MR KARAN THAPAR , IF YOU INTERVIEW ME AND WERE TO ASK ME “WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE HINDU IN INDIA?” , THIS IS HOW, SIR, I WOULD ANSWER YOU”.
Greeks, Turks , Persians, Afghans, Mongols, Kushans, Portuguese, British , Dutch, French …. all in the name of trade, plain looting, or else “bringing enlightenment” or “civilisation“ to native heathens (“saving lost souls”) and in the name of their respective religions … had a gala field day invading India throughout both pre-Christian and post-Christian era.
Between 640 AD and 800 AD , Islam spread and conquered the entire Middle East , North Africa , Spain , Turkey, The Stan countries , Mongolia , India and even further east .
Much of the modern world therefore cannot disabuse itself of the notion that India was and is a nation custom-built for enslavement — militarily, ideologically, economically and culturally.
Post-Independence in India, most minorities settled down as peace-loving communities in a pluralistic society where they realised the reality of their minority status. The Parsis are a notable example .
There are still however sections of minority groups in India who yet suffer from the hangover of history. They cannot stomach the thought that Islam and the West after all were once sovereign kings and rulers of this vast country and its teeming millions of meek Hindu slaves. They are acutely aware of their present minority status and cannot help smarting under the feeling of being somewhat disempowered , disenfranchised and dispossessed. They want status quo ante somehow and somewhat restored in India . It’s a drug withdrawal symptom … where the drug happens to be memories of power, grandeur and overlordship of a vast sub-continent across centuries.
Such wishful thinking they know cannot be fulfilled in a modern republic like India given its robust Constitution. Except through and with parliamentary superiority gained through engagement with the larger body politic of a predominantly Hindu India , the minorities simply cannot hope to regain the old glory days of minority-rule over an enslaved Hindu country that had always been up for grabs in history.
So what then is the alternative for the disgruntled historically hung-over minorities in India ?
The obvious answer is to seek solidarity abroad with larger international forces who have the same agenda of neo-imperialism and whose numbers today are legion across so much of political space within the West, the Middle-East and of late in emerging China too . The minorities of India now see that the only way for them to recapture power over the subcontinent —- the same one that they ruled for over a millennium — lies in active covert and overt collaboration with the larger forces of Pan-Islam, Pan-Western Neo-Liberalism and Pan-Neo-Communism forces that wield power and influence in varying degrees in the rest of the prevailing world order. . This is a battle for the long-haul … they know it … but then given their experience of history of India the minorities believe they are very much on the right side of history.
This is the reason why many of the more militant-minded minorities of India (with the exceptions of the Parsees and Jews here perhaps) will never accept or reconcile themselves to their minority status, or settle down peacefully in India. This battle for them has no end-date … ideologically speaking , for them , it is going to be as perennial as both the “jihaad” and the “crusade” are — which both are fundamentally conceptions of world domination.
After 75 years after Independence, the Hindus of India at last seem to have woken up, fully grasped and understood the ingrained psychology and history-driven predisposition of the minorities. And much of Hindutva thought that is being articulated today in the political arena of the country is really nothing more but the average Hindu’s way of asserting “no way am I going to let the History of the last 2000 years repeat itself!”.
Regards,
Sudarshan Madabushi
Bhaarath Maatha ki Jai 🇮🇳 🙏