Desicritics Category: Politics: Religion

On the Ban on Shivaji: Hindu king in Islamic India

Golden Boy — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 00:50:30 EDT

It was amazing to see how Muslim Organizations in Maharashtra came all out in support of the ban on the Book Shivaji: Hindu king in Islamic India by James Laine.

For a while I wondered what the hardcore Hindu Right-wing loyalists, who pounced critically on anything pro-Moslem, thought of this unanimous support from the most unexpected of the opponent’s quarters!

“They are afraid: if the ban on this book is lifted, Satanic Verses would be next in the queue”, my best friend of 30 years who is a hardcore BJP loyalist opined cynically!

It’s flourishing time in India’s democracy, where Right-wing Hindus cringe at all the flowery “all-was-well in the past” history books written by “well-meaning” Left-wing authors! Then we have the Right-wing Hindu intellectuals who leave no stone unturned on desicritics to opine how the fatwa against drawing the image of the Prophet is wrong. The atheist hardcore democratic liberals on the other hand voice their terror at acts like banning a book, which spells the doomsday prophesy to their utopian hardcore Free-Speech world.

It is interesting to note here how Hollywood would opine that it is sheer cruelty to children to tell them that Santa Claus does not exist! But they would not keep this “sacred” principle when it comes to depicting religious figures like Jesus and the holy saints, slandering against their names till the believers go pale in the face!

Osho speaks of a beautiful allegory in one of his books – “A child plays with his favourite toy all day long. He eats with the toy beside him; he goes to bed with the toy. The toy is an inseparable part of his fantastical world and he cannot live without it. When he is sleeping, mom takes away the toy and puts it in the rack with the other toys. When the child wakes up next morning, he frantically searches for the toy and cries for it until he has it back in his arms.

Now this same child grows up. One fine day, the sun is shining bright outside, he keeps the toy in a corner and goes out to play. He completely forgets about the toy. And now the toy has to be put in the rack forever, because the boy has no use for the toy, he has simply transcended it, grown out of it. And when he sees other children playing with their toys, he says to himself with a smile on his face, “They are mere children, still playing with toys!”

Nobody could have forced the boy to give up his toy when he himself was a child; it would have perhaps scarred him psychologically and who knows, would have caused a perversion in him so that when he grew up he would need sex-toys! So a forced snatching-away of the toy was not advisable! As long as the need was there, the toy was his world, and when he grew up, he neither gave away the toy nor threw it away in disdain, he just moved on, transcended, grew up!

We as adults don’t understand this simple phenomenon of human life!

Bob Pike, the guru of management training, says – “Adults are babies with grown-up bodies”. And it is so true!

What applies for the child and his toy, applies to the adult and the things he holds sacred, to feel safe – be it Shivaji or the Prophet Mohammed!

The right-wing Moslems or the liberals may still fume and fret and shout, “But Shivaji was neither a religious figure nor a religious icon like Prophet Mohammed!” For these ideological few, I narrate the following incident.

My hair-stylist is a lady, who has a special penchant for furry cats and the New-Age Philosophy. She does tarot-reading, cleanses her home off evil spirits, invites positive energy in her house with bells and candles, and tells me that “Shivaji, the Maratha King, has joined the ranks of the Gods in another realm! You see, there are these people who keep his photographs at home and adore him! Well, with all this reverence, Shivaji has become a god and he can provide a boon whenever an ardent devotee asks for it! Why, I know people in whose dreams he visits and provides vital information…!” she says

So well be! Who are we, with our minds chained and coloured with this radical ideology and that, to take away gods from idolators, prophets from the faithful, and toys and Santa from innocent children?

Why not enjoy and celebrate our ‘sacred’ differences and not impose our beliefs on others. That’s what the right to religious faith is all about in a secular democracy like ours - Not spoiling the world of children and devoted faithful with our so-called ‘truths’ about their religious icons and Santa!

A Road to Peace? Cracking the Qur'an Code

Ruvy — Sat, 22 May 2010 16:25:01 EDT

It was late April on a warm night in Jerusalem. The room on the third floor of the Israel Center of Jerusalem filled up. Dr. Asher Eder introduced the evening as the master of ceremonies. His opening remarks were to serve to introduce Lowell Gallin’s new book, Cracking the Qur'an Code: God’s Land, Torah and People Covenants with Israel in the Qur’an and Islamic Tradition.

In much the same fashion that the short story, The Sentinel, was the seminal basis for the novel, 2001, this essay by Dr. Asher Eder, Peace is Possible Between Ishmael and Israel According to the Qur'an and the Tanakh, has been the seminal work that has helped bring forth Lowell Gallin's groundbreaking book, Cracking the Qur'an Code: God’s Land, Torah and People Covenants with Israel in the Qur’an and Islamic Tradition.

In his remarks, Dr. Eder pointed out how the Qur’an is deliberately misinterpreted to create conflict between Muslims and non-Muslims and read greetings from Sheikh Professor Abdulhadi Palazzi

The author, Lowell Gallin, then began his lecture. He described how a former Deputy-Attorney General of Israel, Nahum Rakover, introduced him to Sheikh Professor Palazzi, who has turned out to be the man whose appearance was foretold by Dr. Eder 40 years ago – a Muslim scholar who would arise who would state in plain Arabic and English that the “emperor had no clothes”; that Jew-hatred, Israel-hatred, holocaust denial and anti-Zionism was a lot of garbage.

And then he launched into his subject. I managed to get an interview with Lowell Gallin, and the topics covered on that hot evening in April in that lecture are revealed to you in that interview which follows immediately below.

__________________________________________________________________

What inspired this book?

There was no such book and I thought there should be such a book. The book is composed of essays - but the "reactor core" of the book are the Sacred Verses which are divided into five sections:

God's Land Covenant with Israel,
God's Torah Covenant with Israel,
God's People Covenant with Israel,
The Eternal Capital of the Israelite Kingdom of David and Solomon, and
The Tabernacle - references to the First, Second and Third Temples (Jerusalem is not mentioned in the Qur'an by name - it is not mentioned in the Torah by name, either).

Why should a Muslim be interested in a Jew explaining his book to him? Doesn't that seem arrogant?

The book is written in honor of and based on the teachings of Dr. Asher Eder of Jerusalem, and Sheikh Professor Abdulhadi Palazzi of Rome, Italy. I acted as a scribe or recording secretary to put their teachings in book form. Sheikh Palazzi recommended that we use the English translation of and commentary of the Qur'an by Professor Abdullah Yusuf Ali - his English translation and commentary on the Qur'an is the one most respected by Muslims world wide. Note that the 3rd Edition of Prof. Ali's Commentary was published in Lahore, India, in 1938. It is critical to use a modern version of this work that is absolutely faithful to this 1938 3rd Edition, not one corrupted by "Saudi" or Wahhabi publishing houses. The two "kosher" publishing houses today of this work [Ali, Abdullah Yusuf. The Holy Qur’an: Text, Translation and Commentary] are Goodword Books, New Delhi, India, (e-mail: info@goodwordbooks.com) and Tahrike Tarsile Qur’an, Inc. Elmhurst, New York, (e-mail: read@koranusa.org).

Why and how does one make this claim? What do you mean by "kosher" editions?

A. In the original commentary Prof. Ali used the word "God" whereas the "improved" Wahhabi versions use "Allah" - the "improvers," the Wahhabi, believe that Allah cannot be translated. This is just a way to identify the tampered translation.
B. In the original commentary, Prof. Ali had many positive comments about other religions, Hindus, Zoroastrians, as well as Jews and Christians. The "improved versions" remove all of these.

You say you merely are a scribe or recording secretary. Sheikh Palazzi has a website where his own teachings are made very clear. Why this book, then?

This is the first book to give all qur'anic references to the five subjects I mentioned above. Professor Ali gives the majority opinions, and where applicable, he mentions minority commentators as well. You get from Professor Ali a "sense of the Muslim consensus". The book has a section on the work of Salah Choudhoury, a Bangladeshi journalist who is a Muslim Zionist, and a section on pro-Israel ethnic Turkic (Sunni Muslim majority) nations. It should be noted here that the Muslim world is not all anti-Israel, nor is it necessarily united in its politics, and we non-Muslims do not really comprehend it very well.

Somehow there is a disconnect here. Why is it that so many régimes, particularly Turkey, are so hostile to Jews and Israel if Muslims supposedly are not?

Muslims where? Albanian, Azerbaijani, and the Central Asian Turkic republics have strong diplomatic, economic and military relations with Israel. What about everybody else? The North African nations are not really Arabs. Ethnically, they are not Arabs at all. What about the Pakistani, the millions of Muslims in India? What about the Malaysians, the Indonesians, the rebels in the Philipines? What about the Arab nations and the Muslim "diaspora" in Europe and elsewhere? What function does the Jew-hatred, anti-Israel sentiment, and holocaust denial serve in these countries? It's really very simple.

The autocratic régimes, if you want to even call them that, can deflect the rage of their own people at the inablility of these régimes to provide anything. These societies are nightmares, they are living hell on earth. Their leaders say to themselves, "You cannot blame yourself, you cannot blame your elders, you cannot blame God." Some blame the Jews for the poverty. That's how these régimes survive. That's how the so-called "Palestinian" society survives. Their basic attitude is "someone else is always responsible for our mess".

Who funds all this? "Saudi" Arabia, Quwait, and the Gulf States are funding this world-wide. This is the "public" face of "Islam." What you are really seeing is the public face of Wahhabism pretending to be Islam.

What is Wahhabism? Why is it so bad?

Wahhabism is the tribal religious cult of the al-Saud tribe of Nejd in Arabia. Wahhabis believe that all NON-WAHHABIS are not really Muslims. ONLY Wahhabis are true Muslims. Sunni and Shi'ite Muslims, in Wahhabi eyes, are NOT Muslims. All non-Muslims are fair game for murder, rape, theft, and torture. They make videos of the "fair game." Like fourteen year old school girls, or Daniel Pearl who was beheaded. Al-Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas and the Taliban are all Wahhabi in theology and are funded from "Saudi" Arabia. Their oil money funds all these terror activities and wars.

The Wahhabi call themselves Salafi. Too many call them "jihadists", or "Islamo-fascists" or "Islamic fundamentalists." These names mean nothing and only mislead and cover up the true evil - the true people who are carrying on and inciting war between the Children of Abraham.

Thank you very much.

__________________________________________________________________

In the end, this book, though written in English, is for Muslims to read. They are the ones who study the Qur’an. It is their holy book, and the bottom line, the argument of this book, is that the Qur’an guarantees the right of the Children of Israel to control all of the Land of Israel. Having contributed to this book myself, I cannot write a review on it. But the acid test is not how I, a Jew, might view this book, but how a Muslim might. And Professor Fazal ur-Rehman Afridi, a Muslim from Pakistan, has written a review of this work at his site, The Balkanization of Pakistan.

Dr. Eder made a point about Islam about how Muslims view efforts at success. According to Dr. Eder, who once considered converting to Islam, Muslims believe that they have an obligation to try three times with their best and strongest efforts to accomplish something. Only after they have tried three times with their best efforts, and have failed, will they say that Allah meant for that endeavor not to succeed. Then he explained how the Muslims attempted to conquer Europe twice – once in 782 C.E., when they were stopped by Charles Martel, and the second time in the late 1600’s when they were stopped by the Swedes. The third attempt is taking place now. If this book can help stop this effort, so much the better. But that is not the main reason this book has been written. The real intent of the book is to bring peace between the Children of Ismail, and the Children of Israel.

The reason I’ve sought publication of this article at a South Asian site, is that India has the second largest number of Muslims of any nation in the world, and to my knowledge, English speaking Pakistanis and Bangladeshis can access this site as well. This means that hundreds of millions of Muslims could be exposed to this article, and possibly be influenced to buy this book (from Lulu.com) and to come to view the Qur’an in a light that can bring peace to my war-torn region of the world, as well as possibly to their own. At present, this region is on the edge of war, yet another war, one that will be brought about by evil men whose “messianic” vision will bring yet more death and destruction to this region.

Apparently, the millions dead in the war between Iraq and Iran in the 1980’s were not enough; the thousands dead in the fighting in Yemen have not been enough. The thousands dead in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq are not enough. The millions wounded and crippled for life are not enough. The homeless in refugee camps of the desperate throughout the Middle East are not enough. It seems that to the Wahhabi terrorists across South Asia and the Middle East, and to the Shi’a madmen in Iran, more death, more injured, and more refugees are just what the doctor ordered.

Speaking as a Jew and as an Israeli, I tell you that if this nation is attacked, and it may well be attacked as early as this summer, this nation will deal out death to its enemies. Our eyes will hold no pity, and there will be more dead, more wounded, more refugees whose lives have been ruined by the destruction of their homes, and possibly even worse destruction, destruction I would rather not name. But a lot of this can be changed by a change of heart. And Cracking the Qur’an Code provides an avenue for that change of heart.

So, I am appealing to my Muslim cousins reading this to take the effort to read Cracking the Qur’an Code to understand that yet one more time, the hand of peace is being offered; not the greasy palm of the bought off politician, but the dry hand of a man of peace who does not want to see his children forced to become men of war. Time grows short, and opportunities to avert terrible evil grow fewer and fewer. But a change of heart may enable wounded souls and hearts to heal and bring peace, that we might all sit, each one of us, under our own fig tree without fear and look towards tomorrow – a tomorrow of hope and prosperity.

Cracking the Qur'an Code: God's Land, Torah and People Covenants with Israel in the Qur'an and Islamic Tradition (Jerusalem: Root and Branch Association, Ltd., Print and E-Book Editions. Copyright © Lowell Gallin, 2009). On sale now at Lulu.com. Bulk order discounts and worldwide shipping are both available.

Ajmal Kasab And Faisal Shahzad - Double Faults

Deepti Lamba — Fri, 7 May 2010 04:26:46 EDT

Why would an educated man with a good job and a family plant a car bomb in Times Square? The story of Faisal Shahzad is quite similar to the storyline of the film Kurbaan where Khalid, a lecturer at an American university is actually a terrorist who wants to take revenge against the West for carrying out drone attacks in Afghanistan.

While the movie plays out in usual Bollywood style with Saif Ali Khan playing the insidious cold blooded terrorist with panache Faisal Shahzad turned out to be a blundering idiot who left not only the getaway car keys but also his house keys in the car that was planted with the bomb which he returned to retrieve

His call to book a one way airticket from New York to Dubai was his undoing. Unlike the systematic terror operation carried out in Mumbai by Ajmal Kasab and his cohorts this was a shoddy one man operation but the intent was the same- to hurt as many innocents as possible.

While the likes of Ajmal Kasab with criminal mentalities are easily shepherded into terrorist organisations it is the fall of the educated Muslims that has become topic of intense discussions. Friends of Shahzad believe financial woes turned Shahzad Faisal into an extremist:

But in the last few years, beset by financial troubles, he was a changed man, friends remarked. He even asked once if he could fight in Afghanistan.

"The recession had taken a toll on them, I guess," a friend of Shahzad told NYT.

He said that their money worries became apparent in 2008 or 2009 and that Shahzad "lost his way during the financial problems".

"JP Morgan Chase has since moved to foreclose on the Shelton house, which the couple had abandoned in a hurry, leaving behind clothes and toys," the daily said.

Faiz Ahmad, a friend from Shahzad family's ancestral village, Mohib Banda describes seeing him "completely quiet on the sofa, like someone who has some worries, and undergoing some internal change".

"So he was sitting silent, silent. And silence in itself is a question," he said.

It is not clear when Shahzad became radicalised but one classmate noted the change one year ago.

"His personality had changed — he had become more introverted," he said.

"He had a stronger religious identity, where he felt more strongly and more opinionated about things".

Not every individual who suffered the economic recession and has strong religious beliefs becomes a terrorist. Like Kasab who looked for an easy way out of his impoverished circumstances Shahzad Faisal too found it easy to blame the West for his financial woes and redeemed his flagging self esteem by finding purpose in radical Islam.

It isn't ideology alone that sways the mind but there are other factors as well. For some it could be tragedy of extraordinary proportions that entrenches the need for revenge but for others it could be something as simple as the cowardly inclination to blame others for one's present circumstances.

Whether the individual comes from a rich or poor background becomes a moot point. The basic weakness in character comes forth and rehabilitation of psychopaths is out of the question.

Kasab will hang for murder and Shahzad Faizal should not see a day out of prison for attempted murder.

Religion - A Powerful Weapon To Tackle Maoists

Suresh Naig — Fri, 9 Apr 2010 07:59:39 EDT

The ruthless carnage of CRPF Jawans by Maoists should open our eyes, towards a sustainable and pragmatic solution. A simple analysis of the situation will lead us to a simple conclusion. Major plank of the Maoists is empowerment of the tribal community, on which they derive their sustenance. Empowerment is possible only through knowledge and knowledge cannot propagate in vacuum. It requires necessary infrastructure in the form of overall development. By denying development in the tribal regions, attributing corruption and unequal distribution of natural wealth, Maoists have kept the tribal people under perpetual ignorance. It is this ignorance, which is the main capital for the Maoists without which they can never survive.

Before the democratic elected Governments it was the religious institutions which had brought basic developments of education and health care to the tribal regions. On that count, Christian missionaries of the bygone centuries rendered remarkable service in tribal villages, of course with the ulterior aim of propagating Christianity. Nevertheless their contribution to the society at large can never be undermined.

Once a secular government occupied the centre stage with all its plus and minuses, religion was the first victim and along with it the rural development. Development in tribal and remote villages is always associated with culture and religion; any attempt to disassociate religion from development would draw flak from the community. Religion has a decisive say in many tricky issues of health and education, where ignorance is spread by religious charlatans, in the absence of organized religious institutions.

Shedding its prejudice against religion all the concerned governments can embark on developments – cultural, education and health tagged with religion, so that infrastructure developments can follow without much hassle. Tagging development with religion has great advantages politically too; primarily Maoists will be isolated from the tribal people because of their political ideology of irreligion. Secondly when resources generated from cash rich temples such as Tirupati, Puri, Varanasi etc are employed in tribal areas towards religion tagged developments, even BJP cannot object to it. Religious mutts can build temples, schools, hospitals and hostels for school going children in tribal areas; Maoists will think twice in attacking these institutions for the fear of antagonizing tribal people. In equal measures Government can encourage Christian missionaries to play their perfect game, perfected over a few centuries.

Maoists thrive with their major capital – ignorance of the tribal people and lack of development. Maoists will go to any extent in destroying Government’s attempts in dispelling ignorance of the people and they scuttle all attempts of development. Religion is a powerful tool among the tribal to dispel ignorance and religious infrastructure can usher in other infrastructure developments. Tirupati and Vatican are standing examples of religion triggered infrastructure development. Of course it will take generations to achieve that massive scale of religion based development. However, religion based development will have least resistance from opposing forces and it will entail a positive participation from the beneficiaries – tribal folks.

Another major stumbling block for the Government forces is intelligence gathering. Kautilya – the maverick political advisor in his political treaty Ardh Shastra enunciates effective espionage and intelligence gathering using religious platform. The methods he had described in his book are pertinent even in present day’s circumstances. A Sadhu or a Swamy enjoys unbridled confidence of the local populace in a short span, which will take ages for the Government agencies to achieve. Using this confidence all developments can follow at a rapid pace, coupled with effective intelligence, isolating Maoists at their own game.

Religious sentiments are deep seated in our psyche, the proof of which is the shutting of Newspaper printing on religious holidays such as Ganesh Chaturthi, Dussera, Diwali etc and subsequent non publication of that day’s edition. No Newspaper office is closed on account of National Holidays – Independence Day or Republic Day. Most of us are Hindus, Muslims and Christians than Indians.

TTD can plan its Kalyana Utsavam in tribal villages, Puri Jaganath temple board can plan a Devine yathra of its Lord in tribal villages, which will invoke positive participation of all the simple tribal folk. After winning the confidence of the people, isolating and vanquishing Maoists will not be an uphill task. When the tribal people suffer due to ignorance, the decision makers of the Government suffer due to their prejudice.

Shaikh Dr Tahir ul-Qadri Issues Anti-Terrorism Fatwa Without Teeth

KS — Thu, 4 Mar 2010 16:16:45 EST

Regarding Shaikh Dr Tahir ul-Qadri’s Anti-Terrorism Fatwa, recently launched in London, I guess any steps forward in fighting terrorism should be considered a good thing. However, these initiatives can be read in many ways and I’ll give you a few points off the top of my head, replicates what many others are thinking in the Muslim community.

Firstly, I doubt this will have the clout envisaged by one of it's apparent key promoters the Quilliam foundation (a counter-terrorism think tank) as the fatwa itself does not have the unanimous backing of the most prominent scholars and Sheikhs, although the opinions and rulings of some prominent scholars do appear to have been involved in drawing it up. Also this is not the first fatwa to condemn suicide bombings/terrorism, and Qadri is not the first ‘important/eminent’ Sheikh to issue such a fatwa, as many more prominent scholars and Sheikhs have done so already, and these are ignored by those idiots that seek to commit suicide bombings and terrorism anyway. Furthermore, most Islamic scholars and Imams have already consistently condemned killing people in the name of Islam for a long, long time. There is simply minimal publicity about these earlier efforts and therefore the time spent promoting Shaikh Dr Tahir ul-Qadri’s Anti-Terrorism Fatwa would have been better spent promoting that Muslims have already been condemning terrorism for some time.

Secondly, regarding Qadri's status, the Sheikh in question appears to head a Sufi organisation and as such there will be many branches of the Muslim community that will not recognise his rulings. In fact, its likely that most of his own followers will accept his fatwa but then as his followers they are likely to not support terrorism or suicide bombings anyhow. Furthermore, another reason he is not a universally accepted figure by all individuals and branches of the Muslim community is because in the past has made segregating comments about some other Muslim communities such as Wahabbis and Deobandis. So I’d suggest that this fatwa is not really groundbreaking apart from inside his own organisation and will never be widely acknowledged apart from by his own followers.

Thirdly, although it is important that such a Fatwa has been publicised, the importance and reach perceived by the press, Quilliam foundation, etc, does appear overrated/overestimated. Why? Because those that commit such crimes have already heard existing Fatwa’s stating it to be wrong and ignore them, those that do not recognise this Sheikh would have already heard existing Fatwa’s stating it to be wrong, those that follow this Sheikh should already be clear terrorism is wrong and do not need a Fatwa to tell them this, and those non-followers that already know it to be wrong do not need another Fatwa to remind them.

I’ve read a cross-section of interesting views which collectively place this Fatwa in it’s correct context and weight it’s relevance.

"The fatwa, running to 600 pages, has been written by Muhammad Tahir ul-Qadri, founder and leader of a Muslim sect based in Pakistan, and highlighted in a press release from the Quilliam Foundation, an anti-extremism thinktank which last year received £1m funding from the British government." (Guardian)

"It (the fatwa) plays on a widely-held (and sometimes willful) misperception that Muslim leaders have not spoken out against Islamist violence. Large numbers of Muslim leaders have denounced violence, suicide bombs, 9/11, 7/7 and many other bloody attacks by Islamist radicals (check out a long partial list here)." (Reuters)

"Tim Winter, a lecturer in Islamic studies at Cambridge University, said while ul-Qadri’s step of declaring "miscreants as unbelievers" was unusual, it was unlikely extremists would take notice of his edict." (Al Jazeera)"I dont think any Muslim will disagree with his fatwa .. Whoever has killed an innocent human beings regardless of religion , colour , race , nationality is a terrorist. At the same time he should have mentioned American and its allies are also terrorists (including govt of pakistan ). They have also killed millions of innocent human beings in Iraq , Afganistan … We cant say one side is terrorist and other is fighting for so called democracy." (Islamonline forum)

"The scholars of K.S.A have been condemning terror and issuing fatwas since the 70’s (maybe even before then) and no one took any notice…" …"The barelvis and assorted sufi councils are flavour of the month with the UK government to spread division, hate and doubt among Muslims." (Ummah.com forum)

"What’s funny is that the Government have money to waste in what’s supposed to be a recession. They give money to the Quilliam Foundation to elicit fatwas from men who have virtually no influence on the Muslims in the UK. How ironic that these munafiq "scholars" are seen as a joke by the very Muslims they are meant to be deradicalising." (Islamic Awakening forum)

So thinking more about the 'Qadri Fatwa' and The Quilliam foundation there are some concerns that need to be raised.The Quilliam foundation is headed by Ed Husain, a former religious extremist, and actually has minimal support from Muslims. I’ve said previously that his book, The Islamist appears to be another Wafa Sultan type attempt to profit off the back of Islamophobia and the fear of ‘Islamism’. As Craig Murray also has said, Husain has realized that, having tried to make a mark in the world through religious fanaticism, that he can make more money and career progress by instead jumping on the anti-Islamist gravy train.

When Husain’s not traveling the world lecturing on the threat of ‘Islamist ideology’, he benefits from the fact that the UK government has had Ed Husain up in the Quilliam foundation and has thrown more than £1 million of taxpayers’ money at it.

It’s about time the public (including Muslims) begin questioning and criticizing these self-proclaiming fatwa writers and the barrage of advice they give to the police and security agencies on counter-extremism methods that only serve to further demonise and stereotype Muslims.

India's Influence on The World History and Economy.

Sumanth — Mon, 1 Mar 2010 07:53:34 EST

The world often views India as a country with huge poverty and most people outside India probably blame India or Indians for the same. When L.N. Mittal took over Arcelor in France, there was a major controversy in Europe as the Indian went on a buying spree to become the biggest steel maker in the world. For many people in France, Germany and Europe, this came as a shock.

So, what is India then? And who are the Indian People? And what does it mean to have an Indian identity? Is it the software engineers working as code coolies? Is it Gandhi preaching non-violence? Is it just the rapid economic growth and the new Indian markets?

The present world mostly does not know what India is. To a great extent, just like many modern Indians, I too do not know what India is. Just recently, I asked the question: what was the GDP of India in 1500 A.D. and searched the Internet for the information? I would like you to ponder this question as you slowly go through the rest of the article on Indian National identity.

Buddha preached in India almost at the same time when Socrates had inquiry sessions with his disciples during 430 B.C. As Socrates changed the western world though his thoughts, Buddha’s “science of mind” influenced the east for ages to come.

In 332 BC, Alexander captures Gaza and Egypt. Next year, he captured prosperous Babylon. In 326 BC, he defeated a local Indian king Porus in Battle of Hydaspes, even as a much bigger Indian Army waited for him somewhere near Delhi. (Hydaspes, Alexander)

Greek Sources noted:

"As for the Macedonians, however, their struggle with Porus blunted their courage and stayed their further advance into India. For having had all they could do to repulse an enemy who mustered only twenty thousand infantry and two thousand horse, they violently opposed Alexander when he insisted on crossing the river Ganges also, the width of which, as they learned, was thirty-two furlongs, its depth a hundred fathoms, while its banks on the further side were covered with multitudes of men-at arms and horsemen and elephants. For they were told that the kings of the Ganderites and Praesii were awaiting them with eighty thousand horsemen, two hundred thousand footmen, eight thousand chariots, and six thousand fighting elephants. And there was no boasting in these reports. For Sandrocottus, who reigned there not long afterwards, made a present to Seleucus of five hundred elephants, and with an army of six hundred thousand men overran and subdued all India."

Just 10 years after Alexander’s conquests in the world, a massive Indian empire () rose into prominence. Chanakya was a young professor at University of Taxila(Taxila) during Alexander’s Invasion. Studying the Greeks and Persians, he realised the political dynamics of the world at that time and he went on to alert the biggest Indian Kingdom of Magadh. Later he crafted a Machiavellian strategy and created an army led by a young man to capture Magadh just 2 years after Alexander’s death at Babylon.

This young Indian man was later known in world history as the king “Sandrocottus”(Chandra-Gupta Maurya). Most Indians know that Chanakya employed massive networks of spies, information warfare and treacherous strategies during capture of Magadh.

After Alexander’s death in 323 BC, Seleucus I Nicator got the largest area including Babylon, Indian territories near Indus River, much of Middle East, Syria and parts of modern turkey. Ptolemy I Soter declared himself as Pharaoh of Egypt. Cassander ruled Macedonia (modern day Greece). Antigonus I Monophthalmus had Turkey. (Diadochi, Seleucid_Empire )

Seleucus invaded India in 305 BC, confronting Chandragupta Maurya (Sandrocottos), founder of the Maurya empire near Indus River. It is said that Chandragupta fielded an army of 600,000 men and 9,000 war elephants. Seleucus lost and ceded large territories east of Indus to Sandrocottus.

It is generally thought that Sandrocottus married Seleucus's daughter, or a Greek Macedonian princess, to formalize an alliance. In a return gesture, Sandrocottus sent 500 war-elephants, a military asset which would play a decisive role at the Battle of Ipsus (in central Turkey) in 302 BC. In addition to this treaty, Seleucus dispatched an ambassador, Megasthenes, to Sandrocottus, and later Deimakos to his son emperor Bindusara, at the Mauryan court at Pataliputra.

However, it’s Ashoka (Greek name: Piodasses), the Grandson of Sandracottus, who influenced the rest of the world and world history. Ashoka was a ruthless military strategist and he consolidated and expanded the Mauryan empire to whole India. He had his last war in 261 against the democratic state of Kalinga, whose traders blocked his Kingdom’s access to many eastern sea ports. This was a bitter war with deaths of more than 100,000 people. (Kalinga War)

The Kalinga War was fought near this river (in Picture):

This war and the bloodshed deeply impacted him and he converted to Buddhism. He worked to propagate the principles and values to people in India and foreign countries. In the history of Buddhism, Ashoka is considered just after Gautama Buddha. Ptolemy II Philadelphus, the ruler of Ptolemaic Egypt sent an ambassador named Dionysius to the court of Ashoka.

The efforts of Emperor Ashoka to spread the Buddhist faith are described in the Edicts of Ashoka( 272- 231 BCE). The Edicts of Ashoka are a collection of 33 inscriptions on rock pillars or cave walls made by the Emperor Ashoka of the Mauryan dynasty during his reign from 272 to 231 BCE in different parts of the empire. (link,link)

Two edicts in Afghanistan have been found with Greek inscriptions, one of these being a bilingual edict in Greek language and Aramaic. This edict, Edict 13, found in Kandahar, advocates the adoption of "Piety" (using the Greek term Eusebeia for Dharma) to the Greek community.

In this rock edict, it is mentioned that Ashoka sent emissaries beyond his borders, as far as the Greek kings of the Mediterranean and it clearly mentions the names of the rulers of those times.

(amtiyoko nama yona-raja param ca tena atiyokena cature 4 rajani turamaye nama amtikini nama maka nama alikasudaro nama)

“King Priyadarshi considers moral conquest the most important conquest. He has achieved this moral conquest, repeatedly both here and among people living beyond the borders of his kingdom, even as far away as six hundred yojanas (3000 miles), where the Yona king Antiyoka rules (Antiochus II Theos), and even beyond Antiyoka in the realms of the four kings named Turamaya (Ptolemaios), Antikini (Antigonos ), Magas and Alikasudara (Alexander II of Epirus) and to the south among Cholas and the Pandyas....wherever conquest is achieved by Dharma, it produced satisfaction, Satisfaction is firmly established by conquest by Dharma.” (Antiochus II Theos,Ptolemy II Philadelphus,Antigonus II Gonatas,Magas of Cyrene,Alexander II Epirus)

The words used to describe Greeks (Ionia) are Yavanah, Yona in Sanskrit, Pali and some other ancient languages.

During 30 BC, the last Ptolemy Cleopatra of Egypt arranged the escape for her eldest son Caesarion to India from red sea port Berenice. The plan failed.

Ashoka’s son and daughter went to Sri Lanka to spread the Buddhist Principles. It is through the Central Asian sources that the Chinese got introduced to Buddhism and centuries later the Chinese monks travelled to India to get the principles of Buddhism and that finally take us to Shaolin Temple, the Martial arts, Vipassana, Zen Koans or Zazen Meditation. Buddhism also spread into South East Asia in later centuries (Suvarnabhumi). Ashoka ruled a highly prosperous country with a huge GDP compared to most other countries at that time. The volume of intellectual thought processes in any civilisation is a direct function of its prosperity.

The Indian traders were trading with Egypt, Persia and also with South East Asian countries and the Chinese. Indians and Chinese remained influential in the world economy for a very long time.

So, what was the GDP of India 2000 years ago?

From 1st Century AD till 1250 AD, India had the world’s largest GDP and it was somewhere between 25 to 30 percent of world’s GDP closely followed by China.
During 15th century (during Emperor Akbar, the Great), India’s GDP was 26% of world’s GDP and it was second largest in the world after China’s GDP. The Europe had a GDP of 21% of the world.

An estimate of India's pre-colonial economy puts the annual revenue of Emperor Akbar's treasury in 1600 A.D. at £17.5 million, in contrast to the entire treasury of Great Britain in 1800, which totalled £16 million. The gross domestic product of Mughal India in 1600 was estimated at about 22.6% the world economy, in comparison to Ming China's 29.2% share.

Annual revenue reported by the Emperor Aurangzeb's exchequer exceeded £100 million in 1700 (twice that of Europe then). Thus, India emerged as the world's largest economy, followed by Manchu China and Western Europe.

The GDPs of major countries of the world over the last 500 years (data by Angus Maddison):

Lawyers Refusing to be Lawyers

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 16:15:12 EST

The right to legal representation is a cornerstone of every civilised society. For a legal association to refuse to support an accused is nothing but a breakdown in that country’s civilisation and basic humanity. In other words, the country’s pretensions to be civilised and defend rights is frankly in the toilet. This was brought home to me when I read this story:

Islamabad (AsiaNews) - Because of the threats posed by the powerful Lahore Bar Association – an umbrella organization of city lawyers - no Christian or Muslim lawyer is ready to take on the defence in the murder of 12 year-old Shazia Bashir, it was reported yesterday by The Pakistani Christian association that deals with legal assistance.

The girl, of Christian faith, died on Jan. 23 as a result of violence - even sexual – at the hands of her employer, a wealthy and powerful Muslim lawyer in Lahore. The alleged culprit, Chaudhry Mohammad Naeem, is a former president of the Lahore High Court Bar Association. The girl, just 12 years old, had worked as a maid in the home of Naeem in the last six months.

Now you can draw what conclusions you may from this story. But here are some more examples before you do.

1. This was the legal representation situation with respect to trying Kasab, the sole surviving member of the Pakistani terrorist team which attacked Mumbai. I quote:

The news of providing state legal aid to Mohammed Ajmal Kasab, the sole surviving gunman in the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, has stirred profound consternation throughout India. Shiv Sena honcho Bal Thackeray thundered that no trial for Kasab is necessary, that the television news clippings are evidence enough, and that he should be hanged in full public view at the Gateway of India opposite the Taj Palace, which was one of the attack sites.

Thackeray found support from an unexpected quarter, with All-India Milli Council president Iqbal Mohiudeen invoking the shariah: “An eye for an eye, a limb for a limb, and a life for a life.”

The homes and properties belonging to three Mumbai-based lawyers who volunteered to appear for Kasab have been vandalized. A Parsi lawyer was even castigated collectively by his own community through the Bombay Parsi Panchayat.

2. There were terror blasts in Varanasi, Faziabad and Lucknow in the court premises. I quote:

After the terror blasts on 23rd November on court premises in Varanasi, Faizabad and Lucknow in which 15 people, four of them lawyers, were killed and over 80 injured, some bar associations had taken an unprecedented decision not to provide legal assistance to the accused in the blast cases.

The move was condemned as it was against natural justice.

It has to be pointed out that in both these cases in India, the lawyers have been appointed to defend the accused. But the fact that some are denying legal assistance to the accused is a shameful situation. This is directly going against the fundamental rights of all citizens of both countries. Despite the fact that the accused committed horrible crimes, they are presumed to be innocent till found guilty. So to exhibit some kind of weird protest against terrorism or religious participation is criminal. What next? Teachers refusing to teach because the pupil is from a different religion? Doctors refusing to treat patients because they are from another religion? Or how about architects refusing to build houses because the requester is from another religion?

These people are professionals and are supposed to uphold their professional standards. By refusing to do so, they are knuckling under total obscurantists and blithering idiots who are frankly uncivilised. Totally not cricket.

Hindu Nationalism in UK and the VHP

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Fri, 5 Feb 2010 00:56:49 EST

This was a very curious paper that I read. It was even more curious, because just a day before I got this paper, I read this note which was published in Outlook. I have to admit that I am in some sympathy with the views of Roover, but how it is taught in the west is something that I find a bit strange. At the very least, I would have expected some reasonable facsimile and similarity in the ways it is taught compared to Judaism, Christianity, etc., but this is specially in the USA, much less in the UK. I have personally had several experiences of this. Anybody saying anything good about Hinduism or its philosophy or any thing like that is almost automatically considered to be a raving Hindutva casteist rage boy. I have seen this happen far too many times. I strongly suggest you read that article and here’s a quote:

In one sense, then, the picture for students of India is even grimmer than the one Tripathi sketches. In another sense, there is hope, because times of turbulence also hold the potential for intellectual change. As students of India, we will have to take seriously the growing discontent among Hindus about the ways in which their traditions have been depicted. Some of this is inspired by an attempt to sanitise the Hindu traditions according to the model of Islam and Christianity and the prudishness of middle-class morality. However, other strands express a deep sense of grievance towards the secularist hegemony and the academic allergy to Hinduism. As long as reasonable and well-educated minds do not address these grievances, Hindu nationalism will be able to tap into the growing anger among Hindus and manipulate this to its own benefit. To address such problems, one needs to work towards a climate of intellectual freedom that has too long been absent from the study of India.

So while I am quite interested to read about the scholarship that is done about Hinduism and India, I am not 100% sure about the academy. Do not get me wrong, I think the Hindutva chaps are a bunch of goons themselves and they come up with serious stinkers. In any case, they and their bunch of merry men are most certainly against academic freedom (witness the cases against the beef book, etc. etc., read my friend’s book on this issue. I can't say much more than this, as I think I am biased in favour of Salil’s book.

Usually my net scraper for the “Hinduism” keyword throws up very few scholarly alerts but this article piqued my interest. The author is assessing the role of Hindu nationalism in the development of Hindu identity in Britain. And to do that, he delves into the VHP UK organisation. After some 10-15 pages, I am not very sure where he ends up. This is the abstract:

This paper assesses the role of Hindu nationalism in the development of Hindu identity in Britain. Some accounts argue that the authoritarian network of Hindu nationalist organisations apparent in India is reproduced in Diaspora contexts, especially in the west. The paper argues that this degree of organisational intentionality is not always borne out by evidence in the UK. Although Hindu nationalist organisations have achieved some success in establishing their presence, in national arenas they frequently give way to umbrella organisations such as the Hindu Forum of Britain (HFB) and the Hindu Council UK (HCUK). The paper argues that Hindu nationalist organisations nevertheless operate vigorously in multilocal contexts, fuelling a 'Hindutva effect' which has a broader ideological influence. The paper examines some of the positions taken by the HFB and HCUK to demonstrate how this influence is played out in national arenas, before reflecting more broadly on the implications of these dynamics for the development of diaspora identities.

There was one event that the VHP organised 20 years ago, but since then, it has been remarkably quiescent. Their website is basic, its members aren't represented in the organisations which deal with civil society, etc. So he talks about all this and then says that the VHP is a serious organisation spreading a nebulous underground version of Hindutva. He called the VHP arranged sammelan as a tamasha. That was a cheap shot frankly, not worthy.

Then the chap starts talking about conversion. And I am seriously surprised that the author does not understand the importance of conversion to a Hindu. I mean, isn't this obvious? We are talking about a religious identity, and a factor which goes directly against this identity and reduces it will be considered to be a threat. So when the Hindu elders in the UK were raising their concerns about Muslim gangs converting Hindu (and Sikh) girls, the British Police considered that as a legitimate problem. But the author thinks that this objection to conversion is an expression of Hindu Nationalistic thought. Erm, no!

Then furthermore, he goes forward and says that this is a subterranean inflection towards Hindutva. I totally disagree. This is going to the core of a Hindu’s identity and it has no political leanings at all. So I am not sure where he is getting the subterranean bit from or where he is seeing Hindutva. It's like seeing a commie under every bed.

The next result that he finds is that to protect against the threat of conversion, one has to “wake up” Hindu Unity. This apparently demonstrates the presence of Hindu nationalist ideology. Again, this is a massive over reading into the word “wake up”. If I say that we need to do jagran, then it is the same. It is making visible, bringing up, to awaken, to rise up. Obviously he doesn't link this to Swami Vivekananda who said, “Arise, Awake! And stop not until the goal is reached”. Or how about his poem? I quote:

The Song of the Sannyasin

Wake up the note! the song that had its birth
Far off, where worldly taint could never reach
In mountain caves and glades of forest deep,
Whose calm no sigh for lust or wealth or fame
Could ever dare to break; where rolled the stream
Of knowledge, truth, and bliss that follows both.
Sing high that note, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
Strike off thy fetters! Bonds that bind thee down,
Of shining gold or darker, baser ore;
Love, hate; good, bad; and all the dual throng,
Know, slave is slave, caressed or whipped, not free
For fetters, though of gold, are not less strong to bind;
Then off with them, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
Let darkness go! the will-o’-the-wisp that leads
With blinking light to pile more gloom on gloom.
This thirst for life, for ever quench; it drags
From birth to death, and death to birth, the soul
He conquers all who conquers self. Know this
And never yield, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
‘Who sows must reap,’ they say, ‘and cause must bring
The sure effect; good, good; bad, bad; and none
Escape the law. But whoso wears a form
Must wear the chain.’ Too true; but far beyond
Both name and form is Atman, ever free.
Know thou art That, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
They know not truth who dream such vacant dreams
As father, mother, children, wife and friend.
The sexless Self! whose father He? whose child?
Whose friend, whose foe is He who is but One?
The Self is all in all, none else exists;
And thou art That, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
There is but One – The Free, The Knower – Self!
Without a name, without a form or stain.
In him is Maya, dreaming all this dream.
The Witness, He appears as nature, soul.
Know thou art That, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
Where seekest thou? That freedom, friend, this world
Nor that can give. In books and temples vain
Thy search. Thine only is that hand that holds
The rope that drags thee on. Then cease lament,
Let go thy hold, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
Say, ‘Peace to all: From me no danger be
To aught that lives. In those that dwell on high,
In those that lowly creep, I am the Self in all.
All life both here and there, do I renounce,
All heavens and earths and hells, all hopes and fears.’
Thus cut thy bonds, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
Heed then no more how body lives or goes,
Its task is done. Let Karma float it down;
Let one put garlands on, another kick
This frame; say naught. No praise or blame can be
Where praiser praised, and blamer blamed are one.
Thus be thou calm, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
Truth never comes where lust and fame and greed
Of gain reside. No man who thinks of woman
As his wife can ever perfect be;
Nor he who owns the least of things, nor he
Whom anger chains, can ever pass thro’ Maya’s gates.
So give these up, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
Have thou no home. What home can hold thee, friend?
The sky thy roof, the grass thy bed; and food
What chance may bring, well cooked or ill, judge not.
No food or drink can taint that noble Self
Which knows itself. Like rolling river free
Thou ever be, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
Few only know the truth. The rest will hate
And laugh at thee, great one; but pay no heed.
Go thou, the free, from place to place, and help
Them out of darkness, Maya’s veil. Without
The fear of pain or search for pleasure, go
Beyond them both, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
Thus, day by day, till Karma’s powers spent,
Release the soul for ever. No more is birth,
Nor I, nor thou, nor God, nor man. The ‘I’
Has All become, the All is ‘I’ and Bliss.
Know thou art That, Sannyasin bold! Say –
    ‘Om tat sat, Om!’
— Swami Vivekananda

Composed at Thousand Island Park, New York, July 1895.

I mean, if just the term “waking up” got him so excited, I wonder what he will do with the song of the Sanyasin? Will he consider Swamiji as a raving Hindutva militant revolutionary? He also says that the 1993 Global Vision 2000 conference in Washington DC was “ostensibly” a centenary celebration of Vivekananda’s visit to the USA, but he thinks this was a key moment in the development of the US Hindu nationalist movement. But he does that without any follow-up explanation, and we are supposed to swallow it.

In other words, the author simply does not prove that Hindu identity is nationalism at all and even lesser are the links to the VHP. There might well be Hindutva effects, but he does not consider the other factor which in many ways is more powerful than the Hindu identity factor. This is the linguistic/cultural factor. Hindus in the UK are more defined by their Asian Gujerati or Punjabi background or their Indian background, rather than something that is a broad based tent. For example, there is a shed load of professional (doctors, accountants, nurses, technology professionals, etc.) Indians who have come over directly from India who do not belong to any of these groupings of Punjabi or Gujerati chaps.

So no, I am not impressed with the forced identification by the author. There is no such thing as an overarching British Hindu identity. The Hindu organisations in the UK are primarily religious and cultural, and very rarely do they step into the political area and for the author to try to attribute Hindutva to this society is simply not borne out by the facts that he quotes. The people on the left and in the academy must realise that they really cannot go about publishing pap like this. Like the climate science academic research imbroglio brewing, their reputation is suffering significantly.

The 1818 Battle of Koregaon - The Beginning of a Casteist War?

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 23:26:58 EST

I received the following email on new year’s day:

ON 1ST JANUARY 1818, MERE 500 BAHUJAN SOLDIERS COURAGEOUSLY FOUGHT AGAINST 50,000 TYRANNICAL FORCES OF MANUWADI PESHWAS AND GAVE THEIR LIVES TO END THE OPPRESSIVE MANUWADI REGIME

EMPIRICAL RULE OF BRITISHERS IN RECOGNITION OF THE GREAT BRAVERY OF BAHUJAN SOLDIERS UNDER THE CAPTAINCY OF SIDNAK MAHAR, ERECTED A MONUMENT AT KOREGAON-BHIMA, PUNE ON THE BANK OF RIVER BHIMA.

DR. B. R. AMBEDKAR, THE BODHISATTVA WHO FOUGHT THROUGHOUT HIS LIFE AGAINST THE AGE OLD MANUWADI OPERATIONS, INVARIABLY USED TO VISIT AND SALUTE THE "VIJAY STAMBHA"- MEMORIAL OF BAHUJAN WARRIORS

LET BAHUJANS NOT FORGET THEIR MARTYRDOM AND OFFER THEIR SALUTATIONS TO THE GREAT MEMORIES OF THOSE GREAT BAHUHAN SOLDIERS WHO RELENTLESSLY FOUGHT TO BREAK THE SHACKLES OF OUR AGE OLD SLAVERY.

LET'S NARRATE THE HISTORY TO FUTURE GENERATIONS SO AS TO MAKE THEM STRONG ENOUGH TO WITHSTAND MANUWAD.

Very impressive. I had never heard of this before, so went looking for more information. Here’s another site where there is more background. Hmmm, fascinating stuff. So if I understood the essence, it was a group of 500 Dalit soldiers who fought approximately 25000 Brahmins. And why is this important? I quote:

First, the British army fought this battle with a minuscule army expecting the worst, especially after their experience of the Pune Regency. Secondly, the battle of Koregaon was one of the most important events which helped tear down the Peshwa Empire and subsequently the Peshwa had to abdicate. Thirdly and most importantly, it was an attempt by the untouchables of Maharashtra to break the shackles of the age-old caste order.

That sort of didnt really jibe with what I had read about the Maratha Wars. So I went to do a bit of poking around.

1. The Maratha Wars:

While I can understand the desire of Dalits to home into that skirmish and claim that to be the be all and end all of all, skirmishes like this have to be grounded in the greater framework. The Maratha Empire brought to life by Shivaji attained its greatest strength by 1760 as shown in the image below.

And I should point out that Shivaji was not a Brahmin. While they claimed Kshyatriya status later on, there are some arguments that he was originally a Dalit, a Shudra to be precise. See here for an overview of this argument. Finally, Shivaji’s army was largely composed of people like him, so it was a Dalit Army anyway which got promoted, so to say. Then comes the first Anglo Maratha War 1777-1783 where first the Maratha’s won and then the British won. In both cases, native soldiers were far too frequently Dalits. Anyway, more land was captured by the Brits and the power of the Maratha’s was further reduced. Peshwa Baji Rao II and his father basically got up to no good. In 1802, BajiRao went and sucked up to the British after being defeated by Holkars in the Battle of Poona. This pissed off the other Maratha warlords and they got into a bit of a fight with the British which ended with more loss of territory for the Marathas. Then comes the crucial 3rd War which our Dalit friends might now appreciate.

This relates to the 3rd Anglo Maratha War 1817-1818 or the Pindari War. The Pindari’s were highly mobile cavalry units which were not on the payroll of any ruler but associated with rulers in return for protection and permission to plunder. Guess what? These Pindari’s were low caste, Ladul and also had quite a lot of Muslims (mainly Afghans and Pusthun). Anyway, all this plundering was not good for the British and a really very big army of 120,000 men and 300 artillery pieces was put into gear by Lord Hastings to exterminate these Pindari’s. The attacks happened from the east in Bengal, from the South in the Deccan and from the west from Gujarat and Bombay. Look at the map above and see who is the nut in this 3-way nutcracker? The Marathas.

2. The immediate predecessor to the 1st Jan 1818 Battle of Koregaon.

Once the British invaded Maratha territory to go after the Pindari’s, there were skirmishes between the Peshwa’s forces and the British forces such as the sack of the British Residency in Pune, and then the British routed another Peshwa force at Khirki. Then the main battle was fought in the Battle of Khadki on November 5, 1817 where the Peshwa Baji Rao was routed pretty much comprehensively and then the British took over the Peshwa’s seat at Shaniwarwada by November 17, 1817. The Peshwa, by this time, was running ragged. There was another battle between the Nagpur forces and the British at Sitabalsi on November 27 1817. The next battle to be fought was the Battle of Mahidpur on 20th December where the Holkar’s fought and lost to the British, after being betrayed by one of the Pindari (who killed Tulsibai).

3. The Battle of Koregaon:

A good description of the battle can be found here. This is a book by WC Taylor, A Popular History of British India published in 1847. See page 268-269 for details of the battle. Sounds like a pretty good bash. Taylor says that the Peshwa’s forces numbered about 25,000 although it should be noted that counting was pretty vague at that time. Still, it wasnt 50,000. But here’s the crucial thing, the Peshwa’s forces then retreated not because they were defeated by Captain Francis Staunton’s forces, but because they got to hear that British reinforcements were coming over. The British forces lost 200 soldiers out of 500, and 6 out of 7 British officers. Good defensive battle without food or water at this village. You can see the layout of the land here although there are no records extant of how the battle actually went, the defences and the lay of the land.

4. The soldiers.

The soldiers who did most of the dying were Mahars. And again ironically, they got their start in being soldiers by no other than Shivaji to become scouts and fortress guards. They were highly mobile light infantry, which is the reason why they were in the 2nd Battalion, 1st regiment of ‘Bombay Native Light Infantry’ as part of the Maratha Light Infantry. The Peshwa’s soldiers were also by and large lower caste soldiers including Mahars, in any case, not Brahmins. So the fighting basically was between lower castes, only the people who were ordering them around were the British and the Peshwas. This Mahar Regiment still exists and has provided two of the most brilliant Indian Army Chiefs: Gen (Retd) K V Krishna Rao and Gen (Retd) K Sunderji. Also, there is no caste element to the regiment from 1963 onwards and it is now a fully mixed regiment.

5. The aftermath of the Battle of Koregaon:

There was another fight between the fleeing Peshwa’s forces and the British at Ashti on February 20th 1818 and he remained under pressure till he surrendered to Sir John Malcolm on June 3, 1818 and was given the pension of an annual payment of 8 lakhs rupees. The Battle of Koregaon was celebrated by raising of an Obelix which commemorated this.

So all in all, I am afraid what my research threw up was in sharp variance with the mythology is being provided. It was frankly a small battle / skirmish in a much bigger war, the Peshwa’s forces were not defeated in this skirmish, the British Army did not fight this battle expecting the worst because they had been winning every battle in this war, this battle of Koregaon was not really that important as fighting kept on happening for months after this battle and I am afraid there is absolutely no evidence that any kind of caste based ideology was involved in the fight.

So all in all, good myth but a rather more calm reading of the historical record tells differently. I can also see why the Dalit hotheads want to use this battle to burnish their credentials. After all, all revolutions need their battles. Google for “Battle of Koregaon” to see how this myth is being built up, but I am afraid the reading is slightly different. If they do want to celebrate the success of lower caste soldiers, they should celebrate Shivaji, the Indian Soldier, the bravery that these soldiers showed to whoever paid them. See here for the campaigns that the Maratha Light Infantry got involved in. But to bring this casteism into the Indian Army? Not really cricket, old chaps. But I am very happy to be corrected if I have not referred to any other source or documentation. Happy to learn more.

Pakistan's Insider Jobs?

C N Anand — Sat, 5 Dec 2009 12:24:21 EST

To turn against one's own country and work for an enemy organization, one has to be embittered to the core, face repression, thwarted in ambition, blocked at every corner, or witness family members raped and killed. Money can only nudge a person into working against his country, the underlying motive has to do with something snapping deep down. The motivation behind the assassination of Indira Gandhi was a perceived sense of repression.

Pakistan started off well with Mohamed Jinnah promising a secular government. Secularism did not last long. Christians and Hindus were soon made second class citizens and those who could afford it fled the country. Those who could not leave, subsisted doing lowly jobs. They could not do any damage to Pakistan as they were not in a position to do so as they lived a hand to mouth existence, and were not employed in sensitive positions. The Ahmadiyas were declared non Muslims and many fled the country. The Shias of the Northern Areas were brutally put down and could not stand the might of the praetorian Pakistani army. The Baluchis have been putting up a fight blowing up gas pipe lines, but have not managed to take the fight outside Baluchistan into the hinterland. There are no Baluchis, Sindhis, Shias of Northern Area and Ahmadiyas in the Pakistan army. The Pushtuns and Punjabis are well represented in the Pakistani army.

The Pakistani offensive in the NWFP could not have endeared them to the Pushtuns. Video recordings of Pushtuns being beaten and tortured in Swat is reverberating across Pakistan. Pushtun refugees streamed out of Swat just before the crops could be harvested. The Tarbela dam Pushtun oustees are yet to be compensated, and are refugees in their own country. Pushtuns outside NWFP, living in Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad are not known to own businesses or occupy high government offices, with many living in slums. However, the Pushtun representation in the army is 15 to 22% among officers and 20 to 25% among the rank and file, where as they comprise only 16 % of the population. Four chiefs, Generals Ayub Khan, Yahya Khan, Gul Hasan Khan and Waheed Kakar have been Pushtuns. However, there are no all Pushtun regiments.

The Pakistani army is known to back-seat-drive Pakistan when a civilian government is in power, and is a government within a government. However, the last few months have seen the inner sanctum of the Pakistani army being violated. The army Head Quarters was attacked and officers taken hostage. The officers Mosque near the Head Quarters, a heavily guarded shrine, was penetrated and many high ranking officers slain. Marriots hotel, frequented by the glitterati of Islamabad was devastated. All this could not have happened without insider help. The Pakistan army must have investigated and the findings must be shaking them to the core. When will the Pushtuns in the army be disarmed is the question. The cracks in the Pakistan army are bound to show soon.