When Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh, made the ridiculous statement that ?Muslims have the first charge on our resources?, he was revealing that he had contracted the ?M? virus. M virus, alternatively called minorityism, unbalances the brain and rationality of Indian political leaders and the elite in media and academia, and makes them lopsidedly favour minorities even if not required on the principles of equity.
Of course being compassionate to deprived minorities and their concerns is a noble human rights value. But being fixated on Muslims and Christians, treating them as the only minorities of concern, even if these religious communities are majorities in pockets e.g., in Kashmir and Northeast India, is lopsided.
In such a lopsided minorityism, Hindus as and when in minority do not have the same rights, even as a ?last charge?, as the events in Kashmir and Northeast have proved. The facts that Hindus in these areas are being butchered, raped, driven out, forcibly converted do not concern Dr. Manmohan Singh.
Muslims and Christians as minorities, are not entitled to ?first charge? because sequentially Muslims and Christians have been ruling classes for one 1000 years while the Hindus were brutalized. Only SCs and STs are entitled to first charge, and that too for one generation.
Political parties that have been swearing by secularism all these years, however because of minorityism, have failed to persuade the masses that what they advocate is good for country. The nation is in search of something which is more relevant and consistent with our ancient ethos, since secularism as defined and propagated today in India has been reduced to minorityism or minority appeasement. In this dispensation, only Hindus have to appease Muslims and Christians even when they are in majority in pockets of India. Anywhere else in the world, Muslims and Christians do not have to return the favour of appeasement.
The question today is not whether secularism is flawed but whether we should conceptually redefine secularism to make it acceptable to the masses in the country. The answer is surely ?yes?. Such a re-defined concept must be however harmonized with concept of an Indian identity.
Such an identity conceptually requires that India be regarded as Hindustan, i.e., a nation of Hindus and those other who proudly accept Hindus as their ancestors. In this context, Indianness means ?Hindutva?. Thus, Indian identity rests on two pillars: India as Hindustan and Indianness as Hindutva.
In India, Jawaharlal Nehru and his followers had given the concept of secularism an anti-Hindu content. For example, personal and inheritance laws would be legislated for Hindus and subject to judicial review, but not for Muslims and Christians. Thus Manmohan Singh'sM virus has its roots in Nehruism. Even in public functions, cultural symbolism such as lighting a lamp to inaugurate a conference or breaking a coconut to launch a project was regarded as against secularism. A conceptual void thus will remain until we not only reject minorityism but also develop a concept of secularism that is in harmony with the national imperative of Hindutva and the nation as Hindustan.
To fill this void, we need to develop therefore a concept of secularism by which an Indian citizen could comprehend how he or she should bond ?secularly? with another citizen of a different religion, language or region and feel as a fellow countrymen. The Indian instinctively cannot accept the idea that India is what the British had put together, and that the country was just a body administratively incorporated after a series of invasions that did good in arts, crafts, modern education and communication, to the geographical mass of what is known as India today. We cannot accept this rubbish dished out from the JNU.
Instead, Bharat Mata has a soul which Shri Deendayal Upadhyaya had called chiti which soul was not recognised in Nehru'signorant view. The ridiculous idea that India is a nation fostered by British rule, propagated even today by JNU historians, therefore finds just no takers amongst the Indian people.
Only by using religious symbols can this void be filled. India being 83 per cent Hindu, the rest being of Hindu descent, and that the folklore in this religion is pan-Indian, therefore it is easy for the masses of all Hindustanis to understand religious bonding. Ramayana narration traverses from the Punjab to Sri Lanka. Mahabharata covers incidents from Assam to Gujarat. Adi Shankara connected Kerala to Kashmir. This need not alienate Muslims and Christians if they proudly accept that their ancestors were Hindus. The problem arises only if the Muslims and Christians identify themselves with foreign invaders.
Minorityism has undesirable effect on national integrity. For example, minorityism enables Muslim men to resist family planning by making their women vulnerable to sudden divorce, and hence in fear not have a voice in how many children they will bear. Muslim men know that uniform civil code will never come under a regime committed to minorityism.
Christian missionaries have now under minorityism got a free hand to conduct money-induced religious conversion. They are not bothered from where that money comes and what ethical and moral norms they have to violate for it.
For example, Mother Teresa shocked the conscience of all genuinely secular-minded persons when she wrote directly to Judge Lance Ito of Los Angeles Court on behalf of a known fraud and embezzler Charles Keating who was facing prosecution because he stole $252 million from 17,000 pensioners, retail stock holders and insurance premiums by selling them bogus bonds of his company. He had donated $5 million (Rs.25 crore) to Missionaries of Charity, Kolkata, headed by Mother Teresa, and that was enough for her to write to Judge Ito directly asking him not to convict Keating! Her words to Judge Ito were even more astounding: ?Please look into your heart as you sentence Charles Keating and do what Jesus would do.?
Judge Ito ignored her plea, and convicted Keating to spend years in jail, and also imposed a huge fine. He however asked the Public Prosecutor (Deputy District Attorney in US) Paul W. Turley to reply to Mother Teresa. Turley turned Mother Teresa'splea on her by posing a question: ?You asked Judge Ito to do what Jesus would do. I submit the same challenge to you: Ask yourself what Jesus would do if he were given the fruits of a crime; what Jesus would do if he were in possession of money that had been stolen; what Jesus would do if he were being exploited by a thief to ease his conscience?? Then came Turley'spunchline: ?I submit that Jesus would promptly and unhesitatingly return the stolen property to its rightful owners. You should do the same.?
Then Turley implored Mother Teresa: ?You have been given money by Mr. Keating that he has been convicted of stealing by fraud. Do not keep the money. Return it to those who worked for it and earned it! If you contact me I will put you in direct contact with the rightful owners of the property now in your possession.? (Extracted from Hitchens Christopher: The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice.
Of course, Mother Teresa felt no such moral compulsion, ignored Turley and kept Keating'stainted gift of $5 million of stolen money.
Hence, we Hindus must learn today that in the name of secularism and vasudhaiva kutumbakkam we do not fall prey to pious looking foreign women dressed in saris and talking about a ?universal God?, or pretending to be grieving widows. Remember, when Ravana came to abduct Sita, he came dressed as a pious sannyasi, and not as his true self.
Likewise, minorityism is a recipe for national disintegration and disaster. Capitulationist Hindus are paving the way for this to happen. The only antidote is a virat Hindutva. The present UPA is hell-bent on protecting the interests only of the Muslims and Christians by lopsided minorityism. For them to convert is to be permitted, but if anyone tries of his volition converts out of Christianity or Islam, then the state moves in to stop it. For example, in 2005 a group of Mizos were discovered by Jewish scholars as a lost tribe of Israel. The Mizos also confirmed that their practices were still Jewish but formally they had been converted forcibly to Christianity by British colonialists. They desired to return to the Jewish faith. Therefore in November 2005 Israel decided to dispatch some Rabbis to Aizwal to conduct the necessary re-conversion ceremonies. But Dr. Manmohan Singh himself intervened on the direction of Ms. Sonia Gandhi to ask the MEA to cancel the Rabbis? visa and inform Israel that ?Government of India does not approve of such conversion activities.?
Hindus have been traditionally very liberal and secular. The tiniest minority, the Parsis turned down the offer of reservations by the British colonialists saying that they are ?comfortable with Hindus.? In fact, the fleeing Zoroastrians from Muslim rampage in Persia went in all directions. Only in India they survived as a community.
We cannot allow therefore the M virus to destroy the Hindu foundation of India. Hence, Hindus must develop a virile modern mindset. We have to recognise that Islam has a Jekyll and Hyde theology?one behaviour when in majority [Hyde] and another while in minority [Jekyll]. Christianity especially Catholicism of Opus Dei, and Evangelism in US are predator theology?which means convert unless we show them out virat ekta. Thus the only antidote is Hindutva.
(The writer is President, Janata Party and a former Union Law Minister.)
