In an age when India fancies itself as a modern republic — secular, pluralistic, and constitutionally bound to the pursuit of justice and equality — the tragic events that unfolded in Pahalgam serve as a chilling reminder that beneath the gilded surface of legalese lies a festering ideological rot. When individuals are gunned down not for what they did, but for the mere fact of what they believe — or, more damningly, what they do not believe — then we must ask: Has the Indian state merely become an edifice of theatrical secularism propped up by the cynical collusion of vote-hungry politicians, complicit intellectuals, and ideologically agnostic institutions?
The Pahalgam killings — wherein individuals were executed after being asked their religion — were not isolated acts of violence. They were the grotesque flowering of a toxic mindset that finds nourishment not merely in the gunpowder of terrorism, but in the rhetoric of institutionalised appeasement, religious exclusivism, and what I dare call “secular surrender.” One must be wilfully blind not to see the pattern: Kashmir’s soil has, for decades, been drenched in the blood of those labelled kafirs by jihadist theocrats masquerading as freedom fighters.
And yet, this macabre reality elicits no candlelight vigils in JNU, no indignant editorials in The Wire, and no humanitarian outrage from the keepers of India’s so-called conscience. Why? Because the victims were Hindus — expendable entities in the grand narrative of “minority victimhood” that the political Left has mastered into an electoral science. Worse still, the invisible hand of complicity extends far beyond the trigger-happy militant. The ideological infrastructure that enables such carnage finds expression in the teachings of radical madrasas, the silence of secularist intellectuals, and the calculated evasions of opposition parties who treat Islamist extremism not as a threat to national unity but as an opportunity to consolidate vote banks. One cannot but notice the convenient convergence between the panic in the WaqfBoard over state scrutiny, the perfunctory silence of the Congress Party, and the emboldened rhetoric of clerics who define pluralism as submission.
This opinion is not an appeal to emotion; it is a call to reason. It is a forensic examination of how secularism in India has metastasised into cowardice, how opposition politics has been reduced to moral abdication, and how religious pedagogy — left unchecked and unchallenged — becomes an incubator for civilisational nihilism. The time has come to name, shame, and challenge the ideological ecosystems that enable violence against the very fabric of the Indian ethos.
The Doctrinal Roots of Islamist Violence and Its Indian Mutation
The problem of religious violence in India, and more specifically in Kashmir, cannot be comprehended without peering into the abyss of doctrinal exclusivism that undergirds it. Islamic extremism, in its rawest essence, is not a reactionary eruption — it is a meticulously cultivated creed that draws spiritual legitimacy from absolutist interpretations of scripture. The concept of Dar al-Harb (land of war) and Dar al-Islam (land of Islam) is not some fringe obscurity; it forms the very fulcrum of the ideological construct through which radicalised actors view the non-Muslim world. India, with its pluralistic heritage and Hindu civilisational identity, is by that definition a permanent affront to the exclusivist worldview that jihadist pedagogy perpetuates.
What is even more alarming, however, is the quiet institutionalisation of this mindset within India’s own religious education system. Thousands of unregulated madrasas — often funded by opaque overseas donors — continue to impart not scientific rationality, not critical inquiry, but medieval indoctrination that paints non-believers as enemies to be subdued, converted, or eliminated. When a child is taught that only one Book holds the absolute truth, that only one God deserves worship, and that all others are to be pitied or punished, the result is not merely piety — it is programmed intolerance. That such education is often protected under the garb of “minority rights” is a testament to how Indian secularism has been weaponized not against bigotry, but against those trying to challenge it.
Let it be said unequivocally: not all madrasas preach violence, but too many do preach exclusivity — and exclusivity, when combined with political grievance and theological superiority, becomes the breeding ground for terror. It is not the AK-47 that fires the bullet; it is the clerical dogma that loads the chamber.
The Perfidy of Pseudo-Secularism
Yet, if theological extremism is the disease, then India’s brand of secularism is the enabler — a paralytic doctrine that confuses moral equivalence with intellectual sophistication and subdues truth to accommodate electoral arithmetic. The secular Indian elite has mastered the art of selective outrage with Orwellian precision. A Muslim man lynched in Uttar Pradesh becomes a national crisis, triggering op-eds, panel discussions, and UN interventions. But a Hindu pilgrim slaughtered in Kashmir? That, we are told, is either “communal tension,” “security failure,” or worse, a justifiable “reaction” to historical grievances. This is not secularism — it is moral schizophrenia. And it stems from an ideology that treats Hinduism as inherently dominant and therefore unworthy of sympathy, and Islam as eternally victimised and therefore above reproach. Such a worldview not only infantilizes the Muslim community by exempting it from accountability, it also dehumanises Hindus by stripping their suffering of any emotive legitimacy.
The idea of secularism in India has mutated into a grotesque farce — an ideological shield used by opportunists to protect religious majoritarianism of a certain kind, while demonising any expression of Hindu civilisational pride as fascism. In this warped morality play, the Hindu victim becomes the aggressor, the terrorist becomes the “disenfranchised youth,” and the Islamist preacher becomes a misunderstood reformer. One must ask: when did secularism become synonymous with cowardice? When did standing up for Hindu lives become a “communal” act? When did dissent against jihadist terror become hate speech? This moral inversion is not merely dangerous — it is suicidal.
The Political Collusion of the Opposition: When Silence Screams Guilt
Let us speak plainly. The Indian National Congress — once the standard-bearer of India’s freedom struggle — has devolved into an instrument of intellectual cowardice and political duplicity. Its failure to condemn Islamic terrorism by name, its flirtations with Islamist figures for electoral gain, and its tacit endorsement of the “Hindu terror” narrative make it an accomplice in the ideological erosion of the Indian state. Recall the strategic silence that followed the mass exodus of Kashmiri Pandits in 1989. Recall the shameful coinage of “saffron terror” to balance the moral scales. Recall the opposition to banning radical outfits like SIMI. These are not accidents — they are a political doctrine rooted in appeasement, cowardice, and opportunism.
The same pattern repeats across the fragmented alliance of regional satraps and national dynasts. Whether it is Mamata Banerjee’s indulgence of Islamist clerics, or the Aam Aadmi Party’s electoral courtship of extremist Muslim voices, or the Communists’ cultural relativism that romanticised jihad as resistance — the end result is the same: a national consensus of cowardice. Pahalgam, then, is not an aberration. It is a symptom. A symptom of what happens when an entire political ecosystem privileges votes over values, and fear of offence over fidelity to truth.
Media Complicity and the Death of Public Conscience
The Indian media — ever eager to don the robes of moral guardianship — has displayed an astonishing selectivity in its reportage. Newsrooms erupt in outrage over the harassment of hijab-clad students in Karnataka, but fall eerily silent when Hindu devotees are gunned down for failing a religious identity test in Kashmir. The same journalists who champion freedom of expression go deathly quiet when it comes to criticising Islamist bigotry. The same editorial pages that dissect the symbolism of saffron fail to examine the genocidal slogans of La ilaha illallah shouted at Hindu homes. This is not journalism; it is ideological performance art. And it is corrosive — not only to public discourse but to the very notion of truth. A society whose information class is ideologically enslaved cannot hope to remain democratic for long.
The Educational Apocalypse: How Religious Instruction Became a Weapon
At the heart of this civilisational crisis lies a neglected but potent force: education. Or rather, its abdication. The proliferation of madrasa education that extols dogma over dialogue, memorisation over modernity, and division over diversity has created a parallel intellectual universe. In this universe, secular law is irrelevant, science is suspect, and the only valid knowledge is that which emanates from theological absolutism. The state’s failure to regulate such institutions — out of fear, political calculation, or sheer indifference — is not just a policy failure. It is a civilisational betrayal. No country can allow its children to be raised in epistemic ghettos and hope to emerge as a pluralistic, progressive society. And yet that is exactly what India is doing — subsidising its own fragmentation in the name of religious freedom.
Towards a Strategic Response: Retaliation, Reform, and Reclamation
What, then, is the way forward? First, let us abandon the pretence that dialogue alone can neutralise fundamentalism. You cannot reason with a man who believes your death is a divine command. The response must be multifaceted — military, economic, ideological. India must impose strict economic sanctions on institutions that propagate or shelter radical ideology — whether they be seminaries, NGOs, or foreign-funded charities. The flow of zakat, hawala, and Wahhabi petro-dollars must be choked. Tax exemptions to organisations that engage in divisive pedagogy must be revoked. No democracy can survive if it finances its own enemies.
Second, a wholesale reimagining of Indian secularism is in order. Secularism cannot mean blind neutrality between victim and aggressor. It must mean unflinching defence of constitutional values — even if it offends religious orthodoxy. The state must assert its authority not as an agent of appeasement, but as the custodian of civilisational balance. Third, public memory must be preserved. The massacre of Hindus in Kashmir must not be allowed to fade into statistical oblivion. National museums, school curricula, and public commemorations must tell the truth — not just about 1947, but about 1989, 1998, 2017, and Pahalgam. A nation that forgets its victims prepares for their repetition.
Reclaiming the Republic from Its Own Complacency
Let us end with this: a republic that recoils from naming its enemies will eventually be named by them. The Pahalgam massacre is not a wake-up call — it is the alarm we keep snoozing. But every snooze comes at the cost of innocent lives, of national integrity, and of civilisational coherence.
India must choose: appeasement or assertion, surrender or sovereignty, pseudo-secularism or principled pluralism. To stand with the victims of Pahalgam is not to be communal. It is to be human. It is to say, unequivocally, that no life deserves to be measured, mourned, or memorialised based on religious identity. To do otherwise is to surrender — not just territory — but the soul of the Indian republic.
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