EditorialIndiaNewsOpinionPoliticsSpirituality

Kashi, Mathura Mosques, Private Grief of Muslims, Not The World’s Concern


You are already Here! Don’t leave without Like, Share, Commenting, or Tweet…be the Voice of the Free Press!!

EDITORIAL: By Saeed Naqvi, Copy Edited by Adam Rizvi, TIO:

Muslims who are out to transform Gyanvapi, Kashi, and the Shahi Masjid, Mathura, into issues exactly on a scale that the other side wants, must pause to glance at the cover of the May 20 issue of The Economist. It shows Narendra Modi airborne in an electric three-wheeler.

“India’s Moment” in bold font dominates the cover. Below the heading, in smaller font, are words of doubt: “Will Modi blow it?”

Also Read: India: Use of Facial Recognition Technologies (FRTs) in Policing.

Your wails about the two mosques may rend the skies, but they are unlikely to veer the world from its main preoccupation. New world order is being shaped. As this process gets underway, India is in a very sweet spot. No country in the world is being wooed as assiduously. Foreign Minister, S. Jaishankar has found his touch. He has corrected the tilt which has enhanced India’s value in the emerging post-Ukraine world order.

Also Read: Tucker Carlson’s Replacement Theory and Protectionism.

The omens are bad for Muslims who have pitched their tents just at this moment around the mosques. The world is riveted on how the global cookie will crumble. The Economist, which is the mouthpiece for western capitalism, is all starry-eyed: “India is likely to be the world’s fastest-growing world economy this year.” Where do the two minority places of worship figure in this hoopla?

The lavish barrage of expectations being showered is not for the love of India alone. The world “will have recognized, if it has not already, that the rise of China was a unique event; the Indian growth will be world-changing.”

Also Read: Why Is India’s Successful 1971 Sri Lanka Intervention, A Forgotten Story?

By way of caution, the magazine has given sufficient play to the political, and social decay which Modi must arrest before India goes full-throttle on the straight. The main message of Hindutva, says The Economist, is “that Hindus must unite to face the danger.” which may “sound absurd in a country with an unassailable preponderance of Hindus.”

“But the urgency and the cry against a narrative of a Hindu Reconquista after centuries of Muslim and European rule over mother India is irresistible for many.”

Also Read: Converting from Hinduism to any other religion is not an option in India!

The Gyanvapi and Shahi Masjid enthusiasts must note two points in the paragraph. Hindu “Reconquista” is being invoked reminiscent of the Christian reconquest in Spain, against a religious category Muslims. That far the image fits India like a glove. But along with Muslims are listed a people who inhabit a territory, Europe. Surely, Europeans too have a religion. French President Valery Giscard d’Estaing opposed Turkey’s entry into Europe because “Turkey is Muslim and European civilization is Christian.”

Also Read: Sri Lanka Outcome: America Returns To South Asia

Do not blame The Economist. This is an established western sleight of hands. During the Bosnian war, “Serbs and Croats” were in conflict with “Bosnian Muslims” – two ethnic entities in conflict with a religious category. Elaborating on Serbian Orthodox and Croatian Catholics would open up faultlines within the Christian universe as the conflict in Northern Ireland does.

Also Read: Putin’s Adviser: Sanctions Hitting Europe More Because US Wants It Weakened

For those protecting the parapets at Kashi and Mathura mosques, it may be useful, to know the opposing side. And it is the multitudes on the “opposing side” who are swaying in a mystical trance with their “beens” (snake charmer’s flute), trying to mesmerize Mother India. When India wakes up, it will be “their” bulwark against China.

Also Read: Crucial Exercise of Delimitation, Electoral Map Jammu & Kashmir

The word “Reconquista” used by the magazine is loaded. It resonates with the return of Christian power in Andalusia. The termination of Muslim rule in Spain which lasted 800 years, bears minimal resemblance to the Muslim predicament in the Indian subcontinent, but the authors of Hindutva may derive inspiration from the way Jews and Muslims were harassed, harried, tortured during the Inquisition which followed the return of Christian rule in Spain.

Also Read: Chennai protest: Muslims in the communal violence-hit Jahangirpuri, Delhi

Inquisition was harsher on the Jews who found hospitality in the Muslim Kingdom of Morocco and later also in the Ottoman Empire. The Jew’s gratitude to the Moroccan king lasted for generations. I have seen King Hassan II’s photographs dominate the drawing rooms of Sephardic Jews in Jerusalem.

The Gyanvapi mosque in Varanasi. Photo Courtesy: Dr. A.P. Singh/File

What should interest Gyanvapi and Shahi Masjid enthusiasts is the story of one of the world’s most magnificent mosques that I have ever seen. Poet Iqbal’s visit to the monument yielded a masterpiece the opening line of which sums up the metaphysical, civilizational perspective. He sees the great monument of Cordoba (Masjid e-Qarduba in Urdu) as:

Also Read: Muslim population growth rate Checked by Assam CM  

“Silsilaye Roz o shub

Asl e mamat o hayat”

(A continuity with interchangeability from day to night, a metaphor for life and death.)

Reverting to the two mosques: these are bad times for being reasonable and yet it is tempting to coax something from Rudyard Kipling:

“If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you…..”

Also Read: New political culture has made India a moving anarchy

The Sachar Committee report in 2005 showed the abysmal drop of the Muslims on every social indicator, but even that report was not as hurtful as the reality today is. It had not shown Muslims as battered and bruised. When a people arc down and out how do you tell them that the mosques are medieval relics of conquest and Kashi and Mathura are like Mecca and Medina to the Hindus. Mathura “Nagari”, not the mosque, is where Maulana Hasrat Mohani longed to die in “Krishna’s embrace”.

Also Read: Ram Navami Flags stitched by Muslims for Centuries!

Wali Dakhini wrote:

“Koocha e yaar aen Kaashi hai

Jogia dil wahan ka vaasi hai”

(The lane where my beloved lives are exactly like Kashi

The yogi of my heart has taken up residence there.)

Also Read: Muslim shopkeepers denied stalls at temple festival fairs in South Karnataka

This is no time to remind wounded people about Wali. Although the irony is that Wali’s Mazar outside Ahmadabad’s main police station was razed by the February 2002 rioters who probably did not even know who lay buried there. No, this is no time to tell them anything, not even the fact that the issue has been raised now precisely in preparation for the elections in 2024 and the RSS centenary in 2025. It is an invitation to Muslims to dig their heels in. The BJP will then polarize.

Also Read: Hijab: My Life, My Right, My Choice, “World Hijab Day”.

Also, be warned on another count. The Economist has already told you: a pity but your tragedies are not in the world’s ken.

Also, Read more from this Author: What Is At The Heart of Ukraine Story?

Curated and Compiled by Humra Kidwai

 


Saeed Naqvi

Saeed Naqvi

Saeed Naqvi is a senior Indian journalist, television commentator, interviewer. He has interviewed world leaders and personalities in India and abroad, which appear in newspapers, magazines and on national television, remained editor of the World Report, a syndication service on foreign affairs, and has written for several publications, both global and Indian, including the BBC News, The Sunday Observer, The Sunday Times, The Guardian, Washington Post, The Indian Express, The Citizen and Outlook magazine. At the Indian Express, he started in 1977 as a Special Correspondent and eventually becoming, editor, Indian Express, Madras, (1979–1984), and Foreign Editor, The Indian Express, Delhi in 1984, and continues to writes columns and features for the paper.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *