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Wednesday, September 2, 2009

[mukto-mona] Re: OUR RESPONSE TO ATTACK ON HINDU FAFILY



Dear Well wishers

I believe we shall overcome. We obviously to ensure our values, dignity, culture, law & rights. thanks for your valuable command,

Regards,
Pinaki Das
Joint Secretary
Sonatan International Foundation (SIF)
9/A, Dhanmondi, Dhaka-1205, Bangladesh
Cell: 01911012249,  01199083665
email: sonatan.international.foundation@gmail.com



On Wed, Sep 2, 2009 at 12:38 AM, Dhiman Chowdhury <dhiman.chowdhury@gmail.com> wrote:

Dear All,

I often refrain myself from discussing societal decay in a public forum.

However, I realize that, to this abstraction of our survival, it is imperative to draw your attention to our tragedy.

Let's accept, the menace we are facing will not go away, in fact it will increase due to geo-economic and religio-political situation of the country.

What we fail to understand and often ignore, is that, the misery we face is the corollary of our inactions, muddy abstractions of egocentricity and self righteousness. It's a behavioral pathology within, and society at large that we need to face. Apathy is the norm in the world stage, human rights to that aspect is a buzz word that is only endowed to communities with economic and political sway, and to the facet, we have little to offer.

But, that too, is the least of our problem.

Our problem is us; our rejoice in dissections, our apathy to our society, our muddy abstraction of self-centricity and self righteousness and our behavioral construct to recognize interdependency of the community.

In despair, I have to admit, we have let down our community…

Unless we unite, pull ourselves out of the muddy labyrinth, our existence as a community may be at stake.

Let us all work on disbursing our duty to the fellows, together, we can triumph.

 

 

Thanks

Dhiman Deb Chowdhury

HRCBM

http://www.hrcbm.org



On Mon, Aug 31, 2009 at 2:21 AM, Sonatan Foundation <sonatan.international.foundation@gmail.com> wrote:
Dear Akash Vai,

We all are dedicated to promote and encourage to protect our human rights and fundamental freedom,
Thanks for your response.

Regards,

Pinaki Das

Sonatan International Foundation (SIF)
Bangladesh

On Mon, Aug 31, 2009 at 2:41 AM, Jahangir Akash <jahangiralamakash@gmail.com> wrote:

Dear All,

Greetings,

Please should be united and to do something about the right and security of minority in Bangladesh.

http://www.humanrightstoday.info/?p=1047 

Please forget your political fascination. As a human rights defender we should be impartial, universal and dedicated to the human rights.

With thanks,

Editor, the Human Rights Today
www.humanrightstoday.info






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[mukto-mona] A comprehensive analysis of India's Partition Process from Foundation of Indo Turkic Studies

Jaswant Singh Book on Jinnah Revisits the 1947 Partition

Since the release of Jaswant Singh's book on Jinnah and the partition on 18 August , political class in India , historians .media and others , even in Pakistan have been engrossed in the dissection of the book 's contents and claims . The author a senior BJP leader has been unceremoniously expelled and the BJP itself is in turmoil . which could hasten a change of the guard.

A comprehensive survey of views and comments on the Partition of Hindustan, its leaders Nehru, Jinnah and Patel and the last Viceroy Mountbatten and the strategy of imperial powers covers this essay.

Cheers and take care Gajendra Singh . 31 August ,2009 .Mayur Vihar ,Delhi

FOUNDATION FOR INDO-TURKIC STUDIES
Tel/Fax ; 43034706 Amb (Rtd) K Gajendra Singh
Emails; Gajendrak@hotmail.com A-44 ,IFS Apartments
KGSingh@Yahoo.com Mayur Vihar –Phase 1,
Web site. Delhi 91, India.
30 August , 2009.

Jaswant Singh Book on Jinnah Revisits the 1947 Partition by K. Gajendra Singh http://www.boloji.com/analysis2/0478.htm
Why are Indians Afraid of Faulting the Imperialist British
Turmoil and Dissensions in Bhartiya Janata Party
Ever since 18 August following the release of Jaswant Singh's book - "Jinnah: India-Partition-Independence ", there has been a turmoil among politicians, specially in his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), historians and in the Indian media. Singh, a former Finance, Defense and External Affairs Minister in Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee cabinet was summarily expelled from the party in a graceless manner. BJP leaders are publicly decrying each other and ranged on two sides, those of Hindu hardline organization, Rashtriya Seva Sangh (RSS) antecedents, with hard exclusive Hindutva ideology, and the others, moderate and educated ones like journalist Arun Shourie and Yashwant Sinha, a former civil servant, apart from Singh, all members of Vajpayee's cabinet and close to him in liberal worldview.

Reaction of BJP and RSS

The sarvsanchalak or the chief of RSS Mohan Bhagwat, who controls the BJP, came over to Delhi from the Sangh's headquarters in Nagpur in central India and to stop the internecine squabbling and party's bleeding credibility. But the theatre and the spilling out of the differences and quarrels have cast a shadow on the credibility on BJP stalwart and former deputy Prime Minister Lal Kishan Advani who in spite of direct attacks has maintained a stoic silence. A new and younger leadership is likely to be installed by the RSS bosses in the near future.
BJP acquired power mainly through Advani's divisive and Hindu-Muslim polarizing Rathyatras (chariot rides), demolition of Babri Mosque in Ayodhya and subsequent Hindu Muslim riots, pogrom against Muslims in Gujarat under BJP Chief Minister Narendra Modi and other anti-national acts . Perhaps realizing that the people cannot be misled any more , Advani used his 'discovery' of a secular Jinnah while visiting Pakistan to attract Muslim votes in India, who are now determinedly opposed to BJP and its policies. One can never put anything beyond a politician's quest for power.
One of the main thrusts of the book appears to be that late Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, along with conservative Congress leader Sardar Patel, were equally responsible for the partition of Hindustan along with Mohammed Ali Jinnah, the main protagonist for Pakistan. Jinnah, an anathema to BJP and its Hindutva philosophy, in fact comes in for praise in the book, for his secular credentials, perhaps with the aim of also undermining Nehru's mystique and the Congress party.

During his 2005 Karachi visit, Advani told a Pak TV channel that "Pakistan would have been a secular nation if Jinnah's speech of 1947 was implemented. It was pushed beneath the carpet. Pakistan would have been a different country had Jinnah's views been understood." His praise for Jinnah's raised a storm in his party. He received fierce criticism from RSS and had to step down from BJP president's post. He was, however, rescued from the isolation by Atal Behari Vajpayee.

Of course none of Sangh Parivar leaders attended the book release and the panel discussion after which the controversy erupted. BJP's lackluster President Rajnath Singh stated that Jaswant Singh views in the book "do not represent the views of the party". "In fact, the party completely disassociates itself from the contents of the book," he added. After the book release, when asked if the RSS agreed with Singh's view that Jinnah has been "demonized" in India, Ram Madhav, an RSS leader said, "I have only read excerpts of the book. But I am constrained to say that it is far from the truth to state that Jinnah was not responsible for the Partition."
BJP spokesperson Prakash Javadekar refused to make any direct comment on Singh's book, but made it clear that the party did not agree with the contention that Jinnah was not responsible for partition and said the party stood by its June 2005 resolution on Jinnah, which holds him as one of the most important politicians responsible for the partition of India. Narendra Modi's BJP government in Gujarat banned the book. Jaswant Singh has petitioned the Supreme Court to lift the ban. India like many other nations even democracies is showing Orwellian tendencies.
Panel Discussion
In a panel discussion after the book release, maverick Lawyer Ram Jethmalani, inimical to Nehru-Gandhi family, described Jinnah as a true secularist and blamed the partition on Nehru. He said Jinnah had been a great collaborator of Gandhi in achieving freedom for India and regretted he had been demonized by a people who idolized Nehru.
A British citizen Lord Meghnand Desai exposed his ignorance of history by declaring that "the division of the country became inevitable around April, 1947 and not before that". He termed Lord Mountbatten the "father of Pakistan" and added that Jinnah had been turned into a villain through complete fabrication of facts, and claimed the Partition happened because of Nehru's individualism and crude Marxism. He said the Congress had no right to represent Muslims and accused Nehru of mindlessly rejecting Jinnah's genuine demand for a guarantee about Muslim rights.
It is irritating that a British loyalist and proxy like Desai is given undue importance in India, his vacuous articles and chatter fill Indian media and corporate channels. It may be recalled that Prime Minister Tony Blair was accused of selling knighthoods to some shady characters in exchange for money for his Labour party. Desai is doing a pretty good job at defending the British in India.
Noted journalist M J Akbar did not agree with Jaswant apportioning blame on Nehru for the Partition. "It was the Congress Working Committee which accepted the Cabinet (Mission) Plan...Nehru was not the dictator of the Congress," he said, adding, "while Gandhi wanted a secular nation with a Hindu majority, Jinnah wanted a secular nation with a Muslim majority." Akbar derided the claims that Nehru was responsible for the partition and that Jinnah was secular. But he praised Jaswant for lifting history from the trap of passion.
Senior journalist B.G.Verghese questioned the premise that Jinnah was secular. He likened Jinnah's threat of direct action with the tactics of the Taliban and accused the then Muslim League of communal blackmail. He defended Nehru and the Congress for rejecting Jinnah's two-nation theory.
CEO of Pakistan's 'The Dawn' newspaper Hameed Haroon said Jinnah's image remains wrongly portrayed and unexplored in that country. He said Jinnah's pictures wearing Western dresses and smoking cigarettes were suppressed in Pakistan "...and he became a two dimensional cardboard of (General) Zia's ideals." According to Haroon, Jinnah's speech on religious freedom was "censored by the information hierarchy of Pakistan before even the state came into being."
Haroon, wondered why India did not explore the true Jinnah. Pakistan, he said, avoided doing it because Jinnah was too liberal and progressive for the bigoted rulers who succeeded him.
It was left to a long time Delhi resident senior British journalist Mark Tully to say there were "no saints and all are, in a sense, sinners...everyone made mistakes." This included both Nehru and Jinnah as well as the British.
Jaswant at Book Fair
"Unless we understand Mohammed Ali Jinnah as a man and as a statesman, we cannot understand Bangladesh, Pakistan and our relations with the two countries. Nobody has written about Jinnah - whom Mahatma Gandhi described as a great man - the way I have," Singh told a packed audience comprising writers, journalists, publishers and bureaucrats at the Pragati Maidan on the inaugural day of the Delhi Book Fair on 29 August.
"Partition has been the most damaging event in modern India. Though I was born in a village far away from Lahore and Sindh, I always wondered how could they ever become foreign lands... and (how) the man (Jinnah) who had so assiduously worked for the 1916 Lucknow Pact could divide the country," he said. [The 1916 Lucknow Pact between the Muslim League and the Indian National Congress had pressured the British government to give Indians more authority to run the country.]

"The takeoff point for my research was 1857 - the mutiny which brought the Hindus and Muslims in the subcontinent together and finally uprooted the British after 90 years, in 1947. The 1857 revolt continued to haunt the British," Singh said.

"Jinnah set another milestone in communal amity in 1916 with the Lucknow Pact. A man who had lived all his life in India barring the last 13 months and who had been insulted by the British did not have to be demonized by us," he said. "India cannot be shackled by its neighbors and unless we become one country, it will be difficult to realize our dreams. We have to cultivate a mindset that allows us to think freely", he added.

Khilafat Movement
Incidentally, another instance of the Congress–Muslim League amity, the Khilafat movement (1919-1924), although mainly a Muslim religious movement, to protect the Caliphate when the British troops occupied Istanbul, became a part of the wider Indian Independence movement. The Caliphate was abolished by Kemal Ataturk, founder of the staunchly secular republic of Turkey in 1923 , fashioned out of the ashes of the Ottoman empire. So when Indian leaders visiting Turkey talked of the Khilafat movement, it made little impact during the secular regimes in Ankara. The money to fight occupation forces sent from India to Ankara was used later by Ataturk to build a Parliament house and a Bank.
Other Comments
Writing about the politics of Partition with entrenched ideological commitments and the desire for explanations and the need to apportion blame, makes it almost impossible to do so. Commented an Indian scholar, Pratap Bhanu Mehta;

"It is a prodigious work of scholarship, wide-ranging in its references and well documented. It has its own historical judgments to make and sometimes they are too swift. But there is no doubt that the book opens up serious and interesting questions. It has a narrative of its own. Partition was not the result of an irrevocable religious cleavage between Hindus and Muslims. It was squarely a product of politics"
Professor Irfan Habib, a noted historian, commented, "One must remember that the priority before them was Independence. The partition was a secondary concern. They probably felt that once the British were out of the way, differences could be resolved, that Pakistan would not be a sustainable entity. There was a bit of misreading of the British imperialist agenda. Also, people forget that, over the years, the wars and wrangling over Kashmir has re-imposed the divide rather than dissolve it."
Riposte by Narendra Singh Sarila, Ex-Indian Diplomat & ADC to Mountbatten
Writing in "The Tribune" of 19 August, 2009, that "Jinnah pursued Pakistan for power; Jaswant disappoints; ignores British designs," retired Indian diplomat, Narendra Singh Sarila, who he was ADC to Lord Mountbatten and wrote a few years ago "The Shadow of the Great Game: The Untold Story of India's Partition,"said;
"I am disappointed with Jaswant Singh's 660-page book on Jinnah and Partition, released earlier this week." At the end he says: "I still fail to understand why India was partitioned in 1947? Or the manner in which it was done." If even after his massive research and hard work, he did not get to the bottom of his subject, there is a reason for it. It is because he has ignored the most important element that was responsible for Partition, namely British strategic interests that required the creation of Pakistan. The British top secret documents on Partition have now been unsealed and there was no excuse for ignoring them. I myself showed these to him some years back. The whole story is there in those documents.
"The Labour government that came to power in Britain in mid-1945 was willing to grant independence to India but was worried about losing its 60-year-old military base here from which the British controlled the whole Indian Ocean area, including the eastern Middle-East that contained oil wells — The Wells of Power — of increasing importance in war and peace and which Stalin, with his rising ambition after his victory over Germany, the British feared, might seize. In the last two great wars it was from their Indian base that the British deployed Indian and British forces in Iran and Iraq and the British Chiefs of Staff were adamant on keeping a foothold in India. But Atlee, the British Prime Minister, knew that the government of a free India under the Congress party's rule would neither give them a military base nor join their team against the Soviet Union in the fresh Great Game. What were they to do?
"Towards the end of 1945, Field Marshal Wavell, the Viceroy of India, came up with a possible way out of their quandary. After the Congress party had refused to cooperate in the war effort in 1939, unless Britain announced that it would give freedom to India after the war, Wavell's predecessor, Lord Linlithgow, had encouraged Jinnah to formulate the Pakistan scheme, informing London that Jinnah was in his pocket. "He represents a minority and a minority can only hold its own with our assistance," the Viceroy told London.
" Wavell now suggested that they use Jinnah's demand to create a separate state in the north-west — not give him all he wanted in the west but territories along Iran, Afghanistan and Sinkiang with the port of Karachi — and Pakistan would cooperate with them on defence matters. On being asked by London to give them a clear picture of the areas that could go to Pakistan, Wavell in a historic dispatch on February 6, 1946, sent a map delineating the boundaries of Pakistan he had in mind, which were exactly the boundaries that Radcliff drew 18 months later.
"So, what Pakistan was going to be was already decided in early 1946 and the time between then and August 15 was used by Atlee, Cripps and Wavell and later Mountbatten to make Jinnah accept the smaller Pakistan and the Congress party to accept Partition, while Atlee kept proclaiming from housetops that they were working to preserve India's unity. All the British maneuvering can be discerned by studying the British top secret files. It is a myth that Jinnah founded Pakistan. President Roosevelt had posted his representative in Delhi after1942 and his dispatches in the US archives also tell us much.
" Some of the assessments in the book are also mistaken. To believe that the Cabinet Mission Plan would have resulted in a united India is moonshine. After 10 years Punjab, Sindh and the NWFP had the option to break away on one side and Bengal and Assam on the other side. That would give the League a much larger Pakistan after 10 years and certainly, in the meanwhile, it would fan the flames of communalism to prepare the ground for the above. And what about the princely states? They had the option to break away too. So, possibly Hyderabad would join Pakistan and would help reach Tripura and Manipur, which would be swallowed up. The Plan would have balkanized India and Nehru, despite the many mistakes he made, was correct in striking it down.
[ As for an Indian federation, look at what has happened in Christian –Muslim Cyprus or divided Palestine-author of the article]
"The Congress made many mistakes in the struggle, but Gandhiji united a heterogeneous and largely uneducated people, without which Independence was not possible.
"I agree with Jaswant Singh that Jinnah at heart was a nationalist and a secularist. And he remained so for the first 60 years of his life — a long time. Jinnah opposed satyagrah, calling it an extreme programme that would lead to disaster. He was shunned by Gandhiji. And Motilal Nehru feared that this brilliant man would eclipse his son, Jawaharlal. In 1928 Jinnah proposed to convince the Muslims to give up separate electorates — that were preventing Hindu-Muslim political interdependence and unity — suggesting in return that Muslim representation in the Central Assembly be raised from 27 per cent to 33 per cent — a very minor concession compared to the possibility of ending the pernicious separate electorates. But he was pooh-poohed, and virtually driven out from the Congress party.
"After the Congress refused to cooperate in the war effort in 1939, the Viceroy sought out Jinnah. The doctors had earlier the same year told him that he had terminal TB. Jinnah had always wanted to be the first in every thing. There are many instances in history of people abandoning their principles to achieve power and glory. So, for him it was now or never. His Pakistan scheme, launching Direct Action — the precursor of today's terrorism — and mobilizing Muslims against the Hindus, were all in the pursuit of power and glory. He did not believe in what he was doing. After Pakistan had been achieved, he spoke in Karachi advocating secularism. But he quickly retreated when opposed by his followers.
"Chagla, who worked with him in his law firm in Bombay, once told me that he was a man of great integrity. But it was tragic that at the end he lost it. And no man can be great without integrity. I also feel sympathy for Jinnah, for his humiliation and suffering. But at the end of his life he did many bad things, and inflicted incalculable harm. To believe that he was great just because he fought the mighty Congress party is nonsense. Do we call Hitler great because he fought the mighty Allies?"
Stanley Wolpert blames Mountbatten
US historian Stanley Wolpert in his book -- Shameful Flight -- revisits Partition, and blames Louis Mountbatten squarely for one of the most horrific episodes of the 20th century. Undoubtedly the arrogant and unrealistic Mountbatten is the central villain in the book. Although the British cabinet gave him a longer time, but Mountbatten never had any intention of using it.
'Mountbatten had resolved to wait until India's Independence Day festivities were all over,' Wolpert writes, 'the flashbulb photos all shot and transmitted worldwide, Dickie's medal-strewn white uniform viewed with admiration by millions, from Buckingham and Windsor palaces to the White House. What a glorious charade of British imperial largesse and power 'peacefully' transferred
One of the reasons for the Labour government in Britain, which had come to power soon after World War II, to grant hasty independence to India was because there was hardly any trust between the Labour and Indian leaders, Wolpert argues. Radcliffe, a barrister, had never set foot on Indian soil before 1947 was to accomplish, in a month, work that should have taken at least a year." Wolpert points out, "He was so afraid of what he had done -- worried that Sikhs, Hindus or Muslims would kill him -- (that) he left India hastily."
"The rapid departure of the British from the region was the catalyst for over half a century of violence, a legacy that lives on today," says Wolpert, discussing why Partition still holds interest "
"The Indian leaders as well as their counterparts in England failed to appreciate how bad and how weak a viceroy Mountbatten was," Wolpert continues. "In many ways, he was the worst viceroy of India, he was the centerpiece of this tragedy." --"I still wonder how it was possible for the leaders of Great Britain, barely two years after defeating, with American support, the armies of Hitler and Mussolini, to withdraw 14,000 British officers in such unseemly haste from India," he adds.
Nehru is also faulted for not listening to Gandhi in getting Jinnah to mediate in the escalating violence in undivided Kashmir. Gandhi even wondered if holding a plebiscite in Kashmir could end the looming violence there.
Why did Nehru listen so much to Mountbatten ! --Nehru unfortunately came too much under the influence of Mountbatten, accentuated by Nehru's education in England. Nehru was charmed by the English upper world, he thought he could trust and work with Mountbatten. "Mountbatten's royal blood appealed as much to the rulers of princely states in India," Wolpert continues, "as his radical views and social charms did to Nehru. His charm was so much that Nehru was blinded by it." Asked if Nehru's relationship with Mountbatten's wife Edwina played a role, the historian says, "It helped him cloud the danger of what Mountbatten was doing."
Years after Partition, Mountbatten would whisper now and then how he had botched up the Independence process. Nehru 'finally awakened,' and admitted in a letter to the Nawab of Bhopal, a friend, 'Partition came and we accepted it because we thought that perhaps that way, however painful it was, we might have some peace.
'And yet, the consequences of that Partition have been so terrible that one is inclined to think that anything else would have been preferable,' Nehru added
Comment by Dr. Niloufer Bhagwat , an eminent international jurist
"The restructuring and reorganization of territories and boundaries of existing states/countries is one of the main instruments of Imperial control of resources and strategic territories ;for this purpose some political and fascist organizations are set up and used . The killings which took place using so called religious parties /cultural organizations on both sides , was both a preparation and a justification for the divide.
"In Iraq as soon as the withdrawal of US troops is a part of the parliamentary agenda with the possibility of referendum being held , the killings once again are stepped up . When an Imperialist power is on the decline it is even more blood thirsty and ferocious , -- To-day it is not one power alone , it is the Banks , financial institutions and financiers at the core of the dominant system .
"Jinnah , the Muslim League , the Jamait - e - Islami , the Tabligi Jammat were all collaborators political and cultural , whereas the Hindu extremist organizations played the same role as did some of the princely States . Gandhi 's assassination was an Imperialist plot and the extremist organizations and their leaders who were a part of the wider plot received support from some of the Princely States.
"There are familial and individual loyalties to the Raj and to the Empire even to-day , which extends into several political parties of the right and left and into institutions and organizations overt and covert . Let us see how the narrative unfolds .The biggest threat to the unity and integrity of India continues to be from the same stream of finance capital operating from more than one capital.
"It appears that Mumbai is once again to be targeted for attacks , the FBI was here inspecting railway stations and other regions duly escorted by policing agencies . The "War of Terror" along with Swine flu are the new instruments of control even as the tatters of the economic policy of neo-liberalism or the ' Washington Consensus ' emerges globally.
"In the context of India I was told by an intelligence operative that the decision making of the 'dirty tricks' department for the country has its headquarters in Mumbai . Now we can add New Delhi, Ahmedabad, Pune and Bangalore though earlier they were not as important.
"It is a matter of immense satisfaction that those who make policy should directly witness its consequences and its impact on diverse sectors , institutions and on society as a whole.
"The book and the controversies raised are diversionary , the Indian National Congress led by Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru assisted by Sardar Vallabhai Patel, Maulana Azad, Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan, with the best will in the world could not have defeated partition, the decision was already taken, Pakistan would be the instrument of Anglo-American policy in the region and for better control it would have either proxies or military governments as an adjunct of the Empire."
The Mother Of All Battles: For Oil , by K Gajendra Singh 07/10/06 "Information Clearing House"---
ME Oil and partition of India;
An important reinforcement to Chomsky's conclusion (that US and Israeli interests coincide in the Middle East ) has been clearly brought out in a well researched book by a retired Indian diplomat Narendra Singh Sarila, 'The Shadow of the Great Game: The Untold Story of India's Partition.' Sarila, who was briefly ADC to the last British Viceroy to India, Lord Lois Mountbatten, in his book documents how the British leadership across the political spectrum, Conservatives and Labour , intrigued, told lies, divided the Indian subcontinent and created the state of Pakistan. Because Mahatma Gandhi with this opposition to violence and war, and emphasis on peaceful means to resolve all disputes and Jawaharlal Nehru with his non-real politic idealism and vision of creating friendship and understanding among colonized and exploited people of Asia, Africa, Middle east and elsewhere , would not join Western military pacts to protect from the Soviet Union, the oil
resources in the Middle East dominated by Western powers .

Sarila highlights "little known facts about the unobtrusive pressure that the USA exerted on Britain in favor of India's independence as well as unity in the hope of evolving a new post-colonial world order. The British leaders warned Indian leaders against dollar domination. Sarila naively forgets, what the US had done in Cuba and Philippines, after it replaced Spain as the colonial master.

After the second world war, British realized that they had to get out of India, but the subcontinent was a vital strategic asset, so till the end London tried to keep India as a dominion like Australia or Canada, to keep it as– "a base for Britain to continue their domination of the Indian Ocean and the oil-rich Persian Gulf with its wells of power," says the author. But as the "Congress party of India would not play the great game with Britain against the Soviet Union," the British decided to partition India.

The ultimate object was to retain at least some part in the North-West of India, "for defensive and offensive action against the USSR in any future dispensation in the sub-continent". And Britain knew that this could be best achieved by having a willing and subservient Pakistan as its client. So the only way -- was to use Jinnah to detach areas of India, which border Iran, Afghanistan and Sinkiang and create a new state there. The author also traces the roots of the present Kashmir imbroglio and how the matter was dealt with in the UN to help out ally Pakistan.

Churchill; "In war every truth has to have an escort of lies." A Western tradition
On the question of dominion status and independence for India in 1942, during the second world war, US President Franklin Roosevelt's envoy Harriman was informed by the British that approximately 75% of the Indian troops were Muslims but only 35% of the troops were Muslims as Lord Wavel , British Military Commander had cabled London the same week). Later British Prime Minister Winston Churchill told Roosevelt in another context that "in war every truth has to have an escort of lies" a hoary western tradition over centuries. They have excelled themselves in the US led illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq. The escort of lies is so numerous that there is little truth left.

The divide and create mayhem policy used in Indian subcontinent is being replicated in Iraq by Bush and Tony Blair, a wannabe Churchill, with the former once claiming that Churchill was like a Texan. --Sarila documents in detail how after the end of World War II in 1945, the new Labour government of Clement Attlee and Wavell decided to divide India. "The British used Jinnah and political Islam to protect their strategic interests." "This policy was the mother of all causes for the creation of Pakistan," asserts Sarila. They succeeded in selling the idea of a truncated Pakistan to Jinnah.

On June 3, 1947, British Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin, while addressing the Labour Party's annual conference, spilled the beans that the division of India "would help consolidate Britain in the Middle East".

A British top secret appreciation prepared in the Commonwealth Relations Office, soon after Indian
independence, now available in the India office archives of the British Library, says: ``Financially, industrially and from the point of view of manpower and general material resources India was stronger than Pakistan.'' But that ``India had no real background on which to build and unite a nation, there being no real affinity between its North and South, the existence of disruptive elements like the Sikhs and the likelihood of the Communists, with their own agenda, growing in numbers and influence''.

On the other hand, the appreciation asserts that Pakistan ,weak in financial and material resources -- through comfortable in food and manpower --``has a definite background, Islam, on which to build up a nation and to unite the people...and has less to fear from internal disruptive forces than the government of India, and less to fear from secessionist tendencies [Bangladesh!]''. So much for the so called British political acumen!

Churchill and other British leaders had to be reminded by Indian leaders that their comments on such lines were unwarranted. Decades after 1947, the British media wrote obituary of elections and democracy in India, only to be proved wrong repeatedly.
The book sends out a cautionary signal to present-day Indians; to avoid misplaced idealism, superciliousness and escapism, to which some of their ancestors fell prey. New Delhi is now being seduced by Washington ( ask US allies Turkey and Pakistan , how they have been let down in post cold war period) into an nuclear agreement to enmesh India into US spider's web , which would adversely affect the security of billion plus Indians . Throughout history barring a few , the last one being Indira Gandhi, navel watching Hindus have shown little strategic acumen .
With weak grassroots political organizations, Pakistan with many British and the British-era civil servants strengthened the bureaucracy's control over the polity. While the politicians wanted to strengthen relations with the British, Washington encouraged Military Chief General Ayub Khan to establish close cooperation with the Pentagon. And in 1958 the military took over power. USA , in pursuit of its national interests , has seldom bothered about the form of government in an ally. Otherwise, why would it embrace Pakistan, or say Egypt, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia or any of the other kingdoms and sheikhdoms and repressive regimes around the world. US talk of spreading liberty, freedom and democracy is just nauseating.

Beginning with Ayub Khan's unofficial visit to the US, the foundations for bilateral cooperation in the military field were laid. These have survived through thick and thin, like a bad marriage which neither side can let go, despite bad patches, like the initial takeovers by Generals Zia ul-Haq and Musharraf. But the 1979 entry of the Soviet troops into Afghanistan and 911 attacks on US Trade Towers and Pentagon brought back the old romance. US finds military and other dictators easier to handle. "
Then there is another fine book by another retired Indian diplomat C. Dasgupta.
C. Dasgupta's War and Diplomacy in Kashmir 1947-48

Dasgupta's reflections in his introduction bear quotation in extenso: "The conflict which broke out between India and Pakistan in 1947 was unique in the annals of modern warfare: it was a war in which both the opposing armies were led by nationals of a third country (Still to depart colonial power). British generals commanded the armies of the newly independent states of India and Pakistan... While it was unique in this one respect, the first Indo-Pakistan war was also a typical Third World conflict from a broader perspective. External factors tend to play a major part in wars between medium or small states. Their dependence on major powers for military supplies, economic assistance and diplomatic support makes these states vulnerable to external pressures. Thus the positions taken by the great powers can influence the duration, intensity and even the outcome of such conflicts. The Kashmir war of 1947-48 is one such example. For both India and Pakistan,
Britain was the leading overseas partner in trade, industry and finance. Both countries turned to Britain for military equipment, spares and oil supplies. The war was unique only in the extent to which the two states were vulnerable to British influence on account of the presence of British officers at the senior most levels of their armed forces. These officers were in a position to directly influence the course of the war through the advice they tendered to their respective governments and the manner in which they implemented - or ignored - government directives."

Conclusion

Many ignorant Indians, specially from the north believe that the partition could have been avoided. In 1947. Such colossal ignorance about history !.

The White Christian Europe divided and destroyed the composite five century old Ottoman empire using religion, ethnicity, language divide, even fooling the Arabs whose Caliph, the Ottoman Sultan was resident in Istanbul. See how they have been divided, bullied ,humiliated, destroyed and exploited since 1st WW..

In 1990s, non-Orthodox Christian US and NATO powers destroyed the multi-lingual, multi-ethnic and multi religious South Slav Republic of Yugoslavia consisting of Serbs, Croats, Kosovars, Macedons and others, who followed many religions. The Imperialists would do anything to gain control.

US led illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003 and brutal occupation has destroyed a united secular Iraq of Shia and Sunni Arabs and Kurds,Turkmen and others .

Seeing the level and kind of discussions in India , I feel dismayed that Indian media and think tanks remain brainwashed, even generationally i.e. those whose fathers studied in British schools and universities or British style institutions in India, with their heroes in Clive, Hastings, Curzon, Churchill, Blair and now Bush and Obama .

Will Hindustan be ever free from the pernicious indoctrination by the white race, which still continues.

A Utopian solution!
US, which claimed to be a hyper power and the new Rome till 2003, after its illegal invasion of Iraq is now struck in a quagmire. It has strengthened enemy Iran, a regional power throughout history, which Washington must now engage to find solutions to its failure in Iraq and even Afghanistan. US proxy Georgia was beaten back by Russians last year with the loss of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Another proxy President Victor Yushchenko of Ukraine, brought to power by US franchised street revolution in 2005 has seen his popularity plummet to less than double figures. Shanghai Cooperation Organization is gearing up to stop NATO inroads into Eurasia. At home US banksters have destroyed US economy, now in fast decline.

When and if US led western military and economic power declines, which will also affect China (Gordon G Chang wrote in May 2009 of the "Beginning of the end of the Chinese miracle ", that after two decades of uninterrupted prosperity, the initial stages of the downturn are exposing the inherent weaknesses of China's economy, and those fissures will be felt near and far. But the jury is still out) there is a chance for the leadership of the subcontinent, Afghanistan, Iran, Central Asia, and even Turkey to lay the foundations of an economic community on the lines of Europe Union and ASEAN.
Under Devputra Kanishka's rule from Peshawar in present-day Pakistan, traders and preachers moved freely and flourished in his empire, which covered most of Central Asia and Xinjiang down to central and east India. During the 16th century AD, traders moved freely in the empires of the Moghuls of Hindustan, and the Uzbek Shaybani Khans of Khawarizm on the Aral Sea, the Shia Safavids of Iran and the Ottomans of Turkey right into central Europe. A hundi (based on the hawala - trust - system still in existence today) issued in a Delhi bazaar was valid in Istanbul or Bukhara.
K Gajendra Singh, Indian ambassador (retired), served as ambassador to Turkey and Azerbaijan from August 1992 to April 1996. Prior to that, he served terms as ambassador to Jordan, Romania and Senegal. He is currently chairman of the Foundation for Indo-Turkic Studies. Copy right with the author.
Email: kgsingh@yahoo.com
August 30, 2009

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[ALOCHONA] Moriarty hints at America's 'tragic mistake' in 1971



Moriarty hints at America's 'tragic mistake'
 
Dhaka, Sept 2 (bdnews24.com)—US ambassador James F Moriarty Wednesday hinted that his country made a "tragic mistake" by opposing the birth of Bangladesh in 1971.

"Senator Kennedy helped my country to correct a tragic mistake back in 1970 and 1971.

"We expressed that by quickly recognising Bangladesh after the end of the war, you all recall that," Moriarty told reporters after a discussion in memory of the late Senator Edward Kennedy, who personally supported Bangladesh's war of independence despite the then US administration's opposition.

"We were one of the first countries to recognise (Bangladesh)," Moriarty said at the Liberation War Museum.

But the envoy avoided saying directly that US policy on Bangladesh was wrong.

"Ambassadors never say that their countries made a tragic mistake. They just imply it," he said.

Bangladesh came into being as an independent country on December 16, 1971 through a nine-month bloody war against the occupying Pakistan army. India and the former Soviet Union directly supported Bangladesh's freedom struggle.

The US administration then headed by President Richard Nixon opposed the war against Pakistan, an ally of the US, and provided military support to Islamabad to crush Bangladesh's fight for independence.

Senator Edward Kennedy extended total support to Bangladesh's war of independence from the start. He visited refugee camps in West Bengal as millions of Bangladeshis took refuge in India to escape massacres by Pakistan forces and their local collaborators.

Moriarty said Senator Kennedy's pro-Bangladesh stance moulded the US public opinion in favour of Bangladesh.

The US recognised Bangladesh on April 4, 1972.

Moriarty's statement came in the wake of Edward Kennedy's death, aged 77 at his home in Massachusetts, Boston on Aug 26, with local media recounting his stand against US policy in supporting the 1971 war.

Prime minister Sheikh Hasina, leader of the opposition Khaleda Zia and foreign minister Dipu Moni all paid tribute to Kennedy as "a global champion of liberty and human values", remembering his support during the birth of Bangladesh.

"The country lost a true friend with his demise," former foreign secretary Faruk Chowdhury told bdnews24.com on the day.

"Edward Kennedy brought the woes of the Bangladeshi refugees during the liberation war in 1971 before the eyes of the world," said Chowdhury.

The senator also submitted a report to the US senate on the plight of Bengali refugees in India, added the former bureaucrat, who was chief of protocol during Kennedy's visit to Bangladesh in 1972.

Source: http://www.bdnews24.com/details.php?cid=2&id=141738&hb=top



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[ALOCHONA] Khaleda Visits Injured Anu Muhammad But.....




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[mukto-mona] FW: [wp] US Convert Stirs Anti-Muslim 'Crusade' --also see the issue of apostasy in Islam



Dear all,

 

Assalamu alaikumIn addition you can all articles on apostasy from Islamonline.net and apostasyandislam.blogspot.com .The general opinion now is that there is no punishment for apostasy unless it is accompanied by rebellion.

 

Shah Abdul Hannan

 

-----Original Message-----
From: witness-pioneer@yahoogroups.com [mailto:witness-pioneer@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Mahmudul Hasan
Sent:
Monday, August 31, 2009 2:40 AM
 
Subject: [wp]
US Convert Stirs Anti-Muslim ‘Crusade’

 

 

 

US Convert Stirs Anti-Muslim ‘Crusade’

 

 

IslamOnline.net & Newspapers

 

 

Rifqa’s conversion (C) has become a something of a new crusade by evangelical Christians.

Rifqa’s conversion (C) has become a something of a new crusade by evangelical Christians.

CAIRO — The custody battle between Christian evangelicals and a Muslim family over a runaway teenage girl who converted to Christianity is blemishing the image of the Islamic faith and fuelling hatred against the Muslim community in the United States.

"We feel frustrated because this is a family problem of a certain family,” Imam Tariq Rasheed, director of the Islamic Centre of Orlando, told the Orlando Sentinel on Monday, August 31.

“The way it has been portrayed is defaming Islam and giving a way, way negative picture of our religion."

Rifqa Mohamed Bary, 17, left her Muslim family in Ohio in July and went to Orlando, where she converted to Christianity.

The teen, of a Sri Lankan origin who now lives with a pastor and his family, says she fears returning to her family because of her conversion.

Her father says that his daughter can practice Christianity and only wants her to return home.

The case has become something of a new crusade by evangelical Christians and attracted the interest of evangelicals, who view it as a test of religious liberty.

Christian activists are lobbying to allow the girl to remain in Florida, citing instances of “honour killings”.

A Florida judge says the teen will remain in foster care until a Sept. 3 hearing.

Confusion

Muslim leaders ridiculed claims by Christian activists that the Qur’an exhorts killing of converted followers.

"There is not a single verse in the holy Qur’an that stops a person from exercising the freedom of choosing his or her religion,” Imam Rasheed said.

“There is nothing about a punishment if you change your religion."

Gwendolyn Zoharah Simmons, assistant professor of religion at the University of Florida, agrees.

He said non-Muslims often confuse “honour killings” with a Qur’anic verse that calls for capital punishment for those leaving the religion.

He stressed that that law is applied by a court, not by individuals or family members.

"They assume the law and the Qur’an are synonymous, and they are not," Simmons said.

"The Qur’an is not a law book," he said.

Simmon believes that the teenage girl may be herself confused about the difference between capital punishment under Islamic law and “honour killings”.

The controversy, coupled with moves by an evangelical church in Gainesville to post a sign reading "Islam is of the Devil" and have school children wear T-shirts with that message, is fuelling anti-Muslim sentiments and feeding Islamophobia across the country.

"This plays into an irrational sense of fear among people who aren't familiar with the tenets of the faith," Simmons said.

"What is shameful in this entire ordeal is the way in which those who should know better, and who profess quite different values otherwise, are willing to repeat stereotypes and fuel fires of ignorance and violence."


http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1251021306310&pagename=Zone-English-News/NWELayout

 


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[mukto-mona] Hints of Pluralism in Egyptian Religious Debates



Memo From Cairo

Hints of Pluralism in Egyptian Religious Debates

By MICHAEL SLACKMAN

Published: August 30, 2009

CAIRO — Writing in his weekly newspaper column, Gamal al-Banna said recently that God had created humans as fallible and therefore destined to sin. So even a scantily clad belly dancer, or for that matter a nude dancer, should not automatically be condemned as immoral, but should be judged by weighing that person's sins against her good deeds.

Skip to next paragraph This view is provocative in Egypt's conservative society, where many argue that such thinking goes against the hard and fast rules of divine law. Within two hours of the article's posting last week on the Web site of Al Masry al Youm, readers had left more than 30 comments — none supporting his position.

"So a woman can dance at night and pray in the morning; this is duplicity and ignorance," wrote a reader who identified himself as Hany. "Fear God and do not preach impiety."

Still, Mr. Banna was pleased because at least his ideas were being circulated. Mr. Banna, who is 88 years old and is the brother of Hassan al-Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, has been preaching liberal Islamic views for decades.

But only now, he said, does he have the chance to be heard widely. It is not that a majority agrees with him; it is not that the tide is shifting to a more moderate interpretative view of religion; it is just that the rise of relatively independent media — like privately owned newspapers, satellite television channels and the Internet — has given him access to a broader audience.

And there is another reason: The most radical and least flexible thinkers no longer intimidate everyone with differing views into silence.

"Everything has its time," Mr. Banna said, seated in his dusty office crammed with bookshelves that stretch from floor to ceiling.

It is a testament to how little public debate there has been over the value of pluralism, or more specifically of the role of religion in society, that so many see the mere chance to provoke as progress. But now, more than any time in many years, there are people willing to risk challenging conventional thinking, said writers, academics and religious thinkers like Mr. Banna.

"There is a relative development, enough to at least be able to present a different opinion that confronts the oppressive religious current which prevails in politics and on the street, and which has made the state try to outbid the religious groups," said Gamal Asaad, a former member of Parliament and a Coptic intellectual.

It is difficult to say exactly why this is happening. Some of those who have begun to speak up say they are acting in spite of — and not with the encouragement of — the Egyptian government. Political analysts said that the government still tried to compete with the Muslim Brotherhood, a banned but tolerated Islamic movement, to present itself as the guardian of conservative Muslim values.

Several factors have changed the public debate and erased some of the fear associated with challenging conventional orthodoxy, political analysts, academics and social activists said. These include a disillusionment and growing rejection of the more radical Islamic ideology associated with Al Qaeda, they said. At the same time, President Obama's outreach to the Muslim world has quieted the accusation that the United States is at war with Islam, making it easier for liberal Muslims to promote more Western secular ideas, Egyptian political analysts said.

"It is not a strategic or transformational change, but it is a relative change," said Mr. Asaad, who emphasized that the dynamic was for Christians as well as Muslims in Egypt. "And the civil forces can unite to capitalize on this atmosphere and invest in it to raise it to become a more general atmosphere."

Two events this summer highlighted the new willingness of a minority to confront the majority — and the overwhelming response by a still conservative community.

In June, a writers' committee affiliated with the Ministry of Culture gave a prestigious award to Sayyid al-Qimni, a sharp critic of Islamic fundamentalism who in 2005 stopped writing, disavowed his own work and moved after receiving death threats for his writing.

Muhammad Salmawy, a committee member and president of the Egyptian Writers' Union, said he thought Mr. Qimni had been honored in part because "he represents the secular direction and discusses religion on an objective basis and is against the religious current."

What happened next followed a predictable path, but then veered. Islamic fundamentalists like Sheik Youssef al-Badri asked the government to revoke the award and moved to file a lawsuit against Mr. Qimni and the government.

"Salman Rushdie was less of a disaster than Sayyid al-Qimni," said Mr. Badri in a television appearance on O TV, an independent Egyptian satellite channel. "Salman Rushdie, everyone attacked him because he destroyed Islam overtly. But Sayyid al-Qimni is attacking Islam and destroying it tactfully, tastefully and politely."

But this time Mr. Qimni did not go into hiding. He appeared on the television show, sitting beside Sheik Badri as he defended himself.

A second development involved a religious minority, Bahais, who face discrimination in Egypt, where the only legally recognized faiths are Islam, Judaism and Christianity. Nine years ago the state stopped issuing identification records to Bahais unless they agreed to characterize themselves as members of one of the three recognized faiths. The documents are essential for access to all government services.

An independent group, The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, won a court order on behalf of the Bahais that forced the government to issue records leaving the religious identification blank. The first cards were issued this month. While the decision was aimed specifically at solving the problem faced by the Bahai community, the case tapped into the evolving debate, said the group's executive director, Hossam Bahgat.

"It is an unprecedented move to recognize that one can be Egyptian and not adhere to one of these three religions," Mr. Bahgat said. Still, he remains less than optimistic; most of the public reaction to the Bahais' legal victory was negative, Mr. Bahgat said.

"It is known that you are apostates," read one of many comments posted on Al Youm Al Sabei, an online newspaper.

But there has been at least a hint of diversity and debate in response to Mr. Banna's remarks on belly dancers. Hours after they were posted, some readers began, however tentatively, to come to his defense. "Take it easy on the man," an anonymous post said. "He did not issue a religious edict saying belly dancing is condoned. But he is saying that a person's deeds will be weighed out because God is just. Is anything wrong with that?"

Mona el-Naggar contributed reporting.

 

A voice for 'new understanding' of Islam - Africa & Middle East - International Herald Tribune

By Michael Slackman

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CAIRO — Gamal al-Banna is 85, and for much of his life he has been overshadowed by his famous brother, Sheik Hassan al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist political party.

That seems to have suited him just fine, though. He liked to write, read and think. His sister left him a lot of money, and so, for decades, that is exactly how he spent his days.

His bedroom is at one end of a dusty old apartment on a chaotic street in the center of the city. At the other end is his office, his desk piled high with papers. In between are books - 30,000 of them, arranged neatly on floor-to-ceiling shelves. One section is devoted to the 100 or so books he has written and translated.

Banna is no longer living in his brother's shadow. And, like the organization his brother founded, the younger Banna is no friend of the establishment, but for quite a different reason. He is a liberal thinker, a man who would like to see Islamic values and practices interpreted in the context of modern times.

Egypt's gatekeepers of religious values, the government-appointed and self-appointed arbiters of God's word, condemn, dismiss and dispute what he says. They have also banned at least one of his books.

"Gamal al-Banna has opinions that fall outside the scope of religion," said Sheik Omar el Deeb, deputy in charge of Al Azhar, the centuries-old seat of Islamic learning in Cairo. "The people, of course, oppose anybody who talks about things that violate religion."

Banna does not press his ideas, does not try to wage a contest with the institution of Azhar, but instead takes the long-term view, hoping to plant a few seeds that will, in time, take root and spread. He recognizes that, at the moment, the other side is winning the contest of ideas in Egypt, and the region.

"If religion was correctly understood, it would be a power of liberation,"

Banna said. "But it is misunderstood, and so it is driving us backwards."

What are his views, the ones officialdom have said fall "outside religion"? He has a lot to say about women: They are not required to wear a veil, as most do in Egypt; they should not be forced to undergo a practice referred to as "female circumcision," as most do now in Egypt; and they should be allowed to lead men in prayer, which is forbidden in Egypt.

"My idea is that man is the aim of religion, and religion only a means," Banna said. "What is prevalent today is the opposite."

Egypt, often looked to as a center of moderate Islam, is like the rest of the Arab world becoming more conservative and less tolerant of opposing religious views, according to thinkers like Banna. Since August there have been at least three high-profile cases here in which religious officials condemned, or sought to have criminally charged, people or publications promoting religious ideas they deemed offensive.

"When the Muslims used to disagree, they had different schools of thought," said Sayed el-Qemni, another writer favoring changes, who lives in a small city outside of Cairo. "No one would point to the other and say, 'This is not Islam.' But when one school of thought says, 'I am the correct school of thought and everyone else deserves death,' then you are starting a new religion."

Qemni has received death threats for some of his writings, and sleeps with two police officers guarding his house. By contrast, Banna exudes a sense of impunity. That, he says, is not a result of his name - though that is a powerful force in a society where family ties are deeply respected - but because "I am free."

He is free because he has been careful not to become involved in political movements and because of his sister, Fawziyya, who left him the equivalent of about $100,000. That is a huge sum in Egypt, especially considering Banna has no family and lives and works in the same apartment at a nominal rent.

"I am a completely independent man," he says with a smile. "I am not an employee, I am not in any party, and I am not affiliated with anything - completely independent."

Banna was born Dec. 15, 1920, in El Mahmoudia, a village in Egypt's northern Nile Delta, northwest of the capital. The youngest of five children, he moved with his family to Cairo when he was 4 years old. His oldest sibling, Hassan, went on to form the Muslim Brotherhood, which today is the largest organized opposition in Egypt, even though it is officially banned.

Their father, Ahmad Banna, a self- taught prayer leader and religious teacher, supported the family by repairing watches (his small wooden work table sits in the hall of Gamal's apartment). The elder Banna spent years of his life indexing the many thousands of sayings of the Prophet Muhammad, assembling them in a multivolume set that sits on his youngest son's shelves and inspires him to this day.

As a young man, Banna was kicked out of high school after a dispute with an English teacher. He finished his studies at a technical school and did not pursue college because, he said, he knew he wanted to pursue writing. So he went out and began to write. In 1946, he published a book called "A New Democracy," and included a chapter titled "Toward a New Understanding of Islam."

Banna says one of the fundamental problems with religious leaders in Egypt is that they look to the interpretations of their ancestors and not to the Koran itself. To look directly at the book, and not at the words as interpreted by men living in a different time, would have a liberating effect, he says.

Many of his ideas challenge the core beliefs of the radical Muslims who have been driving the religious agenda in the region. The most radical Islamists say, for example, that elected governments are un-Islamic because people must follow God's law, or Sharia, and not that of a Parliament.

But Banna says the radicals are guilty of pursuing the very logic they say is un-Islamic. They would impose what amounts to their interpretation of the Koran onto other Muslims. That, he says, is no different than relying on a Parliament to pass laws, as both are a result of man's intervention, not divine revelation.

Islam, he says, needs to be seen in a modern context. "Because Islam is the last of religions, if it was rigid and closed, it could not stand the changes of the ages," he said.

Banna does not deliver his message as a lecture. He speaks casually, slipping between English and Arabic, smiling, waving his hands. He has his own name now, and a philosophy quite different from the Islamist organization his brother founded.

Banna has stayed far from politics, but that does not mean he is apolitical. On the contrary, he believes that the reason his ideas have not gained momentum is that political freedom in Egypt is stifled by the nation's rulers.

"They want only power," he said. "They don't want freedom of thought. Free thought - that will condemn them."

 

 
Allah, Farid, juhdi hamesha
Au Shaikh Farid, juhdi Allah Allah.

Acquiring Allah's grace is the aim of my jihad, 0 Farid!
Come Shaikh Farid! Allah, Allah's grace alone is ever the aim of my jihad
 
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