously divisive political parties have not shown any awareness of the nature of the threat facing the nation, so it is too early to say if they can unite with the King and Army for a larger purpose. If Prachanda formally seizes all power in Nepal, there is little doubt that America will seek bases on Nepali soil, in order to 'contain' China. This does not augur well for India. Yet we must prepare for this eventuality, as there is no other reason to plant a Christian in Kathmandu.

The 21st century seems set to witness a major geographical realignment with old national boundaries being merged into larger conglomerates. America already calls the shots in Pakistan and through it, in Bangladesh. It has bases in Afghanistan, and Tibetan leader, the Dalai Lama, has been cultivated and controlled through a Hollywood star. Christian supremos have been put in place in India and Nepal, while Christian protégés are being promoted in Sri Lanka and Myanmar. That gives you a new political entity already christened by the US State Department - South Asia. Not a nice thought; not one that can be readily dismissed either.


Sacrilege at Tirupati hills

The current initiative of Sri Swarupanandendra Swami of the Visakhapatnam-based Sri Sarada Peetham to mobilise Hindu seers to protect dharma in the face of rising depredations by evangelists has not come a day too soon. While religious conversions are innately offensive, the rising political eminence of an Italian-born Roman Catholic has witnessed a corresponding growth of aggressive proselytising at famous Hindu pilgrimages and holy sites.

Ms Sonia Gandhi has reinforced missionary muscle by sponsoring the rise of Christians in Congress State Governments and party units on an unprecedented scale. Non-Christian Congress Chief Ministers have been made to acquiesce in missionary activities, and outrageously 'leaky' welfare schemes have been floated for the benefit of the tax-free NGO industry, most of which is anti-Hindu.

The latest affront to India's civilisational ethos comes from missionary activities at Tirumala and Simhachalam, where police were compelled to take the offending preachers into custody. This has forced the normally quiescent authorities of Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam (TTD) to urge Chief Minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy to enact legislation to prohibit propaganda by non-Hindu faiths on the seven Tirumala hills, traditionally regarded as the sacred body of Sri Vishnu.

It is inconceivable that the TTD authorities are unaware that the Chief Minister avidly promotes the activities of his Seventh Day Adventists sect, and has even built a church upon his family lands. They must be at the end of their tether to appeal to a proselytiser to respect their faith and ban physical and psychological encroachment upon their sacred spaces. The TTD is demanding a two-year jail term and fines for violating the law it wants enacted. It is pertinent that while the State Government does not permit panchayat elections in Tirumala in view of its spiritual eminence, predatory faiths are permitted a free run of the hills. It would, therefore, be in the fitness of things if the Government steps in before matters deteriorate further and declares all seven hills as the TTD zone, where politics or alien faiths cannot enter.

Actually, both conversion activities and willful trespass by missionaries upon the sacred spaces of other faiths can be prosecuted under Section 295-A of the Indian Penal Code, provided the authorities are willing to punish the offenders. It is undeniable that the determination to convert devotees of a faith(s) maligned as "false" by the proselytiser is an intentional insult to the said creed. This cannot be condoned and disguised as "freedom of religion" in order to facilitate the missionary agenda, which is almost wholly funded by Western Christian nations. Secondly and more seriously, deliberate intrusion into the holy spaces of other faiths for proselytisation and conversion to one's own dogma falls squarely within the gamut of a "malicious intention to outrage religious feelings." The growing temerity of missionaries at the Golden Temple, Tirupati and other Hindu temple towns calls for speedy redress by the law.

Sadly, it is fairly certain that neither the UPA regime at the Centre nor the Congress State Governments will act to mitigate the victimisation of the Hindu community. Indeed, sinister plans are reportedly afoot to bolster the conversion industry by a backdoor capture of SC/ST reserved seats in Parliament and the State Assemblies, by surreptitiously making these available to converts (so-called Dalit Christians). This could seriously erode the political empowerment of historically deprived sections of Hindu society, and Bahujan Samaj Party leader Ms Mayawati would do well to take cognisance of this move to forge a new minority-based electoral vote-bank in Uttar Pradesh.

Briefly, the National Commission for Religious and Linguistic Minorities (NCRLM) is currently (but quietly) seeking public opinion on extending "constitutional benefits" to SC/ST converts. In the prevailing reservation-prone atmosphere, I initially thought this meant that the UPA intended to include Dalit Christians in the SC/ST reservations in government jobs and educational institutions. Had this been the case, however, the issue could have been simply framed in such terms.

The coy usage of the term "constitutional benefits," instead of specifying caste or community-based reservations, suggests that the NCRLM's real objective is to recommend a blanket extension of all constitutional benefits of Hindu SC/ST groups, to Dalit Christians. This will provide backdoor political reservations for Dalit Christians by helping them to contest from and grab the existing SC/ST parliamentary and Assembly seats.

This would be consistent with the UPA agenda of fragmenting the nation by privileging non-Hindu social groups. It also explains Ms Gandhi's indiscreet overtures to the Muslim community on the issue of reservations in Government (Andhra Pradesh's failed attempt), educational institutions (Aligarh Muslim University), and armed forces (Mr Sachar's infamous but aborted head count). Worse, like Minto-Morley, she recently instigated Muslims to demand greater representation in public life, which certainly suggests communal reservation in Parliament and the State Assemblies.

Of course, Ms Gandhi does not actually intend to empower the Muslim community. Repeating the familiar Western political subordination of Muslim communities all over the world, her intention is to create a Christian oligarchy in India, with Muslims serving as beasts of burden (captive vote-banks). Hence the mollycoddling of the Muslim community in a manner designed to raise the hackles of Hindus, with obvious repercussions for the 'winability' of Muslim candidates. This is expected to drive the community back into the Congress embrace. An NCRLM recommendation to extend SC/ST constitutional guarantees to converts will, therefore, mainly benefit the Christian community.

If there is no resistance to this diabolical scheme, Ms Gandhi could soon have a significant Christian lobby in Parliament, through a fraudulently procured amendment altering the basic structure of the Constitution. An East Timor-like situation could develop in any part of the country where Western Christian nations have a geo-strategic or purely economic interest. Their lust for the mineral-rich north-east predates independence and is fostered by insurgency movements backed by various church denominations.

Indians need to acknowledge the abiding kinship between the Church and political power in the West. Christianity underwrites Western civilisation, a fact its ruling elite never loses sight of, unlike India, where it is fashionable to use Euro-centric slogans to undermine the native ethos. Little wonder Ms Gandhi's Indian ascent has seen the appointment of Indian Catholic theologian Ivan Dias as ex-Cardinal Ratzinger's heir to the (renamed) office of Grand Inquisitor. It is almost midnight for India's Hindu community.


BJP's Yayati syndrome

Some time after the arrest of the Kanchi Acharyas, the BJP think-tank hosted a talk where an ideologue defended the greatest civilisational insult Hindu India has suffered since the assassination of Guru Tegh Bahadur by a rabid Islamist ruler. The speaker diminished the seers and insinuated that Chief Minister Jayalalithaa would prove the charges against them in court. This caused grave disquiet among the audience and many bemoaned the low calibre of the BJP leadership that abysmally failed the Hindu community.

I remember telling those who sought my views on the appalling state of the party that, having shed the Hindu cause under coalition compulsions, the aged leadership was reluctant to resume the Hindu burden. Like king Yayati, however, it was so intoxicated with office that it would not see the exit signs Fate was beaming so insistently. Like the king, it swallowed the youth of its children (Generation Next), for public good, of course. In the Mahabharata story, wisdom finally dawned and the old king sought to return his son's youth. But that great renunciate refused to take back his gift, so father and son renounced the world together, after placing the grandson on the throne. Sadly, the BJP's Geriatric Club thirsts for the youth of its grandchildren also (Generation Next to Next).

Nothing illustrates this more vividly than the attitude towards the double tragedy that has hit the Mahajan family. The murderous assault on Pramod Mahajan was little more than a photo-op for some leaders, and a perfect excuse to cancel a flop yatra. BJP leaders maligning the late leader are oblivious of the possible political ramifications of the murder. If reports that assassin-brother Pravin had joined the Congress party a month before the crime are true, the case acquires a new dimension.

Strangely, BJP has left the probe entirely to the police, who have taken Pravin's anger that his brother did not make him richer, at face value. We know nothing about the persons Pravin was in touch with in the days and hours prior to and after the incident. After all, he took an unusually long time to reach Pramod's place, and later, the police station. Pravin's telephone records are being kept secret.

A month later, Pramod's secretary Bibek Maitra dies mysteriously and his only son, Rahul, barely survives. The conspiracy angle is obvious, but after the impromptu concern of president Rajnath Singh, a powerful force reins in party sympathisers. Sushma Swaraj (who dismissed the Ram Janmabhoomi as an encashed cheque) twice emerges from LK Advani's residence to declaim that BJP has no truck with the tragedy. This approach suits a rival political entity admirably. Interestingly, amidst this baffling tragedy, NCP leader Sharad Pawar breaks ranks with Congress to field nationalist tycoon Rahul Bajaj for the Rajya Sabha. BJP supremos, who once preferred Sanjay Gandhi acolyte Lalit Suri and Congresswoman Najma Heptullah to Mr Bajaj, have to concur.

There is more to the Rahul Mahajan episode than meets the eye. On June 1, Sahil Zaroo takes Rahul Malhotra and Karan Ahuja to the house; on hindsight, it seems he needs witnesses to something likely to unfold there. They arrive at 11.30 pm and after a private talk with Maitra (recently changed to Rahul), Sahil claims receiving Rs 15,000 to buy cocaine. Sahil and Karan buy five grams of cocaine from Vasant Vihar, and Karan decides to go home. Sahil returns alone; he and Maitra snort the stuff, but the latter says it is not genuine and demands a replacement. We do not know what Rahul Malhotra does all this time.

Police say Maitra sent his driver Anil with Sahil and Rahul Malhotra to change the material, but now Rahul also opts out. Sahil is physically well at this point; he gets Trishay Khanna to accompany him to the Mahajan residence around 2 am. As Sahil, Anil and Trishay enter the room, they find Maitra frothing at the mouth and Rahul's body cold. Sahil calls the servants while the driver telephones former aide Harish Sharma for guidance.

If Sahil went to change the dubious powder, what did Maitra and Rahul consume that caused such deterioration in their condition, and how? Did Sahil return merely to check their condition? What did Sahil imbibe that caused delayed illness, not serious enough to prevent him from flying to Srinagar? Sahil and Trishay had the presence of mind to remove Sahil's car from the scene and get him an injection at Spring Meadows clinic; this suggests he got a specific antidote.

Sahil's lawyer claims his client met Maitra to get an air ticket to Srinagar released from the VIP quota. This is easy to verify, but it does not explain why Sahil went to the residence twice with 'witnesses'. Police say Abdullah gave cocaine to Sahil, but Maitra died of heroin overdose, and servants say Sahil switched a packet of white powder in Maitra's pocket. A television channel reveals that on the night of the crime Sahil made 18 calls to Abdullah, one to a film producer, and numerous calls to the daughter of a Mumbai police officer. For someone intending to spend the night doing cocaine, it sounds strange.

Something is rotten. Rahul Malhotra, Trishay Khanna and Karan Ahuja consider their moves, find a reputed narcotics lawyer, speak to a news channel, and then surrender to the police. Although it may have been too late to find alcohol in their blood, it is surprising they were not medically examined for consumption of drugs. If the police makes them approvers, the entire case will appear fraudulent and contrived. It is pertinent that after making a huge splash about Rahul using a five hundred rupee note to chase the cocaine (now heroin), the police have not told us if they recovered the remains of any such note; they have changed the quantity of drugs involved.

The determination to prove that Rahul consumed and distributed drugs smacks of political vendetta. Defamatory stories are being planted against Maitra and Rahul. However, some observers point out that if Rahul really was a drug addict, he would have displayed the classic 'withdrawal' symptoms in custody. Yet Rahul has not asked jail authorities for a 'fix'; such self-control is not possible for a 'regular' on the drug circuit.


Wincing over Da Vinci Code

Three Vatican-affiliated satra-pies have unilaterally banned the Hollywood blockbuster, The Da Vinci Code, thereby affirming paramount loyalty to Il Papa as opposed to the Indian nation. Nagaland, as is well known, was among the first States in which foreign Christian missionaries armed, trained and inspired tribal converts to secede from New Delhi. Recall that this was an era in which Bangladeshi bases and ISI did not exist. Gun-running and arms proliferation went back to the munificence of rich Western nations.

Goa, though not a Christian-majority State, is dominated by Governor SC Jamir, ex-Chief Minister of Nagaland. However, to the uninitiated, the decision that raises eyebrows is that of Punjab. Yet the cognoscenti know that church building has acquired unimaginable proportions in the tenure of Captain Amarinder Singh; one can hardly visit cities like Amritsar without stumbling over a missionary every few yards. Obviously Capt Singh is trying to please his foreign-born Roman Catholic boss at the cost of his natal culture.

Yet we would be making a serious mistake if we do not remember that Pakistan was created - partly by dividing Punjab - as part of a design by the Christian West for post-colonial domination of the region. Pakistan helped the West monitor events in the oil-rich Gulf and Hindu India. That is why, when the Seventh Fleet of our now 'natural ally' failed to deter Mrs Indira Gandhi from liberating East Pakistan, West Pakistan was handed the blueprint for a new offensive against India.

Although credit for the Khalistani movement has historically vested with the late Gen Zia ul-Haq, it bears the stamp of our old colonial masters. Divide and rule, and what better tool than the Sikh community, which had already been re-invented from the sword arm of Hindu society into a spoilt minority? Elite or ordinary, Punjabis are both gregarious and greedy, and it was a cakewalk for Zia's Punjabi Muslim officers to cultivate pilgrims to Nankana Sahib with sentimental claptrap about how politicians had divided the united soul of the people and overload the visitors with gifts. Propaganda and freebies were both lapped up with alacrity, and the rest is history. Meanwhile, Khalistani leaders found hospitality in Britain and Canada. The same farce is now being enacted in Kashmir.

It is my contention that dismembering India from both flanks remains a Western goal, and Punjab's effete politicians are the tool for its execution. Those concerned about India's territorial integrity would do well to watch developments in border States. If Christian missionaries have an overt presence in the north east, they have a powerful covert presence on the western border as well, and this includes Gujarat and Rajasthan, where West-funded Christian and 'secular' NGOs have a formidable presence.

Not surprisingly, both States figure on the Bishop of Rome's radar for daring to enact anti-conversion laws to protect India's civilisational continuity and national character. Pope Benedict XVI's remarks challenged our sovereignty and the UPA response was tepid because of the supremacy of an Italian-born Roman Catholic, who refused to rebuff this gross insult to her adopted country, though her acolytes had claimed she was a 'Hindu' when she stormed into Tirupati without signing the register for non-Hindu visitors. As president of the only political party which condemned this civilisational assault, Mr Rajnath Singh would do well to declare that should the BJP return to power, it will de-recognise the non-secular, non-elected Vatican City regime. This will go a long way in keeping soul-scavengers at bay.

Interestingly, even as the head of Christendom's largest sect was interpreting our Constitution for us and telling us to behave so he could make good (Christian) souls out of us, the Vatican executed a duplicitous charade on the issue of faith conversions. According to news reports, between May 12-16, the Pope's Council for Inter-religious Dialogue and the Office on Inter-religious Relations and Dialogue of the World Council of Churches invited a group of carefully selected persons from the Bauddha, Christian, Hindu, Islamic, Judaic and Yoruba (Nairobi) traditions to evolve a common code of conduct for conversions.

Now this is half-clever. A Church-chosen gathering endorses the Christian position that conversions are legitimate, and agrees to prescribe certain procedures by which these may be undertaken. Missionaries can thus work unimpeded while the cultures being cannibalised are made to shut up. A placebo was offered against "unethical" conversions; it was said: "There should be transparency in the practice of inviting others to one's faith."

To my mind, conversions are innately unethical; the objective is to grab territory by making citizens abdicate from the natal tradition. Hence, missionaries should openly state that the purpose of their charity is to procure numbers for the church mission of universal dominion. Ideally, such invitations should be extended outside the borders of target societies. Vatican City could issue one lakh visas to Afghan tribals, inviting them to Christianity. The exhortation that humanitarian work should not be used to take advantage of vulnerable sections is simply deceitful. The behaviour of missionary charities in the Asian tsunami in Tamil Nadu, Sri Lanka and Indonesia was shameful, but consistent with missionary tradition.

The final agreed report sought to plant the notion that freedom of religion is a fundamental, non-negotiable right of every human being in every country in the world. This is said to involve the freedom to practise one's own faith without obstruction (a warning to Islamic republics like Saudi Arabia), and the freedom to propagate one's faith to people of one's own and other faiths (ie. convert them). Above all, however, it includes the freedom to embrace another faith out of one's own free choice (to be certified solely by the converting agency). This is utterly consistent with Christian unilateralism and Western arrogance.

The modern world, however, needs a touch of diplomacy. Accordingly, the report piously intones that freedom of religion enjoins the "non-negotiable responsibility to respect faiths other than our own, and never to denigrate, vilify or misrepresent them for the purpose of affirming superiority of our faith... all should heal themselves from the obsession of converting others." Now if only the rapporteurs of the meeting would take these recommendations to Pope Benedict XVI and make him acknowledge the errors and injustices perpetrated by the Church over two millennia of its existence.


Jainas, cream of Hindu society

The Union Minister for Minority Affairs' determination to impose minority status upon Jainas has come as a shock to a community that has long regarded itself as the cream of Hindu society. Obviously, Mr AR Antulay is only continuing the UPA policy of fragmenting the nation by offering reservations to Muslims in Congress-ruled states and extending 27 per cent reservations to OBCs in higher education. Coupled with the Prime Minister's hints that the private sector should open its doors to caste-based employment, this has made Ms Sonia Gandhi's supremacy in Indian politics the most implosive period in the nation's modern history.

Barring some wealthy Digambara Jaina families with ambitions for maulvi-like control over the community, Jainas have neither sought nor desired minority status. Jainas have never shirked hard work or competition, and therefore excel in all spheres of life, from trade and industry to professions where merit alone assures ascendance. Far from furthering their cause, minority status could actually deprive them of access to institutions of higher education as Jainas are a minuscule community, never having crossed even half percent of the population. With merit criteria removed, minority status will push Jainas from the penthouse to the basement.

Despite their size, Jainas enjoy disproportionate influence over the Hindu community and are perceived as the pinnacle of Indic spirituality. Jainas share common roots with Hindus and aver that 22 Tirthankaras hailed from the Iksvaku dynasty of Shri Rama, while two belonged to the Hari clan of Shri Krishna. No wonder the Indian constitution classifies Jainas and other native spiritual traditions as 'Hindu,' though like the others, Jainas retain their distinction on the Indic spectrum, adhering to particular forms of belief and worship. This is hardly the same as being 'separate,' a mischievous colonial concept invented to promote opposition and division.

Jainas profoundly influenced India's cultural and social life. Early on, they compelled Hindus and Bauddhas to accept the supremacy of ahimsa (non-injury to all creatures) and vegetarianism, and fashioned these into cornerstones of Indian culture. According to Jaina theology, the universe and everything in it, even rocks and stones considered inanimate in other traditions, is a living organism with a soul (jiva, atma). Long before modern science accepted that plants are living organisms with senses, Jainas were aware that plants were living beings worthy of respect. The knowledge that plants breathe oxygen at night is behind the Indian sentiment against plucking flowers or cutting trees after sunset.

Jaina awareness of nigoda (single celled) life-forms led to the injunction against animal sacrifice and consumption of meat. Meat is a perfect breeding ground for nigodas, hence consumption of meat leads to a fall in spiritual evolution. Sufferings inflicted upon living creatures are revisited upon one through the karmic trajectory, and man suffers for misdeeds committed in any lifetime. Jaina tradition emphasizes man's personal responsibility for other species ("parasparopagraho jivanam") and the environment. This compassion towards lesser beings made Jainas pioneers in setting up hospitals for birds and animals.

Jaina tradition does not bestow special sanctity on the cow as it respects all life without distinction, but Jainas tend to take the lead in movements against cow slaughter as it is historically and culturally a humiliation of the Indic tradition and Jainas cannot stay aloof from such a flagrant act of violence for this gentle animal. Among Hindus, Vaishnavas became vegetarian. Devotees of Devi continued to practice animal sacrifice on ritual occasions and many coastal and other groups retained meat in their diet. However, once the vegetarian ethos was entrenched as morally superior, it could never be dislodged through the centuries that followed.

Jainas similarly absorbed Hindu beliefs, even if these did not enter the official theology. The Mahabharata expounds four debts that the individual must discharge: deva rna by worship; pitr rna by continuing the family; rsi rna by acquiring and disseminating knowledge; and manava rna by service to humanity. Jainas have a story that Aristanemi, the twenty-second Tirthankara, wished to renounce the world without getting married. His paternal cousin, Sri Krishna (himself the avatara of Vishnu), reminded him that all previous world Saviours had married and raised families before renouncing the world in pursuit of the spiritual quest; hence he should marry and please his father.

Hindu and Jaina traditions are like the weft and woof of the unstitched garment favoured by our saints; they cannot be separated without severe haemorrhage to both. The shared spirituality of the Indic tradition is like an unstitched garment - whole, inclusive, interlinked, and unthreatened by the inevitable loss of culture, tradition and diversity that accompanies monotheistic traditions. The latter may be compared to stitched garments - elegant, structured, appealing, but ever haunted by the inward sense of loss that accompanies the rejection of diversity in divinity.

Minority status is a historical millstone round the nation's neck, caused by the fact that the Constituent Assembly offered some privileges to the Muslims in order to avert partition, but retained the provisions despite partition. Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel had the vision to foresee that a political minefield lay ahead on this route; he favoured a seamless society without religious barricades.

In fact, there is a serious flaw in the argument that India's religious minorities need special constitutional guarantees to preserve themselves. Unlike monotheistic faiths, the sanatana dharma accords space to other creeds and India has been a civilisational haven to persecuted communities such as Jews, Syrian Christians, Parsis, Tibetans and Bahai's. It has also sought to accommodate historically aggressive communities.

These communities have received an unwarranted bonanza from the Sonia Gandhi-led UPA, in the form of exemption from implementing the 27 per cent OBC quota in educational institutions run by them. This will give minority-run educational institutions an unfair political and economic clout, while aggravating social divisions in the larger society by inducing competition on the basis of caste, rather than merit.

As recently as August 2005, a Supreme Court Bench comprising then Chief Justice Mr RC Lahoti and Justices Mr DM Dharmadhikari and Mr PK Balasubramnyan, had directed the national and State level Minorities Commissions to find ways of reducing and ultimately ending the list of notified minorities, rather than increasing them. The court warned against encouraging fissiparous tendencies in the nation; it seems the warning fell on deaf ears.

Biblicists target Hindus

Unknown to most Indians, the raging controversy over the California school textbooks being challenged by Hindu American parents is rooted in the staunch commitment of certain academics to the Biblical version of Creation. Herr Michael Witzel, whose professional reputation is linked to the Aryan Invasion Theory, which derives from a Biblical perspective, denies the decisive scientific evidence to the contrary.

His devotee, Mr Steve Farmer, is equally convinced that "Genesis 1:28 contains god's words". Mr James Heitzman, the 'expert' secretly hired by the State Board of Education (SBE), has famously claimed that the non-decay of Francis Xavier's body is a true miracle. Mr Stanley Wolpert, another expert, insists the Aryan Invasion happened even though there is no proof for it.

It will be surprising if Harvard University, which made president Larry Summers step down for his controversial opinions, retains Herr Witzel on its rolls for long. Not only is he a Creationist; he reportedly teaches his doctoral students the Sanskrit alphabet! Does Harvard teach the English alphabet to doctoral candidates in English? A decade ago, Herr Witzel's Sanskrit Department was mired in a lawsuit, and it seems matters have hardly improved since. Professional worries could explain why his friends have launched a mis-information blitzkrieg about the Hindu American Foundation lawsuit against SBE, when hearings have not even begun.

Prof Witzel's claim that his letter of December 7, 2005 to the California Department of Education (CDE), which checkmated the reasonable corrections sought by Hindu parents in the schoolbooks, was signed by "world specialists on ancient India - reflecting mainstream academic opinion," does not stand scrutiny. Far from being "world specialists," many signatories are not academics at all; many are linguists (the dubious discipline on which the Aryan Invasion rests) or Sanskrit professors, rather than historians or archaeologists with expertise on India. Many are Marxists; others have controversial theories about South Asia.

To begin with, Prof Witzel himself teaches Sanskrit and is no expert on ancient Indian History or Hindu dharma. He clearly lacks the credentials to determine how Hindu children should be taught their religion and history in a manner that does not demoralise them. Mr Steve Farmer's theories regarding Harappan scripts have been discredited by academics, including JM Kenoyer and Asko Parpola, who signed Witzel's appeal. The famous Marxist ideologue, Ms Romila Thapar, is an 'expert' on ancient India with poor knowledge of Indian classical languages, including Sanskrit.

Mr S Palaniappan holds a PhD in Engineering and works for a company in Houston! Prof Homi Bhabha teaches English and American Literature and Language. Prof Madhav Deshpande and Ms Patricia Donegan teach Linguistics; Dr Garrett Fagan teaches Roman History and Ms Joanna Kirkpatrick has done work on Anthropology, folk art and gender studies.

Then, Prof Hideaki Nakatani teaches Philosophy in Tokyo; Ms Sudha Shenoy Business and Law in Australia; Mr Lars Martin Fosse was a commercial translator; and Prof Wim van Binsbergen teaches African History at Leiden. Prof. Rajesh Kochhar did his Ph D in Astrophysics and worked for 25 years (1974-1999) at the Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore; Mr Dominik Wujastyk taught in the Department of Anatomy and Developmental Biology at the School of Oriental and African Studies; Dr JM Kenoyer teaches Anthropology and Prof Maurizio Tosi teaches Archaeology in Italy.

This worldwide signature campaign is not about sixth-grade textbooks. It is an issue of Hindu dignity and civil rights everywhere in the world; hence the decision of the California Parents for the Equalisation of Educational Materials (CAPEEM) to file a Federal lawsuit is remarkably bold and correct. Victory here will drastically curtail the Hindu-baiting industry in the West, with a trickle-down effect in India. This is the first time a Hindu community has filed a lawsuit against a state agency (California State Board of Education and California Department of Education) for violation of its civil rights, and against discrimination, defamation and mistreatment of their religion and people.

The California SBE initially followed due process, and recommended changes desired by the Hindu groups to the Curriculum Commission. At this late stage, however, it illegally entertained the baseless objections of Prof Witzel and ordered a revision of the whole process. A second expert panel was surreptitiously set up, comprising Professors Witzel, Stanley Wolpert and James Heitzman, all signatories of the Witzel Letter, thus openly violating Curriculum Commission criteria that experts should not be affiliated to groups suggesting or objecting to the proposed changes.

It is obvious that Hindus received unfair and unequal treatment in the matter of how sixth grade students in the public education system would be taught about the Hindu religion. Both the substance of the final edits and the procedure adopted by SBE and CDE was flawed.

This has the effect of officially promoting a Judeo-Christian conception of Divinity to the exclusion of other perspectives, with the result that the Hindu faith is projected in a negative manner as compared to other religions. This deprives Hindu students of an educational experience at par with that of their peers, and thus violates their rights under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution.

Even worse, the constitutional requirement of State neutrality towards religion in general and towards different religions, was discarded. The CDE thus tacitly endorsed certain faiths by accepting the changes they wanted, and denigrated Hindus by portraying their religion inaccurately.

The CDE justified its move to overturn the accepted amendments mooted by the Hindu community on the specious plea that some groups were associated with third parties deemed to be 'nationalist Hindu' or 'Hindutva supporters.' This is an express violation of the First Amendment and its promise of Free Speech, which protects the rights of individuals to express themselves free of government retribution, as also the right to associate with persons of their choice.

The worst aspect of the behaviour of the California authorities was their sudden decision to conduct private meetings without informing the known interested parties, and refusing to keep or release records of previous meetings. This inexplicable volte-face, which made them abandon their own procedures by establishing a second expert panel and adopting its recommendations in a non-transparent manner, requires an explanation. One hopes the Federal suit will expose these backroom manoeuvres.

Judas: History's haunted heretic

Imagine a scenario in which Ravana was no villain, but a beloved brother of Rama. Such a fundamental transformation in the portrayal of a key character in an epic could hardly occur without an equally elemental alteration in the status of other lead players. More crucially, this would necessitate a critical makeover of the narrative's basic plot.

It cannot be otherwise with Jesus of Nazareth, or Bethlehem, or Galilee, whichever location scholars finally agree is the hometown of the Son of Man. Indeed, one of the greatest historical denouements of our time may be a scholarly verdict that Jesus was involved in a seditious intrigue which failed, and that the Roman governor acted in consonance with the law. The recently unveiled Gospel of Judas reveals that this long-reviled disciple was a pawn in a political conspiracy; once we learn the plot, we may understand why the early Church fathers went to such great lengths to conceal the truth.

The Gospel of Judas makes it impossible for scholars to evade the issue they dodged when the Gnostic Gospels surfaced at Nag Hammadi three decades ago. This concerns the nature and purpose of Jesus' apparent leadership of a band of followers, and the authenticity of his teachings as preserved in the Bible. Given the grudgingly acknowledged importance of Mary Magdelene, who was not merely Jesus' wife but an important priestess of the cult of Isis, and her relationship with wealthy Jewish families, it seems logical that some of the shadowy figures in the story played a far more important role than previously thought.

The role of the Sanhedrin (Jewish clergy) requires re-evaluation. We need to know why Jesus challenged the Temple authorities at Jerusalem by overturning the tables of the moneychangers, a key episode which has never been explained properly. If he wanted to reform Judaism, he should have solicited community support like other prophets. If he was emerging as the religious leader of a non-Jewish community, our difficulties increase.

Superficially, Christianity emerged as the majority of Jews rejected Jesus and his Gentile followers went their own way. Yet this cannot explain the determined support he received from rich Jewish families at critical junctures. We also do not know if Jesus was truly the leader of this nascent sect, or just the public face of an organisation whose mission eludes us.

Some scholars say John the Baptist was the charismatic leader of the era. Leonardo da Vinci belonged to a secret society that revered John; he is believed to have faked the Turin Shroud to depict a man beheaded, not crucified. This society (the church denies the Priory of Sion exists) believes Jesus was a junior who appropriated the legacy of John; others think Mary was the real leader. We do not know if Mary was present at the Last Supper, but Leonardo's classic shows a woman seated next to Christ, unless one Apostle was a feminine-looking cross-dresser. However, if Jesus was not the leader of this group, the mystery of the creation of the Roman church deepens.

More seriously, the Gospel of Judas removes the fig-leaf by which Christianity justified its anti-Semitic bias for two millennia. Anti-Semitism led to the Inquisition, which coexisted with the Renaissance and Enlightenment, reaching even India; it is unlikely to disappear with the moral resurrection of Judas.

Pope Benedict XVI owes the international community an explanation for this crude racism rooted in Christian theology since St. Peter; he must open the archives and reveal the truth. As the Vatican is a member state of the United Nations, Mr Kofi Annan should take up the matter of its crimes against humanity with the same urgency as he espoused the cause of an Afghan convert to Christianity.

Conversions bring us to what I call the Christian Conundrum. Christianity pressurizes peoples to renounce their natal faith, but while negating the old civilizational experience fails to present a meaningful spiritual alternative. Hence, many Christians feel a vacuum in their lives. The authentic doctrine of Christ is unknown; at least fifty gospels existed in the early centuries, each rooted in a Judaeo-Pagan environment.

Then, in the world's first grand experiment with a totalitarian ideology, a group of church fathers notarized the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, as official (canonical). They declared all other texts heretical and attempted to destroy them and their adherents. The Gospel of Judas did not suit their political purposes; it was condemned by Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons (180 CE), as the work of a sect which revered the biblical murderer Cain, the Sodomites, and Judas, believed to be a keeper of secret mysteries.

The impugned Gospel suggests the disciples were seeking a temporal kingdom of the Messiah; that Judas followed Jesus' instructions to have him arrested; and that they probably hoped for a public uprising that would place Jesus on the throne. This validates the view that the kingdom Jesus sought was an earthly one, and that his core mission was political. Perhaps he did hail from the clan of King David, as some early literature suggests.

Some scholars say Judas helped Jesus to die on the cross so he could fulfill his theological obligations. However, such a remote-controlled religious suicide seems a bizarre way to establish the Kingdom of God on earth. It is more likely that a guerilla action was foiled, with devastating consequences for the conspirators, the bitterness of which engendered the Jewish-Gentile divide that dogged the Jews for two millennia wherever Christianity spread?

According to some accounts, after betraying Jesus for thirty pieces of silver, Judas felt guilt-stricken and committed suicide two days later. However, silver pieces had been discontinued some centuries previously. According to Matthew (Acts 1:18), Judas bought a field with his money, called the "Field of Blood" because his guts burst open there. It seems likely that Judas was murdered, either as revenge for the death of Christ, or to cloak a deeper conspiracy.

It is pertinent that bloodshed has always accompanied the march of the church. Despite this, in an era when heresy-hunting made dissent a suicidal pursuit, the Gospel of Judas was preserved by people with a commitment to truth. The Vatican should explain the political reasons for expunging all but four gospels from the public domain. It should also, like the former Soviet Republics, open its archives to international public scrutiny.

Conversion not a personal matter

Defying conventional wisdom, I find myself in sympathy with the rage of Afghanistan's orthodox clergy at the Karzai regime's succumbing to Western pressure and literally smuggling a Christian convert out of the country, when he was supposed to be under investigation for apostasy. Coming as this does soon after the Dutch cartoons lampooning Prophet Mohammad, the incident must have enhanced the psychological unease in the Islamic world about the motivations of the Christian West.

The matter has serious implications for Islam and other non-Christian civilisations, and deserves dispassionate analysis. The accused, Abdul Rahman, converted to Christianity 16 years ago while employed by an international Christian agency helping Afghan refugees in Peshawar, Pakistan. This means that as in tsunami-hit Indonesia, Christian missionaries disguised as aid workers are active even in 'friendly' Islamic countries.

Rahman worked for four years in Pakistan, before moving to Germany, where he lived for nine years. On returning to Afghanistan in 2002, he tried to secure custody of his two teenage daughters from his own parents, who refused on account of his changed religion and called the police, resulting in the recent prosecution. Significantly, just before the Taliban regime fell in 2001, it had imprisoned eight Western aid workers for trying to convert Afghans. The concerned NGOs vehemently denied the accusations, but after the workers were rescued by US troops, many admitted the proselytisation charge.

Rahman's prosecution under the post-Taliban constitution brought the wrath of the supposedly secular Christian world upon the government of President Hamid Karzai, proving my contention that secularism is a twin-god of Christianity, a mask to promote the Christian agenda while denying similar freedom to other faiths. So, led by the Vatican and the United States, howls of protest arose from France, Italy, Germany, Britain, Australia, Canada, Sweden, Austria, even NATO (a Western military bloc) and the West-dominated United Nations. Surely the separation of religion and State calls for restraint in promoting the cause of conversion, especially as this entails a nasty determination to eliminate other faiths and impose dominion on other peoples.

But such niceties from never inhibited the West from actively funding conversions with a clear political agenda. Conversion, as East Timor proves, superimposes the economic and political goals of the proselytising nation upon the interests and aspirations of the converted. East Timor's secession from Indonesia gave Australia a free run of the formers' oil reserves; the Afghan narcotics trade currently stands at $2.8 billion.

To return to Rahman, the Karzai regime crumbled quickly. At first the prosecution was halted on the ground that the accused was mentally unstable; he was released for medical scrutiny, and hastily smuggled to Italy, where he received political asylum. The Afghan ulema's impotent rage is symptomatic of modern Islam's sterility in facing the West's imperialistic designs on its terrain. Islam would do well to put its house in order and denounce the jihadi mercenaries serving the geo-strategic goals of the West.

The Indian view on conversions is akin to that of Islam (minus the death penalty for apostasy). As per the lived experience of human societies all over the world, dharma or religion has never been a matter of individual choice. Dharma is primarily and intrinsically integral to family, clan, social and cultural inheritance. All human beings are born into a spiritual tradition and initiated into its customs, philosophy, tenets and taboos from an early age, just as they are given appropriate education or skills by their natal families.

Normally, a person does not choose his dharma in the manner in which he chooses a political party or association on reaching adulthood. Like family name or clan (jati, gotra) identity, the spiritual and cultural heritage is a natal legacy. It can be renounced, like material wealth; but the norm is to pass it on to future generations as a birthright. Every individual, family and social group has the right and duty to revere and protect this legacy and demand it be respected by other human beings and groups. This is a foundational right of society, and the Supreme Court's decision upholding conversion by one spouse to another faith as a legitimate ground for divorce, affirms it. This is logical, because far from being a personal matter, dharma permeates all aspects of life intimately.

Western propaganda that religion is a matter of individual choice is actually a legal subterfuge to checkmate opposition as Christianity undermines rival faiths and "harvests souls" in order to takeover targetted communities and nations. That is why the issue of freedom of religion is couched mainly in pro-missionary terms, as a one-sided right to force the Bible down the throats of pre-selected human targets. To my mind, proselytisation is a grotesque form of psychological and spiritual (often even physical) violence and an abuse of human rights because it denies the targetted community or individual the agency to uphold as meritorious and intrinsically valuable an extant civilisational ethos, with its accompanying gods, morals, ethics, culture and traditions that have been practiced for centuries.

In a world order that claims to be post-colonial, there can be no justification for such invasive appropriation of the ethical agency of other peoples. Evangelism violates the basic premise of equality of all religions, and the United Nations would do well to consider the critical question whether all religions have a right to exist, particularly in the core homelands in which they were born, and in lands where they are currently the principal creed.

Linked to this is the question whether a particular monotheistic faith, one that alone is represented at the United Nations as a State power, enjoys special immunity to insult and annihilate other faiths in their own space. Far from siding with the Christian West, should not the United Nations take action to protect other faiths and cultures from the terrible depredations of this imperialistic political culture?

Evangelical traditions cannot be allowed the license to deny respect and honour to the god(s) and spiritual eminences of a community being targetted for conversion. Indeed, this cussed approach to proselytisation must be viewed as a form of totalitarianism, of mental and psychological subversion of the individual and community. The utterly vulgar call for "harvesting souls" should be designated as a form of immoral human trafficking because the moral autonomy of the community and individual is denied; both are degraded, and hence a crime committed against humanity. Muslim scholars and activists opposed to organised religious conversion, as distinct from an individual personally seeking out another faith, may find the Global Congress on "World Religions after September 11" (Montreal, September 11-15, 2006) an appropriate forum to debate these issues.

A post-colonial world order cannot justify such invasive appropriation of the ethical agency of others, unless we are now witnessing a new imperial order. Non-Christian nations would do well to join hands and petition the United Nations General Assembly for sanctions against organised evangelism in vulnerable communities.

Several member-States have experienced the misuse of charity and aid for promoting conversions, and now even developed societies like Japan are realising the damage done to the native ethos and national culture by mindless imitation of Western mores and adoption of Christian ritual and symbols in their wedding ceremonies. Maybe it is time to demand reparations for the social, psychological and cultural harm done by evangelical imperialists.

The judicial grandstand

Two deplorable tendencies have of late manifested themselves in the Indian legal system. The first is a nonchalance which gives the rich and powerful unfettered freedom to tamper with evidence and purchase or intimidate witnesses in criminal offences involving themselves, without even the formality of asking witnesses if they need protection, or wish to report being intimidated, or offered inducements. The second is a propensity to adjust due process in favour of kangaroo courts run by ideologically and politically motivated NGOs and their media accessories in cases where verdicts do not meet the latter's expectations. Two glaring examples concern Ms Zaheera Sheikh and the late Ms Jessica Lall.

While the media is pleased with the punishment meted out to Zaheera and is now crusading for the murdered Jessica, there is profound disquiet in society over the manner in which the courts treated a young victim of the Gujarat riots. The fact that even senior jurists have expressed reservations over the quantum of punishment meted out to her makes it worthwhile to examine if the suo moto response of the higher judiciary and statutory commissions to the media-NGO nexus serves or compromises justice.

Zaheera's case has been accompanied by propaganda that the jury system is better than the system whereby a presiding judge carefully sifts the evidence on record, and after hearing the arguments of counsel on both sides, arrives at a verdict. This allows for judicial objectivity, and judges with a developed sense of justice have often corrected investigating officers to prevent derailment of justice. The jury system is prone to manipulation (of emotion, if nothing else) and was abolished after a high profile murder case involving a naval officer.

A legal system that does not protect witnesses can hardly guarantee the integrity of members of the jury, most of whom will doubtless be chosen from the ranks of the very NGOs and secular gendarmes who are canvassing for this system in the first place. In other words, the "beautiful people" of Page Three, the ones who made a mockery of the life and death of Jessica Lall, will outsource justice to themselves.

To return to Zaheera, I am concerned about the apparent judicial haste and predisposition, and the disgraceful media coverage which has concealed many relevant issues and inhibited a healthy public debate. The key questions are when Zaheera told her first lie; who decides which testimony is genuine, which is induced and by whom; and who decides which crime shall be punished and which offence shall be ignored?

Twenty two persons were acquitted in the Vadodara fast track court when Zaheera failed to recognise them as those who set fire to the Best Bakery. The case would have gone the way of the 1984 and other riot cases had Zaheera not been airlifted to Mumbai and her dramatic testimony about being "threatened" stage-managed. Obviously, the Sheikh family was contacted by interested parties after the Vadodara verdict, and some kind of mutual "understanding" arrived at before the tickets for Mumbai were purchased. Thereafter the young girl was projected as star witness in a larger struggle to demolish Chief Minister Narendra Modi.

The derailment of justice began when the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) responded to media reports, but failed to do its homework properly. So, acting on an unsigned affidavit (this point needs to be emphasised) furnished by Ms Teesta Setalvad on Zaheera's behalf, the NHRC urged the Supreme Court to order retrial outside Mumbai. The apex court went along, again without scrutinising documents, and thus established an amazing precedent on utterly faulty premises. Zaheera termed it "pamphlet- baazi".

Assuming Zaheera was intimidated in Vadodara, it is strange she was not given police protection in Mumbai, and was left to the mercy of her new NGO friends. Since high-profile NGOs always have a political agenda, the authorities must explain how the security of witnesses in sensitive cases can be outsourced in this manner.

Then, in her second volte face, Zaheera accused Ms Setalvad of tutoring her to recognise persons from photographs. This is a startling disclosure and the failure to investigate it unfortunate; we have a right to know what agencies provided photographs of accused persons to NGOs controlling witnesses. Zaheera also accused her mentor of making millions in her name and not fulfilling promises made to her. This led the media to allege that Zaheera "sold" her Mumbai testimony to a BJP legislator, and the courts seem to have gone along with this perception. Yet it is well known that many NGOs enriched themselves after the riots and failed to pass on commensurate benefits to the victims; hence there should have been an across-the-board examination of accounts of such NGOs, and recording of evidence of victims on the nature of their rehabilitation?

But last April, when Zaheera demanded that the Supreme Court Registrar-General probe her allegations against Begum Teesta, because it was not Zaheera's personal conduct but the "alleged offer of inducements, the manner of inducements and the persons responsible for the inducements" that should be investigated, her objections were disregarded. Common sense says that something made Zaheera accompany an unknown Ms Setalvad to Mumbai. If it was greed for funds gathered in the name of Gujarat victims, did the money in Zaheera's bank accounts fall short of her demands, and who helped open her new bank accounts? The Supreme Court Registrar General was assisted by a Joint Commissioner of Police, but failed to furnish evidence to prove his insinuation that Zaheera received funds from a politically incorrect source. Thus the question of what made Zaheera turn against her Mumbai hosts remains a mystery, but her revolt was crushed with a sledgehammer.

Zaheera may be demoralised today, but she once demanded the right to cross-examine the NHRC chairman because she had visited the Commission with Ms Setalvad and made an oral submission which was recorded by him and two other members. Zaheera alleged that her oral testimony differed from the record NHRC placed before the Supreme Court. This is a serious charge and the nation needs to be reassured that such a sensational "hijack" of justice does not happen again. Zaheera has exposed major holes the ethical roofing of statutory commissions that play to an international human rights gallery, and the Hindu-baiting media-NGO nexus. In the circumstances, her demand for a parallel probe into Ms Setalvad's post-Gujarat assets remains pertinent.

As for poor Jessica, after seven years of connivance by police, politicians, media (which quickly reinstated the goons in whose illegal bar the shooting occurred to the Page Three celebrity platform), and a somnolent judiciary, the only surprise is that we were not told that her murder was a figment of the imagination. After the cynical manner in which the accused in the BMW murder case was allowed to fly abroad for higher studies and the case virtually dropped thereafter, there was no reason to believe that Jessica's killer and his accomplices would not get away. But the monstrous verdict broke the bonds of public apathy, and the market-savvy media ditched the hounds to hunt with the hares. It is left to the judiciary to explain why laws on evidence, material witnesses, and perjury (applicable to Zaheera), were not invoked, and why the judge was elevated with such haste to the High Court.

Sunset in Sacramento

The apparently acceptable Indo-US nuclear deal may have caused satisfaction to South Block and the State Department, but America's Hindu community is feeling psychologically beleaguered as old Hindu-baiters from both countries gang up to abort a necessary correction of school textbooks in California. As the issue has a bearing on the self-esteem of Hindu Americans, besides relating to the integrity of Hindu civilisation and its correct depiction, I am surprised that the BJP, which initiated the tilt towards Washington and also undertook the revision of history textbooks while in power, did not so much as whisper its concern to the visiting President George Bush.

Neither Prime Minister Manmohan Singh nor UPA supremo Sonia Gandhi can be expected to be sympathetic to Hindu concerns in either country. Ms Gandhi has overseen the placement of old party favourites in educational and cultural institutions and the restitution of a rendering of Indian history that fails to instill national pride in the student. We are thus faced with the old colonial reconstruction of Indian history, which diminishes the fabulous achievements of Hindu civilisation and the unity of its social constituents, and deconstructs it into a disparate mosaic whose different components do not amount to a cultural coherence.

America's Hindu community has long borne the burden of a humiliating and incorrect depiction of Hindu religion and culture; parents have faced young children saying they are ashamed to be Hindus. This motivated parents in Fairfax County to seek removal of distorted passages in textbooks, and California Hindus followed suit when the due process for revision of textbooks began last year.

Unfortunately, unlike Islam and Judaism, America's Hindus lack political clout. Hence they were hopelessly out-manoeuvred by professional Hindu-haters led by Prof Michael Witzel of the Harvard Sanskrit Department. As Harvard University ignored protests that Herr Witzel was misusing the varsity letterhead to pursue a political agenda, Hindus should settle scores by forcing closure of the Sanskrit Department by ensuring that the professor gets no students for two successive terms. Hindus should also reconsider support to Senators like Bobby Jindal, who have renounced and denounced the faith in which they were born in order to pursue political ambitions, but are insensitive to the concerns of those who elect them. Indian-origin fundraisers for any politician should also be made to understand that they cannot get something for nothing.

Like Jews and Muslims, Hindus only wanted the textbooks to portray their religion and history fairly and accurately. They diligently followed the due process and got several changes approved in this manner. Sadly, the California school board allowed this process to be hijacked by Herr Witzel, who claimed to be a religious scholar, though he is a non-Hindu, a known Hindu-baiter, and proponent of the discredited Aryan Invasion Theory. The Witzel intervention was both illegal and untenable, and could not have been possible without backroom manipulation of the state board of education (SBE); Hindus owe it to future generations to bring out the truth through a good courtroom battle.

The California SBE gave undue advantage to Herr Witzel when it should not have entertained him at all, especially after he said he was acting on an anonymous complaint from a non-existent Arun Vajpayee. Yet Witzel and his collaborator Steve Farmer immediately launched a high-decibel political campaign against the Hindu community's proposed corrections, claiming these were motivated by "Hindu nationalism" (whatever that means) and getting bodies like the Federation of Indian Leftists (FOIL) to enter the fray. They alleged that American Hindu families seeking textbook revisions had links with the post-Godhra Gujarat mobs!

It is unforgivable that the school board deferred to such a shocking defamation of the Hindu American community in California, and a good attorney should be hired for a class action suit. Even more astonishing is the fact that the SBE set up a curriculum review panel (CRP) comprising Witzel, Stanley Wolpert (who signed Witzel's appeal to SBE - so much for objectivity), and a hired Prof James Heitzman. This CRP rejected 58 changes approved by CBE-appointed expert Prof Shiva Bajpai, and labeled him a "Hindutva apologist;" Hindu Americans learnt of the existence of the CRP much later. It is significant that the changes sought by other religious groups were accepted in toto, without being subjected to other-community review and endorsement, and this reflects a religio-cultural bias against Hindus which the dominant Christian monotheists of America need to admit.

Worse, the defamation and untruths do not end here. Last December, a Kansas University Professor of Religious Studies, Paul Mirecki, who enraged Christian bigots by lampooning the Biblical version of Creation, was beaten up; he told police that the men who beat him made references to his controversial statements in this regard. Yet in an article in a leading magazine in India, Witzel and Romila Thapar concealed the truth and insinuated that the professor was beaten by so-called Hindu fundamentalists. They further alleged that death threats were made to some of their gang.

Yet Witzel and Thapar erode their already dubious academic credibility by claiming that NASA and ISRO satellite imagery of ancient riverbeds along the famed route of the Saraswati do not prove the existence of the river in Vedic times. More embarrassingly for the California board, they admit the textbooks contain many passages that are "very culturally biased and insensitive". Indeed, they assert that the authors of the impugned textbooks lack the knowledge and qualifications for the task, and suggest dumping both textbooks and authors and hiring so-called international scholars from The Academic Indology Advisory Council¸ which they have set up with fellow travellers.

Surely the next step will be political lobbying on Capitol Hill to ensure that these self-accredited anti-Hindu academics become the sole contractors for writing Hindu religion and history! Witzel-Thapar want to launch an academic license-permit raj in the Free World, to teach the erstwhile natives their place.

In the circumstances, the Hindu Education Foundation (HEF) has done well to continue the struggle. Besides violating due process, the SBE failed to consider over 300 errors identified by the Vedic Foundation (VF). Alleging bias, VF plans to pursue matters with an independent panel of specialist Hindu scholars within US academia. It points out that the interpretation of Hindu dharma in the impugned books is at variance with the way Hindus understand and practice their faith, a fact which cannot be treated lightly.

Why, for instance, should devout Hindus accept that their children be taught that "Hindus worship talking monkeys and throw widows into fires". Why should the primordial stories in Hindu scriptures be branded as 'myths' when the scriptures of monotheistic traditions are said to come from Only One (mutually exclusive) God(s)? Most dishonest is the politically motivated attempt to project social evils like untouchability and rigid caste divisions upon India's ancient civilisation, when both are products of the medieval encounter with Islam. Is there a link between these biases and the US Administration's current interest in women and Dalit (mostly Christian converts) rights?

Despite protests, the California SBE genuflected before antagonistic scholars. Hindus in India and America would do well to ponder why Islamic countries consistently stay aloof from the writing of Hindu or Indian history, including that of the medieval period, and all intellectual colonialism, whether of the capitalist or communist variety, has back-linkages with the West.

Communal catechism

An unmistakable aspect of the controversy over the Danish cartoons caricaturing Prophet Mohammad is that the Christian West has been quick to give it a strong political and economic dimension, while the worldwide Islamic community perceives the matter as a religious insult motivated by political deceit. This, I believe, is the crux of the matter.

The freedom of expression invoked by the all-pervasive Western media is bogus. The cartoons were a deliberate attempt to inflame the volatile and defensive Muslim community across the globe, to justify a crackdown against it on the European continent, which the Western Christian community regards as its heartland, because the early communities of the Gulf-born faith grew in Rome and had their earliest victories there.

Today, the Islamic and Western civilisations are locked in a deadly embrace; hating and fearing each other, they are seeking political power over the same landmasses, viz., the Gulf, Europe, and by extension, the Christian continents of America and Australia. Regardless of the strength and status of Muslim and Christian communities outside this terrain, this is the critical battlefield, which is why I maintain that Hindu India and Indian Muslims should stay aloof from this seething cauldron. Allow me to explain.

Islam is the dominant religion and culture in the Gulf, which is also its natal basin, but most regimes are politically subordinate to America. Those opposing Western domination are fighting for survival. Yet in Europe, Islam is a seamless demographic and cultural invasion. This is partly true of Australia, though in America the faith currently keeps a low social profile.

Islam is united, coherent, and numerically significant; Europe's fond belief that poor Muslim immigrants would perennially serve as cheap labour has shattered; Islam is a political challenge and Europe is culturally and economically vulnerable. Islamic ascendancy in Europe would instantly negate Washington's geo-strategic plans and world hegemony.

Worse, Europe is on the defensive; its duplicitous manoeuvres have played themselves out. In the aftermath of the Second World War, it set up the Vatican as an independent Christian nation and admitted it into the United Nations; it is an open secret that the Vatican served as a major funnelling agency for Western-American interventions in the Soviet bloc during the Cold War.

But this awesome political face of Christianity was camouflaged behind a new god called Secularism, which deemed religion illegitimate in public life. Accordingly, the West devoted five decades to brainwash the world regarding the irrationality of faith, a claim rejected by Islam, while the Marshall Plan-induced prosperity pushed its own people into a hedonist spiral in which collective good was subordinated to individual whim.

Throughout Western civilisation's cultural crisis, its core institutions and economic and political elites in Europe and America remained Christian. The common commitment to Christianity, capitalism and the (carefully controlled) free market is why Europe accepted American supremacy over the Western world, and likewise made charity and evangelisation instruments of foreign policy.

But the West was unable to convey this duplicity to its own people, who are de-motivated in the inevitable conflict with Islam for cultural and religious supremacy in Europe. What is at stake, therefore, is territory, the geo-political landscape of the white Christian people. And the threat is not confined to Europe; it is a matter of time before it surfaces in the US, because neither Islam nor Christianity believes in peaceful coexistence.

Islam and Christianity realise that land and people are held together, not so much by ethnicity, as by affiliation to a common religion and way of life. Christianity spread because the early apostles turned their gaze away from the ethnicity-bound Jews, and Islam quickly outgrew its Arab origins. Both religions retain an abiding commitment to conquest by conversion, and do not hesitate to operate on each other's turf.

While most of Christianity's modern successes have been in Buddhist and other non-Muslim lands, Islam has made major inroads in white societies by conversion, immigration, and steeper birth rates. Europe's Muslim population is no longer quiescent, and the host societies are feeling the strain. Europe wants to stop the influx of more Muslims, and somehow expel those already inside. In short, it needs an excuse to light a ready torch.

Islam understands the importance of political power for controlling and guiding the community of believers. The Prophet exercised political dominion over the faithful, and three of the four Pious Caliphs who succeeded him were assassinated due to disputes relating to power and succession. Since then, there has always been a strain between the sovereign and the imam in both Shia and Sunni Islam, but today, I believe, there is a broad understanding between Sunni Islam under the Saudi king, Shia Islam led by Iran, and the orthodox clergy of both sects.

This is because they are struggling both for genuine political autonomy of the Islamic nations in the Gulf region where Islam was born, and to retain a foothold in Europe to counter the pressure from Western civilisation.

The West needs political and economic domination of the oil-rich Gulf to maintain its world hegemony and standards of living. But decades of easy living have softened its people and placed the entire burden of defending Western Christianity on the shoulders of the United States, which also fears physical engagements. That Europe has no stomach for battle can be seen from Denmark's hysterical reaction to the boycott of Danish goods in the Arab world, in protest against the cartoons.

The European Union and the United States also condemned the boycott, which has cost the Danes millions of dollars. Surely it is ridiculous to expect Islam to pay for the Christian world's desire to blaspheme the Prophet? Yet the West denounces the violent protests against Danish embassies in some countries and equally reviles the boycott of foreign goods!

Interestingly, in India, some secular (read anti-Hindu) Muslim intellectuals have also criticised the entirely peaceful and democratic method of protest through boycott, and this raises suspicions that a section of the community may be willing to play into Western hands in a conflict that is certain to be bloody and prolonged. I am concerned because, until last Friday, all protests by Indian Muslims in cities like Srinagar and Bhopal were non-violent. In Delhi, the Shahi Imam of Jama Masjid used the occasion to condemn MF Hussain's vulgar painting of Bharat Mata and thereby showed sensitivity to Hindu sentiments.

Now, other forces seem to have got into the act. In Congress-ruled Andhra Pradesh, the Friday prayers suddenly turned violent in Hyderabad city, with protesters hell-bent upon damaging shops in a manner that could create communal ill-will. Simultaneously, an Uttar Pradesh minister placed a Rs 51 crore bounty on the heads of the foreign cartoonists, which Muslim clergy in the city were quick to condemn.

This set Hindu secularists against orthodox Islam for the first time in recent memory, which lends credence to my suspicion that Secularism is intrinsically pro-Christian. Ms Sonia Gandhi has refused to speak her mind on the cartoons, but is pushing a divisive minority-pampering policy through the UPA. She has said Indian Muslims are Congress' "natural allies;" are Hindus enemies? It will be interesting to see if Indian Muslims agree, at the behest of a European Christian, to tease Hindus and force India to join the battle for Europe against Islam.


Engage, don't enrage, Islam

Powerful Western rhetoric notwithstanding, political Islam is not a stateless entity with mindless hatred for non-Muslim societies. The sub-text of the Saudi monarch's recent visit to India suggests that the keeper of Islam's two holiest shrines may be steering his country away from the sterile Wahabi Islam that has given his faith a bad name the world over.

More significantly, King Abdullah may have realised that while Islam is the only major religion standing openly in the international public arena (others having retreated under pressure of a new Christian god called secularism), it is therefore as vulnerable to attack as the pillars of Mina. Among colonised peoples of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Muslims have suffered the worst humiliation, with puppet regimes hoisted upon imposed borders, in service of Western economic and strategic interests. When leaders like Saddam Hussain and the Iranian Ayatollahs tried to challenge this covert imperialism, they fell foul of the old colonial-corporate mullahs.

The quiet dignity with which the King avoided the politically dicey (for him) visit to Rajghat eclipsed many significant acts of omission and commission. No Hurriyat leader camped in Delhi to apprise the Saudi royal of the sufferings of the Kashmiri people (read Muslims). In fact, seditious Kashmiris surface only at the bidding of Pakistani, American and British leaders, and this should make it evident that far from being an Indo-Pak dispute, Kashmir is a legacy of colonialism.

Refuse to entertain Britain and America, and the problem will resolve itself. The contrived controversy over Saudi aid to restore Jama Masjid fizzled out, and I think that more than deft handling by the MEA, it was the Saudi embassy that spoke a few quiet words of wisdom to Indian co-religionists. Thus, the richest and most eminent Muslim monarch came, and Indian Muslims had nothing to whine about to him!

More astounding is King Abdullah's statement that India is his second home. Can Al-Hind be Dar-ul Islam? This was no polite noise, but Indian analysts missed its significance. I think the King has protected Islam's flanks in the emerging third crusade with political Christianity, and has quietly intervened in the Western strategy of inciting Islamic groups to bleed a predominantly Hindu India (via Pakistan and ISI-controlled Bangladesh), while western military-economic machines trample over Muslim lands.

If India is 'home' to the guardian of Islam's holiest shrines, it means India is being invited not to join the crusade against Islam, and Islamic nations are being given the signal to stay focused against political Christianity and its menacing presence in the Muslim world.

I say this because for the first time since the end of the second World War, a major controversy concerning Islam, in the form of insulting cartoons published by Danish newspaper Jyllands Posten in September 2005, has not led to violence in India.

Having grown up hearing the excuse that Muslim grievances over Palestine caused this or that violent incident; having witnessed India being made the site of sponsored Muslim rage over The Satanic Verses, which then spread to other parts of the globe, the present situation is unprecedented. The cartoons led several Muslim nations to recall their envoys from Denmark, while a boycott of Danish goods provoked sharp rebuke from the European Union, which is surely a political ex-pression of support for the offensive caricatures of Prophet Mohammad.

The cartoons were an intentional act of religious disrespect by political Christianity, comprising the socio-economic-political elites of Europe and America. The culture editor of Jyllands Posten let the cat out of the bag saying the critical issue was the integration of immigrant Muslims and Islam's compatibility with modern secular society. This simply means that Muslims living in white Christian lands must discard their Islamic identities and conform to a Christian ethos; Pope Benedict XVI has sought conversion of European Muslims to Christianity.

Secularism is Christianity's schizophrenic twin; it enables Christian powers to pretend religious indifference while pushing their political agendas in non-Christian societies. Just as the separation of church and state in the past created Western political and intellectual elites who could more successfully execute the Christian quest for world dominion, so the ideology of secularism served to delegitimise the native traditions of non-Christian countries. That is why West-promoted secular elites in politics and academics have been so consistently hostile to India's Hindu ethos. Secularism does not mean neutrality towards religion, but involves active hatred of traditions that could blockade Christian political, economic and intellectual supremacy.

Conversions are necessary to procure greater subservience of the natives. This is the reason why all so-called secular Christian nations have a budget for overseas evangelism, which is nothing but an offensive intrusion in the internal affairs of non-Christian cultures. In India, secularism ridiculed Hindu anxiety over missionary activity and promoted Muslim separatism through personal laws that gave the most obscurantist elements power over the entire community.

The cartoon controversy was deliberately aggravated by a Norwegian Christian magazine which republished them last month; one showed the Prophet wearing a bomb-shaped turban. When Muslims objected, a united Europe republished the cartoons simultaneously on February 1, 2006, which is a powerful political snub. Moreover, the timing coincides with the Euro-American assault on Iran's nuclear programme. Interestingly, Salman Rushdie received a staggering advance to demonize Ayatollah Khomeini for deposing the darling of American oil companies. Rushdie went further and distastefully placed women named after the Prophet's wives in a brothel.

I sincerely hope pious Indian Muslims will now understand the Hindu sense of hurt at MF Hussain's hate-filled depictions of Hindu goddesses (secular Muslims are shameless hypocrites). They should also gracefully accept the judicious rules of coexistence that sanatan dharma places upon all social beings.

The genesis of the predominantly American initiative to corner Iran reportedly lies in President Ahmadinejad's plans to open an oil bourse based on the euro rather than the dollar, and Israeli intelligence's belief that by March 2006, Iran would reach the "point of no return" in terms of technical expertise to enrich uranium in quantities needed to build a nuclear warhead. Before he fell sick, prime minister Ariel Sharon had asked his forces to prepare for possible strikes on secret uranium enrichment sites in Iran.

Israel's eagerness for diplomatic relations with Pakistan, mother lode of nomadic terrorism, is part of a Western strategy to contain proud Islamic nations that seek agency for their people. Yet larger forces may compel President Musharraf to stand by his co-religionists.

Mr Ahmadinejad's defiance in the face of referral to the Security Council raises suspicions of covert support from powerful Islamic countries and at least one major regional power. The international community must be vigilant against a Euro-American conspiracy to destroy the political dignity, financial viability and military might of oil-rich Islam.

Eminent Americans like Mr Robert M Bowman, former director of the US Star Wars space defence programme, believe that the manner in which the Twin Towers in New York fell indicates synergy between mercenary jihadis and domestic political terrorists, as the buildings could not have collapsed upon themselves unless explosives had been placed at strategic places and set off simultaneously via remote control. If there is an iota of truth in this assessment, the world has a duty to ask if the Euro-American crusade against Islam should be dignified by international consent.

Yogi and the desi commissar

Marx is dead, I'm not too well, and God, by god, is alive and kicking! Heaven help us, for the heavens have fallen upon our humble heads. Refugee commissars of an aborted Soviet Eden, hoping against hope to share the fruits of the October Revolution with the world's only twice-born nation, we have been ground to dust by rabble roused by a saffron-clad half-naked fakir.

Father Marx, your dialectic has crumbled before the spiritual materialism of a humble sadhu. This son of a poor Haryana farmer is guilty of one of India's million mutinies. Born Ram Kishen, paralysed at the age of two-plus, he was admitted to the gurukul of one Swami Baldev at the age of four, and decided then itself to be a swami. It's not fair; how could Hindus permit a poor little boy to breach the caste hierarchy?

At least we know why no one trusts Brahmins - they always break the rules. This Ram Kishen (he now calls himself Swami Ramdev and bewitches Hindus with his yogic powers by rolling his one good eye), was taught the holy scriptures, including Patanjali's sacred asthanga yoga. Daily he preaches the Hindu way of a healthy life before incredulous multitudes in colloquial Hindi and a smattering of English. Great Commissar, you can see that under the guise of Ayurveda, this yogi is peddling a potent cocktail of Hindu-Hindi-Hindustan, which we have had such a hard time squashing from the time of Bharatendu Harishchandra.

Dear Karl, we realised that if we did not respond with our own Molotovs, we would never again see a Red Star in the East. Our desi commissar Brinda Karat picked up the gauntlet by despatching medicines from the guru's pharmacy to the Union Health Minister.

Unfortunately, he proved a duplicitous bourgeois, possibly an admirer of the Baba. So while our family-owned television channel showed large pieces of animal and human material found in the samples, Doordarshan quoted contradictory findings from two separate laboratories, and the Minister said he did not know where our samples came from. What cheek, when we are supporting this Government to keep the brotherhood of saffron at bay.

We need Engles to intercede with the Angels. The Minister passed the buck to the Chief Minister of Uttaranchal, a wily Brahmin even by the standards of that cunning caste. He flushed our hopes down the cold waters of the Gangotri, which is partial of this Ramdev, because he once lived in its caves. I tell you, nepotism is built into the landscape of India!

The situation is hopeless. For 15 years we earned public odium for supporting that Bihari cowherd; we remained loyal even after he lost support of both nar and Narayan. He repaid us by ridiculing the dictatorship of the proletariat and its bhadralok vanguard, and prostrating himself before that sweaty sanyasi.

Even before the saffron party could feel the pulse of the people (remember their wimpish response to the arrest of Kanchi Acharya?), the Yadav cowboy started shouting about "indigenous causes" and "foreign multinationals." Doesn't he know the Communist Party is one of the great multinational corporations? And we are doing so well in India - our real estate rivals the evangelical churches.

But the cowboy hit us bad, telling those idiotic television reporters that so long as herbal medicines added life to one's years (it should be years to one's life, but you can see how naughty he is), it hardly mattered if they contained the bones of "manav ya danav" (human beings or devils). Where does that leave us? Comrades preaching vegetarianism are a blot on the Gulag archipelago.

Worse, the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh also jumped into the fray, saying the Baba is being victimised at the behest of multinational drug companies, to hurt the "swadeshi" concept of medicine, particularly the idea of yoga as a counter to the culture of imbibing pills for every ailment. Now swadeshi is simply Hindu (it can hardly mean Mecca or Rome), and yoga goes back to the Vedas, so you can see where Mulayam Singh Yadav is heading. It is said the yogi is his caste fellow; this could explain the behaviour of the Yadav twins.

It beats me that Hindu upper castes genuflect before this bairagi. They are the ones who guzzle the colas that Ramdev says are fit only to clean toilets. I must admit colas make economical cleaners, and Andhra farmers have proved they are cheap and effective pesticides. Actually, Ramdev has been smart to link us with cola multinationals -they have a bad product and a high public profile - and are easy to target. In fact, I think we made a mistake when we decided to pick a quarrel with Ramdev for the sake of a handful of retrenched workers in Haridwar, because the swami is a smart cookie and the dismissed workers are fools - they took us for a ride and we came off worst.

Look at the guts of a yogi who says he is willing to teach Comrade Karat pranayam, the Hindu science of breathing for a sound mind and body, and adds in the same breath that he is not a pushover like the Kanchi Shankaracharya. If only we had known this before; if only we could have foreseen that the storm that did not rise when the Shankaracharya was incarcerated would not abate when a smooth-talking fakir was at the receiving end.

You will wonder, Great Commissar, why the tsunami of public anger broke out for the latter, while God alone wept for the former. Since the dharma of both men is the same, I think the answer lies in their karmic responses to life's challenges - one is contemplative, the other combative.

But our real problem is that this swami is a mayavi, like his kinsman, Krishna. He spins his web around society gently, with yogic aerobics and loads of sweet talk, which he claims can cure all serious and even "incurable" diseases. His gullible admirers rush to buy his medicines on their own; he accuses us of links with foreign drug companies, and we are speechless.

Worse, in this era of intensified capitalism which is somehow called liberalisation, his programme boosts the TRPs of his host television channels and earns them fabulous revenues. The secular media is bourgeois, and ditches us for this reason. As for the Government media, it is a fact that all these good-for-nothing politicians line up at the ashram after dark for special life-enhancing medicaments. Haven't you noticed that the lifespan of a politician far exceeds the national average?

Sadly, the Ramdev episode has given a new lease of life to the hitherto dormant Hindu atma; Hindus will no longer be content to live as dhimmis in their own country. We chose the wrong target and attacked with the wrong weapon. With hindsight, it appears that a protective Hindu sentiment enveloped the yogi when that idiotic group, SIMI, told him to close shop because some Muslims were deriving medical benefits from the Hindu asanas. It did not help that a reputed Muslim classical singer derided the Astha channel, which Hindus revere, but was silent about Q TV. By the time our desi commissar jumped into the fray, the scales were already tilted against us.

Islam for Security Council

As the White House resorts to intellectual demagoguery to manipulate world opinion on Iran, Iraq, and the United Nations, some things need articulation. One is that despite the intensity with which a 'demonise Islam' project is being promoted worldwide, real engagement with the 'religion of peace' is being vehemently discouraged, thus promoting a peculiar impotence aimed at facilitating American unilateralism.

Even more disturbing is the way Washington is trying to browbeat the UN by withholding dues, and justifying the armed occupation of Iraq and intended action against Iran in language reminiscent of the despicable 'White Man's burden.' The artificial escalation of the Iran crisis suggests we are witnessing a drama scripted by the Bush administration's 'Dirty Tricks Department,' and given the denouement over Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, it will be a crying shame if the international community again permits America to indulge its lust for free oil.

UN reform is imperative to end its West-centric bias and make it more egalitarian, or at least more representative of world power equations. Ideally, the Security Council should be abolished and all issues decided by majority vote in the General Assembly. I view the Security Council as an oligarchy of Western (essentially Christian and imperialist) nations; Russia was included due to its emerging superpower status, but also as part of a policy of containment of Communism through engagement.

China made it to buttress the millennarian Communist 'religion' to which Jawaharlal Nehru wished to convert India. The fact that all permanent members of the Security Council are nuclear weapons states underlines its inegalitarian ethos.

The Security Council reflects the pro-Western balance of power after the Second World War. Its proposed expansion to accommodate the economic might of Japan and India is a ruse to accentuate its pro-Western tilt, and is hollow because of an intellectual failure to admit the necessity to politically engage Islam as a growing and assertive world force.

To be relevant and credible, the Security Council must acknowledge the burgeoning sentiment against the evangelical-cum-neo-colonial agenda of the dominant West, and offer other major religious groups a seat at the high table. To begin with, the General Assembly can either extend statehood status to all billion-strong religious groups, or terminate the special privileges of the Vatican.

India deserves recognition as representative of the worldwide billion-plus Hindu community, not as a Western dhimmi state. Among Islamic nations, Iran alone makes the grade. However startling this proposition may appear, it merits serious consideration. Radical Islam, a nomadic entity backed by several Islamic States, is a tangible threat to the non-Islamic world; giving it a political address could facilitate dialogue and accountability.

In fairness, it must be conceded that after European Jews, Muslims of the oil-rich Gulf have suffered grievously at the hands of the Christian West (only the forms of exploitation differ). The land was fractured arbitrarily and handed over to pro-Western potentates; that democracy was considered inconvenient can be seen from the coup that installed Reza Shah Pahlavi after Mossadeq tried to harness Iran's oil wealth for the benefit of the Persian people. Today the Iraqi people and Saddam Hussain are suffering for similar insolence.

The recent remarks of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad should be seen as an Islamic quest to engage the world more equally. Certainly the Holocaust happened, but Mr Ahmadinejad is within his rights to question why land for European Jewry was not found on the European mainland where they suffered centuries of brutal persecution long before the advent of Adolf Hitler. When the British Raj instigated Muslims to secede from India, they were not asked to move to the sands of Arabia.

More recently, when oil-rich East Timor was systematically converted to Christianity and instigated to secede from Indonesia (the religious demography changed from 12.2% Christians in 1900 to 91.4% in 1990), the Timoreans did not move to Bethlehem. Thereafter, White Australian companies grabbed the oil, and this can only aggravate the Muslim grievance with the modern world.

Mr Ahmadinejad senses that his country is going to be subjected to the crippling sanctions that killed millions of Iraqis; the secret uranium enrichment sites are as bogus as the Iraqi WMDs. Western analysts were long aware that America was lusting for a rapacious oil deal with Baghdad, on the lines of the 60-year deal that President FD Roosevelt sewed up with the Saudi royals in return for protecting their parasitical lifestyles in international hotspots. Now, with Saddam Hussain in custody and a Vichy-style regime in place, the Texan oil majors are having a ball.

Iran put itself on America's hit-list by deposing the Shah, but Washington could not contemplate physical action until public opinion had built up against the excesses of the mullahs. Now with the Iraq action sparking off Shia resurgence in the region, the situation has become volatile. Accordingly, the client state of Israel has been asked to prepare for a pre-emptive strike against Iran's allegedly secret uranium enrichment sites (The Sunday Times, December 11, 2005), and International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed El-Baradei has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

This is a thinly veiled bribe to vindicate the proposed US action against Iran. Anyone doubting the veracity of this statement has only to recall that the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded jointly to Bishop Carlos Felipe Ximenes Belo of East Timor, and secessionist leader Jose Ramos Horta. In 1998, the US Catholic Conference pressed for making "the promise of the 1996 Peace Prize a reality..."; in 2002, East Timor became independent. El-Baradei is already echoing the US view that the world is "losing patience" with Iran.

America's tragedy is that only Shia Iran, secure in the memory of its ancient Persian civilisation, medieval Islamic might and modern oil wealth, can mitigate the force of radical Islam. Shias sought to link the legitimate succession to the Prophet to his direct descendants and clan; this alone can give Islam stability and rootedness, and enforce limits upon it.

The Sunni denial of weightage to the blood tie gave Islam its fabulous appeal to nomadic adventurers, and made it a powerful ideological tool in the hands of mobile jihadi squads like Al Qaeda, which can be funded by rich and effete regimes like Saudi Arabia, but cannot be controlled by them. Even Gen. Musharraf needs protection from mujahideen who dislike his proximity to America.

Modern Israel is a compensation for Western racism, but serves as an outpost of Western imperialism. India should recall Israel's rush to establish ties with Pakistan, source of all terrorism in the subcontinent, and realise that it has no stakes in the survival of the Jewish state. Tel Aviv has cold-shouldered India's concerns, giving a clean chit to nuclear proliferator AQ Khan. In fact, President Musharraf's motorcades are reportedly equipped with signal-jammers to thwart remote controlled blasts, which have been secretly provided by Mossad at the instance of Uncle Sam.

New Delhi must realise that a nuclear Iran discomforts Israel; India's insecurity comes from a nuclear Pakistan, which continues to get the latest military hardware from America and Israel. Our salvation lies in recognising our Hindu identity and strenuously protecting it from evangelisation and infiltration. Whether or not the UPA leadership appreciates this, only a Hindu India can take its rightful place in the comity of nations.


At odds with the cross

Two indigenous groups with a lived history of centuries of civilisational amity are supposedly engaged in fratricidal conflict in Assam's Karbi Anglong district. To the bewilderment of the majority of Karbis and Dimasas, gangs of armed and hooded goons have been killing members of both tribes since late September, while sparking rumours that the other group is behind the killings.

The gangs carry modern weapons but hack their victims with the traditional dao, and their modus operandi does not conform to the usual forms of killing in the Northeast.

The general calm among the civilian population of both tribes, despite media hype over ethnic strife, led their leaders to believe that hidden forces are operating behind the scenes. A joint delegation of Karbi and Dimasa leaders visited the capital last month to apprise Home Minister Shivraj Patil of their suspicions that hostile elements are making mischief to seize sensitive territory.

Their concerns are central to any discussion on the nation's territorial integrity as there is an intimate relationship between land and faith. In the Indian experience, change of faith has resulted in change of national loyalty. The violent Tamil secessionist movement collapsed because the cultural unity of the Indic civilisation overcame colonialism's divisive Aryan-Dravidian legacy.

In contrast, regions where Islam became predominant seceded from the motherland. The eminent religious studies scholar Arvind Sharma feels Hindus should reject the British-imposed term "Partition," as the division was not a mutual decision of the concerned parties; rather some parts were instigated to walk away.

Secession did nothing for common citizens in Pakistan or Bangladesh, but it gave post-colonial Western imperialists a foothold in our part of the world. Worse, the footprint is getting larger, whether or not we admit it. The Twin Towers tragedy gave America the opportunity to secure bases in Afghanistan and Peshawar (Uncle Sam does not easily relinquish bases offered by docile democrats and dictators), and the Kashmir earthquake has brought it literally on our head. We can ignore this altered geo-strategic environment at our own peril.

Even today, the regions where the country faces secessionist threats are those where internationally-funded religious conversions and religion-based infiltrations are altering the demographic profile, a fact substantiated statistically by Census 2001. In the circumstances, the Union Home Minister would do well to heed the Karbi-Dimasa cry for help.

Both claim a proud and ancient Hindu lineage - Dimasas claim descent from the Mahabharata hero Bhima, while Karbis claim to be the offspring of Hanuman's brother Sugriva. In fact, Karbis believe they came to the Northeast in search of purthemi kungripi (Sita Mata) during the Treta yuga, and failed to return to Ayodhya; Dimasas hold that they migrated from Hastinapur (Delhi) via Himachal Pradesh and Cooch Bihar, and established a kingdom at Dimapur, which they ruled for four hundred years.

Both tribes worship Mahadeo Shiva and other Hindu deities. Both communities are staunch nationalists and vigorously resist missionary activity in their areas, with the result that conversion is virtually nil among Dimasas and only five percent among Karbis.

Both tribes believe that the genesis of the present crisis lies in the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Isak-Muivah) demand for Greater Nagaland (or Nagalim). They say an internationally-sponsored attempt is currently underway to create a Christian belt in the region, which is to include Chamling and Tirap districts of Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur, Karbi Anglong and North Cachar Hills of Assam, Mizoram and Meghalaya.

The fact that the Karbis (who are predominant in Karbi Anglong) and Dimasas (the majority in NC Hills) are staunch Hindus is a major stumbling block in the goal of Nagalim. Hence the church has adopted a two-pronged strategy. On the one hand, Karbis and Dimasas, already squeezed between Christian Nagaland, Meghalaya and Mizoram, are being subjected to violence to compel them to convert to Christianity, as are tribals in neighbouring Tripura. A Hindu sadhu was shot dead some time ago.

On the other hand, the Church may be using Karbi and Dimasa militant outfits to achieve its objectives. The United Peoples Democratic Solidarity (UPDS) of the Karbis and Dima Halam Daogah (DHD) of the Dimasas were set up by certain sections to pursue a political and economic agenda.

The Dimasa DHD was armed and trained by NSCN (IM), but when it refused to pay taxes and work for Nagalim, their relations soured. NSCN (IM) then prompted Hmar People's Convention (HPC) to object to the Dimasa militant camp near Haflong, provoking armed clashes between them in 2003.

Intra-Dimasa conflicts between DHD president Jewel Gorlosa and vice president Dilip Nunisa led the former to form a new outfit called Black Widow, which worked with NSCN (IM) to set scores with DHD.

NSCN resents DHD's desire to include Dimapur and adjoining Dimasa areas in a Dima homeland. NSCN is powerful enough to get some MLAs, MPs and student bodies of four hill districts of Manipur and some MLAs, Village Council Chiefs and student bodies of Changlang and Tirap districts of Arunachal Pradesh to visit the Hebron Camp in Nagaland and issue a statement supporting inclusion of their districts in Nagalim. Obviously the conspiracy to carve out a huge Christian territory in the region is being carefully planned and executed.

The Karbi militant outfit, UPDS, was also armed and trained by NSCN (IM). It too seeks an autonomous state/separate homeland, but lacks a popular mandate and advances its demands at gun point. The UPDS signed a ceasefire agreement with the Centre in May 2002, while the DHD did so in January 2003, but it seems likely that these militant groups (or their splinter groups) were nonetheless used by NSCN (IM) to create trouble in the area.

The Karbi Lingri National Liberation Forum (KLNLF) was set up by a group of extremists who disagreed with the UPDS ceasefire agreement with the Government.

There are thus enough armed gangs moving about the region with impunity. From September 26, 2005, over one hundred Dimasas and Karbis have died in violence, and over one thousand houses across 40 villages torched; nearly 52,000 persons have been forced to take shelter in relief camps. The enquiry ordered by the Assam Chief Minister does not inspire confidence, largely because of his minority-appeasing credentials.

The critical question that remains to be answered is why international forces are allegedly determined to convert these tribes and sponsor separatism in the region. Delegation members who say they risked their lives coming to Delhi, point out that the reasons can be discerned in the undue interest taken in the Northeast by former US President Jimmy Carter, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, the Baptist World Alliance and the World Council of Churches.

What is going on is a post-colonial quest to re-colonise India through strategic balkanization, and this area is rich in oil, uranium, mineral and forest wealth.

Given the fact that the NSCN (IM) ceasefire with the Government ends on January 31, 2006, the outfit is under pressure to create unrest and force an out-migration of the local population. Hence it has built bridges with Bangladeshi infiltrators also, and more violence may ensue in coming days.

The State Government is notable for its absence in the area, while militants are operating freely, threatening villagers trying to return home from relief camps in order to harvest their crops. An ill-wind blows in the Northeast.

Our loss in Nepal

By choosing to isolate King Gyanendra of Nepal and support discredited, thoroughly corrupt politicians and the Maoists after last February's palace coup, the UPA Government adopted a disastrous policy whose impact is now beginning to take shape. Faced with total non-cooperation from India, especially after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his team decided to suspend arms supplies to the Royal Nepal.

Army which were needed to combat the Maoist terrorists, King Gyanendra has been forced look towards China. Ironically, while India decided to break with its long-standing policy of non-interference in the internal affairs of another sovereign state and, to an extent, successfully lobbied with the US and the EU to put pressure on the King for restoration of democracy, China refused to take a moral position.

The real contours of Beijing's disinterest have now begun to emerge with the arrival of truckloads of arms and ammunition for the Royal Nepal Army. With New Delhi abdicating its responsibility to actively engage with the King and provide him with the wherewithal to fight the Maoist menace that is as much a threat to Nepal as, it is to India, and Washington and Brussels remaining aloof since their stakes in the world's only Hindu kingdom are marginal, Beijing has decided to step in and make its presence felt.

It is nobody's case that the Communist Party of China is interested in propping up direct rule by Narayanhity Palace, but it is obvious that New Delhi's cussed response has provided Beijing with an excellent opportunity to grab the space vacated by us. And, it does not require a soothsayer to predict that if China continues with its policy of engagement, then a day shall arrive when New Delhi can claim to have won moral victory but the strategic victory will be of Beijing.

Between February and November, the UPA Government has managed to squander India's advantage and spike the policy that had been painstakingly put in place ever since we managed to dissuade King Mahendra from cosying up to the Chinese in the early-1960s. The net result of this folly is manifesting itself in the rapid shrinking of India's sphere of influence in the region, such as it was to begin with.

There is time yet for the Prime Minister to undo the mistakes of these past months and retrieve some of the ground we have lost in Nepal. For that, he must scrap the policy of disengagement, drop the contrived demand for restoration of democracy and instruct his advisers not to cut deals with politicians who have lost credibility with the masses and survive on Government of India largesse or criminals like Pushpa Kamal Dahal, also known as Comrade Prachanda, who heads the Maoist terror brigade.

If the Prime Minister can so enthusiastically participate in dialogue with a military dictator masquerading as 'President' in Pakistan, if the Government can do business with the regime in Myanmar and if we do not sit in moral judgement on the presidents, kings, princes, emirs and sheikhs who rule Arabia with tyrannical fervour, then there is no reason why we should be so fanatically obsessed with restoring democracy in Nepal.

This is not to suggest that King Gyanendra can turn the clock back and return to the days of absolute monarchy. But to mollycoddle the Maoists and allow the Chinese to consolidate their hold over Narayanhity Palace are not the best tactics to prevent King Gyanendra from doing precisely that.

Volcker pirates as prosecutors

Having salivated over the sauce in the Volcker Committee report and thrown Mr K Natwar Singh out of the Foreign Ministry, may we ask where the beef is? I ask because I am sufficiently Gandhian to believe there must be a moral relationship between ends and means, and while the goal of embarrassing Congress supremo Sonia Gandhi is seductive, the discredited report of a questionable officer is probably not the best way to achieve this.

The Iraq crisis is deeper than Volcker's selective scandals. While American lust for Iraqi oil goes back over three decades, a convenient reference point is the 1990 Kuwait war, when a 34-nation Allied coalition (not including India) took on Saddam Hussein. The US Department of Defense estimated war costs at $61 billion; others said $71 billion. About $53 billion was contributed by various countries, and if we accept the estimate of $71 billion, we get a deficit of $18 billion, and a motive for the theft of Iraqi funds under the Oil-for-Food Programme (OFFP).

The real scandal is revealed in the pie-chart of expenditure under OFFP, shown on the UN website (http://www.oilforfoodfacts.org/history.aspx), but not in Volcker's report. Volcker covered up this multi-billion dollar scam by planting red herrings, sending Indian media and politicians running after cents; neither paused to rethink even after Volcker admitted he diluted his report to save Secretary General Kofi Annan.

According to the UN website, the OFFP legally yielded $69.4 billion, which was meant exclusively for food, medicines and other necessities. But only $38.6 billion was actually spent on so-called "humanitarian purposes". A whopping $18 billion was looted as Reparations for the Kuwait war - though this was not sanctioned by any UNSC Resolution, despite valiant claims by some honourable Indians. It may be relevant to ask who is going to pay reparations to the Iraqi people for the illegal invasion of their land and devastation of their grand cities, and for US-sponsored loot of Iraq's oil wealth by way of "reconstruction" contracts to favourite firms linked to leading politicians.

To return to OFFP, about $1.3 billion was spent on oil transportation, $1.1 billion on operational costs, $0.6 billion on repayment to unidentified member states, and $0.5 billion on UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (the weapons inspection teams whose composition remains secret). I saw the UN pie-chart at the instance of the gutsy Ms Radha Rajan of Vigil Public Opinion Forum (http://www.vigilonline.com), who pointed out that UN snatched $30 million from the mouths of dying Iraqi men, women and babies as a gift to Volcker for this gutter inspector's report. I say this because the Volcker Commission's $30 million salary came from the $38.6 billion, supposedly already spent on humanitarian work.

Now UN claims that the OFFP was wound up three months prior to the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, and the remaining sum of $9.3 billion transferred to a Development Fund for Iraq (which no one knows who is running, how, and for what). So Mr Kofi Annan must explain how Volcker and his boys (some of whom quit, abusing him of fudging matters) received $30 million from money already spent on humanitarian work! There is obviously a massive fudging of figures here, and the Security Council must scrutinize the humanitarian work budget, and clarify if the cost of the so-called Independent Inquiry was also the responsibility of the enslaved Iraqi people! I somehow don't think so, and after Volcker's confession, Mr Annan should be asked to put in his papers.

Volcker has named friends and firms that paid Saddam an extra 30 cents per barrel for Iraqi oil in defiance of a UNSC ruling. The sad truth is that UN deliberately fixed the price of Iraqi oil below the international rate, to facilitate the rape of its oil wealth. This is what made the 30-cent premium to the Saddam regime financially worthwhile. It may be kept in mind that UN failed to provide for even transport costs of the oil, and later had to approve transport costs amounting to $1.3 billion when it vetted individual contracts.

Clearly, at least half of $69.4 billion 'legal' funds from OFFP was misappropriated. Iraqis died at the rate of 300 a day, 1.8 billion in ten years, for lack of life-saving drugs, under the sanctions regime. And under Oil-for-Food, the White Man made money. Iraq's untold scandal is that we do not know, thanks to embedded journalists, how many Iraqis are dying of starvation and privation because of the Occupation and lack of accountability about Iraqi oil funds.

Yet Volcker attempts a shameless witch-hunt against former UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali because he resisted American manipulation of the Security Council to serve its oil greed. When Saddam Hussein came to power, the foreign oil companies gave Iraq a measly $400 million per annum; Saddam made Iraq a prosperous nation.

American rapacity to grab Iraqi oil forced Saddam Hussein's hand. The Iraqi people were being denied life-saving drugs and chemicals for water treatment on the pretext that these were 'dual-use' chemicals. Saddam tried to avert the slow genocide of his people by raising a minor premium on oil sales. American cynicism can be gauged from the fact that in the 1970s there was a major scandal in which White American doctors were found indulging in forced abortions of Native American women visiting hospitals for check-ups (it may be interesting to study how this nation of immigrants keeps its non-White population in check).

Saddam did not funnel his premium into a secret Swiss Bank account, but brought it back to the Central Bank of Iraq, to give his people life-saving drugs. America is angry, not because corrupt officials misused a good scheme, but because a "rogue" regime manipulated a corrupt system for a good cause! The Volcker Committee is discredited by the fact that it was headed by a White American; UN emerges as a shameless stooge of America, the sooner it goes the way of the League of Nations, the better.

What is more, Saddam's sleight-of-hand probably generated only $1.8 billion over seven-years (1996-2002), whereas $18 billion was misappropriated as reparations for the 1990 Gulf War alone. Volcker's team, which merely collected papers from the Iraqi oil ministry after the Occupation, creamed $30 million as salary. Truly, White American sense of proportion is unparalleled.

White Settler justice is a sore point even with decent Americans. Bert Sacks of Voices in the Wilderness, which was fined $20,000 for violating sanctions to distribute medicines, said: "The real scandal with Oil-for-Food is that $64 billion of Iraq's own wealth was all that was permitted by the US through the UN Security Council.

After war reparations and other deductions were made, this came to less than a dollar a day for each of 20 million Iraqis in the South-Central regions for all their needs - food, water, electricity, medicine, everything. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children died because the limit of a dollar a day was 'woefully inadequate' to meet their needs - and the US and the UN Security Council knew that." Yet an American judge ruled that it was lawful for Washington to deny necessary drugs and medical supplies to Iraq, despite the evidence that lakhs of children were dying because of brutal economic sanctions.

Iraq's about oil, not food

Good old-fashioned nationalism compels me to write about the duplicitous UN Oil for Food scam at a time when I am deeply anguished over the tragedy which has effectively ended all festivities in the capital.

Most of us will go through the motions of observing Hindu dharma's greatest annual event, but Saturday's bloodstains have left an indelible impact on us all. Delhi Police's sustained efforts over the past few years had revived confidence in the battle against terrorism, making the sudden catastrophe difficult to digest.

The Prime Minister's studied silence on his open border policy has been noticed by all, and so long as South Block substitutes American pressure for an independent foreign policy, we can expect such incidents to be repeated ad nauseum.

The UN Oil for Food programme stinks to high heaven of the oil piracy with which America is virtually synonymous, while Secretary General Kofi Annan reinforces the public impression of himself as a White Man's stooge.

It is no secret that the UN imposed sanctions on Iraq from 1990 under American pressure, causing untold misery to the Iraqi people, who literally began to die of starvation for want of food, medicines, and other urgent necessities (remember the man-made Bengal famine, ushered in by the "benevolent" British Raj?). When the deaths assumed scandalous proportions, the Oil for Food programme was created in 1996, which permitted the Saddam regime to export crude oil and deposit the funds in a special bank account (Escrow Account), which UN would run to buy food, medicines and other articles for the Iraqi people. UN officials would determine the prices at which goods would be purchased and the firms from which purchases would be made (you get the drift).

The UN was always a bloated bureaucracy of over-paid mediocrities from around the world. Still, under Mr Boutros Boutrous-Ghali, it was not a pet poodle of the White House, which it what Mr Annan has reduced it to. Even a nodding acquaintance with the manner in which Mr Annan has conducted his office, from sleeping over the genocide in Rwanda to nodding over the food-for-sex horror in Sudan, would indicate the direction in which the Oil for Food would go. Not surprisingly, one of pockets into which it went is alleged to be that of Mr Annan's son!

But there is more to the deal than mere money. Hence Mr Annan must explain why the UN, having imposed unjustified sanctions against Iraq under American pressure, chose a member of Washington's political elite (former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker) to conduct a so-called 'independent' inquiry into the Oil for Food scam. Many aspects of the Volcker report are fishy.

But the worst, from the standpoint of Anglo-Saxon jurisprudence, is its impact upon the on-going trial of Mr Saddam Hussain. A US-managed court, with US-appointed and trained judges is conducting a trial, the outcome of which is foretold. Despite this, the deposed dictators' legal team is harassed, and international opinion against the continuing occupation of Iraq is sought to be silenced through the Volcker report. Somehow America can never rise above the self-righteous rapacity of its White Settler occupants.

Essentially, what does Volcker have to say? That Saddam used UN's endemic corruption to beat the sanctions by using the Oil for Food programme to earn $1.8 billion for his country; and that he used oil to buy influence with politicians in several countries to condemn the sanctions. In India, there is a frisson of excitement over claims that Foreign Minister Natwar Singh (incidentally an old-fashioned nationalist) received peanuts worth Rs 3.37 crores at today's exchange rate.

Mr Natwar Singh, then an opposition MP, played a leading role in getting the Indian Parliament to adopt a unanimous resolution condemning the US military invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Since it is nobody's case that Mr Natwar Singh shared his booty with fellow Parliamentarians, we must assume that the resolution reflected the Indian national position on war against a friendly country. By mindlessly seeking Mr Singh's resignation, the BJP, which was then the ruling party, must explain if it now endorses American occupation of Iraq.

Moreover, since the then Deputy Prime Minister actively canvassed for sending Indian troops to assist the Americans in Iraq, while on an official visit to Washington, the BJP should spell out its Iraq policy to end public confusion in the matter. Former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee would do well to issue a detailed statement in this regard.

Even civilians like me, with no stakes in the global oil market, knew that UN officials were making money in Iraqi oil. Nations imposing sanctions bought Iraqi oil through channels that Mr Volcker is now pretending to uncover. As a so-called expert on money laundering and an expert criminal prosecutor, he should use his talents to unearth the post-invasion oil rape by US oil firms.

A cursory look at the Volcker report suggests that US angst flows from the fact that upto August 2000, Iraq sold oil through global (read Western) oil companies. But from September 2000, Saddam began to select oil buyers with a view to buy goodwill for his country (a wholesome foreign policy objective by any standard). He particularly favoured permanent members of the Security Council, to get the sanctions eased. Thus, Russia and France benefitted, and US oil companies did business with the Russians.

But this did not go down well with America. After all, the arbitrary and irrational post-Second World War map of the Gulf was drawn up by the Allies only to serve their commercial-strategic interests (read oil needs). As the sole global superpower, America could hardly digest deployment of troops to protect the rulers of friendly Gulf regimes, while Russians ran the oil trade! Volcker gives the game away by protesting that Iraqi crude was being sold to persons who were not "regular players in the oil market." In other words, the Oil Cartel is a Closed Circle and the Free Market is for the birds. As for the business activities of the Foreign Minister's son, what is relevant is whether he settled his dues with the income tax department.

Volcker says there were "layers of individuals and companies" between the oil quotas and the ultimate buyers; hence UN could not determine who was actually benefiting from and controlling the oil purchases.

Frankly, UN is so utterly complicit in financial scandals and human rights abuses all over the world that there is a strong case for it winding up altogether, especially in view of its inability to correct itself and its propensity to act as an arm of the White House. Further, it is none of America's business how a sovereign nation sells its natural resources to keep its people alive. Contempt for UN-US complicity in ravaging Iraq made the 101 oil companies and traders that did business with Baghdad shun Volcker's queries.

It is said that most of the Iraqi oil sold between 1996 and 2002 had an illegal surcharge that UN had declared illegal; but the oil companies and traders paid no heed. Volcker has mentioned politicians in Russia, France, Britain and Italy, who benefitted from Saddam's largesse. He should now identity the American oil majors and politicians swimming in Iraqi oil after the de facto colonisation of that country.



India's heritage is in peril

India is in serious danger of losing ownership and control over its civilisational heritage due to the machinations of an insidious combine of Left-wing academics, Page Three authorities on culture and urban development, and an architects' lobby posing as experts on archaeology and conservation.

Looming behind them is UNESCO, a body whose financial scams makes the United Nations oil-for-food programme smell of roses, which wishes to commodify Indian civilisation in the name of world heritage and detach it from the life of the Indian people. Complicit in these shabby manoeuvres is the Left-dependent United Progressive Alliance regime.

India, with its internationally acknowledged expertise, as demonstrated at Angkor Vat, does not need UNESCO to decide its top heritage sites (a very manipulative game), how they should be preserved, and how its living civilisation and culture should be interpreted.

We must realise that the mindset behind declaring some monuments as 'world heritage' is alien to our culture, and eventually extremely harmful. In fact, India should stop funding UNESCO, force a discussion on the Canadian Government's audit of that body some years ago (it was condemned as an international sinecure for wives and mistresses!), and press for its closure. Allow me to explain.

Those who have seen the pyramids of Giza are moved by their eternal beauty and mystery. In a deep sense they are part of world heritage and deserve to be saved from the fate of the Bamiyan Buddhas. Yet it is the Egyptian Government which protects and preserves the antiquities of Egypt.

The flip side of this picture is that the civilisation that created the great monuments along the Nile is dead and gone. Egypt is culturally alien to its historical past, and it has been left to Western experts to excavate and interpret that epoch. In the absence of continuity of civilisation and culture, the experts are free to make any interpretations and present them as established truths.

Foreign scholarship is never free of bias and cultural baggage; I am personally aware that some Western countries are teaching school students about 'hunger and poverty' in ancient Egypt (god alone knows on the basis of what evidence). There is no one to counter that poor and hungry people could not have built one of the greatest civilisations of the ancient world!

Mercifully, the Indian diaspora in America has woken up to the denigration of Hindus through viciously written textbooks, and the battle for a fair depiction of Indian history and culture has been joined on that continent. Yet India remains the primordial battlefield for the Soul of India. Can we allow a bunch of self-proclaimed experts to cannibalise our culture and heritage, declare it dead and preserve it in museums, where Western experts can freely pontificate about feudalism in pre-Islamic India?

I became acutely conscious of the danger of academic monopolies in July 1993, when Sir Vidia Naipaul spoke to a national daily about the importance of a sense of history. He said: "I recently received a document, the text of a lecture given by some sort of an expert on India who teaches at Trinity College, Cambridge. The lecture was on fundamentalism. In it we are told that Islam was brought to India by traders and merchants and that places of Hindu worship became absorbed into Mohammedan places of worship. Well, all this is absurd and it is said by a serious scholar..."

Naipaul endorsed the demolition of the Babri structure on December 6, 1992, as part of a "sense of history that the Hindus are now developing". It was a fascinating observation.

Readers may wonder why I have chosen to write about heritage at a time when jihadis have slit the throats of Hindus in Kashmir and Hindus in a Bharat Milap procession in Mau, Uttar Pradesh, have been attacked by culturally intolerant persons.

The UPA Government and the Congress party have maintained a stoic silence on both the episodes, which have happened in quick succession. But my objective is larger: Since the keynote of Indic civilisation is unity and continuity, we will not be able to preserve the people if we do not fight for the civilisation that once made them world leaders without reliance upon the barrel of the gun.

While Left-Congress split over the NCERT curriculum has received some media attention, there is complete ignorance about the September 2, 2005, meeting of the Central Advisory Board of Archaeology (CABA). A discordant note was struck with a notification dated 11 August 2005, appointing Dr Suraj Bhan, Dr D Mandal and Dr Sitaram Roy as members (all served Babri Masjid Action Committee during Court-ordered excavations at Ayodhya in 2003), when they did not figure in three previous notifications.

Their agenda was soon apparent. One worthy wanted rules changed so ASI could be headed by archaeologists from outside! This would open the way for Marxist historians to takeover this august body as self-styled archaeologists. The same expert wanted to delink ASI's explorations from conservation activities, to help Page Three Cultural Czars and their NGO fronts to grab public funds.

The political nominees exposed their non-academic agenda by making adverse remarks upon ASI's report to the Allahabad High Court on the Ayodhya excavations of 2003. Given the paucity of time and the pressure under which the team worked, with the court being asked to ensure 'communal representation' of even the labour force, the report was commendable.

Indian academics lack the honesty to appreciate evidence which contradicts their ideological fantasies, and we need to question the integrity of a regime that appoints such persons to premier institutions preserving national heritage.

The Ayodhya excavations established the occupation of the site from at least 1250 BC, through successive historical periods. ASI found the remains of a monumental building of the Medieval-Sultanate period (twelfth to sixteenth century AD), over which the disputed Babri structure was constructed during the early sixteenth century. This truth is indigestible to Marxist historians, who are determined to choke the ASI, which alone has the power to overturn the mythologies peddled by them.

Another episode that angered them and figured in CABA was the accidental discovery of vandalised medieval Jain temples during restoration work at Fatehpur Sikri in 2001; they insisted such 'discoveries' must never be made again! Yet, true art lovers are eternally indebted for the unearthing of some of the most beautiful statuary in Indian history, especially a breath-catching Devi Saraswati.

Jains have a fascination for the Goddess of learning, and it is an endearing irony of the Indic tradition that all famous Saraswati images found in India hail from Jaina temples. To my mind, only an iconoclast would wish to keep such an image from detection in order to protect the exposure of medieval vandalism.

Sadly, the Saraswati, honoured in Indian tradition as "best of mothers", became one of the first political casualties of the UPA, with the Ministry of Culture declaring there was no evidence of the river, even though it is being revived in Haryana, Gujarat and Rajasthan! Decades of work by Government organisations (and an accidental picture by NASA) have established the course of the 1600-km long river from the Himalayas to Gujarat; excavations along the route would establish the cultural chronology of the Vedic people. We must fight for our roots if we are to preserve our trees.


Medium, message and mythology

The Rajasthan Congress took one day to expel Manchand Khandela, vice president of its Intellectual Cell, after his 250-page polemic against the 'dynasty' made it the laughing stock of Indian politics.

Although Mr Khandela didn't tell us anything new, he did shine the spotlight on two unsavoury aspects of Gandhi Family politics, viz., Mom keeps mum and Baba blabs too much.

For Congress, these home truths were the equivalent of the "mukhauta" episode that grounded Mr LK Advani acolyte Mr KN Govindacharya. But whereas Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee proved on several occasions that he was no "mask" and Mr Madan Lal Khurana's return settled the issue of supremacy in the BJP, for Congress the Khandela episode could signal the unravelling of its premier family.

I can understand the panic of Rajasthan PCC chief BD Kalla once it became known that "Sonia Gandhi and Indian Politics" called the lady a "manipulative maharani." Since the BJP was as shocked, though delighted, at the unexpected salvo, it is obvious Mr Khandela acted independently. His attack on dynastic politics probably reflects the suffocation party workers feel at the limitations the family imposes on their careers. Some issues mentioned in the book merit attention.

Foremost is the statement that "Sonia's decision to decline the Prime Minister's post was not a sacrifice but political compulsion. The decision was not the voice of her conscience." This is true, as Ms Gandhi went to meet the President with Mr Manmohan Singh only to stake her claim to the job; she returned ashen-faced within minutes, barely able to speak to the media. Some hours later her "inner voice" was announced and "national mourning" orchestrated: "The entire scene in Parliament's Central hall was like a darbar, where the Maharani was listening to her praise surrounded by sycophants. If Sonia really wanted to decline the post, what was the need for all this tamasha?" The question remains pertinent.

As for Amethi MP, Rahul Gandhi, Khandela says: "A young prince, who likes to talk big, has also become part of this darbar. He has the illusion that he has the divine right to rule India." As if on cue, the heir to the dynasty quest to return to Race Course Road gave newsmagazine Tehelka (September 24, 2005) an hour-long interview, which so scandalised the party that it made him deny giving the interview. Congress also forced the champion of 'sting journalism' to accept that no interview had been granted.

Since Rahul Gandhi is unlikely to be permitted free interaction with the media again, it is worth examining what he said to journalist Vijay Simha, as the hollow questions and vacuous answers convince me that the interview is genuine. What does the Harvard-educated Baba have to say about his constituency? According to Rahul Gandhi, "An MP can't do much. I get Rs 2 crore (under MPLAD). That allows me to lay eight kilometres of road. That's it." If this is true, it works out to a staggering Rs. 2500,000/- per km., and calls for an immediate end to the scheme! The MP adds: "But we have been able to get 500 kilometres of road laid in Amethi. To me that's an achievement. What can I do beyond that? Nothing." Yet this also works out to a healthy Rs 40,000/km. I think there is need for a CAG enquiry in each MPLAD, especially the VIP pocket boroughs.

Following his illustrious parents, Rahul Gandhi is ignorant about India and proud of it. He tells his admiring interlocutor: "I do not arrogate to myself the belief that I am the repository of wisdom. I do not believe in the Indian tradition that there is one repository of knowledge, and that this repository is going to do everything." Correct me if I'm wrong, but normally when we speak of repositories of knowledge in the Indian tradition, we mean the native Hindu tradition. Now this Hindu-Indian tradition does not believe there is only one repository of knowledge. That, Rahul dear, is a monotheistic mania which the Indian (Hindu) tradition has refused to imbibe. So next time you speak about tradition, do tell us if you mean your 'fatherland,' your 'motherland,' or your future 'sasural'.

The piece de resistance is Rahul's reason for entering politics! He says: "My goal is to take India to the number one slot... For that, my family taught me to be humble... Without humility I would be nowhere. I could have been prime minister at the age of 25 if I wanted to. But I decided I wouldn't do things in that fashion. I would not go around yelling at my seniors, boy you guys, you can't do this or you can't do that. I could easily have done it. But I believe that unless I am able to bring something to the table, I must not take up anything." Since Rahul is now 34, becoming prime minister at 25 would coincide with the time his mother led Congress to it's lowest-ever tally; the young man is hallucinating in broad daylight!

Asked by his breathless interviewer if that meant he would not enter the Congress Working Committee, the could-have-been-PM demurred: "As a CWC member I can't tell the prime minister not to do something. I can't tell senior ministers and senior party leaders not to do something. That will be awkward." Now before you conclude that Rahul is going to stay out, here is his very next statement: "I will get into the CWC. I will take more responsibility in the party. After all I am in politics... Of course, I'll take my place at the appointed time."

What this boils down to is quite simple. Mama Gandhi and her cohorts have chalked out a plan of action to launch Rahul Baba in a big way, so that he can replace Mr Manmohan Singh before the next elections, provided the UPA lasts its full term. Mr Singh understands that Madame is in a hurry and that he lacks the charisma to take Congress to victory at the hustings. Hence he graciously took the little prince to Kabul, to learn something about the political environment in India's neighbourhood.

Sadly, this was lost on Rahul, who thinks he can only learn from Western countries. Gushing over a trip to Hamburg, he said: "Here people keep asking why I travel abroad. I am not going to do politics the way these people have done... When I meet people from other countries, they ask me about our problems. I think that if they are asking me this, there must be something wrong with the way we do things..." The Amethi MP adds: "There was this president of a small county... he looked at me and said it all depends on aid... he laid it out for me... showed me how important aid is. I go to Hamburg and this is what I get. How am I going to pick up something like this in India? How can I learn anything if I stay put in India..."

It is shamefully obvious that Rahul Gandhi looks at India with the eyes and mind of a foreigner who despises the natives but is determined to assert his 'divine right' to rule them. I wonder if Rudyard Kipling intended to extend this privilege to westernised oriental gentlemen (WOGs).



Sania fatwa is different

Having never been a sports-watcher, I just didn't notice that Sania Mirza was playing in skimpy skirts rather than shorts until the bellicose Jamaat-e-Ulema-e-Hind issued dire warnings about her 'un-Islamic' attire. Avid secularists promptly pleaded that the tennis star be allowed to live like a 'normal' 18-year-old and Kolkata Police wisely beefed up security for the WTA event in their city.

Yet given Sania's insistence on emphasising her Islamic identity by publicly stating she does 'namaaz' five times a day, it is difficult for outsiders to argue that a faith impervious to change and reform give one girl special freedom on account of her achievements in the secular realm. At the risk of seeming unsympathetic, it needs be said that neither Sania nor her family has credited the secular nature of the Indian State or the famed tolerance of Indian society for her liberty to nurture her talent. Nor did they keep their religious beliefs in the private domain.

Having showcased their Islamic moorings, they will have to publicly join the protagonists of reform in Indian Islam if they wish to satisfy 'secular' cravings, such as an international career, great fame and big money. Else, they should fall in line with the Jamaat-e-Ulema-e-Hind, for it is well known that Islam demands complete conformity from believers and does not permit piecemeal or eclectic endorsement of its tenets (this is a Hindu luxury).

The Sania fatwa presents a grim challenge to Islam's secular apologists. Dynamic Muslim women achievers will no longer be able to use their personal fame and fortune to build islands of security and immunity from the local or national-level maulvi. Indeed, they will now be the new targets of abuse and intimidation, in order to secure the victory of the Shariat and its guardians.

It is now upto enlightened Muslim men and women to admit that the practice (if not some tenets) of their faith is not in tune with the times, and fails to satisfy their worldly aspirations. They would do well to join the public interest litigation currently before the Supreme Court, seeking an end to the functioning of Shariat courts in the country, and putting curbs upon the unfettered powers of maulvis.

In one sense, this is an internal matter of the Muslim community, and meaningful reforms will be possible only if voices are raised within the community, an initiative taken by the Tamil Nadu women's jamaat. But in a larger sense, no group is an island, and we are all morally obliged to support citizens needing State intervention to avail of constitutionally guaranteed freedoms. But it is going to be difficult for us to press for legal restraints upon Islamic clergy if our Muslim brethren and their secular minders do not refrain from vicious Hindu-bashing every time issues internal to Islamic society crop up in the public domain.

Recently, when the Imrana rape case highlighted the ulema's regressive approach and brought into the open instances of rank injustice towards Muslim women, many Muslim intellectuals and secular apologists equated the outrage with unequal inheritance laws in Hindu society! Such ridiculous obfuscation of issues will not help Muslim women being oppressed by communal pressures, and in fact demean the desperate desire for reform among those who do not know how to escape their current suffocation.

In Hilwari village of Baghpat, UP, Sharif divorced Khursheeda in anger, but soon repented and proposed re-marriage. This was not possible in Islam without Khursheeda marrying again (for one night) and getting a divorce. As the family wished to spare the couple undue trauma, they suggested Khursheeda marry Sharif's 13-year-old brother, get divorced the next day, and re-marry Sharif (Hindustan Times, August 10, 2005).

But the maulvis opposed this, insisting Khursheeda maintain a period of purity prescribed in the Shariat and then marry a man able to consummate the marriage before divorcing her. This is an undignified law and Muslims are unhappy with it. Families in this predicament deserve support from vocal activists like Shabnam Hashmi, Shahbana Azmi, Nafisa Ali, Suhasini Ali, Teesta Setalvad, and Javed Akhtar. But they have been conspicuous by their silence, and it is left to us to plead for abolition of instantaneous talaq and transit marriage (halala) before remarriage to the ex-spouse.

It is difficult not to recall the sad episode of Gudiya, who remarried after the Indian Army declared her husband, Mohammad Arif, dead, and was pregnant when he suddenly returned from a Pakistani jail in September 2004. Instead of facilitating divorce so that Gudiya could live with dignity with the second family, the ulema made return to her legal husband a prestige issue for Shariat. Although Gudiya, her second husband, and her entire village wanted the jawan to go away, the poor girl was browbeaten in a televised and lopsided panchayat, and forced to return to Arif with the abetment of the secular media.

India's Islamic apologists are caught between a rock and hard place because they do not realise that though political appeasement of Islam continues as before, Islam has shed the quietist nature of the early Independence era and become politically ambitious and assertive. For four decades, Congress thrived on a pathetic minority of votes due to en bloc voting ensured by ulema. In turn, Muslim leaders extracted concessions which intensified their control over the community by promoting separatism and ghettoisation; educated Muslims supported orthodoxy in return for some personal immunity, which the ulema now wants to withdraw.

The triumph of Shia Islam with the fall of the Shah of Iran in 1979, however, caused the Saudi ruling family to peddle fundamentalist Wahabi Islam as an antidote to Ayatollah Khomeini, possibly with the blessings of America, which was unhappy at the fall of its puppet regime. In India, Islamic mobilisation was tested a decade later when a lawyer rallied the orthodox after his divorced wife, Shah Bano, won a paltry alimony from the Supreme Court.

Few could have foreseen the consequences of the Shah Bano case. Muslim women activists say that till then, the women were getting alimony from civil courts, just like Hindu women. But the cry of 'Islam in danger' led Darul-Uloom to dub this an infringement of personal law, as Islam does not provide alimony for divorcees. The All-India Muslim Personal Law Board was set up, and a blissfully ignorant Rajiv Gandhi caved in.

But the Shah Bano case was no ordinary surrender. Representatives of an irredentist global Islam were unwittingly, but officially, ceded the 'diwani' (jurisdiction) of India's Muslim community. They quickly assumed totalitarian control over Muslims, but gave the nazrana (votes) to rising Chatrapatis like VP Singh, Mulayam Singh Yadav, Lalu Yadav. This betrayal was not because Congress had failed them in any respect, but to expand their political leverage! That the Assam agitation against Bangladeshi infiltration also climaxed in the early 1980s indicates how Islam synergized over the decades to achieve a staggering demographic and electoral advantage.

Today, ambitious Islam is challenging the Indian state and the innate decency of the Hindu community. As its first victims, Muslims must insist that the law of the land prevail over personal laws. Sania Mirza is rich and privileged; Imrana poor and disadvantaged. Both are equally threatened by repulsive medieval decrees; Muslim activists must speak up for both of them.


RSS@terrorist.com

A friend recently offered a profound insight, viz., the Rand Corporation headquarters at Santa Monica, visible on its website, is shaped like the "Jesus fish," the secret sign by which Early Christians recognised each other and under which they organised to overthrow the Roman Empire.

Today, the Jesus fish is the symbol of Bible-thumping fundamentalists in America, who stick it on their cars to proclaim adherence to a rabid Christian identity that has little tolerance of "Others."

This makes Rand's decision to classify the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) as a New Religious Movement (NRM), given to espousing a "militant religious philosophy based on exclusivity and hate," understandable. NRM is an artificial Western concept in religious studies, to which Rand-CIA expert Mark Juergensmeyer has given a sinister twist in pursuit of a political agenda. This form of hate propaganda originated in Marxist and Christian circles and is now making rapid strides in Christian discourse. Rand espouses the White Settler ideology that hates and demonises all individuals and groups that resist evangelical thrusts in their homelands.

Chronologically, the Rand report is part of a "seeding" by the less famous American Terrorism Research Centre (TRC) last September. Those familiar with the art world would know that "seeding" is a process by which clever fakes of famous artists are "planted" in remote places and "discovered" later. I have found reputed colonial scholars using this modus operandi to plant obnoxious "evidence" about beef-eating in India. Interestingly, TRC is closely associated with the American Government. It listed RSS, which does not possess arms, among "Known Terrorist Groups Operating in India," mostly Islamic, but also Christian, Sikh and Maoist. No justification was given for the classification.

Even a layman can distinguish "terrorism" from alleged involvement in incidents of violence. Rand analysts studying "religious motivations in international politics and... how states have sought to take advantage of or contain religious violence," should have scrutinised evangelical America and radical Islam.

The report, "Exploring Religious Conflict," is intellectually and factually inadequate. It insinuates that RSS was involved in Mahatma Gandhi's assassination because it was "banned for a few years by the Indian government because of its acts of violence and terrorism and its exhortation to followers to resort to terrorist methods in the promulgation of its religious ideas." One expected this statement to be accompanied by annexures detailing RSS literature to this effect; there are none.

Though RSS is ranked as an NRM along with the more celebrated Al Qaeda, no instances are cited of RSS members smashing airplanes into crowded buildings or masterminding synchronised bomb blasts in world capitals. Undeterred, the CIA-funded experts have lumped RSS with mad cults like the Branch Davidians of Waco and Christian and Jewish groups that possess arms and espouse terrorism to achieve political goals.

RSS has been targetted because of its association with the BJP, which came to power at the Centre seven years ago. Although BJP has since diminished in power and status, RSS' stature has grown. Rand claims, with no credible evidence, that RSS indulged in violence against Muslims and Christians, and is a "threat to the idea of India as a secular state." It fails to explain why Washington is adamant about worldwide conversion if it is secular!

Washington is maligning RSS because the latter is not amenable to its geo-political vision and is the only organised group in Hindu society to consistently combat conversion activities. Rand clubs RSS with violent NRMs on the basis of two defining characteristics - a high degree of tension between the group and its surrounding society; and a high degree of control by leaders over members, as witnessed in ritualised acts of mass suicide and homicide by Branch Davidians, Heaven's Gate, and Aum Shrinrikyo.

These fringe sects have certainly indulged in horrendous acts of violence, but it is laughable to apply these yardsticks to RSS. There is no tension between RSS and surrounding Hindu society; nor do its leaders exercise totalitarian control over members. Anyone doubting this should note BJP president LK Advani's defiance of the RSS desire that he step down from his position, and former Gujarat chief minister Keshubhai Patel's refusal to end his tirade against Mr Narendra Modi.

Despite its intellectual juvenility, the Rand report is dangerous because it is likely to be used by the US State Department at its next annual International Religious Freedoms Report. This brings us to the interesting fact that no terrorist groups or individuals have been listed from Pakistan (haven of Wahabi madarsas and ISI-run training camps) or Bangladesh (heard of Bangla Bhai?). According to the South Asia Terrorism Portal, India's terrorism casualties in the decade 1994-2005 (facts, not cosmic hallucinations) are Jammu and Kashmir (31,782); North-east (13,933); Naxalites (5,041); Punjab (175) and Others (6); making a staggering total of 50,937 victims. These were human beings who became statistics in our struggle against foreign-funded criminals.

Naturally Rand will not dare scrutinise American fanatics like Pat Robertson, founder of the Christian Coalition (surely an NRM), who makes no pretense about his espousal of violence to achieve political ends. The renowned tele-evangelist publicly asked the US Government to assassinate Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez for posing "a terrific danger" to America by "exporting Communism and Islamic extremism." Addressing his "The 700 Club" show on August 22, 2005, Robertson proclaimed that if Chavez feared America was plotting to assassinate him, "we really ought to go ahead and do it... It's a whole lot cheaper than starting a war."

Though Robertson issued a formal apology following public outrage over his remark, it seems likely that he endorses assassination as a means of achieving political goals. He remains America's leading religious evangelist and was a contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 1988, which shows he is part of the political elite and that separation of religion and politics is quite porous in America! Worse, Robertson is a vigorous advocate of the politics of Ugly America; he favours action against Mr Chavez because Venezuela controls 10 per cent of American oil imports, denial of which could hurt its economy. President Chavez had threatened that his country would stop oil exports if anything happened to him.

It is hardly surprising that all so-called threats to US security and national interests listed by the Rand report turn out to be countries and societies threatened by American imperialism! India emerges as a nation America needs to "control" to realise its global ambitions, and her Westernised Oriental Elite (WOE unto us) is more than willing to play ball. RSS is one of the few organised bulwarks against this nefarious design; hence the demonization as violent, terrorist, totalitarian.

Interestingly, CIA-Rand says that the Hindu-Bauddha cosmic battle between Good and Evil is a perennial struggle to exit the Wheel of Existence with its continuous cycle of rebirths and achieve Nirvana. Now this metaphysical battle of the Indic traditions never, ever, becomes the manifest physical conflict that perennially accompanies the spiritual quest in Abrahamic faiths (both heretical and mainline sects).

Yet the analogy has been invoked to label Ayodhya as a "battlefield" - a clear signal to the Muslim community not to accommodate Hindu sensitivities on Ram Janmabhoomi. The CIA knows that Hindu dharma's divine battlefield is Kurukshetra; Ayodhya was where we achieved the perfect kingdom under a perfect king, hence 'Ram rajya.'

Absolute power corrupts...

In the cyclical battles between the Devas and the Asuras, there are moments when the latter, ensconced in an overweening arrogance, appear all-powerful and invincible. The wise know their fall will be sudden, dramatic, and complete. And so it shall be with the so-called Revolutionary Leader of Tamil Nadu, who has violated immutable rules of dharma by subordinating the sacred to State power.

In a technical sense, when Ms Jayalalithaa ordered the arrest of the Kanchi Shankaracharya last November on alleged charges of conspiracy to murder a former Matham employee, she was within the bounds of her duties as Chief Minister. Murder calls for State cognizance and action, and the authorities were bound to investigate the crime and take appropriate action. That many believe there is no credible evidence to link either the Shankaracharya or Bal Shankaracharya with the crime, and that the inquiry is motivated by a larger political conspiracy, is another matter.

But the Chief Minister grossly exceeded her limits when she (no one else would dare) directed the office of the Hindu Religious & Charitable Endowments to ensure that Swami Jayendra Saraswati was denied access to the garba griha of the Ramanathaswamy Mandir in Rameswaram, to perform puja, which is his customary and religious right according to mandir rules. The magnitude of his insult can be gauged from the fact that this right is believed to have been conferred by the Deity Himself, and has been bestowed upon just three dignitaries, viz., the Shankaracharyas of Sringeri and Kanchi and the King of Nepal.

Ramanathaswamy Mandir is no ordinary site; it commemorates the spot where Shri Rama worshipped Bhagvan Shiva before crossing the sea to defeat Ravana, and is a site of tremendous spiritual power. It is hardly surprising that this was the first major temple the Shankaracharya chose to visit after being implicated in a host of cases by the former actress. Not even the Indian Prime Minister or President, and certainly not the imperious lady, has the right to enter its sanctum sanctorum and worship the Deity directly.

Hence it was not a small shock for the Acharya and his devotees to be told by unhappy temple authorities that they had instructions from the Government (read Ms. Jayalalithaa) not to permit him to enter the garba griha of any temple under its control. His Holiness adjusted to this horrible disrespect with grace and equanimity, asking the priests to perform puja on his behalf and worshipping the Deity from the spot where pilgrims are allowed special darshan. Mercifully, he was not asked to pay for the 'special darshan.'

The official on the scene of this outrage, the Joint Commissioner, Hindu Religious & Charitable Endowments, explained that he had instructions from the Commissioner not to allow anyone to enter the inner sanctum. Since the only visitor who had this right was the Kanchi Shankaracharya, it does not take much imagination to realize that His Holiness was being singled out for humiliation at the hands of the State.

That this was purely intentional became clear the next day when the State authorities repeated the misdemeanour. Apparently the temple priests were extremely distressed at being made to deny the Shankaracharya access to the sanctum sanctorum; they apologized and asked him to return for puja the next morning. Accordingly, Swami Jayendra Saraswati took the holy bath in the Agnitheertham, but was made to wait for three hours before being told that permission was again denied. The Acharya was also denied entry into the garba griha of the Dhanuskodi Kothanda Ramar temple, though the temple manuals explicitly state that the Kanchi Sankaracharyas have the right to perform pujas in the sanctum sanctorum. Indeed, they have been doing so for centuries.

Hindus believe anyone can choose the path away from dharma. The Tamil Chief Minister has lost her moral equipoise since her party's rout in the 2004 Lok Sabha elections. She prostrated before the State's Hindu-baiting media; withdrew the anti-conversion law and is complicit in the cancerous growth of the conversion industry; and indulged in a vicious assault upon one of the tallest Hindu spiritual leaders.

It is a measure of Hindu disarmament at the hands of the BJP's determinedly secular leadership that
no credible opposition could be launched against the outright assault upon Hindu institutions. There is a great urgency for the Hindu community to regain control of temples from the State, which has no respect for the sanctity of either the temples or the Gurus. A credible legal case can be made about religious discrimination against the Hindu community, because rich Hindu temples are alone seized by Government and their resources diverted to ends for which there is no public mandate.

In Karnataka, the annual revenue of over Rs 72 crore from Hindu temples is misused to support faiths that condemn Hindu dharma as "false" and indulge in conversions; Rs 50 crore goes as Hajj subsidy and Rs 10 crores as church maintenance. Hindu temples can barely cover the salary of priests, and have nothing left for maintenance. Yet Chief Minister Dharam Singh shamelessly hosted the super-evangelist Benny Hinn, who is currently under the scrutiny of the US Internal Revenue Service!

The situation is hardly better in other states. In Andhra Pradesh, Chief Minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy used his position to bring Christian institutions into the decision making loop of the Tirumala Tirupathi Devasthanam and its institutions, and may even be facilitating a church on the holy hills. In Kerala, the State Government wanted to loot Guruvayur Devaswom funds for a water supply and drainage scheme for the town; only stiff Hindu opposition finally shelved the scheme.

What is being undermined here is not the Hindu right over utilisation of temple funds, however substantial, but the foundational tenet of Hindu dharma that man owes a debt to the gods (daiva rna), to the teachers (gurus rna) and to the ancestors (pitr rna). Today, only the last is still being paid because it lies within the realm of the individual households.

Daiva rna has been usurped by the government which not only takes away current temple revenues, but even the lands that devotees have bequeathed over centuries for the upkeep of temples. The Andhra Government recently sold 250 acres of endowment land for a pittance, when the market price was at least one crore per acre. There is a sustained disrespect of Hindu dharma by the so-called secular state. What right does the government have to appoint members to the Boards of major temples (usually members of the party in power, and even IAS officers)?

State interference in Hindu institutions violates Article 26, which guarantees every denomination the freedom to establish and maintain institutions for religious and charitable purposes; to manage its own affairs in matters of religion; to own and acquire movable and immovable property; and to administer such property in accordance with law.

Given the awesome State mismanagement, the Supreme Court would do well to revisit the Guruvayur Temple verdict, wherein it held that State could appoint managers as temple administration is a secular task, as opposed to spiritual management. Since Article 26 explicitly bestows freedom to "administer such property in accordance with law," there is no justification for the State appropriating temple property and revenues on the pretext of supervising them.

London plots its own doom

As in the United States after 9/11, so also in Britain after 7/7, the Sikh community bore the brunt of the first backlash against the London blasts with a gurdwara in Kent being set on fire. Prime Minister Tony Blair called a high level meeting to discuss "community tensions" as 70 incidents against minorities were reported across the country in as many hours. Only a very arrogant people could fail to distinguish turbans from skullcaps. Yet in both countries, the perpetrators of violence were indifferent to the distinction in their determination to teach the "Other" a lesson.

This brings me to the grammar of political discourse, in which Indian media is shamefully complicit. Ordinarily, tensions between communities leading to action against one group are communal tensions resulting in communal violence. Yet, while the "communal" tag is readily applied to incidents in India, especially those that can be attributed to the Hindu community (Godhra will never be called an instance of blatant communal assault), carefully sanitised terms such as "backlash" and "community tensions" are invoked to cover communal offensives by White people. Apparently it is the karma of Brown Folks to bear the burden of the White Man.

Another media duplicity is the comparison between political responses in Britain and India to the attacks in London and Ayodhya. In Britain, the Labour and Conservative parties and mainstream print and electronic media share an unstated consensus on issues affecting the nation. Hence there will always be a unity of political response in times of crisis because both sides know this is imperative to tackle the enemy. In India, in contrast, several political parties as well as the mainstream print and electronic media subscribe to a non-national agenda and work proactively to undermine the emergence of a coherent and self-confident nationalism.

This can be readily seen in the near-hysterical insistence that the attack on the Ram Janmabhoomi should not be communalised (whatever that means); its jihadi (denominational) face should not be mentioned; and there should be no debate on the possible consequences to the nation if the assailants had succeeded in their ignoble intentions (destroyed the temple). It goes without saying that if one political party had not displayed a measure of partisanship on the issue, and if the London blasts had not followed soon thereafter, the issue would have been dismissed as a non-event.

To return to the London blasts, at the risk of sounding unpleasant, it needs to be said that few nations have so assiduously cultivated the terrorist menace that finally visited Britain last Thursday. I am not referring to British support for American action in Afghanistan or Iraq, but to the more cussed English propensity to nurture the "wanted" men of even friendly countries. Even after 9/11, members of the current Labour dispensation remained unperturbed at the presence of highly dangerous men with subversive agendas on their soil. Their smug certainty that these unshackled human bombs would never implode on home ground has resulted in the present dénouement.

Foremost among the Islamic militants London has been pleased to host over the past decade is Syria-born Sheikh Omar Bakri Mohammed, 47, who openly coaxed Muslim youths to join the Iraqi resistance. Media reports suggest Omar addressed a gathering in central London last December and warned that if Western governments did not mend their ways, Muslims would give them "a 9/11, day after day after day". Yet London remained congenial towards those wishing to raise funds and recruits for 'holy' causes. A particularly notorious venue was the Finsbury Park mosque in north London where Abu Hamza al-Masri, wanted in Egypt for plotting terror strikes, propagated jihad with élan. Devotees at this mosque gave generous support to "shoe bomber" Richard Reid and Al Qaeda member Feroz Abassi, who plotted to blow up the US Embassy in France.

With such strong domestic roots, it is hardly surprising that officials feel that Thursday's culprits are probably British-born jihadis, inspired to action by these venom-spewing mosques. The theory is spreading jitters across Europe because it suggests that a home-grown generation of Islamic militants, all citizens of the respective nations being targetted, has been created by 'soft' policies across the continent. In Britain alone, counter-terrorism officials feel there may be up to 15,000 supporters of Al Qaeda. Nearly 600 British Muslim youths have reportedly been trained in Al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan and other places.

Yet even as MI-5 diligently documented these facts, British courtesy towards the rogue elements of other nations remained undiminished. Morocco sought extradition of its citizen, Mohammed el-Guerbozi, a veteran of Afghanistan who reportedly planned the May 2003 Casablanca blasts that killed 45 people. Guerbozi is said to be a founder of the Moroccan Combatant Islamic Group, named by the United Nations as a terrorist group linked to Al Qaeda. A member of the group confessed it had prepared sleeper cells to mount synchronised bombings in Britain, France, Italy, Belgium and Canada. Last December, Morocco convicted Guerbozi in absentia for involvement in the Casablanca attacks and sentenced him to 20 years imprisonment. But Britain refused the extradition request and he lives unmolested in north London.

Spain wanted Abu Qatada, a radical Palestinian cleric with Jordanian nationality, who secured political refugee status in Britain in the early 1990s. He is regarded as the spiritual leader of Al Qaeda in Europe and is also wanted in Jordan, where he was given a 15-year prison sentence in absentia for involvement in bomb attacks in 1998. Both France and Algeria are seeking Algerian national Rachid Ramda, 35, for his alleged involvement in the 1995 Paris metro bombing executed by Algeria's militant Armed Islamic Group.

The alleged brain behind the Madrid bombings, Mustafa Setmarian Nasar, operated out of London with impunity from 1995 to 1998, and has now gone underground. He edited a militant Islamist magazine, Al Ansar. In November 1997, when 62 tourists were massacred at Egypt's famous Luxor tourist site, President Hosni Mubarak told the British Government that seven of the 14 Gama'at al-Islamiya men believed to have planned the crime were ensconced in London. Predictably, Britain refused to hand them over.

Given this tremendous affinity for the dregs of every society, Britain has no one to blame as the pigeons come home to roost. Prime Minister Tony Blair called the serial blasts an attack upon the civilised world. If so, the brain behind them should be identified and neutralised. During two World Wars, the civilised world confronted hegemonist and megalomanical powers. Today, with Al Qaeda's network of terror embracing America, Britain, France, India, Egypt, Indonesia, Kenya, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Spain, it is time to recognise that the opponent has a powerful motivating ideology and an international reach.

What is more, despite the propaganda, the opponent can be linked to certain geographical locations. Saudi Arabia is the fountainhead and financial patron of the rigid Wahabi Islam that is intimately linked with Al Qaeda, and Pakistan provides it training and other support. In fact, ISI's close links with Al Qaeda caused India to demand that Pakistan be dubbed a terrorist state. Sadly, even though Pakistan failed to dismantle its terrorist network, successive Indian governments succumbed to US State Department pressure to talk peace with that country. It is time New Delhi put a price tag on the peace process.


Tectonic upheavals in BJP

There is an irony in the tectonic upheavals currently besieging the BJP. A party that once rode the crest of a national political quest to give Indic civilisation due honour in the public arena is itself convulsed by a clash of ideologies. An elemental struggle is on between those who wish to return to the pre-NDA commitment to the nation's foundational ethos as bedrock of the polity, and those seeking quick-fix solutions in the defeated dogmas of the Nehruvian era.

Every nation derives its identity from a core culture based upon the traditions of the native majority; all groups position themselves around this core. This does not mean that later entrants or minority groups become second-class citizens; but in a democracy, minorities do not determine national identity and ethos.

The forced Partition of India and Congress' refusal to adhere to the two-nation theory provided an ideal opportunity to demonstrate how the inclusive Hindu tradition operated in a modern polity. A Hindu Rashtra, far from being an Islamic-style theocracy imposed by the majority, would have ensured the flowering of the perennial Hindu virtues of affirmation of dharma; respect for religious diversity; and the separate but complementary roles of political and spiritual leaders.

Unfortunately Jawaharlal Nehru stood the civilisational issue on its head. Commiserating with Muslims for becoming a "divided" community, he launched a vigorous policy of minority appeasement to contain the "imagined" Hindu community. A Euro-centric mindset juxtaposed tradition against modernity, debased Hindu civilisation and culture, and proposed a rootless "scientific temper" that was actually a mindless imitation of Joseph Stalin's Soviet New Man.

Nehru's worst sin, to my mind, was not that he imposed a perverted secularism upon India, but that he dishonestly forced Hindus, rather than Muslims, to shoulder and internalise the guilt of Partition. This permitted minorityism to grow at the expense of the Hindu majority, as manifested in the growing Haj subsidy, regressive personal laws, tacit encouragement of illegal immigration by inclusion in the voter's list, tolerance of illegal madarsas, and now, reservations in jobs and educational institution on religious lines (in Andhra Pradesh). And now Andhra Pradesh is set to experiment with political reservations for Muslims in local bodies.

The so-called Nehruvian consensus involved, as a natural corollary, the complete suppression of the culture of the majority community. Sanskrit, engine of the nation's culture, nobility and learning, both sacred and temporal, was the first casualty of this approach. Despite powerful appeals, including endorsement by BR Ambedkar, it was denied the status of national language and relegated to schoolroom learning for a fixed number of years. Although NASA uses Sanskrit to programme supercomputers, the language has failed to get its due in its home country.

Most people fail to realise that modern democracies take the civilisational issue for granted. Indeed, since the mid-twentieth century, no majority in any country has been denied this right, except in India. When we look at the new post Second World War nation-states, we see that Israel made Jewish civilisation and culture the bedrock of its nationhood and Pakistan based its identity upon the Islamic injunction not to live under a non-Islamic polity.

While I have no personal information about Christian East Timor, which was carved out by the West and the United Nations from Muslim Indonesia some years ago, it can hardly have a non-Christian ethos. East Timor is powerful evidence of how the West continues to use religion as an instrument of international diplomacy to subvert other nations and cultures; those of us who claim adherence to Nehruvian-Western standards of secularism in public life would do well to examine this deeper truth before reading false sermons to the Hindu community.

It is hardly surprising that many Hindus have viewed the Congress raj as a continuation of the British Raj, because India is institutionally insensitive to popular sentiments. Some years ago, the Supreme Court looked askance at attempts to update and rewrite history books, though it ultimately approved the revised NCERT curriculum. Around the same time, however, a petitioner who sought that namaz be prohibited in public places (roads, pavements) as it inconvenienced others, did not merely have his petition dismissed, but the apex court actually accused him of causing communal tension and fined him Rs 10,000 which is quite unprecedented.

Nehru's cleverly crafted all-India minority vote-bank, however, served the Congress well and with help from sections of the Hindu community kept it in power for over four decades, despite the party never managing to win a majority of the total vote. The pent-up anger of the Hindu community first showed up in the rout of the Congress in most of northern India in 1967. It is my view that post-1967, all people's movements in India have aimed to undermine and overthrow the Nehruvian order, which has been systematically unsympathetic to their aspirations. That is why anti-Congressism was the hallmark of opposition activity for several decades.
The BJP's failure to respect the mandate given by this sentiment enabled the Congress to make anti-communalism a plank to attract anti-BJP parties to its fold. Yet, I believe that the civilisational issue has not gone away merely because it has been sidetracked once again. The BJP would do well to recognise that it was the Hindu concern with national identity and self-esteem that made the Ram Janmabhoomi movement such a phenomenal success, and the inability of party leaders to cope with the consequences of that triumph in no way invalidates the movement.

Even if one accepts the BJP claim that coalition politics prevented unilateral movement on the Ayodhya temple, it is inexplicable that even after the Archaeological Survey of India, under High Court instructions, excavated the site and found the remains of two tenth and twelfth century Hindu temple complexes below the Babri structure, little was done to facilitate the temple construction. Indeed, the Babri pillars were proved to be affixed to the Hindu temple. This is why even when Mr Advani was forgiven for calling the demolition the saddest day of his life in 1992, his reiteration of this view in Pakistan after Hindu civilisational memory was so explicitly vindicated in stone, propelled him out of the gates of history and into ignominy.

The civilisational issue is crystallising once again, and we will be remiss in our duty if we fail to seize the opportunity providence is offering in terms of a minority-majority synergy. Last time the Hindu community used Rajiv Gandhi's capitulation to ulema on the Shah Bano judgment to open the locks of the Ram Janmabhoomi. Since then, the issue of the common civil code has become far more serious, with obscurantist ulemas making a mockery of the human rights of Muslim women. Some time ago, young Gudiya was forced to return to her first husband although pregnant with the child of her second husband whom she truly loved.

Now, Imrana, raped by her father-in-law, is declared divorced from her husband and told to marry another man if she wishes! Rabid secularists like Shabana Azmi and Teesta Setalvad cannot be expected to speak for her, but Hindu dharma's inclusivist tradition demands that it embrace the beleaguered Muslim woman. A common civil code has never been more imperative; for BJP it may be the route to reinvent itself in national life.

Land of religious persecution

BJP president LK Advani's startling endorsement of Mohammed Ali Jinnah's secular credentials is less damaging than his hallucinations about the common civilisational heritage of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh - successor states of undivided India.

This politically popular but untrue dogma of 'one people' divided by machiavellian politicians needs to be nailed, so that India's unilateral disarmament vis-à-vis growing fundamentalism in its neighbourhood can be ended before more damage is wrought upon us.

Quoting Quaid-i-Azam's now immortalised speech of August 11, 1947, Mr Advani said all three countries should adopt the principles enunciated therein, viz., equality of all citizens; freedom of faith; non-discrimination by the State in matters of religion; and non-protection by the State for religious extremism and terrorism. Since Pakistan legally discriminates against non-Muslims and sponsors terrorism against India, and Bangladesh practices ethnic cleansing of its Hindu and Buddhist minorities, it is baffling that the BJP leader should put these countries at par with innocent India.

Far more damaging, however, is the flawed understanding of civilisation and heritage. A common past does not bind a people together if it does not flow perennially into the present. Like most Indians (read Hindus), Mr Advani willfully disregarded the fact that the continuity of the Indic heritage was ruptured when an exclusivist faith shunned its inclusivist embrace. We will continually demean and debilitate ourselves if we do not evolve paradigms to deal with this reality.

We need to dialogue with other nations and civilisations on our own terms. Sadly, the virtues extolled by Mr Advani are rooted in Western political thought rather than the Indic tradition, though they are consistent with it. A common civilisational heritage of the nations of undivided India would necessarily be rooted in sanatana dharma (eternal way), the negation of which is the raison d'etre of the Islamic breakaway States. The driving impulse of the three countries now vests in divergent sources; we need to acknowledge that the deviation impacts upon our internal and external security.

Sanatana dharma is a generic term for the eternal spiritual values Indians have cherished over millennia. Based on the cosmic vision of ancient rishis, it is inspired by the ideal of universal welfare of all beings, both human and other creatures. Though it has a formal structure, it is not limited to form, nor fixed in time or space. It includes a realm of pure Consciousness where knowledge is experienced through intuitive perception. Irreducible to words, this is expressed as 'that which is not' or 'that which is beyond'.

This rare ability to define itself in terms of what it 'is' and what it 'is not' distinguishes sanatana dharma from the one-dimensional literalism that bedevils monotheistic faiths. Dharma avoids dogmatism because the sages refused to declare Vedic revelations as final and binding for all times; subsequent generations were invited to discover Truth for themselves. Broadly, the Indic concept of salvation (moksha) rests on experience, not obedience.

Dharma cannot be equated with religion, which denotes belief in a single messiah and a single path to redemption, and dismisses all other paths as false and fit for annihilation. Religion is definitionally dogmatic, and the point of this brief discourse is that Pakistan and Bangladesh (now a Pakistani proxy), having separated by rejecting the common civilisational heritage, are driven by an impulse to destroy what is left of India. It would be irresponsible to overlook the civilisational aspect of this threat, as successive Indian governments have done, most culpable being the NDA.

Quaid-i-Azam's August 11, 1947 speech needs to be put in perspective. It upset his staff and colleagues and attempts to purge it from official records began within hours of its being delivered! Still, it may be consistent with Islam. Although Jinnah prompted the bloodshed of August 16, 1946, which forced Partition, and several League leaders called for population transfer throughout 1946 and 1947, he probably envisaged that a sizeable Hindu and Sikh population would remain in Pakistan.

It is known that British proved unequal to the task of ensuring safe population transfer, and possibly requested him to try to stem the rioting since he had got the State he wanted. Nehru was also reluctant to handle more refugees, particularly in the east, and West Bengal Congress leaders urged Hindus to trust the Muslim League and remain in East Pakistan. The consequences of this betrayal are still with us.

Anyway, Jinnah wrested Pakistan because he did not want Muslims to live under a Hindu majority, as was inevitable in a democracy. Pakistani writer Javaid Iqbal confirms this: "Since Muslims constitute a large majority, they have the right to demand that constitutionally the head of the state of Pakistan must belong to the majority community..." Similarly, IH Qureshi argues: "Quaid-i-Azam's only argument was that the Muslims were different because they were Muslims, not because they were Bengalis or Sindhis, or Punjabis or Pathans, but simply because they were Muslims. And what in his view made the Muslim different? The basis of the difference was the fact that their entire way of life is founded in the truth, the doctrine and the teachings of Islam." Jinnah could accept Hindus living as a minority in Pakistan. His August 11, speech only indicated a willingness to let them live subordinated to the Islamic state.

Jinnah's Pakistan had necessarily to define itself in non-Indic terms, intensify its Islamic identity and seek closer embrace with the Islamic world. This trend developed in the decades after independence. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto cultivated Islamic sentiments by wooing the clergy and declaring Ahmadiyas non-Muslims. Gen Zia went further and created separate electorates for non-Muslims; imposed zakat and ushr (agriculture tax); and Hudood ordinances (laws of Islamic punishment). Zia set up the Shariat Appeal Bench, and passed the Ahtram-i-Ramazan ordinance which prohibits eating and drinking in public during fasting time. He made Pakistan studies and Islamiyat compulsory subjects at all educational levels, including professional courses. To this, Mr Nawaz Sharif added the Blasphemy Law, which is handy for persecuting minorities.

Most importantly, successive regimes since ZA Bhutto strove to make Pakistan a power centre in the Islamic world. It has the nuclear bomb and has emerged, as Mr KPS Gill points out, as the hub of international Islamic terrorism, mentor of Taliban and Al-Qaeda. At bottom, however, is a feudal society and bankrupt economy needing bankrolling by Saudi Arabia, America, China, all of whom have separate interests. Instability is built into such a situation.

Pakistan's real problem is Islam, which has taken it away from Mother India, but has not been able to weld the Mohajirs, Punjabis, Sindhis, Baluchis, Pakhtuns and Frontier tribes (much less the distant Bengalis) into a nation. Unlike the Jews and Israel, being Muslim does not make a nation; Pakistani provinces are bursting with the quest for cultural and regional identity.

Yet even territorial nationalism is no answer, as Islam does not recognise boundaries, though it does seek territorial expansion. Pakistan is in a pincer; formed by rejecting dharma, its recourse to religion only intensifies sectarian feuds. Since Sindh was burning while Mr Advani was there, one is at a loss to understand where he found evidence of the common civilisational heritage of the two countries. Even the Ashram of the guru who inspired him was burnt down in 1948. It never reopened.

Is there a god-country link?

As conservative Christian groups in America protest against the Air Force Academy's decision to investigate complaints of institutionalised proselytisation at its Colorado Springs campus, questions arise about the status of religious freedom in that country.

Samuel P Huntington, in his expansive, Who Are We, admits America has employed highly coercive techniques in the past to ensure cultural conformity by immigrants of different ethnic and religious backgrounds, and fears the nation may be undone by multi-culturalism.

Despite a formal commitment to multi-culturalism, powerful sections of the American Government and people feel uncomfortable with non-Christians. Hence the deep political commitment to evangelization oversees, of which domestic proselytisation is a corollary.

Logically, America will hardly pump millions of dollars for conversion activities abroad and allow its own citizenry to languish in or convert to non-Christian faiths.

Rajiv Malhotra of Infinity Foundation once said that most Indians simply fail to realise that power in American society resides in its institutions rather than in an inchoate public opinion. This is a powerful insight. The institutions are deeply imbued with the core values of the original White Settlers and extremely focused about White American interests.

This is why the polity is actually an Imperial Democracy; it can tolerate (read ignore) slogan shouting by emotional mobs, but there is no space for dissent against an unstated national consensus by the power elite. Anyone doubting the veracity of this assessment has only to observe how soon Pepsico honcho Indra Nooyi looses her corporate status, even though her non-conformism was purely unintentional.

The growing numbers of non-integrating groups is unsettling to White Americans, particularly after 9/11. As India also faces the problem of secularism run riot, this may be an appropriate occasion to ponder if there is a symbiotic link between nationalism and homogeneity of religious belief among the citizenry.

Alternatively, we may ask how much religious diversity (in terms of percentage of population) nations can absorb without upsetting the dominant majority.

This article has been triggered off by the information that the US Air Force Academy at Colorado Springs, where some of the largest evangelical churches are based, is headed by Commanders who frequently double up as church leaders.

A conservative group called Focus on the Family is opposing the official probe into charges of institutionalised proselytisation. The problem reportedly came to light through the Academy's routine internal surveys, following which officials asked staff and cadets to report cases of religious discrimination.

Over 50 complaints were lodged, including forced prayers (a routine practice in missionary-run institutions in India) and derogatory religious remarks or jokes. One Protestant chaplain would curse non-proselytising officers to "burn in the fires of hell". A football coach put up a locker room banner: "I am a member of Team Jesus Christ."

Independent investigations by a Washington-based advocacy group, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, discovered that prayers (only Christian) were routinely organised before Academy sanctioned events; and students, faculty and staff would pressurise cadets to attend chapel and receive religious instruction.

Academy officers and staff members inserted advertisements in the Academy newspaper asking cadets to contact them to "discuss Jesus". On one occasion, the film, "The Passion of the Christ" was screened at the Academy; fliers advertising the event were placed on every seat in the dining hall with the message: "This is an officially sponsored USAFA event." As I understand it, this would have made attendance compulsory, which violates religious freedom and is certainly an abuse of authority.

The controversy has attracted media attention. It is said the Academy's second-in-command is a born-again Christian who uses his official position to push his evangelical beliefs. Americans United for Separation of Church and State laments that American society permits evangelical Christians to wield excessive power, a trend difficult to reverse.

The Academy organised religious tolerance classes with compulsory attendance as part of a damage-control exercise after the complaints became public. But a programme, Respecting the Spiritual Values of all People (RSVP), prepared by Chaplain Capt. Melinda Morton, became controversial after she told The New York Times that the contents were heavily diluted by officers. The Academy was forced to admit that changes were made.

According to reports, the Air Force's chief chaplain saw the RSVP programme and its dramatisation of interactions between cadets of different faiths, and protested: "Why is it that the Christians never win?" He seemed oblivious of the fact that the purpose of the presentation was to help cadets and officers understand the whole range of human religious experience. The chief chaplain admitted making the remark, but claimed he was only objecting to the disproportionate portrayal of Christians at fault for evangelization efforts. But those who made the programme said it mostly avoided religious identification.

Indians brainwashed by the propaganda that America permits non-Christians total religious freedom without prejudice need to appreciate that while there may be no overt discrimination at the level of ordinary citizens, the larger picture is somewhat different. The chief chaplain was forced to admit asking the Air Force to delete segments of the RSVP programme depicting non-Christian faiths such as Buddhism, Judaism and Native American spirituality, as well as a clip from the film, "Schindler's List," portraying the Jewish Holocaust. The programme was thus reduced from 90 minutes to 50, with the result that instead of educating cadets about other spiritual traditions, it merely conveyed a neutral message that they should respect one another's differences. This defeated the very purpose of the programme, given the pervasive pro-evangelization atmosphere at the campus, and in fact reinforced the rabid Christian White Settler image defended by Mr Huntington in Who Are We.

The American officers and chaplains at this Air Force campus clearly used their office to violate the religious space and sentiments of non-Christian cadets, breaching the constitutional boundary between church and state. Stung by the adverse publicity, the Academy is gearing up to inculcate "sensitivity" among cadets, by educating them about all world religions.

Yet it remains to be seen what actually comes out of the official enquiry, as almost all students and faculty approached by the media privately confessed that they feared speaking up could harm their careers. Chaplain Capt. Morton, who took the risk of going public because she objected to officers using their positions to advance their personal religious agenda, admitted that her Air Force career was over.

Readers of this column are aware that I view evangelical activities in India as akin to denationalisation. As a social scientist, therefore, it may be fair to question if White Americans perceive non-Christians, especially those joining critical institutions such as the military, as citizens who do not share the soul of America. Perhaps the time has come to question ideological conventions born in an historical context that no longer prevails. Separation of church and state was born in a European Christian environment wherein the state actively persecuted other denominations; it was felt nationalism would prosper under a non-denominational state.

Today, the most serious threat to the world order comes from groups organised on religious lines, transcending national boundaries, yet claiming cultural and territorial space in other nation-states. The non-dharmic, non-religious state is at a distinct disadvantage in taking on these elements. A future nationalism may depend upon revalidating the old link between god and country.

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No God but (my) God

Though it is nearly two decades since the agitation for the Ram Janmabhoomi questioned the meaning of secularism, there has since been little serious discussion of the concept. Growing Hindu unease over heightened pro-missionary activism by Congress-led regimes in various States, however, demands that the community's views be articulated to facilitate mature public discourse on the subject.

Secularism originated in the Christian West as a truce offered by a denominational State to sister denominations, whereby they could coexist in peace for the larger good of the nation.

With time, the State ceased to be denominational (though Britain formally remains so), and the offer of coexistence was extended to other faiths that entered Christian lands as immigrants. The rise of immigrant groups in Western countries gave rise to the doctrine of multi-culturalism, whereby non-Christian, non-European peoples were permitted to live a separate existence within the host culture. The rising tide of Islamic fundamentalism, however, is tearing this tolerance apart and voices are being raised in favour of the coercive assimilation that was once the hallmark of the American way.

Hindus, therefore, are not the only people in the world to question the attitude of forbearance towards the abuse of native kindness. Hindus are aware that while Islam openly professes the unity of mosque and State, Christianity detests the separation of church and State and has, from the time the cleavage was forced upon it, continued to use the state to secure its ends. The Western reality, therefore, is that the State is Christian at some level and the church in turn serves as a political arm of the State. Hence the active interest in evangelical activities by Western regimes.

India's secular State extends undue patronage to the Church; as a result Hindu patience is beginning to wear thin. The situation has deteriorated with the rise of the Sonia Gandhi-led Congress in some states. So we have a situation in which BJP-ruled Rajasthan has to change the name of a colony named after the Goddess Sati, but Maharashtra sanctions a Christian township!

Press reports suggest that former Australia cricket captain, Steve Waugh, wishes to set up a 100-400 acre "Christian township" in Mumbai. A rabid evangelist, Waugh recently donated millions for the conversion of tsunami victims. Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh has already appointed State Industry Secretary as nodal agency for the proposal, no doubt scoring points with his party chief.

In Karnataka, Congress Chief Minister Dharam Singh shamelessly facilitated Benny Hinn's evangelical blitzkrieg, which mercifully fell flat, causing embarrassment even to the official church. Dharam Singh's predecessor, SM Krishna, patronized HT Sangliana, Director General of Police (Prisons), who openly supports missionaries. A 1969-batch IAS officer from Meghalaya, Sangliana became famous in November 2001 when he ordered the arrest of Hindu activists protesting against mass conversions in Doddabalapur (Bangalore Rural).

Sangliana and some senior police officers openly lecture on the Bible at Bible College of India, Bangalore, at weekends. While this is by no means a contraband activity, one does wonder if the State administration's tolerance of this display of religious freedom would extend to a Hindu officer indulging in weekly Ram kathas. Even if not openly victimised, such an officer would be sidelined and derided as a bit of a 'crank.' Sangliana however, suffers no such disability; he openly sided with missionaries when the Ma Bhagavati temple in Devanahalli (Bangalore Rural) and Sri Durgamba Temple in Banaswadi (Bangalore) were demolished and churches erected in their place in 2002. In both cases, the Chief Minister and important Congress leaders supported the evangelicals. It is hardly surprising to learn, therefore, that as many as 84 Churches have sprung up in this area in just the last two years.

But the Chief Minister who takes the cake is Y Samuel Rajasekhara Reddy (YSR) of Andhra Pradesh. A practicing Seventh Day Adventist, Reddy reportedly had 350 farmhands converted by the Adventists on his own farm, and is now building a church for them. Reddy is openly pro-missionary. Recently, when it was found that a church is being constructed on lands belonging to the famous Bhadrachalam Rama Temple, given to a Christian organisation for setting up a school, the chief minister prevented restoration of the land to the temple. So now the church is coming up and conversion activity is in full swing at an exceedingly sacred Hindu site.

Mandir lands are also being freely distributed in Naxal-infested areas; a sub-inspector who opposed this was done to death, allegedly by Maoist Naxalites. YSR has handed over the distribution of mid-day meals to government school students to Christian bodies and NGOs, who make the children recite "yesu nama" before giving them the food. This is not only tantamount to forced conversion but also involves the psychological abuse of minors.

The worst offence, however, is the gifting of the contract for procurement of materials for prasadam at Tirupati Balaji to a Kochi Syrian Christian, GB Mathew and his firm, the JRG Wealth Management Limited, three weeks ago. Hindu activists suspect that Christians are being smuggled into crucial areas of decision-making at Tirupathi. For instance, some time ago YSR laid the foundation stones for the construction of Vasantha Mandapam in Tirumala, and construction of a new building for Sri Venkateshwara Oriental College in Tirupati. It is feared that the contracts for these Rs 109-crore projects may be awarded exclusively to Christian firms, thereby making mandir funds available for proselytisation activities.

One week ago, YSR engineered a deal between the Sri Venkateshwara Institute of Medical Sciences Hospital (SVIMS, which is owned and run by the TTD) and Dr Cherian's Frontier Lifeline and Dr KM Cherian Heart Foundation for a telemedicine facility. Dr Cherian is the founder of Madras Medical Mission, a true missionary hospital based in Chennai, and YSR inaugurated the telemedicine facility through video-conference.

Personally, I have little doubt that Dr Cherian is a thorough professional. But given the scale and audacity of missionary activity in the southern states, Hindus feel alarmed that a premier institution owned by one of the most sacred Mandirs of the Hindus (the funds for which come from ordinary Hindu bhaktas) should be made to tie-up with a missionary organization by the State Government. It is well known in Andhra Pradesh that there are more than a dozen Hindu institutions that can match and even surpass the facilities offered by Dr Cherian and his team. In the unlikely event that YSR is not aware of them, they include hospitals of the stature of Apollo Hospitals; Sri Ramachandra Medical College and Hospitals; Sri Sai Baba's hospital at Puttaparthi; Mata Amritanandamayi's Hospital at Kochi; Narayana Hridayalaya of Bangalore; Escorts Hospital, and many other super-speciality hospitals in Hyderabad.

YSR has been equally generous to the State's other monotheistic community. It is well-known that the Andhra Government owes nearly Rs 100 crores to Tirupati Tirumala Devasthanam as compensation for Mandir lands acquired for the construction of bus stands and bus depots. Though it has failed to remit even one rupee of this amount, the Government recently demanded property tax dues from TTD and on receipt of rupees six crores, instantly diverted the sum to create an Idgah Maidan on railway lands next to the Sri Venkateshwara University lands owned by TTD. This, then, is secularism in one country.

John Paul: A loveless legacy

Seemingly, all roads led to Vatican City last week. Virtually all political eminences of the Western world, as also national and spiritual dignitaries of other countries and religious traditions, flocked to pay respects to the Bishop of Rome, shepherd of the Roman Catholic Church, who had one of the best attended funerals in world history. Through all the solemn grandeur of the ceremony, however, one noted with admiration the silent dissent of the People's Republic of China, which simply stayed at home.

Unlike India's political elite, who seek international endorsement through self-abasement and compromise, China's mandarins demand respect through dogged assertion of national pride. Western media hype over the funeral of John Paul II did not send Beijing scurrying to send a representative for a photo-op with George Bush or Cardinal Ratzinger. Instead, the atheist regime remembered how the Chinese people suffered at the hands of the Catholic Church and how the late Pope bestowed sainthood upon 120 "evil-doing sinners".

Bishop Fu Tieshan of the state-run Catholic Church said: "Some of those canonised" perpetrated outrages such as raping and looting in China and committed unforgivable crimes" (Associated Press, October 1, 2000). One saint was Albericus Crescitelli, an Italian missionary who died in the anti-Western, anti-Christian Boxer uprising. He "was notorious for taking the 'right of the first night' of each bride under his diocese," according to the State Administration of Religious Affairs.

India, however, crawled without being asked to bend. Perhaps out of deference to the Italian-Roman Catholic origins of UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, the Government followed Italy in declaring three days of State mourning. And far from remembering the atrocities of the Goa Inquisition, for which the Pope refused to apologise on his India visit, every luminary with access to a centimetre of newspaper space recorded a vacuous eulogy in honour of the departed soul.

In Tamil Nadu, where the Kanchi Shankaracharya is being persecuted by a vindictive regime trying to whip up anti-Brahmin votes for the Assembly elections, the Directorate of Schools issued a Government Order directing all schools to fly the Indian flag half-mast on Friday April 8, 2005 to mourn the death of Pope John Paul II, and send a "compliance report". Some of us wanted to ask why a secular government was issuing GOs to secular State schools and private religious schools (not Government-aided) to mourn the religious head of a foreign religious institution. But we thought it would be uncultured and politically incorrect, so we remained silent.

Such Oriental niceties have been given short shrift in the White Western world that Karol Wojtyla straddled with elan for nearly three decades. Vatican's decision to let Cardinal Bernard Law lead a funeral Mass in Rome has caused outrage in America, where Law had to quit as Boston Archbishop in 2002 for protecting paedophile priests (Reuters, April 8, 2005). The Archdiocese is currently paying over $86 million as compensation to hundreds of persons abused by priests. Law's rehabilitation as archpriest of the Basilica of St Mary Major in Rome has therefore upset the devout.

Many Catholics found John Paul II's papacy disappointing because of his painful indifference towards married priests, women who lost lives, fertility and health in botched abortions, theologians dissatisfied with many aspects of church doctrine, persons caring for AIDS victims, gay Catholics longing for communion, victims of sexually abuse by priests, women wishing to be priests, and so on. The Pope's high profile vis-a-vis the Communist regimes of the erstwhile Soviet Union and Eastern Europe in no way exonerates his "episodic and selective commitments to human rights throughout the world", as Frances Kissling, president, Catholics for a Free Choice, put it succinctly.

Kissling was anguished that while the Pope had no problem meeting persons like Kurt Waldheim, he steadfastly refused to meet a single victim of clerical sexual abuse. It bears noting that some the John Paul II's close friends, notably Cardinal Hans Hermann Groer and Kurt Krenn, Bishop of St Poeltin, were forced out of office amidst allegations of sex scandals.

Regarding John Paul II's reputation as a crusader for human rights, well, many Catholic women think he excluded half of humanity. A staunch advocate of traditional Church policies on women, he refused to ordain women as priests, and condemned contraception, condoms and abortion. He and his conservative advisers worked hard to roll back reforms from the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965), which gave women more say in the liturgy and allowed altar girls to serve Mass. In fact, the Church excommunicated seven women from Germany, Austria and the United States, who were ordained in Austria in 2002.

This arch conservatism alienated both religious and lay women who felt ignored, with the result that the US alone saw a sharp drop in nuns' orders, from 179954 in 1965 to 73316 in 2003. In Ireland, church opposition to divorce and contraception has led it to being perceived as irrelevant and outdated. Critics especially carp at the Pope's opposition to the use of condoms to combat AIDS in Africa, artificial birth control to curb rising population in many countries, and abortion for Bosnian women (mostly Muslims) who were raped by Serb soldiers.

Much has been made of his extensive travels across the world, and his so-called inter-faith dialogues. Former Prime Minister Inder Gujral's wife, Sheila, lauds him for visiting synagogues and mosques and meeting the Dalai Lama (Indian Express, April 9, 2005). It is true that the Pope apologised to the Jews for the Vatican's anti-Semitism and its aloofness during Hitler's Final Solution. He also apologised to the Eastern Orthodox Christians and the Muslims for papal advocacy of the Crusades and the forced conversions and massacres in the Balkans during World War II.

But how sincere were these apologies? The Pope elevated to sainthood such scum as Cardinal Stepinac of Croatia, who supported the Nazi puppet regime of Ante Pavelic and endorsed the shameful treatment of Orthodox Christians and Jews there. Similarly, Jose Maria Escriva de Balaguer, the sinister founder of Opus Dei and close ally of the Spanish dictator, General Franco, was canonised. Many justly felt that such actions undid the benefits expected from "dialogue".

Of course, cunning political spiritualist that he was, John Paul II was much too canny to advocate respect for or dialogue with Hindu dharma, the native and majority faith of this land. This is because he had identified India as a recruiting ground to revive his dying church by converting the populace and subjugating it to the diktat of Rome. Ms Gujral may not notice or care, but those of us who love our Ishta Devatas see the hectoring of men like Karol Wojtyla as an affront to our religious freedom.

Even Western Catholics are disturbed over the manner in which Karol Wojtyla, from the time of his tenure as Archbishop of Krakow, aligned completely with the financially powerful but secretive Opus Dei movement, which has been linked to fascist regimes and is now active in the world of finance, politics and journalism. He went so far as to give Opus Dei special legal status, exempting the organisation from supervision by local bishops, as dissident German theologian Hans Kung points out. Clearly the Catholic Church is in deep crisis. It remains to be seen if it can see the way forward.


Kanchi: A tale of two dharmas

On December 6, 1992, when top BJP leaders expressed panic over the collapsing Babri edifice, I was one of the few to perceive that the Hindu movement was in deep trouble because those riding to the pinnacle of public esteem for espousing a centuries-old civilisational contest had no genuine desire to see it to fruition. Most political analysts then failed to realise that this delegitimisation of the Hindu cause at a critical moment of crystallisation was a disastrous betrayal.

The immediate aftermath was the defeat of the BJP in elections to three out of four States in which its Governments were dismissed (Rajasthan was retained by a hair's breadth). But the long-term effects were far more deleterious. As the BJP pulled its wits together and went on to form the government at the Centre some years later, it began to cynically believe that Hindu sentiment was an exploitable commodity.

Six years in power took the party's comfort levels to such heights that it ceased to relate to the Hindu masses altogether, and even the shock defeat of May 2004 could not shake it out of its somnolence. The moral failure to defend the Kanchi Shankaracharya from state-sponsored harassment aimed at destroying the sanctity and prestige of the matham and Hindu dharma gurus is the direct consequence of this derisive attitude towards Hindu society.

Far from recognising the nature of the threat to our civilisational moorings, the BJP joined the bandwagon of those who (unmindful of the lessons of Partition) support the political agenda of minorities and express anger when told there is a legitimate political agenda of the Hindu community which constitutes the nation's native and core population. In power, it ignored the Kashmiri Pandits, cross-border terrorism that went to the extent of an attack on Parliament, demographic invasions and ethnic cleansing of Hindus in Bangladesh. Even less contentious issues such as a ban on cow slaughter and the return of temples to the community were treated with contempt.

But the worst sin, to my mind, is that an influential clique in the party has internalised the hostile evangelical critique of Hindu dharma and joined hands with a coterie of super-rich, denationalised, secular-modern semi-believers, who seek to distance themselves from the demands of traditional dharma and its obligations towards caste, community, temples, mathams, gurus, acharyas, et al. And to overcome the guilt of this shameful desertion, this class expresses irritation at all aspects of Hindu ritual and belief that do not conform to the standard practices of monotheistic religions and ridicules the traditional upholders of dharma as out-of-date peddlers of obscurantism.

Thus, the tragedy at Kanchi is rationalised as something the Shankaracharya "brought upon himself" by getting involved in matters of public concern. This vicious view is being zealously propagated by self-proclaimed bhaktas in order to silence the reproach of those who still want to pick up the gauntlet. They fear appearing retrogressive by standing up for Hindu dharma and Hindu sensibilities, and hence angrily deny the legitimacy of gurus and swamis of traditional mathams, who are the acknowledged custodians of dharma and dharmins (followers), as they embody the tradition and give voice to its sanctity and power.

Unless countered, the anti-traditional class may carry the day by default, as it is determined to create a dangerous schism in Hindu dharma by carving out a niche within which it can call the shots. Already one can discern the outlines of a dharma of the privileged city-based elite of India, as opposed to the dharma of Bharat with its traditional gods, gurus, rituals, humble belief systems and mighty philosophical quests. This class condemns the myriad living traditions making up the rich tapestry of dharma as "superstition," and seeks an "authorised" version of Hindu tradition that synchronises with monotheistic faiths.

The creation of a dharma of the city-based elite as distinct from the dharma of the village/forest, the invention of a canon in place of a unified diversity, the imposition of religious hierarchy where none exists, can rupture the unparalleled unity and continuity of millennia. The danger is real because powerful secular impulses inspire this alienation. The emerging ethos denies respect to rural, folk, local and even regional sub-cultures, and tries to encapsulate the Indic civilisational ocean in a goldfish bowl.

Yet, there was a time when reputed Indologists expressed awe at the fabulous unity and continuity of Indic dharma, and marvelled at the clear linkages between rural and urban culture. At the popular level where ordinary Hindus live, whether in villages, forests, hills or mountains, dharma means a special relationship with specific deities who play a tangible role in the lives of the people. Recognised widely as Ishta Deva, Kula Deva, Grama Devata, these gods live in the everyday lives of their sincere believers, providing comfort, security, and succour in times of adversity.

These foundational gods of the Hindu tradition were carried to the towns and cities through the ages, as witnessed in the worship of holy trees and plants, sacred symbols like the earthen pot and trishul, and unification with the major gods of the classical pantheon.

Yet it is the foundational gods who link the people with the land and culture. Hence, it was only natural that Swami Jayendra Saraswati made it a point to validate these gods before his people. On March 24, 2005, fisherfolk from Devanampatti in Cuddalore district went to Kalavai to seek the Shankaracharya's blessings before resuming fishing after the tsunami. Swamiji gave them a month's food stocks as prasadam, and ensured that all had a checkup at the Matham's Free Medical Centre before returning to sea (HinduVoice.net).

Notwithstanding the horrible humiliation of his person and the venerable matham at the hands of a former actress, the Shankaracharya performed his duties as spiritual preceptor with effortless grace. He advised the devotees: "In every family, there is a kula daivam and an ishta daivam they pray to. In the same way, by praying to whatever deity is beloved to your mind, obtain well-being-I bless you." A far cry from the "worship my God or else" mafiosi-style religiosity that is battering the land with the intensity of the night tide.

This is India's true dharma: Our great dharma gurus, even when belonging to specific Sampradayas, were genuinely non-denominational, non-sectarian in propagating the fundamentals of the faith. This is why the people could anchor their faith in them as living embodiments of a living dharma. This is why the people intuitively trust them more than the so-called 'revolutionary leaders', and flock to them for blessings and guidance before launching any propitious activity. These simple earthy folk with their rock-solid faith in God and Guru constitute the bedrock of Indian culture and tradition.

The great philosophical heights attained by Hindu spirituality spring from this simple matrix; not apart from it, nor in opposition to it. That is why the Shankaracharya, an expert on the Vedas and other shastras, has made it his duty to ensure that the roots that nurture the Indic civilisation do not themselves wither for lack of nourishment. Gurus like the Shankaracharya are both the root and the tree: Our silence over attempts to chop him down will cost the entire Hindu community dearly and send wrong signals to hostile forces.

Is BJP not saffron enough?

In a virtual indictment of the BJP for indifference towards the growing anxieties and legitimate aspirations of the Hindu community, the RSS has officially advised its political offspring to set up its own organizational base. While it is too early to say if this marks a genuine parting of ways between the two, it is certain that the Mangalore session of RSS's All India Pratinidhi Sabha has made an eloquent appraisal of the leadership of the so-called saffron party.

The BJP is wholly responsible for matters coming to this pass. It frittered away a six-year opportunity provided by a benevolent providence, and resisted honest introspection after the defeat of May 2004. More shamefully, the top leadership took advantage of the disarray among the cadres to close ranks and silence any possible criticism of its performance after the electoral rout. The swift filling up of Rajya Sabha vacancies with defeated ministers and rank outsiders checkmated all dissent, while a strident insistence upon secular-minority politics completed the demoralization of the rank and file.

The writing on the wall was already visible at Haridwar last year, when VHP leaders Ashok Singhal and Pravinbhai Togadia pointedly boycotted an RSS conclave for the duration of Mr LK Advani's visit. But it was water off a duck's back. The momentum of the BJP's "Hinduminus" approach was too strong to be overturned by teasers like the removal of Veer Savarkar's plaque from Cellular Jail and the aggravated provocation of the arrests of Kanchi Shankaracharya Swami Jayendra Saraswati and Bal Perivaar Swami Vijayendra Saraswati.

The incarceration of Swami Jayendra Saraswati on trumped up charges was, as Mr Ashok Singhal rightly observed, a far greater challenge to Hindu society than Ayodhya. This is because the Ram Janmabhoomi, symbol of the return and rightful coronation of the Indic civilization as the foundational ethos of the Indian nation, cannot come before its time. Nor can we get it through the agency of reluctant warriors. That is why it was no accident that the BJP dropped even the formality of adherence to this cause after the Archaeological Survey of India conclusively proved that Babri Masjid was built over the foundations of a twelfth century temple, with "re-worked" temple materials being fashioned into a mosque structure.

The Kanchi Shankaracharya, however, is one of the most important spiritual preceptors of our times, and an articulate spokesman of Hindu concerns on matters such as the social and religious empowerment of Dalits; the conversion offensive of missionaries abetted by State indifference or active connivance; and the return of the Ram Janmabhoomi. His arrest was part of a political conspiracy to terrorise and silence the Hindu community and facilitate the breakneck speed at which evangelisation is currently proceeding in the southern states.

As an open insult to the Hindu community, it should have been met upfront. If public opinion (that did not need to come on the streets) could compel a Congress retreat in Jharkhand and Goa (even if only temporary), genuine anger by the BJP could have made a former actress eat crow in Chennai. But from the start, the party revealed a disgraceful disinclination to take up the issue; its formal positioning on the arrest later was false and duplicitous.

One of its Rajya Sabha nominees struck the first blow with a piece that suggested that His Holiness may well be guilty of some misdemeanour, if not the murder itself, and hence public opinion should await the unfolding of the case in court. Another worthy worked zealously to pressurise the Shankaracharya to abdicate while in jail, and only the most arduous efforts by extra-vigilant devotees averted this disaster, which would have amounted to a tacit admission of guilt.

In Delhi, the party maintained a stony silence, until former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee was cornered by journalists at his own Iftaar party. He responded with some inanity about food and medicines for the aged saint, as if jail amenities, rather than the arrest, were the key issue. Under pressure from the cadres, Mr Advani tried damage control with a partial hunger strike (a dharna between lunch and dinner). The turnout should worry him about his hold over the rank and file, since any state unit chief can bring more people on the streets for an anti-price rise rally. Had Asaram Bapu not graced the occasion, it would have been a complete wash-out. Even the pretence of agitation was dropped thereafter.

Even from a purely political viewpoint, the post-defeat BJP has been so out of tune with the general mood that its top leaders had no clue of ground realities in the States that recently went to the polls. Far from seizing the opportunity to return to a Hindu-centric agenda, the BJP charted a shrilly secular path to keep the NDA intact, in the vain hope of returning to power as per an astrological prediction. Worse, it's President spent months disowning responsibility for expected defeats in Haryana, Bihar and Jharkhand, even before elections were officially announced! Only the determination of dedicated cadres at grassroots level gave the party a fighting chance in Jharkhand and an honourable performance in Bihar.

It bears mentioning that the BJP's election planning was deficient in many respects. The cadres had to fight the central leadership's propensity to perpetuate favourites, rather than field winning candidates. This cost the party dearly in Patna and Ranchi. The Jharkhand imbroglio could have been avoided altogether by better selection of candidates, which would have given the BJP-JD (U) combine its own simple majority.

In Bihar, too, it was only after the first phase of polling that party managers realized the groundswell of opinion against Laloo-Rabri misrule. They did their best thereafter, but the killer instinct was missing. One party upstart pompously intoned that the serial kidnapping of school children should not be made an election issue, as if this was not symptomatic of the thriving extortion industry and complete breakdown of law and order in the State. Yet this psychological fear of striking when the iron is hot best sums up the present state of the party.

Though the results of Bihar and Jharkhand have put some spunk back into the party, insiders lament that the leadership is both tired and unwilling to yield to a younger generation. This finds expression in a hardening of attitudes towards the Sangh Parivar, from where there has been pressure for a generational transition. The argument is offered that consensual leaders are needed to reach out to a larger audience, which can be attracted only by eroding issues of Hindu political assertion.

Thus, the BJP refuses to demand abolition of Article 370, or to speak up against continuing jihadi activity in Jammu & Kashmir despite so-called peace moves. The Kashmiri Pandits have been abandoned, and there is no resistance to UPAs dangerous plans to route gas pipelines through hostile nations. Above all, the party has chosen to ignore the Maoist anarchy in Nepal and synchronised its position with the UPA and Western nations, when India's security demands siding with the monarch. Given such fundamental differences, the RSS has done well to ask the BJP to take responsibility for its own grassroots appeal and political success. Amicable divorce is often the best solution to marriages that do not work.

Minorities hijack democracy

Two successive assaults on Indian democracy by Governors hailing from minority communities exemplify how this country is hostage to a secular-minority determination to inflict political subordination on the Hindu community. While moves for a hat-trick in Patna were thwarted after Rashtrapati Bhavan rang a warning bell, the possibility of tinkering with the people's verdict remains open in Goa, Jharkhand and even Bihar.

Despite the sharp media exposure that saw Congress Party president Sonia Gandhi scuttling for cover and pushed the Manmohan Singh regime into damage control, the secular media continues to be an unreliable ally in the struggle for Hindu rights and dignity. Readers may question this focus on the majority community since the parties cheated of their democratic dues are not exclusivist Hindu parties.

Yet the larger truth is that since it espoused the Ram Janmabhoomi cause (later abandoned), the BJP came to be regarded as a party that perceived and wooed the Hindu community as a wholistic entity, though local caste arithmetic mattered while fielding candidates. But because it sought votes from a united Hindu community, it was dubbed a "Hindu communalist party".

In contrast, the Congress, Left and secular regional parties regard the Muslim and Christian communities as their political cornerstones. Both groups are wooed on the basis of a collective communal identity rooted in religious exclusivity, and are encouraged to give an anti-Hindu edge to their political consciousness. Hence the importance of the Church and the Imams at poll time; the Election Commission must explain why it takes no cognizance of this religio-political theocracy. The secular parties seek Hindu support as add-ons to their minority vote corpus, to win elections, and hence divide Hindus on caste lines. I view this policy of minority-plus-Hindu-collaborators as post-independence colonialism.

In this context, it needs to be understood that democracy is not just numbers, nor is nationalism merely territory. Democracy means the general will of the people as reflected through the majority. In India, Hindus will always comprise the bulk of any majority, in any situation. Jawaharlal Nehru's antipathy for the Hindu people and their civilizational aspirations, rising after nearly thousand years of powerlessness, led him to pervert our democracy in favour of the minorities at a nascent stage. Disarming critics with the bogey of "Hindu communalism" (never explained), he fathered a perverse democracy that distorted the popular will. For decades, Congress was ably assisted by Election Commissions that placed ballot boxes strategically (sic) and inhibited undesired (read anti-Congress) voters from coming to the booths.

Nationalism too, cannot be delinked from the nation's majority-core population, as it includes love of the native culture and civilisation, as much as of the land. Many minority citizens display exemplary loyalty towards India's territorial integrity, and their personal contributions in this regard are second to none. But this is a nationalism of the body, not of the soul. India's minorities claim only partial citizenship when they emphasise a physical relationship to the soil, on account of genealogical ties, as most are converts. By denying themselves, indeed, by actively shunning, the greater citizenship of its rich civilisational cosmos, they not only spiritually impoverish themselves, but insult the motherland in a manner that causes deep distress to the rest of us.

Living in the same house, they declare themselves outsiders. This naturally creates distrust, and if these psychological barriers are to be overcome, some of us must speak plainly, rather than abet misunderstandings through a conspiracy of silence.

Ever since Ms Sonia Gandhi became party president, there has been an utterly disproportionate rise of minority leaders in the upper echelons of the party, and a highly repulsive in-your-face articulation of so-called minority interests, which are to be achieved by debasing the larger citizenry. Thus, under a secular dispensation, there can be no concord; only conflict or competition.

Congress and its UPA allies are brazen about forming a "secular" government by disrespecting the people's mandate in three States. Minority appeasement is India's new jaziya. It is extracted through State power, and understandably minority members figure prominently among the zamindars, for who will better enjoy the forced servility of the subjected?

In Goa, the Manohar Parrikar regime was destabilized and given just 48 hours to prove its majority by a Governor who danced at a party in the wake of the tsunami tragedy. When the Chief Minister won the vote of confidence, he was peremptorily sacked by Mr SC Jamir, in an operation masterminded from Delhi by Mr Ahmad Patel.

Mr Pratapsinh Rane received a month to prove his majority, but poetic justice rendered this counter-productive. As the tactical resignations by the BJP Speaker and Deputy Speaker tilted the scales, the cussedness of the pro-tem Speaker gave Mr Rane a pyhrric victory. A media that was quiescent over Goa screamed at the rape of democracy in Jharkhand, and Congress had to backtrack. President's rule has since been imposed, but with the Assembly in suspended animation, scope for horse-trading remains, unless elections are called.

Jharkhand enraged public opinion because the BJP was close to victory and quickly garnered a simple majority with the help of Independents. But Governor Syed Sibte Razi displayed a shameful bias from the beginning, insisting upon personal verification with the five MLAs, no doubt to browbeat them. When this did not work, he swore in Mr Shibu Soren and gave him three weeks to prove his majority. Congress spokespersons Ms Ambika Soni and Mr Anand Sharma chortled gleefully until an uproar by BJP and the media prompted President Abdul Kalam to summon the Governor.

Congress immediately went into denial. But Mr Razi was made of sterner stuff. He preponed the vote of confidence by just six days and organised the Assembly session in a manner conducive to enable Mr Soren to manufacture a majority. The Jharkhand chapter is therefore far from over. While I believe that any Congressman could have acted as Mr Jamir and Mr Razi did, the fact of their belonging to minority communities gives an added edge to Hindu unease over the intentions of the Sonia-led Congress.

Mercifully, President Kalam's displeasure over Jharkhand alerted Bihar Governor Buta Singh to err on the side of caution, and Mr Lalu Yadav's determination to install Ms Rabri Devi as Chief Minister has been checkmated for the present. But it is too early to predict the backroom manoeuvres that Congress and the RJD will indulge in to get Mr Ram Vilas Paswan to fall in line once media attention shifts elsewhere. If Mr Paswan shows greater sensitivity to his Muslim votebank than to his Hindu supporters, we may well see the rise of a "secular" regime in Patna, sooner rather than later.

This brings me back to the issue of the usurpation of Indian democracy by the minorities. Much of the fault, as Shakespeare said, lies in the Hindu community itself. We have tolerated a language of political discourse that talks of "creating a secular government" and dares to call the natural ascendance of Hindus in public life as "communal".

However, all is not lost. Over the past five decades, Hindu irritation at Muslim obduracy has led to a sharp fall in winning candidates at national and State level, regardless of party affiliation. Perhaps this is a lesson that the Christian community is now waiting to learn.

Godhra: Judiciary under cloud

This very month, three years ago, Hindu pilgrims returning to Gujarat from Ayodhya were burnt alive in a bogey of the Sabarmati Express, in what was widely perceived as an act of communal aggression. Secular apologists of Islamic fundamentalism were quick to explain to a shocked nation that there were good (that is, legitimate) reasons for that gory action.

The Muslim mob at the Godhra station, they said, had been "provoked" by Hindu acts of commission. To begin with, the kar sevaks wanted to rebuild the Ram Mandir at Ayodhya. Now, that may be a heinous crime, but I fail to understand how pilgrims returning home without having done anything to erect the mandir in Ayodhya, could be considered guilty of a crime that warranted roasting alive.

For the sake of communal amity, however, we may let that pass. A second reason advanced was that an unidentified kar sevak got into a squabble with a tea vendor at Godhra station. Another version said that many pilgrims had tea at the stall and returned to the train without settling their dues. Hence the irate vendor rounded up members of his community; they managed to catch up with the train and set it on fire.

A third version was that some kar sevaks forced a Muslim girl at Godhra station into the train and made off with her. No family member of the alleged victim ever came forward to validate the story, nor was a police report filed. Yet this was repeated ad nauseum as if repetition can transform lies into truths.

To his credit, Justice UC Banerjee - though handpicked by Union Railway Minister Lalu Yadav to serve a political agenda - did not waste energy trying to prove these puerile excuses. As a former judge of the Supreme Court, Justice Banerjee realised that the first reason exposed Muslim intolerance; while the second and third reasons were both difficult to prove and impossible to justify. What is more, they seriously incriminated the Muslim community as they showed planning and motivation to commit a grave offence.

So, notwithstanding his defective report, the judge was wise enough to avoid the most obvious pitfalls on his route. This is why he went for the "safe" option of accidental fire: He showed sympathy for the victims (since he could not say the fire never took place); shifted the blame away from the accused; and kept the burden of responsibility for the subsequent Gujarat riots on the shoulders of the Hindu community.

This is by no means a poor achievement for a judge whose appointment failed to attract confidence because he was not nominated by the Supreme Court, but handpicked by Mr Yadav. Mr Banerjee submitted his interim conclusions exclusively to Mr Yadav in the form of a double-edged boon, useful for indicting community-minded Hindus and for consolidating "secular" Muslim voters.

Examining the press reports, what most upsets me is Mr Banerjee's failure to produce the remains of a gas or kerosene stove from the embers of S-6, to back his claim that the apocalyptic fire that consumed 59 persons within seven minutes was caused by passenger fault. Prima facie, it is difficult to believe that anyone could have the luxury of cooking in a bogey with a capacity of 72 passengers, but actually packed with 150 persons. Anyone with a nodding acquaintance with Gujarati culture could have told the learned judge that Gujarati women are notoriously gifted in the art of making dry snacks; the women in that ill-fated bogey would have been well-stocked for the journey and would certainly not cook on the train.

Justice Banerjee lacks credibility because he is perceived to have walked a path staked out by others, instead of scrupulously following the evidence. He did not even glance at the evidence collected by Gujarat's special investigation team (SIT), and disregarded the findings of forensic laboratories that opined that nearly 60 litres of petrol was used to start the conflagration. His decision to submit an interim report the day before he was scheduled to meet the SIT has already attracted adverse attention; his contention that he was unaware that elections were scheduled in the home state of the Minister who appointed him is shameful.

Justice Nanavati has wisely suggested that the nation await his findings. But since the Banerjee report was obviously intended to preempt and discredit the Nanavati-Shah probe, it deserves careful examination. Banerjee suggests that the fateful fire began somewhere in the middle of bogey S-6, and was probably triggered by a cooking stove, or a match or lighter. If the fire did start off accidentally, why didn't the passengers extinguish it, and why wasn't it contained in the section where it started? Since the train was a sleeper, only six persons could have been sitting in that section, since persons occupying the side berths would hardly cook in the passageway. Even if more people were seated in the section, it does not explain the failure to cry for help or warn other passengers about the danger.

The SIT claims the coach was built in 1993 with fire-retardant and self-extinguishing materials. This means that only a very volatile and highly inflammable substance (like petrol) could have caused the kind of inferno that enveloped the entire coach and took 59 lives in seven minutes. Neither a matchstick nor a portable kerosene stove could explain this kind of fire.

The judge has completely evaded the issue of why the passengers failed to open the doors at both ends of the compartment and either escape into the adjoining bogeys S-7 or S-5, or jump off the train once smoke spread in the compartment. Who or what impeded these obvious escape routes when the train was at a standstill? This issue will seriously erode Banerjee's credibility if he does not address it in his final report.

I am equally anxious for the results of the Supreme Court probe into Zaheera Sheikh's contention that despite the verbose activism of Begum Teesta Setalvad, she (Zaheera) had not filed any affidavit seeking transfer of the Best Bakery trial outside Gujarat. I shall briefly recapitulate facts for readers who have not understood the importance of this disclosure.

When Zaheera's testimony in the Vadodara Fast Track court led to the acquittal of 21 accused persons, a bunch of well-connected activists landed in Gujarat, dragged her to Mumbai and sponsored the sensational press conference in which she said the Vadodara testimony was inspired by fear. The publicity-conscious National Human Rights Commission rushed in; accepted voluminous documentation furnished on behalf of Zaheera without any scrutiny; and urged the Supreme Court to transfer the trial to another state (currently going on in Mumbai) as a fair trial was not possible in Gujarat.

To its eternal embarrassment, the Supreme Court has since discovered that Zaheera had not signed a single page presented to the NHRC or the apex court! In other words, there is no legal basis for taking the trial outside Gujarat. The learned judges cannot escape their share of this ignominy, for it is clear that they responded to the hype generated by an ideologically-committed media, rather than perusing the legal record before them. Public confidence in the impartiality of the judiciary is at stake; the judges must examine their contribution to this crisis.

Tsunami tests secular dogmas

Tsunami victims of Samanthapettai near the temple town of Madurai saw the dark side of Christian charity as missionaries stomped out of their village without distributing relief after residents refused their faith-for-food deal (ANI, 16 January 2005).

The 200-odd homeless villagers, coping with hunger, trauma and disease, felt blessed when trucks with food, clothes and medicines moved into the village. But when the nuns insisted that they convert before accepting a minimal diet of biscuits and water, the villagers recoiled with distaste. Hot words were exchanged, but the adamant missionaries beat back local attempts to acquire the relief material and quit with their supplies intact when television crews arrived on the scene by chance.

Unfortunately, the Union Government has taken no cognisance of missionary attempts to prey upon hapless tsunami victims, and reports suggest that missionary groups are getting disproportionate control over distribution of relief supplies. That is why missionaries checkmated in Indonesia are rushing to Chennai.

As is now well-known, the US-based World Help was forced to abandon plans to put 50 Muslim children in a Christian orphanage near Jakarta because the Indonesian Government said: "Muslim children should not be raised in a non-Muslim home." The Council on American-Islamic Relations added: "This confirms some of our worst fears that certain missionary groups would exploit the tragedy and the earthquake to enter into these areas and convert people through use of a disproportionate power relationship. How many incidents of this type are taking place that we don't hear about?" Indonesia has banned foreign adoptions of orphans to allay fears of possible child-smuggling or abuse following the tragedy.

In Aceh, dozens of Western Christian groups have moved in to help and convert victims, triggering enormous tension and impeding relief to nearly six lakh homeless people. The Indonesian Council of Ulemas says using aid to spread religion is wrong, and warns that the "Muslim community will not remain quiet. This is a clear statement and it is serious." But Americans are born-again religious imperialists; evangelist Mark Kosinski insisted: "These people need food but they also need Jesus. God is trying to awaken people and help them realise salvation is in Christ."

World Help has now turned towards India, where (its website announced) "God is overcoming hundreds of years of false religions and idol worship." Such despicable language surely amounts to hate speech under American laws. The United Nations, which avers respect for all faiths, also needs to take cognisance of such abusive practices.

Sadly, World Help is confident that India's votebank-conscious politicians will permit evangelisation under the pretext of religious freedom, as recently witnessed in the facilitation of the Benny Hinn sham show in Bangalore. Its president Rev. Vernon Brewer described the Indonesian orphanage plans as really "no different than what Mother Theresa did by taking Hindu orphan children and placing them in a Roman Catholic children's home in Calcutta, and she won the Nobel Peace Prize for doing that". This is an eloquent comment on the political-cultural underpinnings of the Nobel, and Indian politicians panting for it should accept that getting it involves sacrificing critical national interests.

Western determination to make the world Christian calls for scrutiny of the idea of "secularism". Many Indians lazily swallow Western propaganda that secularism is separation of Church (religion) from State (public realm); that Western nations are superior because they practice this policy; and that secularism is a universal value.

In truth, secularism is only a tactical ceasefire negotiated between warring Christian denominations in blood-stained Europe. The privileges of secularism (State restraint from murder and mayhem against different sects) did cover other faiths entering Christian lands. But the rising anti-Jewish sentiment in France (birthplace of all Western "universal" values) should make us understand the basically intra-Christian nature of this concept. Islam did not produce a truce among Islamic sects, and continues to be plagued by sectarian strife. Islamic tolerance of other creeds is notoriously deficient.

Hindu leaders have mindlessly accepted Western categories of thought and imposed artificial definitions upon society. The Vedic categories of "Vasudev kutumbukum" (the world is one family) and "Ekam sat, vipraha bahuda vadanti" (there is one Truth, wise men call it differently) have been distorted to harm community interests and need a proper explanation.

To begin with, the monotheistic traditions were unknown to India when these pristine thoughts were enunciated. The Vedic seers validated all thoughts, divinities, and sacred symbols revered within the geo-cultural matrix of India, and bound them into the fabled unity and continuity of the Indic tradition.

Does Vedic tolerance bestow spiritual equality to monotheistic faiths? Our ethos does not label any spiritual quest as "false religion" (whatever that means). Yet Hindu dharma is implicitly at odds with monotheistic intolerance. Accepting Christianity or Islam involves hating our own dharma (as secular intellectuals and politicians do), and shunning the other monotheism, as both demand exclusive adherence! Soon our "tolerant" secularists will be forced to choose between Islam and Christianity, as evangelisers up the ante in the contest for souls (read holy warriors).

Much of the current tension in Indian society is on account of "secular" politicians mollycoddling the two monotheisms and suppressing legitimate Hindu aspirations. While secularism in a Hindu context permits the existence of other faiths, it cannot tolerate negation of Hindu identity and culture. Dharma demands that spiritual paths that refuse to coexist and seek actively to destroy others must be repelled.

Secularists will claim a multi-religious society cannot privilege a particular tradition, but this is the reality all over the world. The German State collects taxes for two major Christian groups (non-Christians are exempt). It also provides religious lessons at school for the two Christian sects.

America is famously non-neutral in matters of religion. The dollar proclaims: "In God we trust" and the Pledge of Allegiance invokes God. In South Carolina, Protestantism is State religion and the election of clergy is part of the State election process. The constitution of Pennsylvania advocates religious work for building human virtues.

In Britain, the Church of England is the official Church and the monarch is its head. To this day, a Catholic or anyone who marries a Catholic cannot claim the throne. In Scotland, the general assembly of the Presbyterian Church is the supreme legislative and judicial body. Higher echelons of priesthood automatically become members of the upper house of the British Parliament and thus participate in the legislative process.

In Japan, Buddhism was the state religion from the sixth century until 1934, when a military coup restored the original Shinto as state religion. The 1945 constitution separated religion and state, but Shinto priests continue to preside over all public and private ceremonies. These are all nations that India respects.

Within the country, however, we find that in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, most cash-rich temples are controlled by State Governments. The contributions made by devotees are taken by the State treasury, and the Hindu community is deprived. Not only are donations to churches and mosques untouched, but the contributions of Hindu laity are diverted for upkeep of churches and mosques, and even finance the infamous Haj subsidy! Indian secularism thus discriminates against Hindu dharma and Hindu aspirations. It is high time we liberate ourselves from this false secularism and give due respect to ourselves and our native ethos.

Faith, flesh and fury

As 2004 bowed out, snarling with apocalyptic fury, citizens living or holidaying along the Indian coastline found unexpected islands of hope and refuge as unseen powers stepped in to save lives apparently destined for burial at sea. The picaresque Vivekananda Rock in the middle of the sea off Kanyakumari, hit by 40-feet-high Tsunami waves on 26 December, imperilled almost 2,000 lives, including around hundred children. As frissons of shock and terror caused stampedes, Swami Vivekanand's serene statue mediated between life and death. Ferocious waves struck the statue for two hours, but could not get those sheltering behind; who were later rescued (Times News Network, 27 December 2004).

Miraculous instances of total control of the raging waters were noticed along the Chennai coastline, where Hindu temples stood tall and protected people and even other structures. By all accounts there was heavy devastation in Marina, Santhome, and Foreshore Estate; desolation at Neelangarai; ruin at Kovalam. Yet there was a strange calm at Besant Nagar, where people were saved by the Ashtalakshmi Temple, built at the instance of the late Paramacharya of Kanchi, who consecrated it with the words: "The purpose of constructing this Ashtalakshmi Temple is to save the people living in the land areas from the fury of the sea waves. No harm will befall anyone living in this region from the vagaries of the sea."

At Besant Nagar itself, the famous Rathnagirishwarar Temple was built along the coast after the Paramacharya pointed to the spot saying: "There is a Swayambhu Lingam inside." The people dug, found the lingam, and the temple came up. The Arupadai Veedu Temple of Lord Murugan also stands on the seashore in Besant Nagar, having come up at the instance of Shankaracharya Swami Jayendra Saraswati and Swami Vijayendra Saraswati. Despite the proximity of these temples to the sea, not a drop of water entered their premises; they saved hundreds of people who took refuge in them.

On the Cuddalore coast, thousands were swallowed up by the tsunami, but almost 4,000 fishermen from twenty villages in the Chidambaram region had a providential escape as they had gone for the annual "Arudra Darshan" of the famous Nataraja Mandir to pull the Lord's chariot, as per tradition. Returning to find their villages ravaged beyond recognition, a fisherman said there was no impact inside the Chidambaram Mandir, and that the community was saved by the grace of Nataraja (Eenadu, December 31, 2004).

At Kovalam, the Kannikaparameshwari Temple stood resolutely within 500 metres of the sea, and kept the waters firmly at bay. The Goddess saved hundreds of children who sang soul-stirring bhajans as the sea raged, as other areas of Kovalam were devastated.

My purpose in narrating such instances - as have come to my notice - is to highlight the Indian media's animosity towards Hindu dharma and its deliberate policy of ignoring such major acts of divine intervention, which literally saved thousands of lives, while playing up individual cases of escape from the fury of the elements. Another shameful media omission is the complete refusal to acknowledge the sterling service being provided by thousand RSS volunteers in nine major Tsunami-hit centres. While RSS is not alone in rushing food, medicines and clothing to the victims, it is the only organisation undertaking the more difficult task of the disposal of the dead, and several thousand bodies have been given respectable funerals already.

In sharp contrast, many proselytising agencies are viewing the tsunami tragedy as an opportunity to promote their agenda, and it is just as well the Indian Government has refused to permit foreign adoptions of orphans. KP Yohannan, president, Gospel for Asia, says his organisation is working in India, Sri Lanka and other affected nations, to minister to those suffering both physically and spiritually. With the Vatican pledging $6 million, one shudders to think what price will be extracted for this charity. Dr Ajith Fernando, the "Billy Graham of Sri Lanka", has been reported saying: "We have prayed and wept for our nation for many years. The most urgent of my prayers has always been that my people would turn to Jesus. I pray that this terrible, terrible tragedy might be used by God to break through into the lives of many of our people."

Such shameful quid pro quo is alien to our spiritual tradition. Swami Dayanand Saraswati's AIM for Sewa and several other Hindu bodies are engaged in outstanding relief work. Mata Amritanandamayi, who personally led 15,000 devotees to safety when the waves hit, has announced a Rs 100 crore relief package and offered to adopt all orphaned children in Kerala. Far from aggrandising herself, she is seeking coordination with the State Government which has not been able to raise even Rs 25 crore in this massive rehabilitation effort.

Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, bete noire of Indian secularists, reacted with exemplary speed, with his Crisis Management Group meeting even before the Centre's CMG. Modi was the first to send condolences to the Governments of Thailand, Sumatra and Indonesia. By afternoon the same day, he finished stocktaking and had two planeloads of relief material ready. He also displayed sensitivity in selecting Tamil-speaking officers to coordinate with the Tamil Nadu Government, Malayalam-speaking officers for Kerala, and similarly with the Andamans, and had the presence of mind to change the relief material from kurta-pyjama to lungi-shirt. And even as the Centre's Disaster Management team was surveying the damage, he selected 67 highly affected talukas and appointed 67 officers to look after them in collaboration with local voluntary organisations.

Given this wonderful native energy, I endorse Mr Manmohan Singh's decision to shun foreign aid, though this has annoyed Western diplomatic missions immensely. India has suffered great humiliation while taking foreign aid in the past, particularly during the Gujarat earthquake and the Orissa supercyclone. In Orissa, European aid agencies pontificated upon the State's poor infrastructure instead of focusing on relief. During the Gujarat earthquake, the Japanese rushed to test the water in affected areas and declared it undrinkable, instead of providing relief. These experiences upset the Indian Government, besides which a cost-benefit analysis showed foreign aid to be inadequate and not worth the bother. Interestingly, countries demanding access for relief teams to distribute material relief - which India does not lack - are unwilling to make cash donations to the Prime Minister's Relief Fund.

Clearly they only want access to the sensitive coastal regions. But there are sound logistical and security reasons for refusing foreign aid. Government sources say that after ensuring visas for the aid workers, they have also to provide them security and living environments similar to what they enjoy back home, which is hardly the priority of a hard-stretched administration in disaster-struck areas. Moreover, with the tsunamis having hit some strategic assets, the Government is keen to contain negative reportage in the wake of the flooding of the Kalpakkam nuclear complex. Certain Western nations are also notorious for conducting espionage activities in times of vulnerability.

Already in neighbouring Sri Lanka, around 1,500 US marines are landing - ostensibly to provide emergency relief. They are expected to be based in Jaffna, Trincomalee, Amparai (in the East) and Galle, where they will set up command and control facilities. India is already concerned that internationalisation of Sri Lankan relief efforts may impact upon its geo-strategic environment.

Baptised, but boundary remains

The gutter inspectors are out, revelling in the discomfort of devout Hindus, telling us exactly what's wrong with us. To begin with, it's the Brahmins and the caste system, a euphemism for the fact that we're still a predominantly Hindu society. Then it's those few Hindu mathams that still enjoy the wealth and eminence characteristic of the pre-Islamic era, and do not have to beg for survival. Indeed, they can establish schools, universities, libraries, hospitals and clinics and give the soup-for-your-soul merchants a run for their money.

Believers in the one true God (whoever that is, since every Islamic and Christian sect claims monopoly) warn that mandirs peddle superstition and exploit gullible followers. It is only corporate America, annually pushing millions of dollars into the "faith-based" humanitarian industry, which has the right to stalk the poor and vulnerable in the name of social service. And it has powerful native allies who can tick off the Kanchi Matham for serving devoted Dalit Hindus, and tell the Shankaracharya to confine his activities to the daily "arti". If we are a soft State as evidenced in our attitude towards Pakistan's continued jihadi activities, it is equally true that we are a soft people who have taken the continued humiliation of Swamigal lying down.

Recently a leading US magazine (secular in the uniquely White American way) tried to whitewash Francis Xavier's bloody legacy and convince us that because hundreds of Christians (native and tourists) flock to his once-intact-but-since-disintegrated body, he was a great saint (figure that out, if you can). The Inquisition may have been excessive, but its noble objective was saving the heathens.

The trouble with conversions is that, like a dog that runs after a moving car and wouldn't know what to do if he caught it, the missionaries appear clueless about what to do with the saved (sic) souls. In the West, Christians continued to mistreat their slaves after converting them to Christianity, which is why the liberated slaves are striking back through the Black Muslim movement. India's contemporary Dalit movement is in crisis because it is largely financed and indoctrinated by American and British proselytizers. It is heartening that a few intrepid souls are venturing to challenge these instruments of neo-colonial geo-politics and find their own voice. Though ignored by the secular media, they nonetheless have a case.

Earlier in September this year, several hundred activists of the Poor Christian Liberation Movement (a Dalit Christian body) held a dharna at Jantar Mantar to protest the "increasing corruption in Church organisations". They urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to ensure transparency in the functioning of Christian NGOs that misuse foreign aid received for the welfare of the poor and downtrodden.

The PCLM alleged that some Christian NGOs were torturing and oppressing workers who objected to the mis-utilisation and embezzlement of funds. Demanding an enquiry into the affairs of these NGOs, PCLM president RL Francis alleged that "Christian missionary NGOs are indulging in corruption, casteism and favouritism", and that Church organisations do not submit any account of the crores of rupees received as grants-in-aid. Mr Francis said that Christian schools, colleges, hospitals and other bodies earned huge profits in the name of serving the community, but the church leadership refused to provide accounts of the same either to the community or to the government. Unlike secular Hindus, Mr Francis is not seeking Government takeover of these rich bodies, but wants the UPA regime to press Church organisations to spend at least 50 per cent of their profits and incomes on uplifting poor and downtrodden Christians. This raises legitimate questions about the activities for which funds are received and their actual utilisation.

Scorning the Church demand to include Dalit Christians in the Scheduled Caste list, Mr Francis countered: "On the one hand, the Church demands reservation for Dalit Christians from the government while on the other, it opposes and refuses to provide them reservation in the Church structure. The Poor Christian Liberation Movement wants that the Prime Minister, instead of giving Dalit Christians the lollipop of including them in the Scheduled Caste list, should instead set up a Dalit Christian Development Board for undertaking concerted social and economic development of Dalit Christians."

There is some merit in this view. According to the 1991 census, there were 19.65 million Christians in India (10.7 million in South India and 3.6 million in the North-east). Of the 3.2 million Christians in Tamil Nadu, Dalits constitute nearly 65%. Now, as Vigil public forum legitimately asks, if conversion entails empowerment and Dalits and tribals comprise such a high percentage of the Christian population, what kind of power-sharing equation has been established in the Church hierarchy between priests of the erstwhile upper castes and erstwhile Dalits?

And shouldn't Dalits cease to perceive themselves in terms of caste after becoming Christians? Sadly, the truth is otherwise. Until 1991, out of approximately 134 Catholic Bishops in the country (14 in Tamil Nadu alone), there was no Dalit or tribal until the ordaining of Bishop Ezra Sargunam, a Dalit. Barring the States of Goa and Kerala, Dalits and tribals comprise a major percentage of Christians, yet they are hardly visible at the level of Bishops, Vicars-General, priests, Directors, Professors in seminaries, and surgeons and heads of departments in Christian hospitals and medical colleges.

Even Archbishop George Zus, a high ranking member of the Vatican Hierarchy, commented adversely on this situation while addressing the Catholic Bishops' Council in Pune, in December 1991. Dalit Christians, he said, "make 65 per cent" of the ten million Christians in the South, but less than four per cent of the parishes are entrusted to Dalit priests. There are no Dalits among the 13 Catholic Bishops' Council of Tamil Nadu or among the Vicars-General and the Rectors of seminaries and Directors of social assistance centres.

Secular oppressors of gentle souls like the Kanchi Shankaracharya will, of course, ignore the fact that while Hindu society has elevated Dalits to high status in all walks of life, including the Presidentship of the Republic, the faiths that lured them away from the Hindu fold in the name of equality and social justice have left them seething with discontent. Vestiges of the despicable practice of untouchability are routinely thrown in the face of the Hindu community, but little respect is shown to dharamacharyas who devote their lives to eradicating it. On the contrary, they become vulnerable to persecution.

Of course, secular fundamentalists do not dare probe how untouchability which has no sanction in dharma arose in Hindu society. Like the slave trade, it appears to be the creation of a particular socio-political historical situation. In any case, untouchability is not the only form of discrimination suffered by Christian Dalits. To this day, there are hardly any inter-caste marriages among Christians of the upper castes and Dalit converts, though such marriages are common in Hindu society and no longer attract attention. Yet even today, upper caste Christians will cringe at the thought of accepting the holy water from a Dalit Christian priest, and many churches and cemeteries have even erected walls to keep the dust of the upper caste laity safely distant from the dust of Dalits. Separatism has thus been extended to Mother Nature (earth) and Eternity itself, as Christians are supposed to be admitted to Heaven or Hell at death.

The Brahmin and the Hindu

As Swami Jayendra Saraswati stoically braves the onslaught of secular oppression unleashed by an unholy alliance of Government and media, it is clear that his tormentors have no case, have failed hopelessly in their nation-wide fishing expedition, but are nonetheless determined to keep him incarcerated. Nothing the judiciary has done so far gives ground for hope, so Swamigal's devotees may well prepare for a long eclipse of justice.

There is no legitimate cause to believe that the Kanchi Peetham's lawyers are not up to the mark, as was initially feared when bail did not materialise on the first day, as it should have. The Matham's meticulously drafted public statement, which appeared in select newspapers on 7 December 2004, reflects the professional skill of those engaged in defending the Swami. We must, therefore, take it in the spirit that the scales are tilted against us.

The Hindu-hating media has noted with satisfaction that adherents of Sanatan Dharma lack the terrorising talents of Abrahamic faiths, and we may concede this. We have tolerated blasphemies such as the Shankaracharya's "plans" to flee to Nepal, but we have not asked how the Snam Progetti employee who became a political embarrassment to Signora Sonia Gandhi successfully escaped from the capital in a most timely fashion.

Meanwhile, Brahmin-bashers have rushed to fish in troubled waters. It is being said that Ms Jayalalithaa ordered the action against the Shankaracharya because she needed to shed her pro-Brahmin image and curry favour with the Dravidian masses. It is being insinuated that the Brahmin community is an ogre that has been sucking the blood of the Hindu people for centuries. As the attempt to de-link the Hindu community from the Brahmin preceptor who preserved Dharma through a thousand years of oppression instantly reminds one of the mischief of the British Raj, it is worth scrutinising the language of its modern advocates.

The Aryan Invasion Theory, raison detre for the north-south divide, has been debunked internationally. Brahmin-bashing, however, is one of the corrosive legacies of the Raj that has not been challenged head-on. It is therefore instructive to ask if Brahmins truly monopolised all access to education in the pre-British era, and thus cornered all avenues of employment. What kind of access did non-Brahmin castes have to education in south India before the British liberated them (sic) from the stranglehold of Brahmin control?

Dharampal (The Beautiful Tree) has effectively debunked the myth that Dalits had no place in the indigenoullkkks system of education. Sir Thomas Munro, Governor of Madras, ordered a mammoth survey in June 1822, whereby the district collectors furnished the caste-wise division of students in four categories, viz., Brahmins, Vysyas (Vaishyas), Shoodras (Shudras) and other castes (broadly the modern scheduled castes). While the percentages of the different castes varied in each district, the results were revealing to the extent that they showed an impressive presence of the so-called lower castes in the school system.

Thus, in Vizagapatam, Brahmins and Vaishyas together accounted for 47 per cent of the students, Shudras comprised 21 per cent and the other castes (scheduled) were 20 per cent; the remaining 12 per cent were Muslims. In Tinnevelly, Brahmins were 21.8 per cent of the total number of students, Shudras were 31.2 per cent and other castes 38.4 per cent (by no means a low figure). In South Arcot, Shudras and other castes together comprised more than 84 per cent of the students!

In the realm of higher education as well, there were regional variations. Brahmins appear to have dominated in the Andhra and Tamil Nadu regions, but in the Malabar area, theology and law were Brahmin preserves, but astronomy and medicine were dominated by Shudras and other castes. Thus, of a total of 808 students in astronomy, only 78 were Brahmins, while 195 were Shudras and 510 belonged to the other castes (scheduled). In medicine, out of a total of 194 students, only 31 were Brahmins, 59 were Shudras and 100 belonged to the other castes. Even subjects like metaphysics and ethics that we generally associate with Brahmin supremacy, were dominated by the other castes (62) as opposed to merely 56 Brahmin students. It bears mentioning that this higher education was in the form of private tuition (or education at home), and to that extent also reflects the near equal economic power of the concerned groups.

As a concerned reader informed me, the "Survey of Indigenous Education in the Province of Bombay (1820-1830)" showed that Brahmins were only 30 per cent of the total students there. What is more, when William Adam surveyed Bengal and Bihar, he found that Brahmins and Kayasthas together comprised less than 40 per cent of the total students, and that forty castes like Tanti, Teli, Napit, Sadgop, Tamli, etc., were well represented in the student body. The Adam report mentions that in Burdwan district, while native schools had 674 students from the lowest thirty castes, the 13 missionary schools in the district together had only 86 students from those castes. Coming to teachers, Kayasthas triumphed with about 50 per cnet of the jobs and there were only six Chandal teachers; but Rajputs, Kshatriyas and Chattris (Khatris) together had only five teachers.

Even Dalit intellectuals have questioned what the British meant when they spoke of "education" and "learning". DR Nagaraj, a leading Dalit leader of Karnataka, wrote that it was the British, particularly Lord Wellesley, who declared the Vedantic Hinduism of the Brahmins of Benares and Navadweep as "the standard Hinduism", because they realised that the vitality of the Hindu dharma of the lower castes was a threat to the empire. Fort William College, founded by Wellesley in 1800, played a major role in investing Vedantic learning with a prominence it probably hadn't had for centuries. In the process, the cultural heritage of the lower castes was successfully marginalised, and this remains an enduring legacy of colonialism.

Examining Dharampal's "Indian science and technology in the eighteenth century," Nagaraj observed that most of the native skills and technologies that perished as a result of British policies were those of the Dalit and artisan castes. This effectively debunks the fiction of Hindu-hating secularists that the so-called lower castes made no contribution to India's cultural heritage and needed deliverance from wily Brahmins.

Indeed, given the desperate manner in which the British vilified the Brahmin, it is worth examining what so annoyed them. As early as 1871-72, Sir John Campbell objected to Brahmins facilitating upward mobility: "The Brahmans are always ready to receive all who will submit to them - The process of manufacturing Rajputs from ambitious aborigines (tribals) goes on before our eyes."

Sir Alfred Lyall was unhappy that "more persons in India become every year Brahmanists than all the converts to all the other religions in India put together... these teachers address themselves to every one without distinction of caste or of creed; they preach to low-caste men and to the aboriginal tribes"; in fact, they succeed largely in those ranks of the population which would lean towards Christianity and Mohammedanism if they were not drawn into "Brahmanism". So much for the British public denunciation of the exclusion practiced by Brahmins!

Swami Jayendra Saraswati belonged to this league of Brahmin preceptor so hated by proselytisers. He even rebelled against Paramacharya Chandrashekhar-endra Saraswati in order to serve the Dalits. He became vulnerable to the present conspiracy because of the liberal access he permitted to himself

Justice must be seen to be done

Even at the risk of contempt of court, I must say that the manner in which the Tamil Nadu courts have conducted proceedings against the Kanchi Shankaracharya has left millions of citizens with the feeling that justice has not been seen to be done. As this is the litmus test of justice, the Chief Justice of India, who recently promised probity and transparency, would do well to watch this extremely sensitive case.

It has become a political fashion to invoke the majesty of law while launching a trial by organised propaganda through the media. Thereafter, the law is "guided" along a particular course. Tamil Nadu Public Prosecutor K Doraisamy indicated this course when he called Swami Jayendra Saraswati a "most undeserving criminal", and fought to deny him bail. The courts acquiesced and extended the judicial remand of the 70-year-old seer by a fortnight, even as the case against him showed holes bigger than lunar craters. I also wonder if Ms Jayalalithaa's award of Rs 5 lakh to the wife of the murdered man is judicially appropriate at this stage of the case.

If the law is equal for all, we must understand what equality entails. Some years ago, an inebriated young man in a BMW mowed down five or six pavement dwellers in the wee hours of the morning and nearly washed away the evidence when caught by an alert constable. His lawyers managed bail after a fabulous compensation to the aggrieved families, "without prejudice to the case" (whatever that means), and secured the court's indulgence to send the young man to Colombia University, USA, to complete his education and save his career. The case has never since been heard of and the young man now graces newspaper society columns.

Actor Salman Khan, arraigned in a similar crime, received bail from a compassionate police officer for the princely sum of Rs 900. And the alleged murderer of poor Jessica Lal, who was shot in an illegal bar, chose the day and time of his surrender; the owners of that seedy joint remain the pride of the media. What credibility does media have when it tries to convince us of the Shankaracharya's culpability in a murder?

Nor does the Tamil Nadu police inspire confidence. Ms Jayalalithaa was hustled into prison after Karunanidhi became Chief Minister in 1996; she returned the compliment in 2001. The Kanchi Matham's bank accounts, from which the alleged killers were allegedly paid, metamorphosed from ICICI to Indian Bank. The key accused told the court he was tortured to confess, but retracted a day later, while still in custody.

While on politics, I must share the anguish of the Hindu community at the Prime Minister's statement in Hyderabad that "the Centre has no interest in the matter" (of the arrest). As it is now known that the Centre was informed before the arrest, it is just as well that Mr Manmohan Singh has modified his stance on the matter.

Meanwhile, media propaganda that Hindus are unconcerned about the arrest is questionable. The Hindu Munnani, a largely Dalit group, has protested at several places. Press reports suggest despair among Dalit families of Irulneeki village, the seer's birthplace, where he had launched several development schemes. The Kattunanyakan scheduled tribe, scavengers by profession, built an Amman temple in 1992 with his help. Village chief Natesan said eloquently: "When many still considered us untouchables, he treated us with dignity."

It goes without saying that when a dignitary of the Shankaracharya's status is arrested, there must be a method behind the madness. In this case, there appears to be a synergy of vested interests and given the gravity of the crisis for Hindu society, it is worth placing all floating information on record and giving all concerned a chance to set the record straight. For in fairness, it is difficult to refute subterranean charges.

The most overt reason alleged for the Chief Minister having the gall to order the action is an intimate associate's pathological obsession to possess all prime estate in the State. The Shankara Matham had purchased two world-class hospitals in Chennai and the Shankaracharya's refusal to part with one, despite a heavy duty "courtesy call", caused heartburn.

But the underlying motive is said to be a religio-political conspiracy, with possibly an international angle. His Holiness was a thorn in the flesh of evangelists, and he was reportedly furious when Jayalalitha withdrew the anti-conversion law following her rout in the Lok Sabha elections. Days before his arrest, he had also railed against the Endowments Act whereby government exercised control over temples. He supported the demand for removal of non-believers from temple managements and wanted use of temple finances for purely Hindu religious causes (that is, funds from Hindu temples should not fund Haj subsidy or Church maintenance).

Swamiji hit the conversion industry where it most hurt. He aimed at building a temple in every Dalit village and in giving personal darshan in each village. His Chandrasekharendra Maha Vishwavidyalaya, a Deemed University, controls several educational and medical institutions, which serve the villages and challenge missionary monopoly in these sectors.

In Tamil Nadu, the cognoscenti feel American evangelists planned the whole sordid affair. Certainly the silence of the Western media over the arrest like Sherlock Holmes' dog that did not bark is eloquent. The American organisation that monitors freedom of religion abroad was upset with the anti-conversion law and was dialoguing with the State government to undo it. That President Bush supports vigorous evangelism is no secret. His disrespect for Hindu dharma was on public display immediately after his re-election, when he hosted an Iftaar and Diwali dinner at the White House simultaneously, and attended only the former. The pathetic excuse peddled by his staff was an insult to the worldwide Hindu community and must be perceived as such by Hindus, regardless of ideological predilections.

Within Tamil Nadu, one community reportedly dominated in the arrest drama. Moreover, the Indian Christian Council organised a protest in Bangalore against those who opposed the arrest. MLC L Hanumanthaiah said the Vishwa Hindu Parishat and Bajrang Dal activists were behaving as if the arrest was an offence (wasn't it?). Janata Dal(S) leader Prof Narasimhaiah said the Tamil Nadu police had enough evidence (Deccan Herald, November 17, 2004).

The cognoscenti say that just as Congress governments are promoting the building of churches even where there is no Christian population, so the former actress wanted to cozy up to the UPA chairperson by cutting the nose of the Hindu community. Possibly she fears dismissal of her Union Government, or desires an alliance with the Congress during the next election.

Finally, given persistent fears of a conspiracy to takeover the Matham and its multi-crore assets, some points are in order. Immediately after the arrest, some persons met the seer in jail and pressurised him to abdicate. There is a concerted attempt to make Bal Shankaracharya renounce social activism. When Swami Vijayendra Saraswati was returning to Kanchi from Mehboobnagar, his convoy was stopped by the owner of a reputed newspaper, who personally accompanied him to the city. This gentleman reportedly attended a closed-door meeting of the Catholic Bishops Conference of India in Kerala earlier this year along with the correspondent of a leading news channel. There is something rotten in Tamil Nadu.

Zaheera rattles secular 'fixers'

Two events relating to Gujarat happened almost simultaneously. The first, which still reverberates in news columns, was Zaheera Sheikh's second volte-face in the Best Bakery retrial. The second, largely ignored by our Hindu-hating media, was the demand by Hyderabad Naxalites for the unconditional release of Maulana Naseeruddin, recently arrested by the Gujarat police in the Haren Pandya murder case. Ramakrishna, secretary of the Communist Party of India (Maoist), went so far as to demand that the Andhra Government ban police entry into Muslim homes or ghettoes without permission. Only the Kanchi Shankaracharya can be shamelessly arrested on Diwali eve for a case that does not require his presence in jail.

Even those of us who resist intimidation by the so-called secularists have failed to note the insidious growth of a trend to secure deferential treatment for the Muslim community in the realm of criminal law. The Sharia-based personal law has already bequeathed a grim legacy of inequality, as witnessed in the tragedies of the old Shah Banu and the young Gudiya. And now the criminal law of the land is sought to be tailored to an agenda that renders the Hindu community even more unequal vis-a-vis the Muslims. This calls for scrutiny of the motivation and funding of groups engaged in such activism.

The Zaheera Sheikh case is appropriate for such a study. Zaheera sprang into the limelight after her testimony in a Vadodara court led to the acquittal of 21 accused persons and outraged the secularists. Virtually hijacked by Mumbai activists, she then made headlines with her claim that a BJP MLA had intimidated her and she could not testify freely unless the Gujarat riot cases were transferred from the BJP-ruled State.

So loud was the din created by those determined to wrest a particular kind of judgment from the courts that the Supreme Court concurred with the exercise of tarnishing the reputation of the entire Gujarat judiciary, and took the unprecedented step of transferring the cases to Mumbai. Nemesis came close on the heels of the Congress Party's installation of its Government in Maharashtra: Zaheera accused Teesta Setalvad of virtually imprisoning her in the latter's Mumbai home, forcing her to sign documents she could not read, pressurising her to give a certain type of testimony, and generally threatening her in the guise of organising her legal defence.

Setalvad and her fellow travellers managed a stupendous feat in getting the cases transferred to their chosen state (Maharashtra) on the strength of an orchestrated outcry and a conniving media. This same media has now launched a witch-hunt against Zaheera and is trying to pre-empt the judiciary by declaring her testimony valueless. An activist of Setalvad's impugned NGO, anticipating snags in the cosy relationship with the judiciary, has made the staggering demand for an out-sourcing of the judicial process itself to NGOs with secret agendas and no public accountability.

The Indian judiciary's encouragement to activists with covert agenda's and no locus standi has placed it in an unenviable position. Concerned citizens are now raising questions that deserve an answer. For instance, does Setalvad's alleged behaviour amount to intimidation and prompting of a witness? But the real challenge before the learned judges is rebutting the media campaign against Zaheera and her testimony. The allegation that Setalvad pressurised a witness to name innocent persons is too serious to be shrugged aside without proper investigation, especially when a massive cover-up operation is already underway. The currently emerging view that the riot cases were transferred on faulty premises must be addressed and norms laid down to prevent the hijacking of justice in future.

Judicial activism is now a serious public concern. There is a feeling that the judiciary is prone to taking up high-profile cases out-of-turn, which perpetuates backlog and imperils impartiality. Best Bakery superceded the infamous St Kitts case involving the PMO under the late Rajiv Gandhi. If out-of-turn allotment of Government housing or petrol pumps is a malpractice, what is the judicial merit in selecting court cases out-of-turn?

Zaheera has asked the Vadodara Collector for protection from Setalvad and her NGO colleagues. Given the gravity of the charge that she was taken to Mumbai forcibly and the Mumbai police were unresponsive when approached for help, the judiciary must immediately remove other witnesses from the care of NGO-activists. Press reports suggest that other witnesses have been pushed underground by NGOs, and this may result in doctored testimony.

Some facts in the Zaheera case are being obfuscated by a partisan media. To begin with, she was accompanied to the Vadodara press conference by all her family members, which means that her retraction is not an individual whim. Her lawyer hinted that her relatives had been kept hostage the last time she appeared before the media, and this cannot be dismissed out-of-hand. Secondly, the testimony of witnesses who have testified in the Best Bakery case must be evaluated independently by the judiciary, and not pre-judged by the media.

Zaheera's specific allegation that a friend of Setalvad threatened that she would be "lynched" if she returned to Vadodara appears to have merit as an organised group burnt her effigy there after she reiterated her initial testimony. Even if we posit a margin of exaggeration in the claim that Setalvad and her colleagues told Zaheera she must lie for the sake of her community, one must take cognisance of the assertion that Heena (wife of Zaheera's brother) was at her maternal home when the Best Bakery incident took place, and was falsely made an "eye-witness" by the NGO. If memory serves me correctly, Zaheera said this previously also, when the said sister-in-law made a public statement after the riots. An honest investigation by the police should easily clarify the picture in this regard.

The unmistakable lesson of this unsavoury episode is that there is a well-funded and well-organised extra-constitutional caucus serving ends that have little to do with justice or national interest. Worse, it synergises perfectly with political parties and bureaucrats and is treated with rare indulgence by pillars of the State, such as the judiciary. What is most disturbing in the present case is the sheer brazenness with which they have pursued an overtly communal agenda with the specific objective of humiliating and denouncing the Hindu community as a whole.

Weak and poor Muslims like Zaheera and her family have been used as fodder in a grand design to ensure special treatment for the Muslim community in the matter of criminal law, to further embed and empower political votebanks. The NGO crowd would like the Hindu community to pretend that Godhra never happened and that the Gujarat riots were not a reaction, but an independent act of aggression. Victims unable to identify culprits (who may have died in subsequent police firing) can be hijacked in their own interests (sic) and made to testify against their wishes.

In this scenario, there is no need for justice for Hindus and special yardsticks can be applied to Muslims such as non-arrest in the face of heinous crimes like political assassination, as suggested by the Andhra Maoists. NGOs have run amuck for too long. The Supreme Court would do well to scuttle their covert agendas by questioning their locus standi and transferring the Gujarat riot cases back to the State.

US-Pak axis against India

Whatever the merits of General Pervez Musharraf's latest suggestion on Jammu & Kashmir, there is no avoiding the conclusion that India has accepted the Pakistani position that the State is disputed territory. This is a dangerous development, but in fairness to Mr Manmohan Singh it must be said that it is not a new one. J&K's status as an integral part of India was first jeopardized in the 2001 summit with the Pakistani dictator.

Although former Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh has denied a US role in facilitating (read pressuring) India into talking to Pakistan, there is no other rational explanation for the NDA's volte face after the horrible price paid to regain Kargil in 1999. Worse, citizens monitoring the Agra show on television were dismayed to find the BJP-led regime overly anxious to accommodate the usurper-turned-President's desire to talk Kashmir on Indian soil. The heavy duty sound-bytes from members of the Pakistani delegation created fears that New Delhi would concede actual territory to Pakistan.

It seems this was narrowly averted. But Pakistan succeeded in projecting Kashmir as disputed territory, and the Indian public has since received shocks regarding possible surrender of territory. In Mr Vajpayee's time there was talk of converting the Line of Control into an international border with adjustments giving Pakistan a town falling on both sides of the LoC. Recently, there has been talk of giving Islamabad two key towns that would facilitate a hostile takeover of the Valley.

And now the General has proposed that the two countries grant "autonomy" (whatever that means) to parts of Jammu & Kashmir. What this really means is that New Delhi walk out of the State district by district so that the Pakistani army can move in without bloodshed. And instead of snubbing the General, the Foreign Ministry lamely asserted that serious proposals should not come through the media! Does this mean India will consider the proposal when the US State Department next visits?

In my view, we must urgently scrutinize the US-Pak axis and its potential to damage our security. The American failure to control the ground situation in Iraq has rejuvenated the Islamic fundamentalists. According to Al Qaeda's Voice of Jihad, the US is in a greater strategic mess in Afghanistan and Iraq than the Soviet Union was in Afghanistan in the 1980s (New York Times 27 October 2004). It is said that for all practical purposes Washington has abandoned the war. The excitement of the jihadis is reflected in their websites which regularly broadcast images of Western hostages pleading with their abductors as well as their respective Government's to spare their lives before being beheaded "live" to shock and awe civilians across the globe.

The US-Pak axis comes into play here because, according to western analysts, the Lashkar-e-Toiba, Pakistan's largest militant group, seems to be shifting its focus from Kashmir (no doubt only temporarily) to Iraq. Recently LeT's online Urdu publication gave a call for holy warriors to go to Iraq to avenge the tortures at the Abu Ghraib prison and the alleged "rapes of Iraqi Muslim women". The site alleged that Americans were "dishonoring our mothers and sisters", and hence jihad against America had become mandatory. While it is difficult to assess the impact of this appeal, the Americans have already captured Pakistani members of LeT in Iraq. Hence the State Department's desperation to turn to canon-balls back towards India, howsoever cynical, makes sense.

Of course, even a weak Indian Government cannot accede to such a blatant assault on our sovereignty and interests. Mr Manmohan Singh will greatly enhance his credibility if he unambiguously asserts Jammu & Kashmir's Indian identity, and puts curbs on the absurd policy of open border or soft border, which only facilitates Pakistani access to secessionist elements in the State. This is all the more necessary because, since General Musharraf's 2001 visit, discerning citizens have observed a broad accord between ideologically disparate political parties to undermine the traditional consensus that Kashmir is an inalienable part of India. Prior to General Musharraf's arrival in New Delhi, the principal Left parties discussed Kashmir with the then Pakistani High Commissioner, even though former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto had questioned the General's legitimacy and authority to discuss such sensitive matters with the Indian Government.

Since then, selective voices are being propped up to clamour for a soft, de-militarised border, even though the Army is emphatic that infiltration has not declined. The officially-sponsored proponents of "India-Pakistan bhai bhai" are, however, unwilling to heed this warning. Those who think the Kashmir border is too porous have been rendered politically incorrect and ineffectual.

It is shocking that neither the UPA Government nor the principal opposition party has asked the General to apply his formula to Occupied Kashmir, and allow India to observe its success. There can be no question of parity or quid pro quo on this issue because Occupied Kashmir is mainly populated by non-Kashmiris such as Punjabis, Mirpuris and Pashtuns, who were settled there as part of a deliberate policy of demographic rearrangement. The native Muslim population of PoK is truly oppressed and figures nowhere in the General's proposals. India's Jammu & Kashmir is occupied by its indigenous population, barring of course, the Kashmiri Pandits who have been driven out.

With Al Qaeda cells being unearthed in almost all parts of the country, New Delhi cannot be perceived as soft on Pakistan's jihadi generals and mullahs. Certainly, we cannot pander to a hare-brained American scheme to placate Pakistani fundamentalists with Indian blood and territory. Nationalist Indians would do well to petition President Abdul Kalam to advice Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to keep the Indian people fully informed about the nature of talks with Pakistan or third parties like the Americans or British on the issue of Jammu & Kashmir.

On his part, Mr Manmohan Singh would do well to remember that he heads a coalition Government and that the people of India have not given him a mandate to cede territory to hostile neighbours. Indeed, no political party has such a mandate. Politicians of all hues should know that so long as our Generals and soldiers tell us they are willing to shed their blood for the defense of the motherland, so long as they do not publicly declare that they can no longer face the war of a thousand cuts, we will stand firm. The fatigue of old and tired men cannot be attributed to the nation; hence no political party or coalition has the right to take action inimical to the national interest.

Of course it complicates matters that Jammu & Kashmir is now ruled by the very family that gave terrorism a boost by sacrificing national interests in the Rubaiya Sayeed so-called kidnapping episode. Mr VP Singh's refusal to sack Mufti Mohammad Sayeed encouraged Islamabad to up the ante and declare Kashmir a "core issue" between the two countries. But the roots of the problem go back to 1948, so it is time to stop perpetuating Jawaharlal Nehru's dangerous legacy of special status to a strategic region. And having dismissed the UN resolutions, we must stop entertaining third parties with private agendas. As a start, the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline which has the potential to eternally fund the anti-India jihad should be consigned to the dustbin.

Clamour for tribal harvest

Europe's civilian revolt against the stranglehold of the Catholic Church was won by resurrecting its Pagan heritage as exemplified in Greek philosophy and Roman law. The resultant duality of religious and secular authority provided space for individual liberty, science, and material progress. Hindu society, despite civilisational stresses from hostile invasions, managed to preserve its cosmic worldview and to resist imposition of a mono-source of political and religious power. Islam has been consistent in its advocacy of a single religio-political authority.

Of the three traditions, I consider the White Christian the most treacherous because the First World, despite wrestling personal freedom from the pulpit, uses the Church as an instrument of imperialism. Secularism placed Church aspirations for dominion under non-religious leadership, which is why Western regimes aggressively promote proselytization and the decimation of non-Christian faiths and cultures. The US State Department, as the Vigil public forum rightly points out, views religious freedom an integral part of its foreign policy, which makes evangelization a political agenda.

As Europe's secularisation went hand-in-hand with successful colonial conquests, the West's post-World War II thrust for perpetual sales and profits naturally accompanies the evangelization drive. In my view, Western secularism resulted, not in separation of religion and politics, but in Church subordination to politics. As senior partner in the new equation, the secular polity assumed responsibility for facilitating the twin evils of Christian conversion and market domination (through cultural subversion of traditional lifestyles) upon the world. Unlike Islam, the naked sword was hidden by wooing and co-opting academic, political and economic elites in a grand alliance for "progress" from traditional moorings. The White Christian world is thus far more lethal than Islam, which is openly against non-Muslims.

From this perspective, the All India Christian Council's agitation at the rising stature of the Vanvasi Kalyan Ashram in the tribal belt spanning Gujarat, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhatisgarh, Jharkhand and Orissa, makes perfect sense. Mr John Dayal, general secretary typically rants against VKA social service activities amongst tribals and shows disrespect for tribal resentment against missionary activities and the loss of cultural identity caused by loss of faith. In an article posted on the www.pakistanchristainpost.com website, Dayal alleges coercion and violence in VKA's Ghar Vapsi (return to roots) programme. He claims that the RSS distributes arms and that this has polarized tribals, stimulating the violence witnessed against Muslims in Gujarat's tribal areas after the Godhra conflagration.

Ghar Wapsi is essentially the brainchild of former Union Minister Dilip Singh Judeo, erstwhile ruler of Jashpur in Raigarh (Chattishgarh) and hereditary royal guardian of the Korwa tribals of Sarguja. Apart from resisting the tide of conversions, what rankles with missionaries is Judeo's determination that village communities regain land appropriated by missionaries for schools, hospitals and churches. Judeo, who is well acquainted with missionary tactics through several decades of hard work, wittily advises tribals to accept the services offered by missionaries, but on no account discard their traditional faith and culture in lieu of these services.

Irritated at the success of this advice, Mr Dayal is further enraged that Ghar Wapsi has succeeded to the extent that conversions have virtually stopped and the 'homecoming' movement is gathering momentum. No doubt Judeo's impressive personality and colourful language have contributed to his substantial success. He first came to national attention in 1992, when he told a popular magazine that he had issued a "manifesto to the missionaries" which stated that "we" (tribals) would eat up anyone who ate a cow, and would clip two throats for every choti (tuft of hair on a shaven head) clipped. It bears mention that though evangelists routinely quote this statement, not a single incident has occurred under Judeo's jurisdiction.

The All India Christian Council has also picked up a quarrel with the Chairman of the National Commission for Minorities, Mr Tarlochan Singh, for having asked Delhi Archbishop Vincent Concessao to refrain from evangelization among the Sikh community. The Archbishop sent Mr Singh a loaded missive on Christian theology, individual freedom of conscience, and the power of the Holy Spirit, adding sharply: "We certainly want inter-religious harmony and peace. But this harmony cannot be achieved at the cost of the individual citizen's freedom of conscience, which every other citizen has to respect." The Archbishop smugly reiterated the Church's old ideological deceits that conversion is an adult choice of a chosen way of life; that nobody can convert another person; one can only present a way of life to another person, who is then free to decide his response.

If this is indeed true, conversions to Christianity should normally occur in driblets of one and two, and not in the form of the mass conversions that accompany sustained pressure from evangelists. More often than not, the neo-converts have little idea of Christian theology and its anti-Jewish bias, the schisms and purges caused by fanatical Popes and Bishops, and the myriad changes wrought in the Holy Bible due to the political exigencies of prevailing elites. Conversion of the illiterate and uninformed does not meet my standard of a "free interaction between God and man in the sanctuary of an individual's conscience," as the Archbishop so loftily claims.

That tribals on their own have little time for Christ or the pious missionary can be seen from the fact that the merciful exit of Mrs Gladys Staines (widow of Australian missionary Graham Staines) from India led to a massive homecoming of converted tribals. In Orissa's Mayurbhanj district, seventy-five Christians returned to the Hindu fold last month and more are slated to re-embrace their native faith. The cognoscenti would be aware that acute resentment at Graham Staines' conversion activities had resulted in his sensational murder some years ago.

Of course, Christian activists do not believe in a level playing field. Hence the Vanvasi Kalyan Ashram, which merely facilitates tribals wishing to live according to their traditional mores, received unexpected flak when it observed its golden jubilee in the capital's Mandoli village recently. Even as delegates debated problems of the country's eight crore tribal population, leaders of the minority communities raised Cain on the ground that VKA was bringing tribal hamlets back to the Hindu fold (The Telegraph, October 3, 2004).

Objectively, VKA is by no means as pervasive as its critics aver. Organising secretary Gunwant Singh Kothari claims that out of the 698 tribes in the country, VKA has established contact with 380 only. From humble beginnings in Jashpur (royal estate of the Judeo family) in 1952, VKA today has a presence in twenty-seven States and Union Territories, including all States of the sensitive Northeast; but it does not have even a toe-hold in areas like Goa, Lakshadweep, Ladakh and Pondicherry.

The VKA operates on the premise that loss of culture is loss of identity, and strives to help the myriad tribes to preserve their distinct identities. This is also the keynote of the first ever Draft National Policy on Tribals prepared by the NDA Government to bring tribals into the national mainstream, which is currently being debated nation-wide. The Draft National Policy was prepared as it was felt that despite pious statements of intent made in the Constitution in 1952, the majority of Scheduled Tribes even today live below the poverty line, have poor literacy rates, are prone to malnutrition and disease, and are vulnerable to displacement.

Gudiya: Sub-text in a cultural contest

Like many who followed the poignant story of young Gudiya on a television network last fortnight, I felt the script reminiscent of a predetermined finale. What struck me most was the fact that the programme, slated to help a young woman in a terrible predicament, actively pandered to the orthodoxies of Islamic clergymen. Scuttling even the pretense of a humanistic approach, the anchor facilitated a narrow view of Sharia as the solution to the crisis, and a pre-selected, overwhelmingly male audience, did the rest.

The secular media and hawkers of human rights must realise they lose credibility when fear of Islam prevents them from commenting on the merits of a case. Those who pontificate about the wonderful rights Islam bestows upon women must explain why these liberties unfold as oppression in the lives of individual women. Muslim scholars who expound upon the "evils" of Hindu society, such as the genuine menace of dowry and the largely non-existent sati, must help us understand how this failure of uphold basic human decencies is peddled as justice.

The main events of the tragedy are by now well known. A young soldier, Mr Mohammad Arif, was captured by Pakistani forces and, unknown to his family, spent five years as a prisoner of war. His newly wedded wife was then aged 14, according to her sister. After a few years, Gudiya's father arranged her marriage to her cousin, Taufiq. Gudiya settled into her new home exceptionally well, and was heavily pregnant with her first child when Arif unexpectedly returned. This automatically resurrected the first marriage.

Media reports suggest Arif sensibly planned to divorce Gudiya. But when her father demanded rupees five lakhs as mehr, he decided to assert his conjugal rights while insisting that the child be returned to Taufiq or given to Gudiya's father. He voiced extremely tasteless views to the effect that Gudiya could breastfeed the child for ten days, before giving it to its biological father.

The culpability of Indian secularists lies in the fact that no one made the slightest attempt to respect the sentiments of Gudiya, her unborn child, or her new family. Shrill advocates of human, women's, and minority rights, such as SAHMAT, Shabana Azmi, Javed Akhtar, Javed Anand, Teesta Setalvad, Arundhati Roy, or Mallika Sarabhai, were nowhere to be seen.

Instead, television facilitated Islamic scholars and ulema to browbeat the young girl to return to Arif to claim a victory for Sharia. Since I had strongly felt the show had all the ingredients of a mock trial, I was not surprised to see Taufiq's comment to rediff.com: "The MLA of my area told me that he was taking me to his house in Noida. But he took me to the television studio... I saw that the religious scholars were also there. The discussion started all of a sudden. I didn't know how to react. I was quite upset... When Gudiya said she wanted to go with Arif, I was out of my mind. I stopped thinking. I don't know what happened after that...But I am sure she was pressured. I didn't get time to speak. She also could not express herself. There was a women's group. They wanted to speak to her alone. But the TV guys didn't allow it. Finally the decision was taken and we all returned home. When the clerics gave their verdict, what could I do? The TV people cheated me. This is not the way to settle disputes."

Gudiya's uncle, Mr Riyasat Ali, expressed dissatisfaction with the Naurangabad panchayat which said she should return to Arif. He said: "She was pressured by the people there. She was not allowed to speak. The clerics told her that she had to follow the Shariat and go to Arif. They said her son would become illegitimate if she did not. She was left with no option. Can a woman express herself in front of so many men?"

Islam, unlike Christianity or Hindu dharma, views marriage as a contract and not as a sacrament. Hence divorce is easy in Islam. Hence it was both logical and proper for Arif to divorce Gudiya so she could remain with the family which gave her so much love and affection. If the greed of Gudiya's father made him play with his own daughter's happiness, the community leaders should have taken him to task and instructed Gudiya to surrender the mehr.

As Dr Sughra Menhdi and Ms Naheed Taban of the All India Muslim Women's Forum later alleged (The Pioneer, September 22, 2004), Gudiya was pressured to return to Arif as the ulema and her family did not tell her about the Sharia provision for divorce and the possibility of legalizing her union with Taufiq. Instead, Islamic scholar Maulana Wahiduddin Khan and Mufti Ejaz Arshad of the Dar-ul-Uloom, Deoband, quoted archaic judgments and refused to entertain the legitimacy of human sensitivities and decencies. The Mufti denied Gudiya was paying for mistakes made by her father, saying her consent was taken at the time of nikaah. I, however, am unable to agree that a village girl is a free agent at the time of marriage.

Gudiya was deconstructed into a piece of recovered property, with the ulema and studio audience determined to return her to Arif. As the television network played ball with fundamentalists, the pressure on the young girl, burning with fever and denied support from any quarter, was too obvious. Her decision was a travesty of justice.

The only concession to public opinion was the declaration that Arif would keep the newborn child. But Arif was explicit that he did not want to do so: "It is Taufiq's child. If he doesn't want to take care of the child, then I will. When it grows up, Taufiq can take over." It seems likely that after weaning, the child may return to its real father, and this may be for the best since it is unlikely to get affection in Arif's home. Gudiya herself was eloquent about her so-called free choice: "Who knows what will happen to me. I may die or the child also may die. No one can say anything about it."

Little wonder that even the Muslim villagers of Mundali, where Taufiq lives, were unhappy with the verdict. Elders openly told journalists that Gudiya should live with Taufiq as she was carrying his child. They were furious that Arif wanted his wife, but not her unborn child. This was valiantly stated by Ms Nahid in the studio, but hers was a voice in the wilderness, and her sense of helplessness at the façade of free will being imposed upon the unfortunate Gudiya made for sad viewing. Both she and the audience outside the studio knew the outcome of the debate as a foregone conclusion.

It is high time that Muslim religious and secular leaders begin to appreciate that many perceive the Sharia as an institutional mechanism of totalitarian control over the community. In this sense, it is at odds with the modern world's striving for a justice that conforms to society's sense of what is just. This quest for a just solution remained unmet in Gudiya's case, and therefore left an enduring impression that justice was not done. This dissatisfaction is fairly pervasive in the Muslim community today.

The demography of politics

When the Muslim votebank frowns, politicians get into a frenzy. Reacting with alacrity to Muslim ire at Census revelations of the community's steep growth rate, the UPA Government reverted Commissioner JK Banthia to his parent cadre for not consulting the Union Home Ministry before releasing data on religious demography. Congress president Sonia Gandhi jumped into the fray, promising an inquiry into so-called statistical errors, and the message heard loud and clear across the country was that there is be no public space for the legitimate concerns of the Hindu community.

First reports gave the Muslim growth rate as 36 per cent in the decade 1991-2001. Later, adjustments factoring in the absence of data from Jammu and Kashmir in the 1991 census and from Assam in 1981, scaled this down to 29.3 per cent, a decline of 3.6 per cent from 32.9 percent growth in the 1991 census. Questions have legitimately been raised about the original and the "adjusted" figures politically extracted from the Census Commission.

Certainly the "adjusted" figures have a higher comfort value. They show that instead of the decadal growth rate of Muslims increasing by 1.5 per cent in 2001, it actually fell by 3.6 per cent. Yet these figures surely hide the true extent of India's Muslim population, as both Jammu & Kashmir and Assam are States with a high Muslim population. Hence, when the figures for both States are added, we will have to admit having a much higher total Muslim population in the country, and a higher percentage of Muslims to the total population. This reality cannot be evaded.

Hindus have long had a latent fear that the Muslim community will exterminate it from its homeland through demographic aggression in the form of over-breeding and illegal immigration. There is a secret dread, articulated by former Director General of Police, Mr RK Ohri (Long March of Islam, 2004), that Hindus in India will meet the fate of the Christians in Lebanon and parts of the Balkans, where sharp demographic changes over a span of a few decades reduced the majority community to minority status. The warning is not without merit. The population of indigenous religious groups in the country has steadily fallen in percentage terms over the past 110 years, from 1881 to 1991, and this trend has accelerated after Partition. The present controversy over Islamic injunctions against family planning has only added to Hindu discomfort.

The Census 2001 statistics have attracted so much attention partly on account of the security and economic implications of illicit immigration from Bangladesh, and partly because the growth rate of most native religious groups has stag nated or declined. The Muslim community scored poorly on development indices such as literacy and employment, and virtually confined its contribution to the national kitty to demographics. This has understandably frightened the Hindu majority, especially since the Minister of State for Home, Mr Sriprakash Jaiswal, went so far as to demand a ban on release of population figures of different religious groups. Some politicians even foolishly asked the rationale behind collecting such figures.

Actually, as Dr JK Bajaj of the Centre for Policy Research, Chennai, has pointed out, this is not the first time that the Census has released data on the relative population of different religious groups. Right from the first Census of 1871, data regarding religious demography has been made public and is in fact, the most keenly awaited census data. What is unique about the 2001 figures is that this is the first time since Independence that the Census has tabulated religious demography against socio-cultural factors like literacy, age distribution, employment status, female child ratio, and so on. This has enabled scholars to examine the causes of the changing demographics of different religious communities. As of now, it appears that the Muslim population in India is unlikely to stabilize at normal replacement levels. From 10.43 percent in 1951, Muslims have risen to 13.43 percent in 2001.

It is relevant that even the "adjusted" figures of 29.3 per cent put the Muslim rate of growth well above the national average, and also above that for other major communities such as the Hindus (20.3 per cent); Christians (22.6 per cent) and Sikhs (18.2 per cent). It bears mentioning that the Hindu growth rate in the previous decade declined by as much as five percentage points, to 20.3 percent. Hence, the nine per cent officially admitted lead enjoyed by the Muslim community has understandably sent alarm bells ringing across the nation.

Since independence, Hindus as a community have been declining in percentage terms. In 1951, Hindus comprised 85 percent of the population. By 1961 itself they had fallen to 83.4 per cent; they were 82.7 per cent in 1971 and 80.5 per cent in 2001. In sharp contrast, the Muslim community stood at 9.7 per cent of partitioned India's population in 1951, but rose steadily to 10.7 per cent in 1961, 11.2 percent in 1971 and 13.4 per cent in 2001. The missing censuses of Jammu & Kashmir (1991) and Assam (1981) hardly detract from this trend.

The situation is especially alarming when we look at particular States. In Kerala, Muslims comprised 17.9 per cent of the population in 1961, but were a formidable 24.7 per cent by 2001. In Assam, Muslims comprised 25 per cent of the population in 1961, but were 30.9 per cent in 2001. In West Bengal, Muslims rose from 20 per cent in 1961 to 25 percent in 2001. In Maharashtra, they marched from 7.6 per cent in 1961 to 10.6 per cent in 2001. These increases in percentage are unlikely to be reversed in the coming decade. Conversely, the proportion of Hindus has declined in each state.

Muslims are now the majority or near-majority community in the districts of Assam and West Bengal that border Bangladesh, several key districts in eastern Bihar, western Uttar Pradesh, and northern Kerala, and of course Kashmir. This rapidly changing population profile of Assam, West Bengal, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh is a matter of legitimate national concern. Today, with 30.7 million Muslims in a truncated Uttar Pradesh, 20.2 million in West Bengal, 13.7 million in a truncated Bihar and 10.2 million in Maharashtra, India is sitting on a demographic tinderbox.

In the eight decades from 1901 and 1991, Assam witnessed a steep fall in the percentage of native religions, from 84.55 to 68.25 per cent, while Muslim population nearly doubled from 15.03 per cent to 28.43 percent. Dhubir, Barpeta, Hailakundi and Karimganj are reportedly Muslim majority districts. In West Bengal, Muslims are the majority in Malda and Murshidabad, with West Dinapur and Birbhum slated to follow. In Uttar Pradesh, Rampur, Bijnor, Moradabad, Saharanpur, Muzaffarnagar and Bareilly are close to becoming Muslim majority districts. In Bihar, Muslims have overwhelmed Kishanganj (65.91 per cent), and dramatically increased their numbers and percentage in Araria, Katihar, Sahibaganj, Darbhanga and Pashchimi Champaran.

The census must also be viewed in the context of India's neighbourhood. In 1941, Hindus and Sikhs jointly constituted 19 per cent of present-day Pakistan, but fell to one per cent by 2001. In 1941, Hindus were 29 per cent of present-day Bangladesh, but declined to 18 per cent in 1961, 14 per cent in 1974, 12 per cent in 1981 and 10 per cent in 1991. Dhaka's sustained ethnic cleansing of the past few years can only have accelerated this trend. The conclusion is inescapable: The region is being Islamised. This has obvious implications for national identity and security.

The apologetic adjective

In a modern marriage, Swami Dayananda Saraswati once observed, two individuals come together as nouns, but after the ceremony, one becomes an adjective, most usually the woman. Metamorphosing from say, 'Saraswati' to 'Saraswati Ramakrishna,' she is reduced to an adjective qualifying the noun 'Ramakrishna'. Yet there are times, the sage added, when 'Ramakrishna' becomes the adjective. If the first scenario is a tragedy, the second one is a disaster.

This is the misfortune of Amitav Kumar, an Indian teaching at an American University who, at the height of the Kargil War in 1999, married a Pakistani, Mona Ahmad Ali, and metamorphosed into Safdar Ali. In subsequent writings seeking public recognition on this count, Kumar fails to explain why-despite warnings by a Hindu and a Muslim friend that the Toronto-based family was forcing him to convert-he was powerless to resist the deracination involved in defecting from his native faith and even unable (or unwilling) to confide in his parents.

The excuse proffered by the bride's mother was that marriage between a Muslim and a non-Muslim was illegal in Pakistan. I cannot understand why the nuptials of a US-based girl with Canada-based parents needs recognition in Pakistan. Amitav-Safdar, however, felt powerless to resist, and despite a civil ceremony underwent conversion and nikaah. His hapless parents discovered this atrocity through a puerile article in Outlook.

Kumar was clear from the beginning that his unusual union would be his ticket to fame. Self-aggrandizement is evident in the claim that his marriage was "unusually symbolic" and would help bring peace to the subcontinent as an Indian Hindu was marrying a Pakistani Muslim, thereby opening "a new track for people-to-people diplomacy".

His mother disabused him of these pretensions after reading Outlook, saying there was nothing special about the union of a Muslim with a Muslim. She spiritedly pointed out that while she had graciously accepted his choice of life partner without asking the daughter-in-law to accept Hindu dharma, she could not understand why Muslims never gave others the same freedom of religious choice. Her tolerance contrasts sharply with the crude insistence of the Ali family to not merely convert, but also indoctrinate Kumar on the core tenets of Islam, and to loudly proclaim in Canadian and Pakistani society that the marriage had engendered the conversion of a Hindu boy to Islam.

Perhaps the implacable insistence on conversion as part of the marriage deal disturbed Kumar somewhere in his being. He dare not apostatize from Islam, much less ask his wife to do so. Husband of a Fanatic (Penguin 2004) is his attempt to rationalize his lapse from dharma, using puerile Western, Islamic and Left-secular critiques of Hindu society as an alibi. Handsomely abetted with grants from the Rockefeller Foundation and Penn State University, he engages in a fulsome diatribe against contemporary India, aimed at winning applause from a non-Hindu and anti-Hindu audience.

In fairness, his style is engaging, and avoids the shrill notes of most Indian toadies of the West or Islam. But sadly for him, as a convert, he is ineligible to lead the new diplomacy of which he so fondly dreams. His extensive travels through India in the guise of a Hindu, and his emphasis on his conversion to secure a visa to visit Pakistan, taint his book with intellectual dishonesty. In a deeper sense, Husband of a Fanatic is a remarkably adept portraiture of a Hindu who does not know his own history and culture, and is so brainwashed by secular rhetoric that he can be sucked into a conversion deal without protest or resistance. And like a good "naya Mussalman," Safdar (Kumar) has no qualms about pontificating against Hindu dharma and culture.

The post-Godhra riots of March 2002 provide Kumar the greatest justification for his 1999 marriage. Traveling to the Shah-e-Alam relief camp with Shama, a social worker whose organization he chooses not to identify, he observes the huge sums of money she had probably received from a political party in Delhi, for disbursing relief. It appears she is equally skilful in indoctrination, telling Kumar: "This is the beginning of another Bosnia." Shama had somehow acquired a CD which purportedly contained a pirated video allegedly made by men killing and raping Muslims. When viewing it with Kumar, however, she was disappointed to discover it was merely a documentary of corpses in a morgue or hospital.

This explicit zeal for Hindu culprits is not matched with compassion for the Hindu victims whose grisly carnage sparked off modern India's worst communal conflagration. Referring to the February 28 torching of the Sabarmati Express, which resulted in the roasting of fifty-eight pilgrims returning from Ayodhya, Kumar lamely states: "The act was believed to be the work of Muslims (italics mine)..." May we say the subsequent riots were believed to be the work of Hindus?

Kumar is reproachful of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee for his statement before the BJP national executive at Goa: "Wherever Muslims are they do not want to live with others peacefully"; and that countries with a Muslim population live under threat of militancy and terrorism. Unfortunately for Kumar, the brutal assault on school children at Beslan has provoked intellectual outrage even in the Arab world, and highlighted Islam's notorious inability to tolerate the existence of non-Muslims. Incoming reports suggest that not only was the siege pre-planned, but that the assailants may have molested some children. Television footage of the victims and their grieving families have removed the veneer of Islam as a religion of peace (sic), and as President Vladimir Putin is no secular namby-pamby nor apologetic nationalist, Russia may well emerge as the true leader of the international rebuff to Islamic fundamentalism.

Inspired by an unverifiable news report in a major national daily that a Hindu woman had been brutally murdered in the Ahmedabad riots because she had married a Muslim, Kumar tried in vain to speak to such mixed couples. He falsely projects himself as a partner in such an enterprise, conceals his conversion and lambastes Hindu "fundamentalists" for not respecting the religion and human rights of others. The forceful attempt to equate Hindu and Muslim fundamentalism exposes Kumar's work as callow and dishonest, for nowhere in the world have Hindus armed and conspired to destroy other groups and nations.

The apology for Islam, however, never ceases. Equally consistent is the sanctimonious talking-down to the Hindu community, telling them what they are supposed to be like. There is the startling claim that: "Hindu children learn to believe that in the Muslim ghettoes in India, men wave green Pakistani flags and burst fire-crackers every time India is beaten by Pakistan in a cricket or hockey match..." Kumar sermonizes: "On the one hand is the division between communities inside India, and, on the other, the division between the two nations, but in the neurotic imagination of the anxious nationalist, the two are identical."

Actually, Pakistani flags and firecrackers were well documented in Indian newspapers. And recently there was tension in Sonepat, Haryana, after some young men hoisted the Pakistani flag. Secondly, it was the division of communities inside India that led to Partition, and the deceitful dissembling of post-Independence politicians and intellectuals inhibited an honest recognition of this reality. No meaningful bridges can be built without this acknowledgement.


UPA's jaziya through backdoor

"How shall freedom be defended? By arms when it is attacked by arms; by truth when it is attacked by lies; by democratic faith when it is attacked by authoritarian dogma. Always and in the final act, by determination and faith."
Archibald Macleish, poet.

Unbeknownst to most of us, we are perilously close to the final act of our existence as a living civilisation. Never before has the imperative for determination and faith in defence of our existential ethos been so urgent, as it is now. A rag-tag anti-Hindu coalition is playing with the dharma and cultural sensitivity of the people, even as a pusillanimous BJP juggles with political vocabulary to evade the legitimate concerns of the Hindu community in its infatuation with an ephemeral Muslim vote.

Implementing a specific though unstated agenda, the phantom-like regime led notionally by Dr Manmohan Singh has moved stealthily to corrode one of India's most important institutions the Army. In an order undermining the spirits of soldiers and officers alike, all Commanders have been instructed to enforce certain measures to ensure that the Army's secular credentials are not questioned (whatever that might mean).

The instructions have caused deep disquiet, causing some perturbed officers to request National Defence College of India alumni Abhijit Bhattacharyya to expose the matter, a job he has done admirably (The Pioneer, 18 August). In my view, the issue deserves wider debate, as it is part of a concerted attack upon India's autochthonous civilisational values and heritage. It is a shame that the media, political parties and vociferous academic-activists have silently acquiesced in this vandalization of cultural identity.

To those who are sensitive to issues of cultural expression, the instructions are obnoxious; a portent of more ominous things, should this government last. The directives prohibit officers and soldiers on active duty from sporting any kind of religious symbols, such as sacred threads, vibhuti, tilaks, even birthstone rings. The statues of deities are banned.

The instructions specifically target Hindu officers and soldiers, who no doubt comprise the majority of the forces, since this is still a Hindu-majority country (though for how long is now an open question). Hindu women officers are prohibited from wearing earrings and jewellery; the sole concession is permission to use sindoor, which must be veiled by a beret or peak cap. Secularism has thus taken a great leap forward, invading the private person of the (Hindu) individual and denying the right to observe customary forms of dharma.

Perhaps sindoor was spared by UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, who harped upon her maang ka sindoor when seeking political legitimacy from a bemused people. It is inconceivable that an order of such magnitude could have been issued without her knowledge, since every decision is taken at meetings presided by her. She must therefore clarify her stand on these measures and their purpose.

Dr Manmohan Singh would be aware that Sikhs comprise a healthy section of the Indian Army. Will Sikh officers and soldiers be forcefully divested of their hair (kesh), iron bracelet (kada) and ceremonial dagger (kirpan)? Or will there be a special order for Sikhs, on grounds that they constitute a religious minority (a subterfuge invented by the British to fragment Hindu society)? Will minority exemptions be extended to Christians and Muslims, with Parsis and Jains thrown in as a balancing act? Will we then circuitously achieve the true objective, viz., the purging of all Hindu symbols of cultural identity from public life?

This is no exaggeration given the fact that in just three months of UPA governance, we have witnessed a move to ban Dr Karan Singh's book on Vedanta (for school children), along with the Tamil Jaina classic, the Thirukural. A cabinet minister has made unseemly remarks against famed revolutionary, Veer Savarkar, to the embarrassment of his own party Government in Maharashtra. And presently, a shocking criminal case has been launched against Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Uma Bharati for attempting to hoist the Tricolour at the Kittoor Rani Chennamma Maidan (also known as Idgah Maidan as Muslims offer communal prayers there twice a year) on August 15, 1994.

Secularist dogma has so terrorised contemporary Hindus that they hesitate to take up cudgels on behalf of their dharma and culture for fear of being branded communal. Personally, I subscribe to Sir Winston Churchill's profound admonition: "If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a small chance of survival. There may even be a worse case: you may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves."

The Hubli Maidan issue is being falsely given a communal flavour, and readers may benefit from a summation of the facts. An organisation, Vigil, held a public meeting at Madras on August 30, 1994, where Karnataka BJP MLC, Mr DH Shankara Murthy, detailed the facts.

The Maidan is public land officially owned by the Municipal Corporation of Hubli-Dharwar. At some stage, a trust laid claim to the land and began constructions upon it. The civil court declared the land was public, but could be used for communal prayers twice annually, which was upheld by the Karnataka High Court in 1992. The Supreme Court admitted a Special Leave Petition (SLP) regarding demolition of the structure erected, but gave no relief in the matter of ownership.

In 1990, after Hindus in Jammu & Kashmir were rendered homeless and the Pakistani flag hoisted in Lal Chowk, Srinagar, the BJP decided to hoist the national flag everywhere. In 1992, Hubli residents decided to hoist national flag at Kittoor Rani Chennamma Maidan. The Congress Chief Minister S Bangarappa said this would hurt minority sentiment and ordered the police to prevent it. When the flag was hoisted on Republic Day, the police removed it. This is the genesis of the dispute over the flag and Hubli Maidan.

Thereafter, the Rashtra Dhwaja Rakshana Samiti was formed to hoist the flag on every Republic and Independence Day. The Congress government resisted and made arrests. On the Republic Day of 1994, the arrested included the 75-year-old retired Director General of Police of Karnataka, Mr Veerabadrayya.

In this backdrop, Ms Uma Bharati decided to hoist the Tricolour on Independence Day, 1994. The Chief Minister, Mr Veerappa Moily, spread the canard that the Maidan was Wakf property and hoisting the flag could inflame passions. A BJP worker, Ramesh, managed to hoist the flag at 6.47 am, before being arrested. Ms Uma Bharati was arrested some hours later. Sometime afterwards, there was an incident of police firing in Deshpande Nagar, where some persons died.

The court will no doubt decide if Ms Bharati can legitimately be held responsible for murder when she was not present at the scene of the alleged crime. But it is obvious that something deeper is afoot, and its purpose is the cultural annihilation of the Hindu people. We are facing a pincer attack from sinister quarters; pusillanimity will only take us to extinction. It is time to rise and validate our culture and our history.


Marxist history's Pak perspective

In September 2000, eminent Pakistani historian Mubarak Ali wrote an article, "How Many Qasims, Ghaznavis, and Ghoris Do We Need?" analyzing the valorization of Arabs and Turks who ravished the land that is now Pakistan, in school textbooks. Ali observed that Muhammad bin Qasim, Mahmud of Ghazni and Shihabuddin Ghori emerged as powerful symbols in Muslim politics in the context of the 1930s' communal atmosphere in India, but their continued aggrandizement had disastrous consequences for Pakistan.

This was because, in imitation of the conquerors, the rulers treated the land as conquered territory and plundered its wealth; whereas previously the loot was deposited in the state treasuries of Damascus, Baghdad, and Ghazni, it now made its way to Swiss banks or other Western havens.

Clearly, Pakistanis discuss history far more candidly than Indians. The Lahore newsweekly, The Friday Times, published an article, "Murdering history amounts to state-sponsored terrorism," which said Pakistani social studies textbooks "would not be out of place in any madrassah preparing the young for an early grave. The Pakistan Army and its 'three decisive victories' over India are mentioned liberally and are an example of how institutional attempt has been made to rewrite history." (April 4, 2003)

These examples have been cited by Dr Yvette Rosser (University of Austin, Texas, US), who has extensively researched history textbooks in Pakistan, Bangladesh and India. In an article published by the Observer Research Foundation, "The Islamization of Pakistani Social Studies," she examined several textbooks and found they glorified violent manifestations of "jihad". Curiously, Rosser discovered that in India, the old Marxist-influenced NCERT textbooks mirrored the Pakistani pattern of glorifying Islamic invaders ("Medieval India Revisited and Revised: Reviled or Rectified?").

Pakistani textbooks of the medieval era resonate with the heroic exploits of Islamic invaders such as Arabs, Central Asians, Turks, Persians and Afghans who mercilessly plundered Peshawar, Lahore, Multan and Sind for centuries. Even today, Baluchi and Pakhtun nationalist historians acknowledge the fierce opposition to Islam. Yet Rosser found that this heroic resistance by the Hindu and Buddhist peoples of Afghanistan and the North West Frontier Province (the frontiers of al-Hind) stood expunged in Pakistani and old NCERT narratives. Yet, it took hundreds of years of violent conflict to convert these peoples to Islam.

The few Hindu kings mentioned in Pakistani textbooks, such as Raja Dahir, who trounced the Arabs more than a dozen times, have received unequal treatment. His numerous successes have been purged and only his defeat by Muhammad bin Qasim in Sind in 712 AD recorded. Raja Dahir and other Hindu rulers who figure in Pakistani chronicles of the past are portrayed as disorganized cowards whose victimized subjects were bitterly divided along caste lines.

Rosser derides Pakistani narratives for depicting the local Sindhi response to Islam "as if there was a welcoming committee up and down the Indus corridor." Pakistani textbooks proudly proclaim that bin Qasim's army ground several cities to dust and massacred all the inhabitants, but do not say "if the locals were killed for waving at the Arab army or resisting the invasion." Both the Pakistani and old NCERT textbooks fail to mention that Arab forays into Gujarat and Rajasthan were successfully repelled for decades by martial groups like the Pratiharas. Indeed, the Arabs in Sind failed to make headway east of the Indus for hundreds of years. The exclusion of this resistance from Pakistani textbooks is understandable, but its deletion from an Indian narrative for Indian students is difficult to explain or condone.

Discerning readers would have realized that the current hysteria by Indian Marxists over history textbooks is precisely to cover up and perpetuate these distortions, which have been exposed by the NDA Government's exercise to update the syllabus and content of schoolbooks. India is the only society in the world where over three-fourths of the population remained true to its native faith despite centuries of Islamic rule and coercion through the sword and economic pressure (jaziya). This unique civilisational resilience of the Hindu people deserves historical recognition.

The kid-glove treatment of Islam in old NCERT textbooks goes to absurd lengths. Arjun Dev's Story of Civilisation discusses Prophet Muhammad and the first three Khalifas, but does not mention the Sunni-Shia schism and the violent death of the Prophet's son-in-law. Yet while writing about the Bhakti movement, he emphasizes the so-called divisions in Hindu society. Both Satish Chandra (Medieval India for Class XI) and Arjun Dev glorify Islam as an egalitarian, scientific, beneficent civilization and carefully avoid mentioning jihad and the extremely violent nature of Arab expansion, which even Pakistani intellectuals call "Arab imperialism." This conscious falsification of facts has naturally given rise to controversies over the old books.

Arjun Dev does not even mention the Arab invasion of Sind. This is honourably treated in the new NCERT Medieval India for Class XI and tallies, says Rosser, with the oral accounts of Sindhi nationalists. The new textbook details seven decades of Arab failure on both land and sea, until finally Muhammad bin Qasim makes a breakthrough in 712 AD. This account asserts that even after the defeat of the last Hindu king, Raja Dahir, his widow and later his son continued the resistance. In contrast, Arjun Dev claims there was no local resistance to the invaders who were welcomed with open arms, while Satish Chandra declares that Islam brought a peaceful and egalitarian social system that unified India. Ironically, Muslim converts today claim discrimination by elite Muslims and demand reservation benefits.

A truthful narration of historical events in India, Rosser observes, is quickly branded as "communalization." NCERT's new Medieval India textbook mentions the 220-year unproductive aggression by the Arab armies, until the Turks intervened and overcame Afghan resistance. But in India, any depiction of Hindu bravery and success in thwarting the Islamic invaders is labelled communal; "secularism" demands showing Hindus as welcoming Muslim rule.

Thus, regarding Mahmud of Ghazni's forays into India, Satish Chandra states that Anandapala's father was routed several times by the raider. Ignoring the heroism of native defenders, he praises Mahmud's courage. Personally, I felt nauseated by Chandra's sycophantic assertion: "Mahmud marched across Rajputana in order to raid the fabulously rich temple at Somnath without encountering any serious resistance on the way".

Actually, fifty thousand civilians died defending the city and Mahmud was so delighted after destroying the temple and its principal icon that he assumed the title "butshikan" (destroyer of images). Yet Chandra defends Mahmud in precisely the same way as the Pakistani textbooks and pompously declares: "It is not correct to dismiss Mahmud as just a raider and plunderer." Actually, those of us who are fighting for a true history of India have no desire to "dismiss" Mahmud. Our struggle is to explicitly "admit" him at the Bar of History as raider, plunderer, iconoclast, et al.

Dhimmitude as a doctrine impacted severely upon India as its vast majority remained Hindu despite Islamic rule. Yet, Rosser notes with amazement, even though the concept of dhimmi (non-Muslims entitled to protection in lieu of jaziya) was critical to the administrative structure of Muslim-ruled states, it was completely omitted by both Satish Chandra and Arjun Dev. An old Arab once extolled the Hindu virtue of undying loyalty: "No moth burns itself on a flame that is dead, except in Hindustan."


The lion and the historian

A famous African adage avers that until the lions have their own historians, the history of the hunt will always glorify the hunter. This, in a sense, is the crux of the current controversy over which school of historians should legitimately write history textbooks for secondary and senior secondary school students.

Unlike most nations of the world, India's native people, culture and civilisation have a unique, unbroken continuity with their geographical homeland, and do not suffer the ethnic or religious ruptures that have ravaged other lands and disconnected their past from the present. India's past runs perennially into the present, so that its history is truly the history of a civilisation, perhaps the oldest civilisation in the world. Its keynote is unity and continuity, which it has maintained despite a millennium of turmoil and torment.

India's true history is in danger on account of a State-supported ideological war that seeks to sever society's link with the past, using history as a tool to pervert national memory and destroy cultural and national identity. The battlefield is the minds of school-going children, who are sought to be poisoned with an unparalleled contempt for the past, especially India's civilisational verities and values.

The NCERT History textbook controversy is a contest between civilisational India versus non-India historiography. Though clubbed under the generic term "Marxist", this school of thought generously accommodates the anti-Hindu biases of Islamic and Western-Christian academics. Its principal objective is to deny the violent entry of Islam into India and negate the horrors perpetuated by Islamic rulers, especially the extensive massacres of natives; destruction of temples and religious persecution; the bitter oppression of the people through extortionist land revenue, jaziya, deportation to slave markets abroad, and the constant use of armed might to quell restive subjects.

Marxist historians worked assiduously to achieve these objectives. However, to whitewash the thorny events of the medieval era, they needed to pervert the preceding epoch as an age of darkness and non-achievement. This explains Marxist fidelity to the colonial claims of an Aryan Invasion, and their refusal to acknowledge the proven synchronicity between the Harappan Civilisation and the Vedic Age. To add insult to injury, they now proclaim that beef was eaten cuisine in the Vedic period, though little credible evidence has been adduced in this regard.

Discerning readers may wonder how motivated historians pervert the past. As an example, I shall discuss the case of Shri Rama, currently regarded as the foremost symbol of Hindu bigotry. I urge readers to dissociate themselves from a controversial movement to build a temple at the Shri Rama's birthplace, and to consider only if his story has a legitimate place in history books, as a major part of our national heritage.

Most readers would know that the Hindu tradition has always maintained that the Ramayana of Valmiki was older than Vyas's Mahabharata. For several decades, however, archaeologists could only establish Mahabharata sites, and seriously wondered if the Mahabharata could be the older epic. Archaeologists like Prof BB Lal struggled valiantly to establish a genre of "Ramayana sites" that could not be wished away, but Marxist scholars had the power to scuttle excavations at critical points, until the court case over the title suit to the Ram Janmabhoomi gave the Archeological Survey of India a unique opportunity to excavate the site without hindrance in 2002.

It is well-known that the ASI's brief was to examine if the disputed Babri structure was built over a pre-existing temple. The ASI found a tenth century temple complex that had probably been destroyed by floods, of which period a circular Shiva temple remained. The materials of this temple were reused in a grand twelfth century temple, of which fifty pillar bases and a 150-feet long and six-foot wide wall were excavated. The Babri Mosque was found to cut into the pillar bases of this temple. When the Babri structure was pulled down on December 6, 1992, a shilalekha (inscription) was found in the Nagari script, which stated that King Govind Chand of Kanauj built and dedicated a temple of unparalleled beauty to Vishnu Hari, who had slain Bali and Dashanan (Ravana). This clearly indicated that the temple was a Ram temple, as Rama alone killed Ravana.

But the most significant aspect of the ASI dig was the finding of human habitation at Ayodhya from 1500 BC, which is seven hundred years earlier than previously thought. The Ayodhya excavation thus settled the controversy about the antiquity of the Ramayana vis-a-vis the Mahabharata, and vindicated the Hindu practice of preserving history through civilisational memory. My question is whether this memory of the Prince of Ayodhya legitimately deserves to be honoured with a place in history books or consigned to oblivion as an expression of Hindu communalism?

Of course, our Marxist friends have had no compunctions in shocking young school students with the claim that our Vedic ancestors, particularly the wily Brahmins, were voracious eaters of cow meat. Undeterred by inconvenient facts like the veneration of the cow in the Vedas and the prohibition on its slaughter, they have continued to perpetuate a colonial falsehood that was invented to facilitate the conversion agenda of Christian missionaries. Discerning readers would have realised that the sudden vehemence with which Marxists are now propagating that Vedic Hindus ate beef is nothing but a crude attempt to de-sacralize the cow and assist the conversion agenda of evangelising faiths.

Finally, we come to what Prof Shiva G Bajpai of Wisconsin University calls "the burden of bad ideas". In October last year, an international academic consensus at California State University, CA, US, stated that there was no Aryan Invasion of India. Hindu civilisational memory always maintained that its spiritual-cultural tradition began with the Vedas centred round the region of the river Saraswati. For Hindus, "Arya" simply meant "noble", and denoted adherence to an elevated culture; it had no ethnic connotations. Though evidence of an Aryan Invasion was always slim, Sir William James floated the theory was to establish that India was a land that passively submitted to successive foreign rule and conquest; that its great Vedic civilisation was itself an alien graft; and that British rule was merely the last of such a sequence.

Normally, such a view should have been scrapped once the British departed and subsequent excavations established that the geo-cultural areas of the Harappan and Vedic cultures were historically overlapping and identical. But Indian Marxists and Islamic intellectuals (the two often overlapped) joined hands and secured patronage to propound the view that the builders of the Harappan civilisation and the composers of the Vedic hymns were different people.

The idea, of course, was to deny the indigenous origins of Hindu civilisation long after it had become impossible to sustain this myth. The objective was to place Arab-Turk-Afghan invasions in "perspective" as a recurrent theme in Indian history, somewhat like the annual floods in the Brahmaputra. We thus have the ultimate irony that the organisers of the California conference are writing to school textbook writers all over the world to ensure that future writings on Indian history assert that there was no Aryan Invasion of India. NCERT has also received such a letter; one shudders to think what its new political masters intend to do with it.

Jihad vs the politically correct

Even as political correctness makes candid discussion about Islamic fundamentalism virtually impossible, concerned intellectuals the world over are cautiously determined to analyse the concept of jihad and its implications for non-Islamic societies.

Ever alert to such dangers, Muslim organisations and their fellow travellers are trying to white-wash the term that noted journalist MJ Akbar bluntly designated the signature tune of Islam.

Shrugging aside such candour, the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) lamented the misuse(sic) of the holy word, claiming jihad has nothing to do with terror (Daily Excelsior, June 27, 2004). A recent television programme on history textbooks saw a student activist quibbling over the definition of jihad as declaration of war against non-Muslims, which indicates the extent to which evasion and negation have permeated the debate.

This is surprising as the Quran is fairly explicit and leaves little doubt about the meaning of its major tenets. Moreover, the ulema have always interpreted it literally, rather than mystically. The strain felt by the AIMPLB in reforming the community's divorce law is evidence of this penchant for literalism.

Hence, it is unfair for Muslims to seek refuge in obfuscation while the world struggles to cope with terrorist attacks, from which even Saudi Arabia is not exempt. Investigating why American-Muslim converts readily embrace terrorism, Mr Robert Spencer, director, Jihad Watch, points out that Quranic passages such as the Verse of the Sword (Sura 9:5) are perceived by Muslims themselves as sanctifying violent jihad (June 3, 2004). In 1991, Cairo's prestigious Al-Azhar University ruled that a manual on Islamic law, which called jihad war against non-Muslims, conformed to the practice and faith of the orthodox Sunni community.

This explains why radical Muslims all over the world insist they are not terrorists, but mujahideen (holy warriors engaged in jihad). Violent jihad, says Mr Spencer, has been a constant theme of Islamic history, and though dormant in Europe for over three centuries, has never been rejected or discarded by Islamic theology. Buttressing this argument, former Director-General of Police RK Ohri, points to a saying attributed to the Prophet: "Paradise comes under the shade of swords." In a meticulously researched work, Long March of Islam, Mr Ohri emphasises that the tradition of jihad began with the Prophet, who approved more than 80 jihads in his lifetime and personally led more than 20, known as ghazwahs. The term ghazi, warrior who has killed in the service of the faith, is etymologically related to ghazwah.

Jihad, Mr Ohri contends, has a long history in India, and continues to be a contemporary reality. Apart from the innumerable jihads waged by successive invading armies, there have been at least three prominent jihads in the modern era. The first was in 1824, when Sayyid Ahmed incited the Yusufzai tribes for Targhib-ul-Jihad against the Sikh kingdom, where the azaan (summons to prayer) and cow slaughter were banned. Though many Muslims from present-day Uttar Pradesh heeded his call, Ahmed and his mujahideen were routed by the Sikh army.

A few years later, Sayyid Ahmed managed to seize the Peshawar valley. But his strict enforcement of Islamic law as interpreted by the puritanical Wahabi school, rapidly disillusioned the Pathan tribes. One night, while he was away with some devoted soldiers, they murdered all his followers. Sayyid Ahmed suffered another reverse while confronting the Sikh general, Hari Singh Nalwa. In 1830, he again faced the Sikhs in Hazara district, where he lost his life in the battle of Balakot.

After a quiescent phase, the Wahabis turned their ire against Britain for declaring war on Turkey in 1914, but all jihad-related activity between 1915 and 1919 failed to yield success. The second major jihad was called by the Khilafat Committee and other Muslim groups after the First World War, when the British and French armies captured Constantinople and abolished the Ottoman Caliphate. This jihad was also a flop. Called by Mohammad Ali, Shaukat Ali, Hasrat Mohani and Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, it witnessed the ridiculous migration and ruin of around eighteen thousand Muslim families who sold their belongings for hijrat to Afghanistan, which was declared Dar-ul-Islam (land of the pure). But this jihad showed its nasty face in Malabar, where thousands of Hindus were massacred, women outraged, temples desecrated and forced conversions made to Islam; the violence stopped only when British troops reached the area and restored order.

It is the third jihad that is the most evocative, and continues to cast a heavy shadow on our age. Declared by the All India Muslim League in 1946, it called for the creation of Pakistan. Calcutta (Kolkata) Mayor, Mohammed Usman, issued the Munajat for Jihad, which, inter alia, stated: "We are starting a jihad in Your Name in this very month of Ramzan enable us to establish the Kingdom of Islam in India. The Muslims in China, Manchuria, Mongolia, Malaya, Java and Sumatra are all fighting for their freedom."

This jihad was a resounding success, thanks in no small measure to HS Suhrawardy, Muslim League Minister in charge of law and order. Though Calcutta had a Hindu majority, the strategic transfer of Hindu police officers from key posts saw a veritable massacre of the population on August 16, 1946, which the League designated as Direct Action Day. With Muslim police officers incharge of twenty-two police stations, and Anglo-Indians controlling the remaining two, the mob had a field day, with a complicit British bureaucracy failing to call the army till Hindus and Sikhs began to organise and fight back.

The most revelatory statement in the Direct Action Day jihad proclamation was the reference to the plight of Muslims in China, Mongolia, Malaya, Java, Sumatra as well as several Arab and African countries, which were fighting for freedom and the establishment of a very strong Islamic kingdom in this world. The creation of Pakistan, Mr Ohri asserts, was the first step in that direction, and the action is now visible in all countries mentioned in the Munajat for Jihad proclamation.

Unlike India's ostrich-like media, leading newspapers abroad are beginning to look sharply at Islam's close affinity with the culture of bombs and explosives. The New York Times is following the Manhattan trial of one Mohammed Junaid Babar, 29-year-old grandson of Pakistani immigrants, accused of aiding a plot to blow up British pubs, railway stations and restaurants. Pleading guilty in a sealed court, Babar said his grandfather imbued him with a strong sense of Muslim loyalty. In an interview broadcast by ITN Five News, Canada, some months after 9/11, he said: "I did grow up there, but that doesn't mean that my loyalty is with the Americans. My loyalty has always been, is and forever will be, with the Muslims" (The New York Times, June 17, 2004). At the time of the interview, Babar had given up a lucrative $70,000-a-year job to go to Pakistan, where he was waiting to be smuggled into Afghanistan to fight American troops.

To conclude, jihad is an integral component of Islamic theology, the call for which can be given as and when expedient. Disregarding this reality under the pretext of political correctness, not only facilitates Islamic radicals in accomplishing their goals, but also liberates the so-called moderates (read apologists) from the moral obligation to reject and oppose this violent doctrine.

History: Trail by ideology

Joseph K was submitted to the motions of due process of law and allowed to have his say before being snuffed out with banal savagery in Franz Kafka's grimly prophetic The Trial. Reviving memories of the communist leviathan since consigned to the dustbin of history, Mr Arjun Singh's committee to review NCERT's new history textbooks has surpassed that sham tribunal with its peremptory decision to recommend scrapping of all textbooks commissioned by the NDA Government.

Though appointed on June 12, 2004, Professors S Settar, JS Grewal and Barun De arrived in the capital only on June 22 and just three days later proposed wholesale purging of the books, without according the authors the minimal courtesy of a hearing. Press reports indicate that the committee worked to a pre-determined schedule, if not to a command performance. Pre-selected experts and activists appeared before the committee, while written offers of cooperation from the affected authors received the cold shoulder.

While no chargesheet was served nor evidence adduced regarding so-called "distorted and communally biased portions" in any of the books under scrutiny, the trial was conducted with unseemly haste. In the absence of a formal prosecution, there was, naturally, no defence. Judgment was pronounced at a hastily convened press conference.

I am personally pleased with this blatant partisanship, as it has taken the subject of history out of the closet and into the public arena, where all can see the intellectual dishonesty of Marxist historians. Besides tarnishing its academic credentials by asserting the primacy of ideology before the discipline of History, the committee is tainted by what legal circles call a conflict of interest.

Prof JS Grewal, the medievalist on the committee, has jointly authoured works with Prof Irfan Habib, who authoured the medieval India section of the Indian History Congress' notorious Index of Errors, which spearheaded the Leftist attack on NCERT. Some news reports suggest that Prof Habib met the committee, as did activists of Sahmat, an organisation that hosted press conferences wherein Leftist academics spat venom against NCERT.

Even worse, the committee executed a personal agenda, disregarding the mandate given by the HRD Ministry. Its order explicitly stated that as textbooks for the current year had already been printed and teaching commenced in most schools, it would be "impractical to withdraw these books at this stage without causing dislocation in the studies of millions of students". The panel of historians was only to identify "distorted and communally biased portions," if any, and simultaneously recommend short passages to fill in gaps that may develop as a result of deletion of impugned passages.

The eminent historians superseded the Ministry's order in totality, for reasons that need to be made public. The committee did not make even a suggestive list of errors or instances of communal tinge in any of the books it rubbished. This suggests, as the authors claim, that there are no such passages, and that rather than honestly admitting this, the historians served a political agenda. By not identifying so-called saffron passages, the committee also evaded the treacherous trap of suggesting substitute inputs. For such an exercise would have completely discredited Marxists, as they would have had to reveal, in black and white, what facts of history they wished to erase or (re)interpret.

An affected author has claimed that the books are being scrapped at the instance of a cabal determined to monopolise the rendition of Indian history. Certainly the committee's behaviour lends credence to the view that Marxists cannot afford an open debate on history, and rely exclusively on State power to suppress facts and impose interpretations upon an innocent public.

Readers who think history is essentially a factual narrative of what happened in the past and cannot be affected by ideological preferences may wish to understand some fundamental issues in danger of distortion at the hands of Indian Marxists and their fellow travellers. To begin with, we need to appreciate that India is no ordinary country, and that the history of India is actually the story of the triumphs and travails of a great civilisation.

This civilisation is anathema to Indian Marxists, who rabidly deny its unity, integrity, uniqueness and continuity. This is why they uphold colonial falsehoods about an Aryan Invasion, even after it has been seriously discredited by academics and archaeologists the world over. Yet Marxists project India as a landmass subject to successive invasions (and immigrations) since the dawn of history, with perhaps only the so-called Dravidians as original inhabitants. In this worldview, Vedic (Arya) Hindus are not a coherent community, and the Jain and Buddhist traditions are projected as rival streams rather than as parts of an unified spiritual spectrum.

Ignoring the magnitude of evidence regarding ancient India's spiritual and commercial forays in the world, Marxists pretend that India was completely isolated from the world until Islam arrived as invader-saviour and ended her seclusion. Violently silencing the view that Islam triggered off the rigidity of the caste system, Marxists claim that Islam transformed Hindu society with a message of equality.

Under the patronage of the Nehruvian State, Indian Marxists have completely disallowed discussion on the cultural deadlock in Indian society following Islam's violent advent in the subcontinent. The havoc wrought by Islam on the Indian people is similarly taboo, and till date there is not a single account documenting the sheer numbers of natives killed is resisting Islamic kings and warriors.

Readers may be surprised to learn that far from lacking a sense of history (another colonial propaganda and legacy), Indian society scrupulously documented the tragedy and heroism of its encounter with Islam. Through the tenth to the nineteenth century, the writings of bards, wandering saints, women of princely families, and other strata of society, all reflect a startling continuity of perception towards Islam. It was the Nehruvian State that ruthlessly purged this vision and created a great schizophrenia in national consciousness that is called secularism, but has a distinctly non-secular tilt. Yet India cannot be healed unless she comes to terms with her past, and she cannot come to terms with her past until she faces it in all its blood and gore.

Marxists are committed to fragmenting and erasing India's civilisational memory, which is why they are resisting even simple non-interpretative narratives from reaching school children. An old textbook dislodged by NCERT managed the feat of writing about Jehangir's reign without mentioning his execution of Sikh Guru Arjan. The persecution and execution of subsequent Gurus by successive Mughal rulers was similarly glossed over, with the result that the ordinary student simply failed to comprehend why groups like the Sikhs, Marathas and Jats offered such sustained resistance to Mughal rule.

Not only do Marxists avoid debate, they pretend that the Index of Errors was not rebuffed by NCERT's fallacies in the IHC's Index of Errors. In the circumstances, they could hardly be expected to do justice to the new books by meticulously examining each one for bias or distortion. It will be a sad mockery of education if the committee now recommends textbooks published by Leftist NGO Ekalavya whose books were not accepted even by the Digvijay Singh Government in Madhya Pradesh, or Delhi Government's SCERT which suggest that Delhi residents provoked their own massacre by Nadir Shah, who no doubt came as an invader-guest!

Knives are out

There is no denying that the knives are drawn between the BJP and the Sangh Parivar. VHP supremo Ashok Singhal fired the first salvo in response to Atal Bihari Vajpayees Manali musings that the Gujarat violence of 2002 was responsible for the BJP's defeat. Aggrieved that the former Prime Minister should casually disconnect the riots from the previous massacre of Hindu pilgrims at Godhra, Singhal squarely blamed Vajpayee and Advani for the rout. He asserted that it was time they made way for younger leadership.

Despite the RSS's attempts at damage control, the second salvo from Mr Prafull Goradia, former Rajya Sabha member and former editor of BJP Today, makes it clear that the issue has been joined. Indeed, it would be a brain dead party that permits its leaders to execute personal agendas for six long years, take the parliamentary tally from 183 to 138, and then accept the blame for loss of office! Mr Goradia's open letter to Vajpayee reflects the anguish of cadres who felt thoroughly betrayed and hold the latter solely responsible for the rout.

It is undeniable that the BJP Government functioned with callous disrespect for the issues and cadres who brought it to power. The party owed much of its electoral magnetism to the oratory and personal credibility of leaders like Acharya Dharmendra, Praveen Togadia and Surendra Jain.

Struck off the party's list of speakers for Election 2004, they were hardly obliged to send their despondent admirers to the polling booths. Media reports have already exposed the public response to Advanis pre-poll yatra in the absence of endorsement from so-called Hindutva firebrands. It was thus inevitable that history would unfold as it eventually did.

Even if we accept the view that the Government faced limitations on Ayodhya, few Indians have been able to digest Vajpayee's decision to reward Pakistani aggression in Kargil with peace talks; to humiliate the Army by keeping it on full alert at the border for a whole year after the attack on Parliament, when it had become clear that the Government had buckled to American pressure; and to ignore the genocide of Hindus in Bangladesh as well as the growing illicit immigration from that country. The Centre remained somnolent even when the Marxist chief minister of West Bengal expressed concern at mushrooming madarsas in border districts.

The BJP leaders behaved like nouveau riche entrants to an elite club. Barring the Prime Minister, top leaders made a beeline for every page-three event. Dazzled by the bright lights and lulled into a false sense of belonging by their new secular friends, top leaders would freeze with misery or open hostility on encountering old Hindutva faces. Not one of the I&B Ministers wished to call pro-BJP analysts to current affairs programmes on Doordarshan or All India Radio; the question of commissioning programmes by non-secular journalists did not, naturally, arise. Some of the more adroit leaders managed a comfortable, if slightly schizophrenic, existence. Cavorting in the main with the secular crowd, they would occasionally apportion driblets of their time to causes dear to Parivar veterans. Unfortunately, some of the Parivar organisations felt unduly flattered at being invited to ministerial bungalows, and compromised on issues where greater commitment could yield higher dividends.

The BJP's apathy to isues demanding swift and decisive intervention was amazing. Falling public investment in agriculture created a nation-wide crisis in the farm sector. The farmers suicides in some southern States was an expression. Far from providing succour, the Central leadership did not even ask the State units for a report, leave alone take up the matter with the concerned chief ministers. As many state units are headed by men with godfathers in Delhi and little grassroots support, the national leadership cannot evade culpability in this regard.

But by far the most shocking cause of defeat was political somnolence and an inexcusable underestimation of the opponent. The BJP believed Sonia Gandhi was content to remain leader of the Opposition for eternity, as this gave her cabinet status and physical security for herself and her family. They fought an airy campaign from the air, and the rest is history. The tragedy is that few lessons have been learnt even in retrospect. The Manali musings clearly reflect a desire to treat the party as a pocket borough. More rumblings are simply inetable.

Why clean Uncle Sam's mess?

The innate decency of the Hindu ethos precludes India from ever subscribing to Prof Samuel Huntington's vulgar formulation regarding the clash of civilisations. Essentially a euphemism for armed conflict between the White Christian and Arab-dominated Muslim worlds to conclude the unfinished medieval Crusades, this simplistic, yet vituperative doctrine would be laughed out of court in any civilised society; it succeeds in America only because it is an intellectually immature and emotional society.

American academia, somewhat like that country's media and entertainment industry, owes much of its success to corporate-style marketing of slogans masquerading as ideas and theories, which curiously coincide with the geostrategic perceptions of the regime of the day. I personally distrust much of it.

India's problems with Islamic fundamentalism pre-date the United States's current obsessions by more than two decades. But, as the post-9/11 events show, even that grisly tragedy has not brought about a convergence of interests and perceptions between the two nations. Other than some meaningless prattle, Washington's insensitivity towards India's problems is simply indecent. Hence, amidst growing indications that the ruling National Democratic Alliance may succumb to US pressure to send Indian troops to maintain law and order in war-ravaged Iraq, it may be worthwhile to dispassionately examine the issues at stake. This is all the more urgent as the Congress President, Ms Sonia Gandhi, seems to have accorded tacit consent to the Government's decision to deploy Indian soldiers.

This is truly unfortunate as India's civilisational ethos is essentially insular, not given to brash external adventures. Hindus do not have the compulsive itch to convert the world to a single way of life, much less to impose their view of order upon it. That is a pretension of the White Anglo-Saxon Protestant (WASP) Americans; hence, it is just as well that they pick up their own tab as they go about burdening the world with blunderbuss solutions to perceived or self-created problems.

The first phase in their much-touted war against terror saw Osama bin Laden and his Taliban airlifted to the safety of Pakistani territory even as Mr Hamid Karzai's unstable regime struggles for existence in Kabul. The second phase saw the hated establishment of Saddam Hussein turn phantom before the eyes of an astonished world, while the high profile weapons of mass destruction faded imperceptibly into the desert sands.

Of course, America got its cake. Sitting pretty on the world's second-most viable oil reserves, it has already made it clear that it will also keep most of the reconstruction pie to itself. The latter has become a source of considerable embarrassment to loyal ally, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, but the Bush Administration is serenely unconcerned.

India has no legitimate reason to help America eat its cake as well. Our delicately nuanced opposition to the US action in Iraq has been vindicated by its outcome. There is no justification for making a volte face and openly abetting the American occupation. Despite the fig leaf of Security Council Resolution 1483, India will have no meaningful role in 'assisting' the people of Iraq to reform their institutions and rebuild their country. As the recognised "authority" in Baghdad, the US-led coalition will control all levers of power. Hence, it is only right and proper that they police the country with their own citizens.

Dispatching Indian troops in Iraq's present troubled circumstances would be tantamount to serving as mercenaries of the US. Iraq is in a poignant mess. Saddam and his evil regime have vanished in thin air, leaving a power vacuum that Washington is ill-equipped to fill. The main Opposition leader, Mr Ahmed Chalabi, has discovered that the people were not exactly waiting to roll out the red carpet; surviving relations of the last monarch may well come to the same conclusion.

The largely secular citizenry is aggrieved at the possibility of Shia clerics seizing power and condemning them to live in an Islamic paradise, a la Ayatollah Khomeini. The presence of the racially different and religiously (perceived to be) inimical American troops aggravates local tensions. On their part, the Americans are edgy and unwilling to take the sniper fire that daily leads to body-bags that have to be airlifted back home and fuel public unrest over a war regarded as unjust and unnecessary.

New Delhi has no good reason to take the heat off the Bush Administration in this regard. A White House that can't brave public opinion while pursuing a policy it perceives to be right for the American nation, should pause a moment and reflect on the endless "cuts" endured by India in its fight against Pakistan-sponsored terrorism and Saudi-aided fundamentalism.

India has no geostrategic interests at stake in the Gulf, though I personally feel that a regime change in Saudi Arabia could trigger off beneficial reforms in Islam across the globe. But we are not the ones who can effect such a change, so we can only wait and watch how the situation develops in that part of the world.

However, with Islamic fundamentalist networks so well-entrenched in the country and across three borders (Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal), India has no good reason to further invite the rage of the Muslim world upon itself by serving as the handmaiden of the new US imperialism. The "pacification" of a turbulent population in Sri Lanka should have taught us to look before we leap in the quest for the Nobel Peace Prize-that eternal and elusive goal of secular Hindu Prime Ministers.

Given the mounting pressures at home, India should in fact decline to send troops even under the United Nations auspices, as there is a huge mess to be cleaned up here. Soldiers and civilians die daily in Kashmir, General Pervez Musharraf sends veiled threats of another Kargil, terrorist plots are hatched and unearthed virtually every day. So where are the surplus men we can afford to send abroad?

An Indian leadership itching for a military adventure should shake off Oval Office pressure and firmly tackle the issue of cross-border terrorism and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. It should also stop closing its eyes to the continuing atrocities against Hindus in Bangladesh, and the burgeoning madarsas on the Nepal border.

A leadership that lacks the gumption to confront these issues should not dare to treat brave Indian soldiers as cannon fodder for America's chocolate cream soldiers who try to win wars by the disproportionate use of force (not to mention unacceptable weapons such as depleted uranium shells), and shy away from real combat on the ground. If the Americans can't hold Iraq, they should hand it over to the UN and leave. New Delhi should be under no illusion that the Indian people will allow America to handcuff India when it comes to grappling with Pakistan and then accept its "request" to clean up the mess in Baghdad.

There is some talk that, without appropriate gestures to the Americans, India may not get the expected share in the Iraqi reconstruction pie. We should not be blackmailed by this talk because even Britain is having a problem getting into Baghdad. Besides, as one commentator has pointedly observed, the demands for Indian skilled labour, technical manpower and middle level professionals will remain regardless of our stance on the occupation. Hence realpolitik, not phony economics, should drive our decisions.

Dismantle the socialist raj

In the midst of a singularly lacklustre election campaign, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot showed undue panic by floating the balloon of reservations for 'economically needy' sections of the forward castes. Brahmins dismissed the move as gimmickry since additional reservations require Central legislation, and demanded that the State include them among the Other Backward Classes so that they can immediately avail of the benefits of Government employment.

This flattening of caste hierarchy to a point where the OBC category has emerged as the prize varna to which twice-born suvarna castes desperately seek admission, provides much food for thought. It overturns all conventional dogmas about caste from the time it came to public notice as a mobilising institution.

Caste has generally been understood in terms of status and ritual ranking in society. While recruitments to the Brahmin varna are recorded in the Rig Veda and even in the Mahabharat, it is historically undeniable that the Kshatriya varna has been the favoured destination of energetic groups. As late as the 18th century, the Holkars graduated from cattle-herders to founders of the respected royal family of Indore. Political power was a potent shortcut to elevation in the caste hierarchy, with the ready cooperation of Brahmin priests. In the early 19th century, the tribal Raj-Gonds of Khairagarh were adjusted in the Nagbansi lineage, which was recognised as Kshatriya in central India.

Another favoured ladder, as noted by MN Srinivas, was 'Sanskritisation', whereby lower castes and tribes adopted the purer lifestyles of the upper castes, and claimed a higher social ranking. In the opening decades of the 20th century, the Santhals of Bihar began to wear the sacred thread and claimed Kshatriya rank. The Mahtos of Chhotanagpur were so determined to achieve higher status that they got themselves de-scheduled as a tribe. The list is endless. In the British period, some ambitious tribes even approached the Rajput Mahasabha for recognition.

Of course, the desire for upper caste status waned after 1950 when the constitution granted 22.5 per cent reservations in Government jobs to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. Forward castes disapproved of reservations as they were denied a chunk of sinecures that would have been theirs in an open competition; but they nonetheless tolerated quotas as necessary to balance the historical resourcelessness and disabilities of these groups.

However, public disaffection grew when reservations were extended to prized seats in prestigious engineering and medical colleges, and merit was compromised by sharply reducing the qualifying marks for SC/ST candidates. This made a mockery of degrees and did not empower the SC/ST candidates, as they often failed in the examinations and had to drop out of the courses midway.

Public anger at the chicanery of politicians came to a boil with the acceptance of the Mandal Commission Report by the then Prime Minister VP Singh, which overnight doubled the quantum of reserved posts. In the dozen years since, several leaders have feebly mooted extension of reservations to the economically needy among the forward castes. Mr Gehlot has now suggested a new Central initiative to examine the issue, and the Bharatiya Janata Party has endorsed his proposal to enhance job reservations.

Even as other political parties struggle to articulate their stands, social scientists would do well to examine the issue before we are pushed through another round of votebank appeasement. It would be pertinent to remember that when the Mandal Commission Report finally became public after a decade-long hibernation, all leading sociologists and experts associated with the Commission dissociated themselves from the report's conclusions and questioned its methodology. The scientific classification of social groups is too sensitive a matter to be left to politicians.

As reservations are intimately linked to caste, a deeper understanding of the working of caste in its contemporary setting is necessary before we aggravate social discontent by willy-nilly expanding the reservation pie. I can see several potential sources of disaffection on the horizon. For instance, given the fact that Government jobs are shrinking and the privatisation of the public sector has gone too far to be reversed, politicians may be tempted to spring a nasty surprise in the form of reservations in the private sector.

In the intensely competitive global environment, such a short-sighted move could do untold damage to commerce and industry. The large multinationals would instantly quit the country unless exempted from this Indian disease. The already unimpressive FDI inflows would dip further, as managers fumble with caste certificates in place of the good old marks or grades. Literally, every shopkeeper would be open to harassment from "caste inspectors", and the confusion in the economy would rival the legendary Tower of Babel. Obviously, the situation would be too terrible to countenance.

In principle, reservations for the economically needy seem unexceptionable, but they would be impossible to implement in practice. Prima facie, every young man or woman eligible and desirous of a job is economically needy, for the simple reason that even affluent middle class families do not have the resources to indefinitely support adult children who do not work.

In the case of the upper castes, how is economic need to be defined? Would we simply identify certain gotras among Brahmins and Rajputs as needy, or would we include all families that fall outside the criteria identified by the Finance Ministry for filing income tax returns (such as ownership of a telephone)? And who will certify the candidate as genuine? A new mountain of corruption will open up in the form of a "certificate industry," which will be utterly disproportionate to the number of upper caste youth securing Government employment through reservations. It is a completely unworthy exercise.

I feel that the time has also come to reexamine the whole issue of social and educational backwardness as a criterion for reservations. The very term "educational backwardness" is an anachronism in a nation committed to the goal of universal education. Since jobs are ultimately given to individuals and not to groups, and no one can hold a job for which he/she is not qualified, the claim of educational backwardness is odd, to say the least. Yet it is a claim bandied without embarrassment by families and groups that willfully refrain from taking the benefits of available educational opportunities. It is high time we put paid to such perfidy.

The claim of 'social backwardness' by the OBCs is equally phony, and several studies have ably documented the political and economic power of leading castes in this category. In the modern world, caste is no longer the organising principle of society-it does not determine occupation; it does not restrict the choice of marriage partner. At best, it bequeaths a surname, a sense of identity/community, and an assured votebank during elections.

In the past few years, new States have been carved with tribals constituting the majority population and thus wielding political clout. Their historical problems of neglect and exploitation can thus be expected to be taken care of over a period of time. 'Social backwardness' then may be said to be confined to SC individuals who are still denied entry to village temples. But they are seldom the beneficiaries of reservations. As we deconstruct the commanding heights of the Nehruvian economy, we would do well to dismantle this parasitic legacy of the socialist raj.


Hindu gods & gospel untruths

A leading newspaper just performed a sterling service by publishing a photograph of the "Ganesh chappals" that have so enraged the Hindu-Indian community in America. Without the photograph, it would have been difficult for people in this part of the world to envisage how something so deeply offensive could have been contemplated and executed with such equanimity by cobblers in a country otherwise prone to the mantra of out-sourcing. The slippers bore tiny motifs of the god Ganesh all over, and no doubt one had only to slip one's feet into them to feel secular superiority coursing through one's veins!

Not so long ago, a leading British store thought Hindu gods were good enough (sic) to grace toilet seats. Without being hyper-sensitive, one may legitimately question why Hindu gods alone are singled out for such honour. I do not believe the incidents are innocent, harmless or accidental. India has been associated with the spiritual quest since the dawn of civilisation; the dullest soul in the world knows the esteem in which gods are held in this land. For a god as universally renowned as Ganesh to land up beneath human feet is to my mind a very intentional insult.

Hindus have a special prayer seeking Mother Earth's forgiveness for having to put their feet upon her sacred body. We cannot view a god on footwear as part of secular evolution. What is more, the religious symbols and icons of the faiths to which the offenders adhere (howsoever nominally) have never found their way into the same profane space into which Hindu gods are being thrust with apparent regularity. I therefore think that it was a mistake for the American Hindu community to let the manufacturer get away with an apology and withdrawal of the offending slippers. The next time such an offence occurs, they should file a class action suit.

I believe these cultural shock and awe tactics are related to the consistent White Christian goal of eradicating all native faiths and traditions in the world. What better way than by eroding the sanctity of other gods? At some level, these activities connect with last year's well orchestrated campaign against a US-based charity, India Relief and Development Fund (IDRF), titled "The Foreign Exchange of Hate: IDRF and American Funding of Hindutva." Coming in the wake of the Gujarat riots, it got good mileage internationally.

The November 2002 report, published by Sabrang Communications, India, and South Asia Citizens Web, France, was basically a rehash of old allegations by the Forum of Indian Leftists (FOIL) and was even authored by Biju Mathew, FOIL founding member. Some American Indian friends of mine have since united under the aegis of Friends of India and investigated the "hate" charges. Sifting through layers of innuendo, they have arrived at facts which debunk Sabrang-FOIL fulsomely.

IDRF's principal crime (sic) is that it collects funds to provide services to the poor in India, irrespective of caste or religion, in areas that missionaries fondly imagine are their sole preserve. Projects are monitored through volunteers who meet their own out-of-pocket expenses and thus ensure that as much as 99.1 per cent funds reach the intended beneficiaries.

Such dedication adversely affects the harvesting of souls! Not surprisingly, Friends of India found that Sabrang-FOIL was targeted at US corporations that provide matching funds to employee contributions to IDRF. Hurting IDRF financially would deprive Indian NGOs of funds and leave the field open to rich evangelists. IDRF was by no means flush with funds as most of its donors were small donors. Over a 13-year period, it raised just $ 13 million. In contrast, in 2001-2002, Christian bodies in Karnataka alone received $ 98 million!

Sabrang-FOIL levelled serious charges against IDRF-funded agencies in the core areas of education, tribal welfare, and so on. Regarding Ekal Vidyalaya schools, it said: "While the stated purpose of the schools is eradication of illiteracy in remote areas, the One Teacher School are heavily involved in spreading Hindutva 'education' with a focus on stopping conversions to Christianity and encouraging 'reconversions' to Hinduism."

As opposed to this, Ms Radhika Sharma in India Currents (an Indian-American monthly from San Francisco, US), observed: "Ekal Vidyalayas offer five years of free non-formal education to village children aged 5-14 years in groups of 30 to 40 ... The teachers are locally educated youths who have passed grades 8 or 9 and have been trained specifically for the purpose... These village schools also serve the ancillary function of a meeting point for the entire community wherein ideas regarding health and better lifestyle are discussed ... The curriculum is designed by educationists to cater to special local needs and is taught in the regional language of the state... The girl child is also well represented: 50 per cent of the students and teachers are female."

Friends of India has provided interesting observations from White American scholar Yvette Rosser (University of Texas, Austin), who recently travelled in some northeastern states. Visiting a non-Christian Dimasi village near Dimapur, Nagaland, she met villagers who told her that "over a hundred years ago the Americans came with the Kala Kitab (black book) and told them their Gods were Satans". Such tolerance!

The village headman told Ms Rosser that they "decided to get organised when in the fall of 1999 there were dozens of huge prayer meetings warning people that Jesus was returning to earth on the new year. Missionaries from different churches would go through all the villages on bicycles with bull-horns and tell people to come to the prayer meeting and be saved-to leave their old evil ways behind and be saved when the rapture comes on Dec 31, 1999".

The Dimasis countered with their own prayer meeting, and later got assistance from the Vivekananda Kendra to print their own Dimasi prayer booklets. No wonder the Federation of Indian American Christian Organisations of Northern America is so upset with them! The Dimasis also managed funds to preserve a unique ancient monument -a giant chess set associated with Mahabharat hero Bhima's wife, who hailed from this tribe. I've seen pictures of this set, and it truly deserves to be on top of our heritage list.

Friends of India has thus taken the Sabrang/FOIL report apart, charge by charge, and established that its authors have no primary evidence from appropriate Government sources or other acceptable proof-points to substantiate their wild accusations. Indeed, the report appears to be nothing more than ideological hatred packaged into accusations against NGOs who are providing yeoman's services in education, health care, managing orphanages, rehabilitation work (Latur and Gujarat earthquakes, Kargil victims), and other social service projects.

The most fundamental allegation, of course, relates to the 'Hinduising' activities of the Sangh Parivar and its affiliates. Here I can do no better than to leave the reader with the profound thoughts of the US-based Jubilee Church: "India ... is desperate for the truth of the gospel. In the land of a million gods, multitudes live in confusion and spiritual bondage with no knowledge of God's goodness. We bring the good news of the gospel not only through evangelism and crusades, but also by revolutionising the standard of living through missionary work, including the development of a Bible College to equip local pastors, and digging wells to bring fresh water to needy villages." Aaa hah...

Hindu gods & gospel untruths

A leading newspaper just performed a sterling service by publishing a photograph of the "Ganesh chappals" that have so enraged the Hindu-Indian community in America. Without the photograph, it would have been difficult for people in this part of the world to envisage how something so deeply offensive could have been contemplated and executed with such equanimity by cobblers in a country otherwise prone to the mantra of out-sourcing. The slippers bore tiny motifs of the god Ganesh all over, and no doubt one had only to slip one's feet into them to feel secular superiority coursing through one's veins!

Not so long ago, a leading British store thought Hindu gods were good enough (sic) to grace toilet seats. Without being hyper-sensitive, one may legitimately question why Hindu gods alone are singled out for such honour. I do not believe the incidents are innocent, harmless or accidental. India has been associated with the spiritual quest since the dawn of civilisation; the dullest soul in the world knows the esteem in which gods are held in this land. For a god as universally renowned as Ganesh to land up beneath human feet is to my mind a very intentional insult.

Hindus have a special prayer seeking Mother Earth's forgiveness for having to put their feet upon her sacred body. We cannot view a god on footwear as part of secular evolution. What is more, the religious symbols and icons of the faiths to which the offenders adhere (howsoever nominally) have never found their way into the same profane space into which Hindu gods are being thrust with apparent regularity. I therefore think that it was a mistake for the American Hindu community to let the manufacturer get away with an apology and withdrawal of the offending slippers. The next time such an offence occurs, they should file a class action suit.

I believe these cultural shock and awe tactics are related to the consistent White Christian goal of eradicating all native faiths and traditions in the world. What better way than by eroding the sanctity of other gods? At some level, these activities connect with last year's well orchestrated campaign against a US-based charity, India Relief and Development Fund (IDRF), titled "The Foreign Exchange of Hate: IDRF and American Funding of Hindutva." Coming in the wake of the Gujarat riots, it got good mileage internationally.

The November 2002 report, published by Sabrang Communications, India, and South Asia Citizens Web, France, was basically a rehash of old allegations by the Forum of Indian Leftists (FOIL) and was even authored by Biju Mathew, FOIL founding member. Some American Indian friends of mine have since united under the aegis of Friends of India and investigated the "hate" charges. Sifting through layers of innuendo, they have arrived at facts which debunk Sabrang-FOIL fulsomely.

IDRF's principal crime (sic) is that it collects funds to provide services to the poor in India, irrespective of caste or religion, in areas that missionaries fondly imagine are their sole preserve. Projects are monitored through volunteers who meet their own out-of-pocket expenses and thus ensure that as much as 99.1 per cent funds reach the intended beneficiaries.

Such dedication adversely affects the harvesting of souls! Not surprisingly, Friends of India found that Sabrang-FOIL was targeted at US corporations that provide matching funds to employee contributions to IDRF. Hurting IDRF financially would deprive Indian NGOs of funds and leave the field open to rich evangelists. IDRF was by no means flush with funds as most of its donors were small donors. Over a 13-year period, it raised just $ 13 million. In contrast, in 2001-2002, Christian bodies in Karnataka alone received $ 98 million!

Sabrang-FOIL levelled serious charges against IDRF-funded agencies in the core areas of education, tribal welfare, and so on. Regarding Ekal Vidyalaya schools, it said: "While the stated purpose of the schools is eradication of illiteracy in remote areas, the One Teacher School are heavily involved in spreading Hindutva 'education' with a focus on stopping conversions to Christianity and encouraging 'reconversions' to Hinduism."

As opposed to this, Ms Radhika Sharma in India Currents (an Indian-American monthly from San Francisco, US), observed: "Ekal Vidyalayas offer five years of free non-formal education to village children aged 5-14 years in groups of 30 to 40 ... The teachers are locally educated youths who have passed grades 8 or 9 and have been trained specifically for the purpose... These village schools also serve the ancillary function of a meeting point for the entire community wherein ideas regarding health and better lifestyle are discussed ... The curriculum is designed by educationists to cater to special local needs and is taught in the regional language of the state... The girl child is also well represented: 50 per cent of the students and teachers are female."

Friends of India has provided interesting observations from White American scholar Yvette Rosser (University of Texas, Austin), who recently travelled in some northeastern states. Visiting a non-Christian Dimasi village near Dimapur, Nagaland, she met villagers who told her that "over a hundred years ago the Americans came with the Kala Kitab (black book) and told them their Gods were Satans". Such tolerance!

The village headman told Ms Rosser that they "decided to get organised when in the fall of 1999 there were dozens of huge prayer meetings warning people that Jesus was returning to earth on the new year. Missionaries from different churches would go through all the villages on bicycles with bull-horns and tell people to come to the prayer meeting and be saved-to leave their old evil ways behind and be saved when the rapture comes on Dec 31, 1999".

The Dimasis countered with their own prayer meeting, and later got assistance from the Vivekananda Kendra to print their own Dimasi prayer booklets. No wonder the Federation of Indian American Christian Organisations of Northern America is so upset with them! The Dimasis also managed funds to preserve a unique ancient monument -a giant chess set associated with Mahabharat hero Bhima's wife, who hailed from this tribe. I've seen pictures of this set, and it truly deserves to be on top of our heritage list.

Friends of India has thus taken the Sabrang/FOIL report apart, charge by charge, and established that its authors have no primary evidence from appropriate Government sources or other acceptable proof-points to substantiate their wild accusations. Indeed, the report appears to be nothing more than ideological hatred packaged into accusations against NGOs who are providing yeoman's services in education, health care, managing orphanages, rehabilitation work (Latur and Gujarat earthquakes, Kargil victims), and other social service projects.

The most fundamental allegation, of course, relates to the 'Hinduising' activities of the Sangh Parivar and its affiliates. Here I can do no better than to leave the reader with the profound thoughts of the US-based Jubilee Church: "India ... is desperate for the truth of the gospel. In the land of a million gods, multitudes live in confusion and spiritual bondage with no knowledge of God's goodness. We bring the good news of the gospel not only through evangelism and crusades, but also by revolutionising the standard of living through missionary work, including the development of a Bible College to equip local pastors, and digging wells to bring fresh water to needy villages." Aaa hah...

Conversion as cultural demise

An AIADMK leader in Pondicherry recently sounded the alarm over a conversion spree in his constituency, Uppalam, which is resulting in an open assault on Tamil culture in the area (New Indian Express, April 18, 2003). In a debate in the State Assembly, Mr A Anbalagan alleged that married women were being prohibited from sporting the tilak, mangal sutra or flowers in their hair, which are the traditional accoutrements to denote marital status in Tamil culture. He claimed that, in this manner, women who would otherwise like to be attired as sumangalis were forced to change their appearance in the name of conversion, and this was having a deleterious impact on the social fabric.

Discerning readers would have read recent press reports regarding the efforts of Christian missionaries to forcefully convert war-ravaged Iraqis. That these activities have fulsome backing from the Governments of predominantly Christian nations is undeniable, and this should be a cause for concern among civilised world citizens, as monotheism (of whatever variety) militates against the spirit of civilisation itself. The United Nations, which has a charter to respect religious plurality and protect native religious traditions, has a special responsibility in this regard, and needs to shed its current stupor.

Press reports indicate that among the organisations that have rushed to provide humanitarian (sic) aid to the Iraqi people are the International Missions Board of the Southern Baptist Convention and the Samaritan's Purse run by controversial evangelist Franklin Graham. Readers may recall that Mr Graham, who is extremely close to US President George Bush Jr, acquired international notoriety by labelling Islam as a "very evil and wicked religion." As for the language used for the Prophet by a Southern Baptist Convention leader, the less said the better.

There can be little doubt that the US Administration is hardly averse to this "aid evangelism". The coming weeks and months, therefore, are likely to see food packets, water, shelter, medical aid, all efficiently exchanged for baptised souls. American evangelists are said to be brimming with the hope that "in victory, God is opening a door for more missionaries". The element of coercion and inducement in such an approach is as overt as it is abhorrent. Mr Ibrahim Hooper of the Council on American Islamic Relations has rightly objected that the two groups are "seeking to exploit people in their moment of vulnerability".

In this context, I feel that there is much merit in the Indian view that the right to propagate one's faith is not co-terminus with the right to convert; nor are these rights absolute. There is a greater need to respect the hostility and resistance of persons targeted for conversion towards such mind-control activity, and to recognise their right not to be so humiliated. In other words, where poor people object to the muscular invasion of their hamlets by foreign-funded missionaries, it is the duty of the administration to evict these trespassers. I am told that in Delhi, in the slums of Badarpur and other outlying areas, poor families are currently being badgered to convert, but the police and administration are unmindful of their plight.

What is most objectionable about conversions is that, though missionaries exploit existing vulnerabilities of people and blame their plight upon their traditional faith, the conversion rite hardly solves any problem. Instead, people are cut off from their traditional mores and cultural sources of stability, while encouraged to become alienated from their fellowmen.

Verrier Elwin, missionary-turned-anthropologist, recognised this danger as early as 1944 when he warned that the rapid pace of conversion of tribes would turn them into a querulous, anti-national, aggressive minority community, with none of the old virtues and few of the new, which would pose grave problems to the future Government of India.

Advocating a complete ban on proselytisation, Elwin asserted that "change of religion is actually harmful to the aborigines; it destroys tribal unity, strips the people of age-long moral sanctions, separates them from the mass of their fellow countrymen and in many cases leads to decadence that is as pathetic as it is deplorable. The methods employed are questionable. There is economic exploitation, exploitation of ignorance and social exploitation. Therefore missionaries should be withdrawn from tribal areas."

These words hold true even today, and apply equally to villages and urban slums. If we take poverty and caste discrimination as the legitimising principles of conversions, we find that poverty hardly disappears with change of religion. As for caste discrimination, Indian church leaders are not averse to perpetuating it.

In Tamil Nadu, for instance, discrimination against Dalit Christians is a way of life (New Indian Express, April 14, 2003). They have separate pews, a separate chalice for the Holy Communion, and separate burial grounds. When some enlightened priests rose in revolt, the double chalice system made way for a new system in which communion wine was served with a spoon. In other words, the church found an intelligent way to evade the issue of egalitarianism.

Some churches have erected separate crucifixes (miniature churches) for Dalits, in the vicinity of the main church. Going by the account of a rebel priest, Rev Dr Dhyanchand Carr of the Tamil Nadu Theological Seminary, Arasarady, Madurai, casteism is so deeply embedded in the church that Dalits have no place in decision-making bodies and Dalit students face immense difficulty entering educational institutions and hostels run by the church. Those who protest against caste bias are quickly demonised as 'Dalit pastors'.

Yet, if conversions are to be effectively resisted so that people are not cut adrift from their social and cultural moorings, the evils bedeviling society must be tackled head-on. To begin with, we must admit that the Hindu social reform agenda has virtually been on the backburner since the death of Mahatma Gandhi. This can be easily calibrated in the degradation of women over the past five decades. Crimes like dowry and bride-burning have spread to communities where they were previously unknown, and new evils like amniocentesis and sexual harassment (in school, college, workplace, neighbourhood) have been added.

For all the rapid strides made in certain spheres, even in the realm of women's empowerment, society in many respects chooses to move in reverse gear. The fact that Dalits are beaten and abused for entering village temples or sharing well-water is simply unacceptable in this day and age. Yet I do not believe it is difficult to end this menace. If the local police station in-charge is made personally accountable for all the offences in his 'thana,' cases will be registered promptly and there will soon be a steep drop in the number of incidents as bigots get the message that the administration means business. It is simply a matter of political will, which successive Governments have failed to demonstrate in order to exploit Dalit sympathy and votes during elections.

Recently, the Samajwadi Party sought to exacerbate social tensions by releasing a CD of Ms Mayawati criticising Hindu gods. The Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister responded by declaring that, though she is a Hindu, she will not tolerate evil in the name of the dharma. Ms Mayawati has a point. It is now for spiritual leaders and responsible citizens to rise to the challenge and reform society from within by shunning the artificially sustained caste hierarchy.


Footprints in earthly paradise

"But soon a wonder came to light,

That showed the rogues they lied:

The man recovered from the bite,

The dog it was that died."

-Elegy, Oliver Goldsmith

Either by instinct or consensus, India's uniquely secular national press simply ignored the recent discovery of a broken pillar with a lotus carving at the site of the erstwhile Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. Such negation cannot, however, diminish the significance of the finding. As senior Government administrator RM Srivastava observed, "The finding of a pillar and a multi-layered flooring suggests there exists a permanent structure beneath the soil. At this point we can only say that remains of a permanent structure lay buried in the soil. It could be anything - a temple, a mosque or even a kitchen structure" (Associated Press, April 1, 2003).

A mosque is simply untenable. Even die-hard Islamists have not claimed that a mosque existed at the site prior to the arrival of Babar's general, Mir Baqi, who was appointed Governor of Ayodhya. What is more, no medieval mosque has ever incorporated sacred and popular Hindu motifs in its decorative patterns, unless it was built by appropriating the materials of ransacked temples. In the case of the Babri Masjid, it may be pointed out that Muslim claimants to the site have always held that the mosque was built on terra nullus (vacant land).

Moreover, the lotus is no ordinary motif, but is sacred to the entire autochthonous religious-spiritual spectrum of India. In art, Hindu gods and goddesses, Jain Tirthankaras, Gautama Buddha and the Bodhisattvas are frequently depicted as seated on lotus thrones. The gods are also described as having lotus eyes, lotus hands, lotus feet. In no other religious tradition does it occupy such exalted status, and its widespread use in native Indian decorative art in no way negates its sacred character.

A kitchen structure is reminiscent of the fabled Sita ki rasoi. It is possible that such a structure could have a carved pillar with a lotus, since the last extant temple at that site is said to have been renovated in the reign of a Gahadavala king. In the finding of a temple building, however, it would simply be synonymous with Sri Rama, Prince of Ayodhya.

It is, however, still premature to rush to conclusions, and officials have emphasised the need for caution. Yet, if one thing is already clear at this stage, it is that the findings are unlikely to end the furious debate over the site's original status, as Muslim intellectuals have taken the path of dogged resistance to its return to the devotees of Sri Rama. This can be seen in the petition seeking a stay on the excavation of the site; the bizarre demand for inclusion of an equal number of Muslim labourers in the dig; the insistence on more Muslim observers and supervisors; and the sustained attempt to negate the possible findings.

In the wake of the Allahabad High Court's decision to order excavation of the site, Muslim intellectuals and their fellow travellers have avoided all reference to Mr Syed Shahabuddin's promise that, if it is proved that the Babri Masjid was built after demolishing the Ram Janmabhoomi Mandir, Muslims would return the land to the Hindu community in conformity with the Shariat.

Indeed, these assurances inspired the Chandra Shekhar Government to bring the Babri Masjid Action Committee and Vishwa Hindu Parishad to the negotiating table. But this pioneering attempt to broker a peaceful settlement failed because the Muslim participants took fright when faced with credible evidence in the form of Mughal revenue records that list the site as Masjid-i-Janmasthan (masjid of the birthplace, which could hardly refer to Babar or Mir Baqi). Egged on by secular friends, they deserted the talks and let a festering sore linger.

Eminent historian Irfan Habib has signalled the Muslim determination not to settle the dispute honourably, by claiming that the excavations are a "post facto rationalisation of what was done on December 6, 1992" (Indian Express, March 12, 2003). Habib claims that archaeological finds are open to several interpretations. But what is germane in the current dispute is only whether or not a temple existed at the site prior to the erection of the Babri mosque. As Ayodhya has from time immemorial been associated with the story of Sri Rama, this would be regarded as convincing evidence by all fair-minded persons.

In this context, one cannot but be suspicious of the motivations of obscure bodies like the Jain Samata Vahini, the Buddha Education Foundation and the Lord Buddha Club, which have suddenly staked claim to the site on behalf of their respective communities. One can readily believe that Gautama Buddha and the Jain Tirthankara(s) visited Ayodhya on account of its established reputation as a holy city, and that viharas sprang up there. This would be consistent with the native tradition of different religious streams commingling and peacefully coexisting at sacred sites.

Yet it would be impossible to maintain that Ayodhya enjoys the status of Bodh Gaya, Sarnath or Kusinagar in the Buddhist tradition, or of Pava in Jaina lore. Even within the Hindu tradition, it belongs exclusively to Sri Rama, just as Dwarka belongs to Krishna. That is why the eminent religious leaders and secular eminences of the Jain and Buddhist traditions have held their peace. The puny midgets claiming to speak on behalf of these two great communities would be well advised to go back to the darkness from whence they have come. Some Hindu friends feel that these organisations are 'fronts' set up to confuse the picture and delay the recovery of the janmabhoomi. While their anxiety is understandable, I have no doubt the court will see through these late-blooming bleeding-hearts and dismiss their suits without much ado.

Of deeper concern is the refusal of the Muslim community to respect the fact that civilisational India has shed the weakness and defensiveness of the past millennium, and is on an irreversible journey of self-renewal and self-affirmation. Muslim intellectuals often accuse Hindus of falsely identifying the community with the atrocities committed by medieval invaders. Yet they scrupulously refuse to distance themselves from these atrocities, and seek to perpetuate the wrongs of the past in the name of minority rights. In Ayodhya, for instance, denial of the logic of the findings is nothing but a determination to perpetuate the Hindu memory of the demolition and prolong the Hindu sense of humiliation.

Muslim intellectuals are also shifting the terms of the debate by raising fears that excavations may be demanded at other sites, particularly the Krishna Janmabhoomi in Mathura and the Kashi Vishwanath Temple in Varanasi. This is too clever by half. In Kashi, one has only to walk around the Gyanvapi Mosque to see the vandalised temple that was deliberately retained as part of the mosque walls to demean the Hindu community at its most sacred site. As for Mathura, an agreement in the mid-1960s conceded the return of the site to the Hindu community after the natural decay of the mosque. It reflects poorly on the Muslim leadership that it has not adhered to the promise not to repair the structure and artificially prolong its life. Hindus have shown phenomenal fortitude. The violation of their sacred spaces must cease without further delay.

Iraq: What's in it for India?

Notwithstanding an American admonition to "get the hell out of there," Ankara seems likely to keep its troops deployed in northern Iraq to preempt Iraqi Kurds from creating an independent state on the ruins of Mr Saddam Hussein's crumbling regime. As Washington desperately needed overflight rights over Turkey to deploy its warplanes, it is in no position to meaningfully protest against the deed. As, at the time of writing, the UN had taken no cognisance of the Turkish action, it seems plausible we may witness a reshaping of the Gulf map, as happened in the aftermath of the two world wars.

Reports suggest that the US State Department and Arab Governments have negotiated names for a provisional Iraqi government, post-Saddam Hussein. There is talk of the country being divided into three provinces, the north and centre being governed by the Americans, and the south by Britain. Power would be wielded by civilian governors, such as General (Retd) Jay Garner in Baghdad and former US envoy Barbara Bodine (a Jew) in Mossul. All this, of course, is still in the future.

What is certain at this juncture is the fall of Baghdad and the establishment of a puppet US regime (whatever its longevity). This would put Iran (where the mullahs are still a formidable power centre, much hated by the civilian public) in a pincer between the new regimes of Iraq and Afghanistan. In New Delhi, there is considerable talk about Iran being the next target of US military action, to be followed (so India fondly hopes) by Pakistan. One will have to watch the events in this region closely before rushing in to comment. But some keen observers have noticed that the fall of Baghdad will find Syria hemmed in by Turkey, Israel and US-occupied Iraq.

Defence analysts believe that notwithstanding the obvious gain of Iraqi oil fields (far richer than the Saudi, with whom America's 60-year monopoly agreement expires in 2005), the real aim of the US military action is geo-strategic. Even though much of the world cannot see how, Washington believes it is sending a direct signal to the Muslim world that it will not tolerate terrorism. We would have to see how this translates on the ground, in terms of the Saudi export of Wahabi Islam and funding of Islamic fundamentalists. We would also have to observe carefully how the paradox of local relief at US presence in Iraq squares with increased anti-US sentiments in the Muslim world, and the impact this will have on incidents of terrorism in other countries, particularly our own.

Meanwhile, it is sunrise for the American economy. The war is estimated to cost approximately $ 40 billion, but the Iraqi reconstruction pie will be a princely $ 90 billion, and the dollars will be raked in once Iraqi oil exports are resumed. The Texas-based Halliburton oil and construction company, with which Vice-President Dick Cheney has been closely associated, expects a major share of the windfall. Halliburton subsidiary, Kellogg Brown and Root, is bidding for infrastructure contracts in the war-ravaged country, and has already won a contract to extinguish Iraqi oil wells (contracts for which alone are estimated in the region of $ 900 million).

Certainly, the Americans have done their homework before undertaking the Gulf adventure. While sharing the horror of civilised persons at the suffering of innocent civilians, one wonders what planning has been done by the Indian Government. Former cricketer Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi organised a massive protest against the US in Bhopal, which suggests that the Congress is going to play the Muslim card for all it is worth in the forthcoming assembly elections. This could explain why Chief Minister Digvijay Singh withdrew on the Bhojshala issue so abruptly; State BJP leaders would do well to weigh these issues while conducting their respective campaigns.

For India (and also for the BJP), a share of the Iraqi reconstruction pie should not distract from the war against Islamic terrorism. Our concerns include achieving sovereignty over all of Kashmir; ending Pakistan-sponsored militancy in the Valley; ending acts of Islamic terrorism all over the country; and ending hostile demographic invasion.

It is quite apparent that diplomacy will not yield tangible results. Attempts to talk peace by willfully ignoring incidents of criminal assault have failed miserably. After Lahore, followed by Kargil, followed by Agra, followed by the attack on the Jammu & Kashmir Assembly and the blitzkrieg on the Indian Parliament, I find it immoral to talk about confidence-building measures with an incorrigible enemy. There are times when the tolerance of evil is itself evil.

We reached that point with the attack on Parliament, and the situation vis-à-vis Islamabad has not changed materially since then. Indeed, it is because some of us refuse to recognise these realities that we faced the attack on Akshardham temple in Ahmedabad, the multiple attacks on the Raghunath Temple in Jammu, and the deaths of innocent civilians in the run up to last year's Assembly election in J&K.

No citizen is ever going to be sympathetic to the Indian Government's compulsions in failing to act against Pakistan after the attack on Parliament, especially after deploying the army at the border on full alert for over a year. There is even less respect for the Home Ministry's failure to decide whether or not infiltration had increased or decreased as a result of the deployment, as if terrorists sign a visitor's book each time they cross over!

At present, the view from New Delhi shows that General Pervez Musharraf is well-entrenched in Islamabad. The only threat to his life is from the Islamic fundamentalists whom he is now trying to restrain under American pressure (there is some justice in the world, after all!). And while I can't for the life of me see a link between poor beleaguered Saddam and the Al Qaeda, none of us disbelieves reports that Osama bin Laden is alive and kicking, most probably in Peshawar city. And Osama means Al Qaeda, ISI, Pakistani military, and other bete noirs of the Indian nationalist establishment.

What is more, General Musharraf is unfazed at the convincing exposure of ISI activities in India, or even at the growing global discomfiture with Islamic terrorism. His dedication to the Bhutto blueprint of creating an arsenal of weapons of mass destruction by hook or by crook (mostly the latter) has done much to promote nuclear proliferation in this part of the world. These weapons are now in real danger of falling into the hands of rogue elements in the inherently unstable Pakistani establishment, where there is close synergy between the army and the mullahs.

Personally, I do not think a mere change of regime will yield lasting results to India, because what we have seen of Pakistani leaders and intellectuals over the past five decades gives us no confidence in that society's ability or desire to sustain a modern democracy. Unfortunately, unlike Iraq, Pakistan has no mineral wealth worthy of making it worth an exercise in modern-day colonialism. That is why, no matter which General or mullah comes to control the nuclear trigger, I have serious doubts about America rushing in to serve as India's street-sweeper or mine-sweeper. The sooner Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee accepts this, the better for us all.

Ayodhya: Over to archaeology

A god who was once a king on earth, a king who is also God, may soon win judicial reprieve and mercifully end centuries of bloody disputation over His legitimate birthplace. The March 5 order of the Allahabad High Court directing the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) to excavate the disputed site at Ayodhya and determine whether or not a temple could be adjudged to have pre-existed the Babri Masjid there and submit its report by March 24, is as sudden as it is unexpected.

At the same time, it is such a logical and just method of breaking the brittle stalemate on the issue that one wonders why it was not adopted earlier. It is well-known that during the demolition of the Babri structure on December 6, 1992, Hindu idols as well as fragments of a destroyed temple were found among the debris. A stone tablet bearing an inscription (the Hari-Vishnu inscription) was also recovered, and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad published the findings in a well-publicised booklet. As one of the issues framed in the title suit over ownership of the disputed site is whether or not a temple existed at the site prior to the construction of the Babri Masjid, the excavations should rationally have been conducted long ago.

However, now that they have been ordered, they should be allowed to commence (and conclude) without let or hindrance. One is hopeful in this regard, as the Supreme Court on March 6 reserved its verdict on whether or not to vacate last year's status quo on the land acquired by the Government around the disputed site at Ayodhya. As no date has been assigned for the verdict, one may reasonably conclude that the apex court too favours an early end to this vexed issue, and may await the results of the archaeological dig.

Not unexpectedly, the decision has raised hackles in some circles. The Congress, principal beneficiary of the Muslim votebank in North India, has adopted a deceptively low profile. Obviously, the party is still toying with the policy of soft Hindutva and trying to play along with the sentiments of the majority community to the extent possible. But this can prove counter-productive, as in the recent Bhojshala controversy in Dhar, where Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Digvijay Singh literally offered the temple to the Hindus before retreating on some specious plea. Hence, in the coming weeks, the Congress would do well to unambiguously clarify its stand vis-a-vis the Hindu claim to the Janmabhoomi.

The Communist Party of India has vociferously demanded that the Supreme Court suo moto stay the execution of the High Court order on account of its possible fallout in other disputes. The CPI stand naturally coincides with that of the All India Muslim Majlis-e-Mushawarat (AIMMM). Left intellectuals have now recovered from the initial shock caused by the High Court order and are trying to browbeat the apex court on the issue. They are also trying to denigrate the scholarship of Prof BB Lal, former Director-General of the ASI, who excavated a number of sites associated with the Ramayana story.

I must say that I find it highly improper that Mr Rajeev Dhawan, Counsel for the All India Babri Masjid Action Committee, should issue press statements against the judicial order. Comments that it is not the court's job to assume the burden of proof cast unnecessary aspersions on the court and vitiate the atmosphere. In no other high profile case has the Counsel for one party been given such one-sided freedom to grandstand in public, and I strongly feel that the media must exercise some restraint in this regard.

As for historians Irfan Habib, Suraj Bhan and KM Shrimali, I am amused that they think the august court should follow a 1993 resolution of the Left-controlled Indian History Congress (The Times of India, March 9, 2003). I believe they are all unnerved by the revelation that the High Court secretly ordered a Canadian firm, Tojo-Vikas International, to undertake a radar survey of the site, and that these findings are quite conclusive. The AIBMAC, which received a copy of the finding, seems to have been badly rattled. There can thus be little doubt that the Tojo-Vikas International report inspired the Allahabad High Court to order fresh diggings at the disputed site.

Personally, I view the attacks on Prof BB Lal, who has an awesome reputation as a meticulous archaeologist and scholar, as evidence that fear has overtaken fury in the Marxist-Islamic armoury. Much water has flown under the bridge since the mid-1970s when Prof Lal's discovery of pillar bases in the immediate vicinity of the disputed structure resulted in the abrupt termination of funding for the project.

Dr SP Gupta, who also undertook extensive digging next to the site in the mid-1970s, found structures dating back from 3000 BC to 900 BC. These included pillars, floors, brick walls and even statuettes, which were covered up with earth and left in situ.

In another dig in 1992, just before the demolition, 68 idols were unearthed and evidence found of a sprawling temple complex that pre-existed the mosque. Traditional techniques such as carbon dating, comparison with contemporary architectural styles and a study of the composition of the rocks can be used to determine the age of the structures once they are unearthed again.

It is also worth noting that the Hari-Vishnu inscription that emerged from the debris in December 1992 has been written in chaste Devanagari of the 12th century AD, which puts it in the era prior to the Ghurid offensive (approximately AD 1192). Experts from the Epigraphical Society of India, who examined the tablet, observed that it recorded the construction of the temple. It reportedly states that a beautiful temple of Vishnu-Hari was built in the temple-city of Ayodhya and beautified with a golden spire; the temple is said to be unsurpassed by any shrine built by previous kings.

There are also references to Vishnu destroying King Bali, and to a 10-headed person (Dashanana), which clearly indicates Ravana. The evidence of the tablet, therefore, may be considered as pretty conclusive by all but die-hard secularists. It is to be hoped that they will be more open-minded when the ASI trenches unveil the truth before them, layer by layer, in brick and stone.

Actually, it is high time that all parties taking an interest in the dispute showed respect to the Hindu community, which has waged a bloody struggle for more than four centuries to reclaim this sacred site. Notwithstanding the calumny that Hindus have no sense of history, the community has preserved the memory of this sacred spot and its association with Sri Rama through centuries of oppression and disempowerment. It is now within a hair's breath of proving its claim even to unbelievers, not by faith but by stone.

The Ram Janmabhoomi Nyas should honour the Hindu civilisational memory by incorporating the ASI findings into the temple plan. What I mean is that the layers, pillars, bases and statuettes officially excavated by the ASI should be incorporated into the temple as a basement, protected by glass panels, and preserved as a permanent museum for future generations. It would be a fitting tribute to the thousands who struggled and died for the Janmasthan.

Constituency is the political key

A strange paradox seems to have benumbed the Bharatiya Janata Party even as it seeks to put a confident face forward for the forthcoming elections in Himachal Pradesh. The party had virtually conceded the State to the Congress until Mr Narendra Modi's mind-boggling victory in Gujarat forced it to recognise the burgeoning Hindu groundswell nationwide, and give Mr Virbhadra Singh a run for his money. While this willingness to seriously fight a tough electoral battle well behoves a political party, the BJP still needs to understand that what people appreciate is a commitment to core values represented by a core constituency.

The party could take valuable lessons from the redoubtable Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister. Ms Mayawati has the courage of her convictions and a clear appreciation of where her best interests lie. That is why, faced with a threat to her chair, she has firmed up the time-tested Dalit-Brahmin alliance and won plaudits from the Dalits for taking on the once formidable Kunda MLA, Mr Raghuraj Pratap Singh alias Raja Bhaiya. As a richly deserved bonus, she seems set to emerge as the State's middle class messiah, because of her strong-arm tactics against the controversial MLA.

The BJP, in contrast, fumbles between the Ram mandir in Ayodhya, Raja Bhoj's Saraswati mandir in Dhar, and the alleged presence of cow meat in the Prime Minister's cuisine. Mercifully, the allegations about beef-eating have been received with distaste across the political spectrum and, despite lack of overt support for Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee, are likely to die a natural death. The positive outcome of this controversy, in my view, is the realisation that there are core Hindu sentiments that cannot be messed around with. Mr Vajpayee's understandable anxiety not to be found wanting on this score has helped centrestage and legitimise these emotions in the public realm. The defence of Mr Vajpayee by secular journalists has further entrenched the Hindu idiom in public discourse.

The crux of the issue is that in politics, what matters is the constituency. Ms Mayawati correctly gauged the multiple issues linked with the continuance of thakurvad in the countryside, and the pent-up frustration against the rule of gun-wielding landlords (and land-grabbers).

Thus, though she aimed at her Dalit constituency which has borne the brunt of the regal pretensions of Raja Bhaiya's family for so many decades, she killed many birds with one stone. The raid on Mr Udai Pratap Singh's palace and Raja Bhaiya's home challenged thakurvad in its own den. At the same time, it struck a deadly blow at the Nehruvian polity, which deliberately propped up ex-rajas and ex-zamindars in the countryside on the pretext of ensuring social stability.

In reality, these agents of the status quo worked to frustrate social and economic reforms to the greatest extent possible, while cornering licenses and permits from the socialist state. Policies and schemes meant for the poor were often creamed off by well-connected landholders (a problem not unknown even today).

But their worst crime was to pro-actively inhibit the children of the deprived sections of society from acquiring an education and thus improving their prospects in life. Even today, in vast parts of the country, one can find leaders and groups who do not want the rural or urban labouring classes to be educated. They fear that once the latter acquire a sense of dignity and self-worth, they will forget their station in life. What is more, they will seek higher wages. The attitude that the social abuse of lower classes is justified is still deeply entrenched and needs to be tackled with firm political will if we are to make progress as a nation.

This is not to say that there has been no progress since Independence, but that it has not been half as much as it should have been. One powerful reason for this state of affairs was the availability of state patronage to the likes of Raja Bhaiya, who considered themselves above the law. This is easily corroborated by a glance at some of the recoveries made during the raid on his properties, which makes the opposition to the use of the Prevention of Terrorism Act against him seem insincere.

Guns and explosives were found in such quantities that the State police had to request the army to help make the recoveries from the sprawling estate. A 1,000-plus acre private pond was found on the estate, which yielded fish worth lakhs of rupees every month. Other findings include 33 liquor shops and other unaccounted wealth in real estate, plus jewellery and bank accounts.

Of course the piece de resistance is the recovery of a human skeleton from a pond, which may be the mortal remains of one Santosh Mishra. An ordinary middle class citizen, Mishra reportedly overtook Raja Bhaiya's cavalcade with his scooter one day in 2001. He either did not know, or did not care, that he was supposed to stop, get down, fold his hands and let the Big Man pass. Raja Bhaiya's megalomania did not permit him to overlook this slight, and Mishra was allegedly abducted, beaten, and tossed into the pond. Given the myriad stories that the MLA made police officers stand when he visited police stations and sat on their seats, it is probably a miracle that Mishra's wife was able to register an FIR for her missing husband.

If this was the fate of ordinary upper caste citizens, one can only shudder to think of the treatment that must have been meted out to the poor Scheduled Castes who lived in the Kunda MLA's shadow. For there can be no doubt that Raja Bhaiya casts a long shadow. Though languishing in jail since last October, a sarpanch who was a key witness in a case against him was shot dead. The father of the deceased openly accused the MLA on television.

Samajwadi Party MP Amar Singh, who initiated a sectarian protest against the crackdown on Raja Bhaiya and his father, may view these misdemeanours with equanimity. Neither his party nor the Congress has much to lose in UP. But it is baffling that BJP leaders such as Mr Vinay Katiyar and Mr Rajnath Singh should join the SP General-Secretary's crusade against Ms Mayawati's strike against Raja Bhaiya.

It is true that the BJP once befriended the Kunda MLA. Politics, as is well-known, makes strange bedfellows. But bedfellows make poor politics. As a former Chief Minister, Mr Rajnath Singh looks pathetic playing second fiddle to Raja Bhaiya. He should project himself as a progressive Rajput who has no truck with the misdemeanours of erring caste fellows. In Gujarat, the sulking Mr Keshubhai Patel was cut to size because the VHP leader, Mr Pravinbhai Togadia, could establish far greater credibility with the Patel community. Mr Rajnath Singh should similarly seek to be the antidote to Raja Bhaiya's damage potential. The Rajput community must also be made to understand that the language of aggression and muscle-power are neither honourable nor acceptable in a modern democracy.

It is perhaps just as well that the BJP high command has directed the State leaders not to rock the boat in Lucknow. The BJP's core constituency is a natural ally of the Bahujan Samaj Party leader's Dalit constituency. The disproportionate aggrandisement of the Rajput community should not be allowed to disturb this partnership.


All unquiet on the eastern front

The two-day lightening strike by Government and private doctors in Bihar, following the abduction of an orthopedic surgeon, Dr Bharat Singh, by suspected extortionists, is only the latest instance of lawlessness in the eastern badlands of India. The almost simultaneous arrest of a CPI(M) activist in a scandal of alleged rape and assault on a marriage party in West Bengal has taken the sheen off another honourable ally of the Congress at the Centre.

Both instances are serious enough to warrant street level agitations against the respective State Governments for their failure to protect the lives and honour of ordinary citizens. Were the Congress the main Opposition party in either State, it would have demanded the imposition of President's Rule in both. It would also have demonstrated its contempt for both regimes with high voltage decibels and public demonstrations.

Not so the BJP. In Bihar, Mr Sushil Modi is renowned for his armchair leadership and allegedly cozy relationship with RJD leader Laloo Prasad Yadav. In West Bengal, the BJP State leadership is celebrated for its near invisibility on the political spectrum. It is a crying shame that the BJP central leadership should tolerate the complete failure of the local units to articulate the anguish of the people in both States. A senior party leader should be despatched to Patna and Kolkata forthwith, and immediate changes in the local units effected.

It is understandable that Mr M Venkaiah Naidu should wish to concentrate his energies on States going to the polls this year. However, if he wishes to realise his ambition of the BJP winning a majority on its own in the general elections of 2004, he cannot afford to ignore popular sentiments anywhere. In fact, States with unpopular regimes and where elections are not on the anvil can provide an ideal environment for the BJP to strike roots if it proves responsive to the concerns of the common man there. It would, therefore, be a grievous mistake to leave the local units of such States in the charge of leaders lacking the vision and tenacity to lead a grassroots movement.

Bihar under the Yadav couple is witnessing the growth of anarchy in algebraic proportions. Only last Saturday, the banned Maoist Communist Centre (MCC) beat two persons to death in Gaya, according to District Superintendent of Police Ravindran Shankran. At the same time, the daylight killings of innocents in so-called police encounters have ignited public rage as never before.

The extortion industry is in full bloom and, as demonstrated in the case of Dr Bharat Singh, concerted public pressure on the Chief Minister and RJD chief can bring about the miraculous release of the abducted person, unharmed. This growing public perception that the State Administration can directly communicate with underworld goons, is no small indictment of the Rabri Devi Government. Clearly the iron is hot; the question is whether the BJP is willing to strike.

The State BJP joined the protest against the police killings. But the party has by and large not stood by the people on all issues attracting public odium against the Government. This is most apparent in some high profile cases of crimes against women. The first is the abduction and 'nikaah' of a married woman, Ms Kanchan Misra, by a notorious gangster, Sultan Mia, who enjoys the backing of powerful RJD leaders. Her family members told the National Commission for Women (NCW) that they feared for their lives.

But despite a strong direction from the NCW, the Rabri Devi Government has taken no steps to produce Ms Misra before the Commission, and the lady continues to languish in illegal custody because the family is too poor to approach the courts for redressal. If the NCW ultimately fails to provide relief to the abducted woman and her family, the National Human Rights Commission must step in without further delay. I must add that I am amazed at the studied and sustained silence of women's rights groups and human rights activists, not to mention the mainstream media, in this case.

Another controversial case involves Ms Champa Biswas, the wife of a senior IAS officer, who was repeatedly raped over a period of three years by one Mritunjay Yadav, son of RJD MLA Hemlata. Recently, the Patna district and sessions court sentenced Mritunjay Yadav to 10 years rigorous imprisonment for the crime. Hemlata was let off as she had already spent three years in jail pending trial.

The verdict has understandably left the victim dissatisfied, as she feels that the mother had encouraged her son to rape her (Champa). She also feels that the court did not take due cognisance of her allegations against prominent RJD bigwigs who, she alleges, raped her between 1995 and 1997. Ms Biswas's ugly ordeal, which includes the alleged rape of other women members of her family and her maid, as also her own abortion and forced sterilisation, have been widely reported in the press and make depressing reading.

Throughout this torment, the Biswas family was friendless in Patna as neither the State Home Secretary nor the Director General of Police would agree to take up the matter. It was only when the family moved to Delhi that it could approach the National Human Rights Commission, the Scheduled Castes/Scheduled Tribes Commission and the then Bihar Governor Mr SS Bhandari, who took the matter up with the Union Home Ministry.

During the trial, three witnesses went 'missing' and a key prosecution witness, Kalyani Biswas, died under mysterious circumstances, but Patna Police did not even register a case! In such a scenario, it is truly commendable that the prosecution managed to secure a conviction of the principal accused.

At the same time, one cannot but agree with Ms Champa Biswas that justice will only be partial until the other powerful persons who oppressed her are punished. In this situation, for Mr Sushil Modi to suggest that it is the job of the (disinclined and disinterested) women's organisations to take up cudgels on Ms Biswas's behalf is quite reprehensible. A political party cannot shun responsibility so lightly.

Neighbouring West Bengal, meanwhile, has been shaken by an armed gang that attacked two buses carrying a marriage party, shot dead a bus driver who resisted them, looted the passengers at gunpoint and allegedly gang-raped several young women. The incident occurred in Nadia district, and the same gang probably looted two other cars the same day.

As the arrested persons included a CPI(M) worker, the local party unit rushed to the defence, claiming the activist was being framed due to a verbal dual with the district police Superintendent. As the Bangladesh border is barely 16 kilometres away, it is being speculated that the culprits may have come from there. If so, we may be in for a spate of such crimes against unarmed civilians in the coming days, as Bangladesh expresses hostility to India's pressure against illegal immigrants.

So far, the State BJP has been fairly somnolent. It would do well to seize the initiative and form citizens' vigilance committees in border villages and highways to face any planned atrocity. Else, more Indian citizens may suffer the fate of the 16 Border Security Forces' jawans in April 2001. Bangladesh, we must acknowledge, is as unfriendly a neighbour as Pakistan.

Preachers and other dangers

Now that we know the Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister owes his political and physical health to the regular intake of cow urine, it may finally be possible for us to maturely discuss hitherto neglected issues that have a vital bearing on our nationhood. I say this because the purpose of this revelation was to establish Mr Digvijay Singh's credentials as a devout Hindu, and thereby deflect a future RSS-BJP attack on his secular persona in the run-up to the next Assembly elections. Gujarat having firmed up a Hindu identity across the country, issues that have been evaded to appease minority votebanks can no longer be brushed under the carpet.

Conversions are one such issue. The abuse of innocents, particularly women and children, by persons claiming religious status is another. Both matters are urgent and sensitive, but I am confident that an informed debate will be to the ultimate benefit of all concerned.

The recent attack on an American missionary in Kerala has highlighted the issue of conversions, particularly with foreign funding. According to a highly coloured account by BBC (January 15, 2003), Reverend Joseph Cooper was assaulted by "right-wing Hindus." Among other incendiary statements, BBC asserted: "In recent years, there has been an increase in violence against Christians in India, who make up about two per cent of the population."

The RSS naturally rebutted the charges. It claimed that Pastor Benson Sam and his wife Sally, who were also injured in the attack, were accused in a case of abduction and rape of a minor girl at Bible College last year. As for Mr Cooper, he had come to India on a tourist visa, which prohibited missionary work.

What is heartening about the episode is the speed with which the true facts were brought to light. Chief Minister AK Anthony, one of our most sensible politicians, refused to make political capital out of the episode. The unencumbered police quickly concluded their enquiries and, by January 20, the American was told to leave the country for indulging in missionary activity in violation of his visa.

The National Commission for Minorities (NCM) felt the US missionary was probably an unwitting victim of public outrage against the "wrongdoings and immoral acts" of Rev Sam's family (Tribune, January 17, 2003). NCM member John Joseph found that a local girl had allegedly been sexually abused and harassed for four months at the Bible Christian Centre, which had resulted in the issuing of non-bailable warrants against Rev PK Sam and his son. The entire family had gone into hiding since October 2002, following wide reportage in the local media. However, when Rev Sam's son, Benson, suddenly appeared in public at a gospel convention with the foreign missionary (his financier), it "spontaneously aroused the fury of some who knew about the misdeeds of Benson".

Local media reports about the sexual abuse of a poor Dalit orphan girl by Reverend Sam and his family make depressing reading, and the local anger is utterly understandable. It now remains to be seen how Indian church authorities react to the charges of sexual abuse in this and other instances. The police, of course, must now make all efforts to arrest Rev Sam and other accused persons in the case.

Most citizens do not know that India was one of the countries investigated by a high-level fact-finding team from the Vatican some years ago, when worldwide charges of sexual abuse in the parishes could no longer be ignored. The extent of the abuse of both male and female devotees in the US, Europe, Australia and Africa, is now known. Yet there has been no introspection in India, and it is time the church authorities took cognisance of the problem and initiated corrective measures on their own. Certainly they must not indulge in false tirades against others when some scandals come to light.

It has, for instance, been established that the 1998 Jhabua nuns' rape case was an intra-Christian affair; but to this day, the event is presented in Christian rhetoric as a VHP/RSS-led attack on minorities. These canards must now end.

As for the American missionary, some newspapers took umbrage at the Government's decision to expel him; some reported his magnanimity in 'forgiving' his assailants! But contrary to the genial image conjured up by such exuberant advertorials, the Reverend, alas, was up to no good in God's own country. According to the residents of the Kilimanoor Dalit hamlet, Mr Cooper spewed venom against Lord Krishna and attributed the modern scourge of AIDS to the avatar of a bygone yuga (The Pioneer, January 21, 2003). If true, such a statement could legitimately explain local resentment against the group. Press reports suggest that about eight months ago, another foreign missionary in the area was hounded out by local residents for making derogatory remarks against Lord Ayyappa, the preeminent deity of the State.

As the American missionary has departed, it is too late to ask for action against him. A few points, however, are in order. The statement attributed to Mr Cooper smacks of extreme religious intolerance, besides being overtly racist (a fit case for Ms Mary Robinson and her Durban Conference). Such conduct, if committed on American soil, would have led to Mr Cooper being jailed for inciting religious hatred and prejudice among different communities. Indeed, this is the reason why the US Consulate dissociated itself from the case, though it initially said it would send an investigative team to the region.

In this context, I feel that the All-India Christian Council has not helped to improve inter-community relations by labelling the RSS and its affiliates as "violent religious fundamentalist terrorist organisations which need to be banned in the interest of global peace, regional stability and the unity and integrity of the Indian republic". After the complete exposure of the real activities of both Rev Sam's son Benson and Mr Cooper, it seems ludicrous to call the incident a "well laid conspiracy to terrorise and polarise the Dalit and Tribal villagers in a State otherwise known for its inter-religious harmony".

The Council has virtually arraigned the Chief Minister and district authorities for not charging the arrested RSS men with attempted murder, and for asking the missionary to leave for violating visa rules. But its allegation that "the Atal Bihari (Vajpayee) Government fully supports religious bigotry and Sangh violence whether it is in Gujarat, Orissa or Kerala" is extremely irresponsible and deserves condemnation from all mature citizens.

Most mischievous, however, is the Council's attempt to equate the constitutional guarantee of religious freedom with a carte blanche to missionaries, especially foreigners, to indulge in dubious conversion activities, often in the face of local resentment and resistance. The Council has rightly noted that through the centuries, Hindu dharma has spread to several parts of the globe and there is today hardly a nation that does not host temples and welcome Hindu gurus with open arms. But it has failed to draw the correct inference from this situation, which is that Hindu teachers have never travelled anywhere with arms, money or muscle power. They have not sought to eradicate any faith or creed, or to impose only one way of life upon resisting populaces. This was not the case with either the late Graham Staines or Reverend Joseph Cooper.


Congress: Ideological cul-de-sac

In spite of the spotlight on Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel and his genuine legatee in the recent Gujarat elections, developments since Mr Narendra Modi's return to Gandhinagar suggest a vindication of Lokmanya Tilak's belief that the Hindu community forms the natural core of the Indian nation. Tilak desired amity and cooperation with Muslims, but was astute enough to realise that Muslim separatism was a major barrier to political freedom. He was also clear-headed enough to perceive that an artificial parity between the Hindu and Muslim communities would not produce a viable nationhood.

It is well known that Tilak fashioned the tools of cultural nationalism with the Ganesh and Shivaji festivals, which gave ordinary people a stake in the freedom struggle and transformed the Congress into a mass movement from a petitioning society. He gave a new edge to the concepts of swadeshi and boycott of foreign goods, besides, of course, the legendary call for Swaraj. What has not been sufficiently understood by modern Indians is that Mahatma Gandhi, who inherited Tilak's party and mantle after his death, altered his mandate by using his mass mobilisation techniques to establish a false equivalence between the Hindu and Muslim communities.

It has been my conviction that Gandhi did not understand the role of ideology in the modern world, or even the nature of Islam. That alone can explain his disastrous decision to launch the Khilafat Movement, an utterly futile attempt to revive an institution intrinsically hostile to India's native culture and civilisation, which also did not cater to the needs of forward-looking Muslims. Khilafat's sole achievement was that it set the trend of recognising only orthodox leaders as representatives of India's Muslim community. What remains to be understood is whether Gandhi learnt anything from his mistakes; certainly he was party to the cover-up of the horrible Moplah riots and atrocities on Hindus. I think modern historians and political scientists would do well to examine that period with greater candour.

Coming to the present, I believe Tilak has been vindicated because the Congress, notwithstanding the rhetoric in its recent Working Committee deliberations, has simply crumbled before the anger of the majority community. The Gujarat elections have shifted the Indian continental template; Hindus now legitimately comprise the core of the nation, just as the Gauls do in France. Anything inimical to Hindu sentiments, therefore, no longer makes good politics, and who can read the political winds better than Congressmen?

That is why we find the Rajasthan Government, figuratively though evocatively, transferring allegiance from Ajmer to Ayodhya. I personally feel this volte face calls for an explanation on the part of the Congress. When the Governor, Mr Anshuman Singh, announced his decision to conduct Ram katha sessions by the famous Gujarati sant, Murari Bapu, in order to raise funds for drought relief, State Congress leaders heaped scorn and derision upon him. But the grassroots workers must have rung the warning bells pretty loudly, for the katha had hardly begun when one found the Cabinet headed by Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot nestling cosily at the sant's feet!

A similar scenario is being played out in Madhya Pradesh, which is also going to the polls later this year. Chief Minister Digvijay Singh has stated (on whose behalf?) that the Congress was not against building the Ram temple in Ayodhya. He has, of course, not dared suggest that the party under Ms Sonia Gandhi would persuade the Muslims to give up their claim to the site, or would support a legislation to empower the Hindu community in this regard. But he has declared himself a follower of sanatan dharma and demanded that the local RSS unit surrender some land to the famous Mahakaleshwar Temple at Ujjain.

While the issue of the recovery of desecrated holy sites of one community is a serious matter, I personally feel that the head of a Government should not resort to petty politics over issues like a temple management's desire for more land. This privileging of a religious group over a private group violates both the Constitution as well as the dharmic tradition, which demands that the ruler be panth-nirpeksh.

As for the Congress' ideological mentor, the Communist Party of India (Marxist), it has for the first time in its history taken cognisance of the danger posed by Islamic fundamentalism, as per media reports of January 9, 2003. At a politburo meeting to discuss the Tripura Assembly elections, the CPI(M) took note of the subversive activity of ISI-funded outfits, with the connivance of the Begum Khaleda Zia Government in Bangladesh. This is a refreshing change from the party's attitude when the new West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya had spoken about the need to check the mushrooming of madrasas on the international border nearly two years ago. Politburo member Prakash Karat has also now acknowledged that the recent decapitation of schoolgirls in the Kashmir Valley proves the presence of foreign mercenaries in the State.

There is no doubt that pure electoral calculations, rather than an altruistic concern for the nation, have influenced the new thinking in both the Congress and the CPI(M). But whatever the reasons, a silent revolution has taken place, and it will definitely impact upon the electoral algebra. It will not be easy to reverse gears on the new road; and it may be only a matter of time before the CPI and other parties make similar moves. The canny Ms Mayawati has already made a shrewd move by declaring herself in favour of such 'Manuvadi' practices as cow worship and favouring a ban on cow slaughter with a view to reducing communal tension.

Clearly the nation, and not just Gujarat, has travelled a long way since the train disaster at Godhra. I can honestly say I had not expected to see such a profound change manifest itself in such a short time span. This is partly due to the fact that I myself viewed the Gujarat riots as something exclusive to the State, which happened on account of Godhra and other accumulated local grievances. Sitting in New Delhi, the educated Indians I interacted with were all deeply disturbed over the riots and the negative publicity they generated abroad. This surface noise inhibited a proper assessment of the deeper current below, which stated that Gujarat affected Hindus across the nation.

The Congress, of course, has understood the new reality, and given the manner in which the central leadership is floundering, State leaders can hardly be blamed for seeking to strike an electoral rapport with Hindus at any cost. It would be mean to remind them about their secular rhetoric at this delicate stage of transition to a Hindu-centric polity. But it is relevant to raise the issue of the minorities.

The Congress' inelegant ditching of the minorities in Gujarat (though they still voted for it), and Mr Modi's handsome victory, have triggered off a 'victim syndrome' among Muslim intellectuals. This is not a healthy development. If the Congress and other parties tacitly agree with the BJP that Indian nationhood cannot rest on anti-Hindu foundations, they must honestly tell the minorities that-while they are entitled to a place of honour within the country's civilisational framework-they must desist from taking positions that put them at odds with the majority community.

Daydreams don't win elections

The euphoria sweeping the Bharatiya Janata Party in the wake of its spectacular success in Gujarat is understandable and justified. A party that looked forward to the forthcoming polls in several States with trepidation suddenly feels vindicated and vitalised. But there is no straight road from Gandhinagar to other State capitals and, if the BJP hopes to give a credible fight in any of these elections, its leadership will have to stop day-dreaming and get down to brass tacks.

Senior Congress leaders have already started introspecting about their unexpectedly poor performance in Gujarat. To their credit, they have grasped the principal reasons for the debacle and have understood that it will not be easy to either stick to or modify ideological positions adopted during the Gujarat campaign. The political crystallisation of the Hindu community is now a factor each party will have to face in future elections. The Congress's problem is that, while it has inwardly recognised the new reality, its President is uncomfortable about it and will probably continue to err on the side of minorityism and caste arithmetic.

This does not automatically translate into advantage BJP, because the party has not reflected upon the true causes of its victory. There has been foolish talk about repeating Gujarat, leading to Opposition charges about communalising the atmosphere. The lively Ms Uma Bharati has been quick to dismiss charges of replicating Gujarat by counter-questioning if there are plans to duplicate Godhra; hopefully this should end such sterile debate.

Anyway, both friend and foe credit Mr Narendra Modi for the triumphal return to Gandhinagar. Yet, if there is one root cause for the Gujarat success, it is the Goa 'coup' whereby determined young leaders prevented the aged and jittery party bosses from deposing Mr Modi to placate national and international opinion. Obviously, if there were no Narendra Modi at the helm, there would be no BJP Government today. An equally germane point is that Mr Modi was made Chief Minister merely to deflect public anger against the inept Mr Keshubhai Patel in the wake of the botched earthquake relief operations, and not because he was considered as a good potential leader in his own right!

The sad truth is that the BJP does not nurture or encourage young talent. In State after State, one finds that a new generation has not been allowed to grow, especially States where older leaders have failed. Take, for instance, Jammu & Kashmir. Is the BJP happy with uninspiring leaders like Mr Chaman Lal Gupta who cannot secure two votes even after terrorist attacks on the Raghunath temple, or does it realise that a youngster who can match the panache of Ms Mehbooba Sayeed is needed to revive the State unit? Why did no leader of stature visit the Valley when the party had fielded as many as 21 Muslim candidates there? Compare this with the number of tickets the Congress gave Muslims in Gujarat, and you will see what I mean. If the BJP had won a single seat in the Valley, the Indian continental template would have recorded a major shift.

In the past, public anger has ousted the Congress in some northern States. But this did not mean that the BJP's old war horses were responsible for the party's victory. In fact, they frittered away the mandate so quickly and scuttled every rising leader, so that future elections became a virtual obstacle race for the party. It is well-known that Uttar Pradesh was lost because of the failure to remove Mr Kalyan Singh in time, coupled with the shameful decision to impose Mr Ram (who?) Gupta on the hapless State. The party lost a fighting chance in Karnataka because of the suicidal pact with Mr JH Patel not long ago.

It is imperative that the rising generation of BJP leaders ensure that those who took such faulty decisions do not enjoy overweening power in future.

In Madhya Pradesh, when the party was riding high on the 'Ram wave' and anti-incumbency factor of the early Nineties, a BJP State supremo unduly created a scandal over an alleged personal relationship of Ms Uma Bharati with a view to damaging her career. The gentleman went on to become the party's national President; mercifully his lack-lustre tenure proved short-lived and ended unsung.

It is to Ms Bharati's credit that she has survived and put a decade-long controversy firmly behind her, and in the wake of Gujarat feels emboldened enough to suo moto assume control of the party campaign in Madhya Pradesh. It may be recalled that she had not long ago refused an invitation to head the State unit, perhaps because she was unsure how she would be treated there if she left the Union Cabinet.

At the same time, if one of the ills facing the BJP is the excessive concern of its geriatric leadership with its own position, an equally serious problem is that this sickness can also be detected in a younger generation of leaders in some States where the party is in opposition. Having got control of the State party apparatus as a result of patronage from central leaders, these men are reluctant to build the party at grassroots level by taking up issues of popular concern.

To cite but one instance, Patna has for the past one month been rocked by the scandal of the daylight abduction of a beautiful married woman by a notorious gangster, Sultan Mia. The news magazine which broke the story stated that she had been forcefully married in a mosque in the Mainpura locality (subsequently denied by the Imam of the said mosque in a deposition before the National Commission for Women). The catch is that the lady, Ms Kanchan Misra, is legally married to another man, whom she has not divorced. Her mother and brother have deposed before the NCW that, in the weeks before the abduction, she feared for her life and that of her family.

One of the scandalous aspects of this sordid story was that the supposed 'nikah' was blessed by RJD Minister Ejazul Haq, who hosted a reception party that was attended by the officer-in-charge of the local police station, among others. A senior police official confirmed to the NCW that a party had been held after the wedding. What emerged from the Commission's investigations is that police and Administration alike are unwilling to get involved in the case, as Sultan Mia is a protégé of the infamous RJD MP from Siwan, Mohammed Shahabuddin.

Despite a strong NCW directive to arrest and prosecute Sultan Mia and produce Ms Kanchan Misra before the Commission within a fortnight, the lady remained in illegal custody at the time of writing this piece.

Most national dailies have steered clear of the controversy out of sensitivity for the feelings of Chief Minister Rabri Devi and RJD supremo Laloo Yadav, MP, who was never once questioned by the media about restoring the woman to her lawful family throughout the recent winter session of Parliament!

But what takes the cake is the behaviour of the State BJP leadership, which acts as if issues of abduction, rape, and law and order, are routine hazards of life, against which they cannot be expected to stir themselves! With leaders like this, neither Ram nor Modi can save the party.

Modi: Taken at the flood

Few men in modern history have dared to meet a tide in flood and ride out boldly into the open sea. Yet this is precisely what Mr Narendra Modi has done. Baptised quite literally by fire, battered by a sensation-mongering media, chargesheeted by ideologically committed activists and hounded by an irrationally oppositionist Election Commission, the cornered Chief Minister battled formidable odds to present the Bharatiya Janata Party its most credible electoral victory in recent years.

The Gujarat elections are a major watershed in national politics. First and foremost, they have upheld Mahatma Gandhi's desire to give India's native religious and cultural traditions a place in the public arena. Gujarat has demonstrated that Hindus, whether Adivasis, Dalits or educated middle and upper classes, perceive themselves as one community. Surely it is poetic justice that this has happened in the Mahatma's own State. Of course, this centre-staging of the nation's civilisational ethos has gone down badly with Congressmen who blame Mr Modi's communal campaign for his spectacular victory. But this only proves that the Congress was insincere in accommodating Hindutva in its electoral strategy, and that it actually hoped to win the election on the basis of the old formula of en bloc minority vote plus support from certain castes.

Gujarat has given a fitting reply to such vulgar communalism, which lacks respect for the dharma and way of life of the majority community. It has demonstrated a grand affirmation of the Hindu identity and self-respect. Henceforth, political parties hoping to come to power on a minority of the total votes polled, and functioning on the basis of colonial stereotypes about the Hindu community being a mere aggregation of castes, will have to do serious rethinking.

I emphasise this because I have noticed the crystallisation of Hindu sentiments across the country, affecting the core support base of each party. Therefore, no political party will be able to trifle with Hindu sentiments while seeking votes on the basis of caste affiliations and minority votebanks. The Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister, Ms Mayawati, was the first leader to discern this trend, and accordingly made startling changes in the Bahujan Samaj Party's political rhetoric and electoral strategy. Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, Ms J Jayalalithaa, showed equal deference to Hindu concerns by enacting the law against forcible conversions, brushing aside the protests of rootless secularists. Now, following Gujarat, Hindu-baiting parties may find the going politically counter-productive.

Politicians, however, can be trusted to learn some lessons sometimes, but not so the media. It would be an understatement to say that the media was biased against Mr Modi. Sitting in the Capital and subscribing to five newspapers daily, I can say that most newspapers failed to even hint that the BJP was heading towards a landslide victory. Common sense said that Mr Modi could not lose after Godhra; that after Akshardham even the Patel community could not afford to sulk over the loss of Mr Keshubhai Patel; and that the people of Gujarat were bound to give a sharp snub to the shameless aggression of the CEC, Mr JM Lyngdoh. But I had no clue about the mandate heading his way because the newspapers told me to place my bet on Mr Shankersinh Vaghela.

Besides the biased coverage, what is unforgivable is the complete failure of the media to introspect and take responsibility for the communal polarisation that it lays at Mr Modi's door. Now that the elections are over, it is time to state a few home truths. The entire media approach towards Godhra was driven by the attitude that it was a tragedy richly deserved by innocent children, women and men because they had dared to visit the Ram Janmabhoomi in Ayodhya. That Godhra occurred without any provocation was simply blacked out. Even more despicable was the manner in which the subsequent riots were delinked from the Godhra carnage and treated as a suo moto aggression on the part of the Hindu community. The media-assisted international vilification of India was simply outrageous.

The scandalous commentary and visuals relayed by a television channel during those troubled times upset citizens across the country, yet the channel itself remains benignly unrepentant. On the very day of counting, a programme was aired live from Ahmedabad. And in a city that gave a thumping mandate to Mr Modi, the organisers were unable to find even a sprinkling of persons favourably inclined towards the BJP! Talk about fair play!

As if this were not bad enough, some sections of the media have taken to playing up minority fears, as though planned pogroms are in the offing. I think it is time to bell the cat about so-called minority fears and to challenge outright the media dishonesty in this regard.

To begin with, there is no truth in the insinuation that the minorities are in danger in this country by virtue of being minorities. This may be true in societies that practice monotheism (of whatever persuasion), but it has never been true of Hindu society on account of the enormous tolerance and innate decency of the Sanatana dharma. So we must no longer tolerate such canards about ourselves; nor should we permit people to disarm us with such vicious falsehoods.

The second issue we need to face is the sheer aggressiveness of the minorities and their intolerance towards the native faith and traditions of this country, as witnessed in their insistence on the right to convert. Moreover, readers may recall that Leftist historians have claimed for decades that medieval invaders who razed Hindu temples did not do so because they were iconoclasts but because they wanted the enormous wealth of the temples. This Leftist assertion was falsified by accounts of the invaders themselves, but citizens were not allowed to utter such politically incorrect truths! Yet today, given the fact that Hindu temples continue to be soft targets of fundamentalists, we need to ask why this is so. The fig-leaf of an economic motive does not exist, so another explanation will have to be found. I am waiting for our secular apologists to offer it.

Some Muslim analysts have noted with dismay the sharp drop in the number of tickets given by the Congress to Muslim candidates. Indeed, falling Muslim presence in State Assemblies and Parliament has been a matter of concern to Muslims for some time now, but has been generally disregarded on account of the specious claim for proportional representation. My suggestion is that the Muslim community can no longer avoid a long overdue introspection about its future course in a modern, forward-looking nation like India.

Muslims believe that secular parties take the Muslim vote en bloc but do not transfer their own committed Hindu vote to Muslim candidates (of whatever party) on account of a secret communal bias. This is not true. The reality is that Muslim candidates are unable to appeal to other groups in society because they do not have a modernising or non-communal agenda.

For instance, why should Hindus vote for a candidate who opposes the Shah Bano judgment giving alimony to an abandoned wife or supports triple talaq and polygamy? Muslim intellectuals have long lectured us about the nation's composite culture-it is time they let it take root on their own home and hearth.