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Monday, September 7, 2015

Re: [mukto-mona] Fwd: Fw: An interesting article by Tarek Fatah in an Indian newspaper



Isn't Tarek Fatah also in denial? He wants Muslims to start "living in a state of Islam", and claims that APJ Abdul Kalam did that! Mr. Kalam was born in a religious Muslim family, and was habituated in the practice of that religion the was he saw it. But did he really live in a state of Islam? Does his last book, "Transcendence: My Spiritual Experiences with Pramukh Swamiji" conform to Islamic preaching, for example? Obviously, it is easier for "start living in a state of Islam/Christianity/Hinduism" kind of people to make money than for "start living in a state of Humanity" kind of people.

Sukhamaya Bain
====================================



On Monday, September 7, 2015 5:51 PM, "Dristy Pat dristypat5@gmail.com [mukto-mona]" <mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com> wrote:


 
Very little of Islamic history can be defended. It's mostly dark part of the human history. So, most Muslims go through denial of those dark historical facts. Aurangzeb was one of the dark periods of Islamic history of India, but - you will find many historians, who have portrayed Aurangzeb as one of the benevolent rulers of India. You may wonder how that happened.

On Mon, Sep 7, 2015 at 8:51 AM, Sitangshu Guha guhasb@gmail.com [mukto-mona] <mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
 

 
 
 
Monday, August 31, 2015| Latest E-book

Why I danced when I found out Delhi's Aurangzeb Road was being renamed after APJ Abdul Kalam

Aug 31, 2015 20:11 IST
By Tarek Fatah
In March, at a lecture in Delhi, I challenged India's Muslims to stand up and reject the Islamic State and instead start living in a state of Islam; the pursuit of truth above everything else.
And to start that journey I suggested they should demand that the Indian and Delhi governments change the name of the city's Aurangzeb Road, named after the murderous Mughal Emperor to the pious and poet prince Dara Shikoh who was beheaded by Aurangzeb.
As an Indian Muslim born in Pakistan, I first visited India in 2013 and was shocked to see the name Aurangzeb adorn one of the most majestic streets of India's capital.
Here was a man who had killed his elder brother to stage a palace coup, who had his own father imprisoned for life and had several Islamic leaders of India hanged to death, among them the spiritual head of the Dawoodi Bohra Muslims of Gujarat. As emperor, Aurangzeb banned music, dance and the consumption of alcohol in the Mughal Empire. In Sindh and Punjab where many Muslims attended discourses by Hindu Brahmins, he ordered the demolition of all schools and the temples where such interaction took place, making it punishable for Muslims who dressed like non-Muslims.
Representational image. Mayank Austen/ Flickr
But nothing is more of a testimony to the cruelty and bigotry of Aurangzeb than the executions of the Muslim Sufi mystic Sarmad Kashani and the ninth Sikh Guru, Tegh Bahadur. He considered the majority Hindus of his realm as 'Kufaar' and placed them as second class to Muslims, waged jihad against Shia Muslim rulers and wiped out all traces of the liberal, pluralistic and tolerant Islam introduced by his great-grandfather Emperor Akbar.
Aurangzeb today would be the equivalent of Caliph El-Baghdadi of the Islamic State (ISIS), if not Osama Bin Laden or Mullah Omar of the Taliban.
Yet, most Indian Muslims are either not aware of Aurangzeb's crimes or choose to relish the thought that he was the one true king who ruled India in the name of Islam with an iron fist and put Hindus and Sikhs in their rightful place—at the bottom of the heap.
So I told the Muslims in my audience that if they truly wanted to fight ISIS, they should take the lead in demanding the erasing of a murderer's name and replace it with his brother who is loved by all as the epitome of Hindu-Muslim brotherhood.
Then came news of the death of India's most loved president, the Muslim from the country's deep south who lived in a state of Islam, not the Islamic State, Dr APJ Abdul Kalam.
On 29 June, I took to Twitter and urged Indians to ask their governments to change the name from Aurangzeb to APJ Abdul Kalam Road.
The idea caught on like wildfire on social media and soon Lok Sabha member from Delhi, Maheish Girri, wrote to Prime Minister Modi to help change the name.
Yesterday, I was woken by phone calls from friends in India with the news that the Delhi government had decided to change the name of Aurangzeb Road to APJ Abdul Kalam Road. It was 3 am in Toronto and I for a moment thought I must be dreaming, but I was awake so I woke up my wife to share the news.
She shrugged me off, "Buddah pagal ho gaya hai kyaa?''
But as best as I could do, I did a mix of the lungi dance and bhangra. I couldn't believe we had pulled it off. (I am now hoping unashamedly that someone in his kindness will invite me to be in Delhi when the formal change in name takes place.)
The change of name, be it a human being or a place carries huge significance. At times such a change is a sign of subservience and servitude to a new master, while at other times it is one of overthrowing the bondage of a former dictator.
Thus Malcolm X dropped his last name and took on X to reject the family name given to him by some past White slave-owner. In the same vein, Stalingrad was renamed Volgograd as a rebuke to the horrors inflicted on the Russian people by Stalin.
In the country of my birth, Pakistan, many names that reminded us of the British Raj were changed. Thus 'Victoria Road' and 'Elphinstone Street' in Karachi took on names to reflect the new reality of a supposedly independent country. But not all name changes are an act of correcting wrong.
I was born on a quiet street in Karachi, Pakistan, in 1949 on what was once known as 'Lala Lajpat Rai Road', named after the Punjabi author, politician and one of the leaders of the Indian Independence movement.
Lalaji, who died in 1928 after suffering blows to his head in a clash with the police in Lahore, needs no introduction in India. But in the land where he gave his life, hardly anyone knows him, let alone honours him for his service and sacrifice. His crime? He was Hindu. Therefore, his name needed to be erased from the newly created Islamic Republic of Pakistan, the so-called 'Land of the Pure.'
Even as a child I could not understand why 'Guru Mandir' the neighbourhood where I was born had to undergo a name change and become 'Sabeel Wali Masjid'.
Already some Islamists inside India are condemning the change in name. They will argue that if changing the name of Lala Lajpat Rai Road in Pakistan is wrong then the same principle should be applied to Aurangzeb Road. Wrong.
Lala Lajpat Rai was a symbol of India's fight for freedom while Aurangzeb is a symbol of India's subjugation and the imposition of an Arabized culture of radical Islam on a land that savours pluralism and secularism. Jai Hind!
more in Delhi
 








__._,_.___

Posted by: Sukhamaya Bain <subain1@yahoo.com>


****************************************************
Mukto Mona plans for a Grand Darwin Day Celebration: 
Call For Articles:

http://mukto-mona.com/wordpress/?p=68

http://mukto-mona.com/banga_blog/?p=585

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"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
               -Beatrice Hall [pseudonym: S.G. Tallentyre], 190





__,_._,___

Re: [mukto-mona] Fwd: Fw: An interesting article by Tarek Fatah in an Indian newspaper



Dark History is repeating, once again, in the Middle-East. Millions of refugees are flooding neighboring small countries, which cannot figure out what kind of people are coming to their countries. It's a mess.

From: "Dristy Pat dristypat5@gmail.com [mukto-mona]" <mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com>
To: mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Monday, September 7, 2015 5:51 PM
Subject: Re: [mukto-mona] Fwd: Fw: An interesting article by Tarek Fatah in an Indian newspaper

 
Very little of Islamic history can be defended. It's mostly dark part of the human history. So, most Muslims go through denial of those dark historical facts. Aurangzeb was one of the dark periods of Islamic history of India, but - you will find many historians, who have portrayed Aurangzeb as one of the benevolent rulers of India. You may wonder how that happened.



On Mon, Sep 7, 2015 at 8:51 AM, Sitangshu Guha guhasb@gmail.com [mukto-mona] <mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
 

 
 
 
Monday, August 31, 2015| Latest E-book

Why I danced when I found out Delhi's Aurangzeb Road was being renamed after APJ Abdul Kalam

Aug 31, 2015 20:11 IST
By Tarek Fatah
In March, at a lecture in Delhi, I challenged India's Muslims to stand up and reject the Islamic State and instead start living in a state of Islam; the pursuit of truth above everything else.
And to start that journey I suggested they should demand that the Indian and Delhi governments change the name of the city's Aurangzeb Road, named after the murderous Mughal Emperor to the pious and poet prince Dara Shikoh who was beheaded by Aurangzeb.
As an Indian Muslim born in Pakistan, I first visited India in 2013 and was shocked to see the name Aurangzeb adorn one of the most majestic streets of India's capital.
Here was a man who had killed his elder brother to stage a palace coup, who had his own father imprisoned for life and had several Islamic leaders of India hanged to death, among them the spiritual head of the Dawoodi Bohra Muslims of Gujarat. As emperor, Aurangzeb banned music, dance and the consumption of alcohol in the Mughal Empire. In Sindh and Punjab where many Muslims attended discourses by Hindu Brahmins, he ordered the demolition of all schools and the temples where such interaction took place, making it punishable for Muslims who dressed like non-Muslims.
Representational image. Mayank Austen/ Flickr
But nothing is more of a testimony to the cruelty and bigotry of Aurangzeb than the executions of the Muslim Sufi mystic Sarmad Kashani and the ninth Sikh Guru, Tegh Bahadur. He considered the majority Hindus of his realm as 'Kufaar' and placed them as second class to Muslims, waged jihad against Shia Muslim rulers and wiped out all traces of the liberal, pluralistic and tolerant Islam introduced by his great-grandfather Emperor Akbar.
Aurangzeb today would be the equivalent of Caliph El-Baghdadi of the Islamic State (ISIS), if not Osama Bin Laden or Mullah Omar of the Taliban.
Yet, most Indian Muslims are either not aware of Aurangzeb's crimes or choose to relish the thought that he was the one true king who ruled India in the name of Islam with an iron fist and put Hindus and Sikhs in their rightful place—at the bottom of the heap.
So I told the Muslims in my audience that if they truly wanted to fight ISIS, they should take the lead in demanding the erasing of a murderer's name and replace it with his brother who is loved by all as the epitome of Hindu-Muslim brotherhood.
Then came news of the death of India's most loved president, the Muslim from the country's deep south who lived in a state of Islam, not the Islamic State, Dr APJ Abdul Kalam.
On 29 June, I took to Twitter and urged Indians to ask their governments to change the name from Aurangzeb to APJ Abdul Kalam Road.
The idea caught on like wildfire on social media and soon Lok Sabha member from Delhi, Maheish Girri, wrote to Prime Minister Modi to help change the name.
Yesterday, I was woken by phone calls from friends in India with the news that the Delhi government had decided to change the name of Aurangzeb Road to APJ Abdul Kalam Road. It was 3 am in Toronto and I for a moment thought I must be dreaming, but I was awake so I woke up my wife to share the news.
She shrugged me off, "Buddah pagal ho gaya hai kyaa?''
But as best as I could do, I did a mix of the lungi dance and bhangra. I couldn't believe we had pulled it off. (I am now hoping unashamedly that someone in his kindness will invite me to be in Delhi when the formal change in name takes place.)
The change of name, be it a human being or a place carries huge significance. At times such a change is a sign of subservience and servitude to a new master, while at other times it is one of overthrowing the bondage of a former dictator.
Thus Malcolm X dropped his last name and took on X to reject the family name given to him by some past White slave-owner. In the same vein, Stalingrad was renamed Volgograd as a rebuke to the horrors inflicted on the Russian people by Stalin.
In the country of my birth, Pakistan, many names that reminded us of the British Raj were changed. Thus 'Victoria Road' and 'Elphinstone Street' in Karachi took on names to reflect the new reality of a supposedly independent country. But not all name changes are an act of correcting wrong.
I was born on a quiet street in Karachi, Pakistan, in 1949 on what was once known as 'Lala Lajpat Rai Road', named after the Punjabi author, politician and one of the leaders of the Indian Independence movement.
Lalaji, who died in 1928 after suffering blows to his head in a clash with the police in Lahore, needs no introduction in India. But in the land where he gave his life, hardly anyone knows him, let alone honours him for his service and sacrifice. His crime? He was Hindu. Therefore, his name needed to be erased from the newly created Islamic Republic of Pakistan, the so-called 'Land of the Pure.'
Even as a child I could not understand why 'Guru Mandir' the neighbourhood where I was born had to undergo a name change and become 'Sabeel Wali Masjid'.
Already some Islamists inside India are condemning the change in name. They will argue that if changing the name of Lala Lajpat Rai Road in Pakistan is wrong then the same principle should be applied to Aurangzeb Road. Wrong.
Lala Lajpat Rai was a symbol of India's fight for freedom while Aurangzeb is a symbol of India's subjugation and the imposition of an Arabized culture of radical Islam on a land that savours pluralism and secularism. Jai Hind!
more in Delhi
 








__._,_.___

Posted by: Jiten Roy <jnrsr53@yahoo.com>


****************************************************
Mukto Mona plans for a Grand Darwin Day Celebration: 
Call For Articles:

http://mukto-mona.com/wordpress/?p=68

http://mukto-mona.com/banga_blog/?p=585

****************************************************

VISIT MUKTO-MONA WEB-SITE : http://www.mukto-mona.com/

****************************************************

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
               -Beatrice Hall [pseudonym: S.G. Tallentyre], 190





__,_._,___

Re: [mukto-mona] Fwd: Fw: An interesting article by Tarek Fatah in an Indian newspaper



Very little of Islamic history can be defended. It's mostly dark part of the human history. So, most Muslims go through denial of those dark historical facts. Aurangzeb was one of the dark periods of Islamic history of India, but - you will find many historians, who have portrayed Aurangzeb as one of the benevolent rulers of India. You may wonder how that happened.

On Mon, Sep 7, 2015 at 8:51 AM, Sitangshu Guha guhasb@gmail.com [mukto-mona] <mukto-mona@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
 


 

 

 

Firstpost.

Monday, August 31, 2015| Latest E-book

Why I danced when I found out Delhi's Aurangzeb Road was being renamed after APJ Abdul Kalam

Aug 31, 2015 20:11 IST

By Tarek Fatah

In March, at a lecture in Delhi, I challenged India's Muslims to stand up and reject the Islamic State and instead start living in a state of Islam; the pursuit of truth above everything else.

And to start that journey I suggested they should demand that the Indian and Delhi governments change the name of the city's Aurangzeb Road, named after the murderous Mughal Emperor to the pious and poet prince Dara Shikoh who was beheaded by Aurangzeb.

As an Indian Muslim born in Pakistan, I first visited India in 2013 and was shocked to see the name Aurangzeb adorn one of the most majestic streets of India's capital.

Here was a man who had killed his elder brother to stage a palace coup, who had his own father imprisoned for life and had several Islamic leaders of India hanged to death, among them the spiritual head of the Dawoodi Bohra Muslims of Gujarat. As emperor, Aurangzeb banned music, dance and the consumption of alcohol in the Mughal Empire. In Sindh and Punjab where many Muslims attended discourses by Hindu Brahmins, he ordered the demolition of all schools and the temples where such interaction took place, making it punishable for Muslims who dressed like non-Muslims.

Representational image. Mayank Austen/ Flickr

But nothing is more of a testimony to the cruelty and bigotry of Aurangzeb than the executions of the Muslim Sufi mystic Sarmad Kashani and the ninth Sikh Guru, Tegh Bahadur. He considered the majority Hindus of his realm as 'Kufaar' and placed them as second class to Muslims, waged jihad against Shia Muslim rulers and wiped out all traces of the liberal, pluralistic and tolerant Islam introduced by his great-grandfather Emperor Akbar.

Aurangzeb today would be the equivalent of Caliph El-Baghdadi of the Islamic State (ISIS), if not Osama Bin Laden or Mullah Omar of the Taliban.

Yet, most Indian Muslims are either not aware of Aurangzeb's crimes or choose to relish the thought that he was the one true king who ruled India in the name of Islam with an iron fist and put Hindus and Sikhs in their rightful place—at the bottom of the heap.

So I told the Muslims in my audience that if they truly wanted to fight ISIS, they should take the lead in demanding the erasing of a murderer's name and replace it with his brother who is loved by all as the epitome of Hindu-Muslim brotherhood.

Then came news of the death of India's most loved president, the Muslim from the country's deep south who lived in a state of Islam, not the Islamic State, Dr APJ Abdul Kalam.

On 29 June, I took to Twitter and urged Indians to ask their governments to change the name from Aurangzeb to APJ Abdul Kalam Road.

The idea caught on like wildfire on social media and soon Lok Sabha member from Delhi, Maheish Girri, wrote to Prime Minister Modi to help change the name.

Yesterday, I was woken by phone calls from friends in India with the news that the Delhi government had decided to change the name of Aurangzeb Road to APJ Abdul Kalam Road. It was 3 am in Toronto and I for a moment thought I must be dreaming, but I was awake so I woke up my wife to share the news.

She shrugged me off, "Buddah pagal ho gaya hai kyaa?''

But as best as I could do, I did a mix of the lungi dance and bhangra. I couldn't believe we had pulled it off. (I am now hoping unashamedly that someone in his kindness will invite me to be in Delhi when the formal change in name takes place.)

The change of name, be it a human being or a place carries huge significance. At times such a change is a sign of subservience and servitude to a new master, while at other times it is one of overthrowing the bondage of a former dictator.

Thus Malcolm X dropped his last name and took on X to reject the family name given to him by some past White slave-owner. In the same vein, Stalingrad was renamed Volgograd as a rebuke to the horrors inflicted on the Russian people by Stalin.

In the country of my birth, Pakistan, many names that reminded us of the British Raj were changed. Thus 'Victoria Road' and 'Elphinstone Street' in Karachi took on names to reflect the new reality of a supposedly independent country. But not all name changes are an act of correcting wrong.

I was born on a quiet street in Karachi, Pakistan, in 1949 on what was once known as 'Lala Lajpat Rai Road', named after the Punjabi author, politician and one of the leaders of the Indian Independence movement.

Lalaji, who died in 1928 after suffering blows to his head in a clash with the police in Lahore, needs no introduction in India. But in the land where he gave his life, hardly anyone knows him, let alone honours him for his service and sacrifice. His crime? He was Hindu. Therefore, his name needed to be erased from the newly created Islamic Republic of Pakistan, the so-called 'Land of the Pure.'

Even as a child I could not understand why 'Guru Mandir' the neighbourhood where I was born had to undergo a name change and become 'Sabeel Wali Masjid'.

Already some Islamists inside India are condemning the change in name. They will argue that if changing the name of Lala Lajpat Rai Road in Pakistan is wrong then the same principle should be applied to Aurangzeb Road. Wrong.

Lala Lajpat Rai was a symbol of India's fight for freedom while Aurangzeb is a symbol of India's subjugation and the imposition of an Arabized culture of radical Islam on a land that savours pluralism and secularism. Jai Hind!

more in Delhi

Delhi's Aurangzeb Road will be renamed after APJ Abdul Kalam

 







__._,_.___

Posted by: Dristy Pat <dristypat5@gmail.com>


****************************************************
Mukto Mona plans for a Grand Darwin Day Celebration: 
Call For Articles:

http://mukto-mona.com/wordpress/?p=68

http://mukto-mona.com/banga_blog/?p=585

****************************************************

VISIT MUKTO-MONA WEB-SITE : http://www.mukto-mona.com/

****************************************************

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
               -Beatrice Hall [pseudonym: S.G. Tallentyre], 190





__,_._,___

[mukto-mona] Lies what ruled Pakistan since its inception!



What did Pakistanis really won so far?

http://www.dawn.com/news/1204953/


KARACHI: With Pakistan just two days away from observing Defence Day and marking the 50th anniversary of the 1965 war, historian and political economist Dr S. Akbar Zaidi dispelled 'the victory myth', saying that there can be no a bigger lie, as Pakistan lost terribly.

People are unaware of this fact because the history that is taught in Pakistan is from an ideological viewpoint, said Dr Zaidi during his thought-provoking lecture titled 'Questioning Pakistan's history'. "Students are not taught the history of the people of Pakistan rather it is focused on the making of Pakistan," he said.

The event was organised by the Faculty of Social Sciences, Karachi University.

Dr Zaidi who also teaches history at the Institute of Business Administration, Karachi, began his lecture by raising a couple of questions: what is Pakistan's history and is there a need to question Pakistan's history. And when was Pakistan formed? Aug 14, 1947 or Aug 15, 1947? For him the fact we are still talking about historical events 68 years later that are apparently settled is interesting. "These events and questions have not been settled. They are constantly being reinterpreted, this is because history does not die, it keeps reliving by questioning facts and truths."

Coming to the question when was Pakistan created, he said one obvious answer is it did so on Aug 14, 1947 but he read out an excerpt from a Pakistan Studies textbook in which it was claimed it came into being in 712AD when the Arabs came to Sindh and Multan. "This is utter rubbish!" he exclaimed, rejecting the textbook account. He said the first interaction with Muslims and Arabs occurred in Kerala in South India for trading purposes.

Some historians claim the genesis of Pakistan lie in the Delhi Sultanate or the Mughal Empire. He, however, reminded everyone that the India as we know today did not exist during the Mughal era. It was during the 19th century the concept of nation-state was formed. There are others who state Sir Syed Ahmed Khan laid the foundation for Pakistan. Dr Zaidi felt this statement was partially true, because Sir Syed always maintained that Muslims should get their rights but he had also said: "Hindus and Muslims are the two eyes of the beautiful bride that is Hindustan. Weakness of any of them will spoil the beauty of the bride."

The 1940 Pakistan Resolution called for the recognition of Muslims within Hindustan and not for a separate entity, Dr Zaidi added.

Social history

He then led the debate towards the questions: "Is the history of Pakistan, a history of the people of Pakistan or is it the making of Pakistan?"As far as he knew everyone is taught a history that includes the Mughals, freedom movement, the Quaid-i-Azam leading the All India Muslim League etc but was completely unaware about the history of the Baloch and the Pakhtun. "I cannot understand Pakistan's history without knowing the history of the Baloch, Pakhtun, Punjab, Shah Abdul Latif and his relationship with the land."

He said he was ashamed as a Karachiite that he had been unaware of Sindh's history. It was important to know about indigenous histories because the "issues we are confronted with, we would have a better understanding in dealing with them". He gave the example of East Pakistan to illustrate this point. "East Pakistan has been erased from memory. The Bengalis of East Pakistan have been reduced to they were traitors, India interfered and East Pakistan decided to separate. But what about Pakistan Army's role in its separation?"

According to Dr Zaidi, history in Pakistan has been badly treated due to several reasons. Students are forced to study history or Pakistan Studies as a compulsory subject and hence the focus is just to pass the exam and get over with it. It is focused on rulers and generals and not on the social history. He highlighted another important reason for history getting a step-motherly treatment, citing that it is a subject that is taken when a student is unable to get admission in other departments in universities.

A robust question and answer session followed the talk during which students and teachers wanted to know why they were being taught distorted version of history, why the contribution of religious minorities to cities such as Karachi, Lahore and Peshawar was not mentioned in their textbooks, why does one have to wear separate identities and how can identification crisis be resolved to make Pakistan into one nation.

Dr Zaidi responded to these queries, explaining that Parsis and Hindus contributed hugely in the educational development of Karachi and in a similar manner the Sikhs in Punjab. "History in Pakistan is taught from an ideological viewpoint. Pakistan needs to be seen as a geographical entity."

Referring to the distorted history, he said: "With the celebration of the victory in the 1965 war round the corner, there can be no bigger lie that Pakistan won the war. We lost terribly in the 1965 war."

He appealed to the attendees to read Shuja Nawaz's book Crossed Swords that exposed the reality of the war.

As for wearing separate identities, he replied there was no need to do so. "I can be a Sindhi, Hindu and Pakistani simultaneously." He added that the diversity of nations should be acknowledged, since nationalities could not be imposed on people.

Published in Dawn, September 5th, 2015




__._,_.___

Posted by: Shah DeEldar <shahdeeldar@gmail.com>


****************************************************
Mukto Mona plans for a Grand Darwin Day Celebration: 
Call For Articles:

http://mukto-mona.com/wordpress/?p=68

http://mukto-mona.com/banga_blog/?p=585

****************************************************

VISIT MUKTO-MONA WEB-SITE : http://www.mukto-mona.com/

****************************************************

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
               -Beatrice Hall [pseudonym: S.G. Tallentyre], 190





__,_._,___

[mukto-mona] Fwd: Fw: An interesting article by Tarek Fatah in an Indian newspaper




 

 

 

Firstpost.

Monday, August 31, 2015| Latest E-book

Why I danced when I found out Delhi's Aurangzeb Road was being renamed after APJ Abdul Kalam

Aug 31, 2015 20:11 IST

By Tarek Fatah

In March, at a lecture in Delhi, I challenged India's Muslims to stand up and reject the Islamic State and instead start living in a state of Islam; the pursuit of truth above everything else.

And to start that journey I suggested they should demand that the Indian and Delhi governments change the name of the city's Aurangzeb Road, named after the murderous Mughal Emperor to the pious and poet prince Dara Shikoh who was beheaded by Aurangzeb.

As an Indian Muslim born in Pakistan, I first visited India in 2013 and was shocked to see the name Aurangzeb adorn one of the most majestic streets of India's capital.

Here was a man who had killed his elder brother to stage a palace coup, who had his own father imprisoned for life and had several Islamic leaders of India hanged to death, among them the spiritual head of the Dawoodi Bohra Muslims of Gujarat. As emperor, Aurangzeb banned music, dance and the consumption of alcohol in the Mughal Empire. In Sindh and Punjab where many Muslims attended discourses by Hindu Brahmins, he ordered the demolition of all schools and the temples where such interaction took place, making it punishable for Muslims who dressed like non-Muslims.

Representational image. Mayank Austen/ Flickr

But nothing is more of a testimony to the cruelty and bigotry of Aurangzeb than the executions of the Muslim Sufi mystic Sarmad Kashani and the ninth Sikh Guru, Tegh Bahadur. He considered the majority Hindus of his realm as 'Kufaar' and placed them as second class to Muslims, waged jihad against Shia Muslim rulers and wiped out all traces of the liberal, pluralistic and tolerant Islam introduced by his great-grandfather Emperor Akbar.

Aurangzeb today would be the equivalent of Caliph El-Baghdadi of the Islamic State (ISIS), if not Osama Bin Laden or Mullah Omar of the Taliban.

Yet, most Indian Muslims are either not aware of Aurangzeb's crimes or choose to relish the thought that he was the one true king who ruled India in the name of Islam with an iron fist and put Hindus and Sikhs in their rightful place—at the bottom of the heap.

So I told the Muslims in my audience that if they truly wanted to fight ISIS, they should take the lead in demanding the erasing of a murderer's name and replace it with his brother who is loved by all as the epitome of Hindu-Muslim brotherhood.

Then came news of the death of India's most loved president, the Muslim from the country's deep south who lived in a state of Islam, not the Islamic State, Dr APJ Abdul Kalam.

On 29 June, I took to Twitter and urged Indians to ask their governments to change the name from Aurangzeb to APJ Abdul Kalam Road.

The idea caught on like wildfire on social media and soon Lok Sabha member from Delhi, Maheish Girri, wrote to Prime Minister Modi to help change the name.

Yesterday, I was woken by phone calls from friends in India with the news that the Delhi government had decided to change the name of Aurangzeb Road to APJ Abdul Kalam Road. It was 3 am in Toronto and I for a moment thought I must be dreaming, but I was awake so I woke up my wife to share the news.

She shrugged me off, "Buddah pagal ho gaya hai kyaa?''

But as best as I could do, I did a mix of the lungi dance and bhangra. I couldn't believe we had pulled it off. (I am now hoping unashamedly that someone in his kindness will invite me to be in Delhi when the formal change in name takes place.)

The change of name, be it a human being or a place carries huge significance. At times such a change is a sign of subservience and servitude to a new master, while at other times it is one of overthrowing the bondage of a former dictator.

Thus Malcolm X dropped his last name and took on X to reject the family name given to him by some past White slave-owner. In the same vein, Stalingrad was renamed Volgograd as a rebuke to the horrors inflicted on the Russian people by Stalin.

In the country of my birth, Pakistan, many names that reminded us of the British Raj were changed. Thus 'Victoria Road' and 'Elphinstone Street' in Karachi took on names to reflect the new reality of a supposedly independent country. But not all name changes are an act of correcting wrong.

I was born on a quiet street in Karachi, Pakistan, in 1949 on what was once known as 'Lala Lajpat Rai Road', named after the Punjabi author, politician and one of the leaders of the Indian Independence movement.

Lalaji, who died in 1928 after suffering blows to his head in a clash with the police in Lahore, needs no introduction in India. But in the land where he gave his life, hardly anyone knows him, let alone honours him for his service and sacrifice. His crime? He was Hindu. Therefore, his name needed to be erased from the newly created Islamic Republic of Pakistan, the so-called 'Land of the Pure.'

Even as a child I could not understand why 'Guru Mandir' the neighbourhood where I was born had to undergo a name change and become 'Sabeel Wali Masjid'.

Already some Islamists inside India are condemning the change in name. They will argue that if changing the name of Lala Lajpat Rai Road in Pakistan is wrong then the same principle should be applied to Aurangzeb Road. Wrong.

Lala Lajpat Rai was a symbol of India's fight for freedom while Aurangzeb is a symbol of India's subjugation and the imposition of an Arabized culture of radical Islam on a land that savours pluralism and secularism. Jai Hind!

more in Delhi

Delhi's Aurangzeb Road will be renamed after APJ Abdul Kalam

 






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Posted by: Sitangshu Guha <guhasb@gmail.com>


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Mukto Mona plans for a Grand Darwin Day Celebration: 
Call For Articles:

http://mukto-mona.com/wordpress/?p=68

http://mukto-mona.com/banga_blog/?p=585

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"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
               -Beatrice Hall [pseudonym: S.G. Tallentyre], 190





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[mukto-mona] Re: For publication



Nobody has experienced hell and came back from the hell how it looks like. But we know that heaven and hell are in this world. When we do wrong to people, we suffer mentally and we don't have peace of heart and mind. But when we are in good relation with everyone, keep ourselves away from dishonesty, injustice, and all evil deeds but help and love people, we have peace of heart and mind. That position of mind is called heaven and the former situation of mind is called hell. So don't search for heaven and hell after the death but heaven and hell are in this world today and for us all.
Rosaline Costa


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Posted by: costa rosie <costa_rosie@yahoo.com>


****************************************************
Mukto Mona plans for a Grand Darwin Day Celebration: 
Call For Articles:

http://mukto-mona.com/wordpress/?p=68

http://mukto-mona.com/banga_blog/?p=585

****************************************************

VISIT MUKTO-MONA WEB-SITE : http://www.mukto-mona.com/

****************************************************

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
               -Beatrice Hall [pseudonym: S.G. Tallentyre], 190





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[mukto-mona] সিঙ্গাপুরে জুয়ার আসরে বাংলাদেশীদের ৫০০ কোটি টাকা



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Also read:

সিঙ্গাপুরে ক্যাসিনোর ফাঁদে বাংলাদেশীরা

মীর মনিরুজ্জামান সিঙ্গাপুর থেকে ফিরে | ২০১৫-০৯-০৭ ইং

http://www.bonikbarta.com/2015-09-07/news/details/48783.html

সিঙ্গাপুরে ক্যাসিনোর ফাঁদে বাংলাদেশীরা 





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Posted by: "Jamal G. Khan" <M.JamalGhaus@gmail.com>


****************************************************
Mukto Mona plans for a Grand Darwin Day Celebration: 
Call For Articles:

http://mukto-mona.com/wordpress/?p=68

http://mukto-mona.com/banga_blog/?p=585

****************************************************

VISIT MUKTO-MONA WEB-SITE : http://www.mukto-mona.com/

****************************************************

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
               -Beatrice Hall [pseudonym: S.G. Tallentyre], 190





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