Ali Sukhanver - -
Be it the Judaism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Hinduism or Islam or even Atheism, all philosophies guide their followers to a path leading to just one theme ‘love-humanity’. This philanthropic approach towards life is the only approach all religious philosophies convey to their followers. We see that the followers of all these philosophies have been doing a lot for the betterment of mankind since ever. Religious philosophies are never limited to the betterment of a specific group of people; all religions have an innate desire of flourishing and expanding and this desire could never be fulfilled unless the message they convey has universality in it; no doubt ‘love-humanity’ is the most universal message. Blaming some particular religion, caste or creed and patronizing hatred-based extremism is the worst kind of terrorism. Recently a report was shared at different forums. The report was prepared and published by the Georgetown University USA. It was pointed out in the report there are more than 200 million Muslims in India whom the Hindu extremists see as ‘an impediment of Hindu nationalist’s goal of remarking India as Hind-only nation.’ Those who prepared this report expressed their apprehension that a Genocide of Muslims is underway in India. Unfortunately such reports never seem reaching the US authorities; if such reports have reached them, they would certainly have shifted their kind ‘patronizing-hand’ from the tormenters to the crushed ones.
The hatred-based extremism is always a mischievous act of a small number of notorious people who have their ulterior motives behind. Groups consisting of such people could be found in every society and every religious school of thought. If the government is serious, such groups are crushed at very initial stages but in case the government is non-serious rather supportive to them, things become horribly disastrous. We have the ever-worst example of the demolition of the Babri Mosque in Ajodhya, India. That was 6th December 1992 when some Hindu extremist groups under the supervision of the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh, Bajrang Dal, Shiv Sena and Bharatiya Janata Party, ransacked the historic Babri mosque and turned it into debris. The situation after this incident turned into a riot-like scenario and ultimately resulted in the killing of thousands of innocent people mostly the Muslims. The most pathetic fact with reference to this incident was the partial rather prejudice silence of the government of India. Indian Court acquitted all accused-figures particularly those who were very active members of the BJP. In other words the Indian judiciary denied justice and failed to hold people responsible for criminally razing down the mosque and to take to task all those who were responsible for this cruel lawlessness.
The partiality demonstrated by the Indian courts paved future-way for targeting of other Muslim religious sites especially in Kashi and Mathura in the Uttar Pradesh State. For the investigation of this sad incident a Commission was also set-up which concluded that the demolition of the Babri Mosque was meticulously planned and the mobilization of the cadres of RSS, Bajrang Dal, BJP and Shiv Sena in Ajodhya was neither “spontaneous or voluntary” but “orchestrated and planned.” The case of Demolition of the Babri Mosque had been under trial for many years, from inquiry commission to the lower courts and then to the Supreme Court but nothing could come out of as the courts intentionally ignored the on-ground realities. As a result of this intentional ignorance 32 accused, including senior RSS & BJP leaders like Lal Krishna Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi and Uma Bharti were acquitted. In short justice was denied to more than 200 million Indian Muslims. In this way, the verdict by Indian court delivered victory to hate, intolerance and chauvinism and thus encouraged the Hindu extremists to be harsher, more narrow-minded and more prejudiced in their approach towards the minorities in India. As a result of this encouragement, different extremist groups got more strength and they started a very well planned movement against centuries old Mosques and Madrassas under the garb of their alleged linkage with historical Hindu sites. In 2022 alone, a score of madrassas and mosque have been demolished. The next target of these extremists is the historical Gyanvapi Mosque, located in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh. It was constructed by Aurangzeb in 1669. Hindu extremists claim that this mosque was built after demolishing an older Shiva temple. This situation is giving birth to a new series of trials and tribulations for the Muslim minority but this does not give the Muslims a license to blame Hinduism of hatred-based extremism. ‘Crush the Muslims’ could be a slogan of a small group of Hindu extremists but this slogan has nothing to do with Hinduism.
Hindu philanthropists have ever been doing a lot of welfare work regardless of religious beliefs for the ailing humanity. Even in Pakistan, a purely Muslim country, we have so many examples of their marvelous philanthropist deeds. There is a 550-bed hospital in Lahore named Sir Ganga Ram Hospital. This hospital was established in 1921 by a Hindu Civil Engineer Sir Ganga Ram. At the time of its establishment, Sir Ganga Ram never intended to specify it just for the Hindu patients; because it was established for the patients, not for the Hindu patients only. Today hundreds of patients are being benefitted from it and majority of the patients treated here are the Muslims. Same is the case with the Gulab Devi Hospital in Lahore. This hospital was established in 1934 by Indian freedom fighter Lala Lajpat Rai in the memory of his mother, Gulab Devi, who died due to tuberculosis in 1927. Another hospital in Lahore is Jan Ki Devi Jamiat Singh which was established by a Sikh doctor Jamiat Singh 85 years back. Humanity is the biggest religion and the strongest philosophy of life. Those who try to distort the serene face of life with their narrow-mindedness and prejudiced approach could never win hearts.
