 |
| The Hindu Phenomenon |
|
RETREAT AND RAGE |
|
|
|
|
| And
what has remained of Pakistan since voluntarily serves the ends of
the United States which must, by the very logic of its being, seek
to undermine any Islamic assertion anywhere. Finally, the intensity
of intra- ethnic clashes in Karachi and elsewhere speaks for itself.
Pakistan is a grand failure in terms of its self- definition and the
Indian Muslims know it in the heart of their collective heart even
if they do not wish to take note of the total disarray in Muslim
West Asia, including the Gulf region.
Seen in rational terms from the perspective of Indian Muslims, partition was one of the greatest tragedies in the history of Islam in India. They felt orphaned as they collaborationist role that Sir Sayyid had recommended to them after 1857 - this time with the Congress government. Nehru made it relatively easy for them to do so by ignoring their role in the country's partition and by denouncing as more dangerous the majority communalism (his expression) which existed largely in his own imagination. But I for one doubt whether the Muslim response to the new situation would have been very different if Nehru's pronouncements had been closer to the reality on the ground which was that the Hindus did not constitute a community in any relevant sense of the term, or if someone else was India's first prime minister, provided, of course, that he fulfilled his obligation of ensuring that the Indian Muslims could enjoy their rights as Indian citizens.
|
|
|
|
