This admittance on the part of the general secretary of the Congress Secular Hindu Forum reveals many things and for that he deserves congratulations.
Today, the utmost need for the Hindu society is to stand up against any injustice perpetrated against it in the same way as Shri Amarnath Shrine Board Andolan had done in Jammu-Kashmir recently. The struggle they launched by rising above the considerations of castes, creeds, religious denominations, languages etc., has set a new example in the history of our country. The political leaders run after vote-bank. So long as they find that the Hindus are divided they run after the Muslim and Christian vote-banks and care hoots for Hindu sentiments and injustices perpetrated against them. But Jammu has changed all this. If we just take cognisance of the jail bharo andolan of three days ? 18th, 19th and 20th August? we shall be able to gauge the uniqueness of this movement.
Jammu has a population of 56 lakh of which 16 lakh are Muslims. From the rest of the Hindu society 2 lakh 21 thousand men came on foot and voluntarily courted arrest. On August 19, 1 lakh 74 thousand women came out from their homes and got arrested. When asked for their names, every one of them replied ?Parvati?, husband'sname? ? ?Shiva?, address? ? Baltal, Kashmir. Perhaps this was the biggest turn up of our matri-shakti in the history of world. The third day was for the children. 1 lakh 12 thousand children between the age of 5 to 15 years courted arrest. No mother or grand-mother expressed any concern about what will happen to the children in case of any stampede. None of the children thought what would happen to their future career. In the jail when asked for the name, the reply was ?Ganapati?, mother'sname? ??Parvati?, father'sname? ??Shiva?, residence? ? Baltal, Kashmir.
On a particular day the government and non-governmental service personnel decided to go on mass casual leave. A question cropped up ? how could the doctors go on casual leave leaving the emergency patients unattended. It was decided that during day time they would be on casual leave and during night they will be attending serious patients. When the patients of different hospitals came to know about this decision, they, some of them were in a critical condition, informed the doctors that??They need two things?dava (medicines) and dua (blessings) and it is said that blessings are more potent than medicines. You administer medicines daily, now we need your blessings. You are being on a full day (24 hours) casual leave that will be dua for us. Rest assured, nothing will happen to us.? And by the blessings of ?Bhole Baba?, nothing happened.
The movement was in its ninth day. Seeing that there was no positive outcome, one Shri Kuldeep Dogra came to the venue, recited a poem there, and in his three minutes address said ??This movement now needs sacrifice and I shall sacrifice my life.? Saying this he sat down and immediately fell down with a bang. Seeing froth coming out of his mouth, it was revealed that he had taken ?sulfas? and before he could be admitted in the hospital, he had already become a martyr on the way.
Before that, six martyrs had already fallen to the bullets of the police force and one to that of security personnel. Now this new series of people seeking martyrdom had started. Had this not been checked, the number could have risen up to 50-100. Is this not a grand example of martyrdom for a noble cause?
The movement for saving the Ram Sethu proved to be the harbinger of united resistance movement of the Hindu society. On September 12, 2007, a call was given for rasta roko (blocking the roads) from 8 am to 11 am, which culminated in success even in the left-ruled states. The case of Agartala (Tripura) however needs special mention for its novelty. There the RSS and the other Hindu forces are not strong enough but the Hindu society strongly wished to do something to show solidarity with the Ram Sethu movement. An idea flashed in the fertile mind of a young man and he immediately shared it with some of his colleagues. Accordingly in early morning at 4 am they placed an old motor-tyre in the middle of the national highway joining Agartala to Silchar and putting some dry twigs, leaves etc. and set it on fire. When the flames rose, immediately some people awoke from their slumber and began to shout agun, agun (fire-fire). Somebody informed the fire brigade and immediately 9-10 vehicles reached the spot and the area was cordoned. This blocked the highway and before long there was a long queue of trucks, buses and cars on both sides. By the time jam was cleared it was already 10-10.30 and thus the chakka jam movement was successful.
In Jammu, when the agitation for Shri Amarnath Shrine was going on, people were courting arrest and making sacrifices. People decided to show their solidarity with the movement all over the country. It was decided that they should resort to jail-bharo movement at their places. Freedom was given to local units to choose any date convenient to them between August 12th and 21st. Apart from Jammu, some 5 lakh 25 thousand people offered themselves to get arrested at 6,120 places. Some of them were arrested; the rest peacefully registered their protests by squatting at a square on road for three hours. The highlight was, men of high status who generally do not come out of their homes also participated in support of this movement.
Time has come for the awakened Hindu society to shed its image of being docile, always prone to be bullied and attacked by others. We never go to attack anybody but if anybody attacks, in self-defence we should never hesitate to resist. The resistance should be such that the attackers get a lesson that we have authority of law to retaliate in self-defence. The attackers should get a lesson for their life that the attack on the Hindu society will only be counter productive.
Today, shedding its centuries old torpor, our country is rising. When we use the term Hindu, it encompasses all those who accept Bharatmata as their mother, all the great personalities of the nation as our ancestors and subscribe to the main ingredients of our sanskriti i.e. ethos that say that the truth is one and the wise men describe it in various ways, as also the principle that there are many paths leading to the ultimate goal and all those paths are true. Those who say that only our way is the true one, all others are false, cannot be a part of Hindu society. Those who indulge in proselytisation by force, allurement and inducement have no place in this nation'slife.
If all of us move in unison, tread our own respective paths cooperating with each other then the day is not far away when the flag of our nation will fly highest in the world. Let us move with our heart throbbing with the spirit contained in the following stanza-
O immortal son'sof our motherland,
Cultivate unquenchable fiery power in yourselves,
Fill the sons of the soil with devotion to the nation,
And spread far and wide Bharat'sname and fame.
Afflicted are the Himalayas is the measuring rod of this Earth,
And evil forces want to sever the saffron fields from us,
Think again about the safety of Ganga, Geeta and Gomata
Fill the sons of the soil with devotion to the nation
And spread far and wide Bharat'sname and fame.
(This is the translation of original speech in Hindi.)
