Why Hindus and Muslims parted ways after living together for centuries
There have been enough of talks on pseudo secularism. The only way left out is crusade for a secular administration will have to be fought from scratch because aggressiveness of the majority could extend to dictatorship. The believers in democracy should not sit silently at this crucial juncture. This article tells the saga of how two communities-Hindus-Muslim living together for centuries, were separated.
The division of the Indian subcontinent has grown 66 years older. The division that had taken place on 14 August 1947 had given births to two nations- India and Pakistan. They have not become nice neighbors even until today far from being friendly. Units of army are patrolling on borders and a war cannot be averted now. Just a few days ago, five jawans of Indian army were killed. There might be a truth in it that the Pakistani army was not involved in this killing directly, but this helps jehadies and Pakistan also in destabilizing India seems the Pakistan army has no interest in peace agreement between Islamabad and New Delhi. These incidents have become a norm than exceptions to happen before every peace efforts begin between two countries. Nobody has been able to explain thus far solidly this that despite living together for thousand years, why two communities bid adieu with each other's? The truth behind this sordid saga
Zealots might argue that the Muslims maintained peace because that was their empire to keep their rule perpetual. This is true that the Muslims and Hindus had established a shared cultured that accepted the meeting of two civilizations. Social get together was regular and both the communities celebrated the festivities of both the communities jointly. However, things started getting uglier since 1930. It did not take much effort for the people, who were advocating for religious identity to snap the thread of relationship between the two communities. Was the majority-ism just to cloak their differences? The reality was that no any shared base could develop between the two communities and both continued standing miles apart- one at the North Pole whiles the other at the South Pole.
Had the matter was so, as has been stated above, why not the exchange of two populations were rejected outright at the times of deliberating upon the division of the country? Not Muslims even objected to this that whatever number of Muslim population would be left out in India would be far in excess than that of their newly created state of Pakistan. Hindus were uprooted after getting out of Pakistan and Muslims were kicked out from Punjab and some cities of northern Indian parts. This was a forced exile Demand for breaking the nation into pieces was already hidden behind the veils, but never ever were Muslims uprooted from their places of centuries until the two-nation theory was propounded in the decades of thirties. The Muslim League triumphed without any effort and labor. In the elections of 1937, it had won 57 seats out of the 482 Muslim seats of 11 states. After a decade in 1946, it won 116 out of the total seats of 119 in Bengal, 43 out of 50 in Bihar54 out of 61 in UP and 54 out of 54 in Sindh.Events during 1930 that sowed seeds of discord between the two communities
During 1930-40, there were two schools of Hindu politicians namely the National Congress School and the Hindu Mahasabha. The Mahasabha was one of the most militant Hindu organizations in the 1930s. As for the Indian National Congress it was of the opinion that without the Hindu-Muslim unity, there was no hope of any great constitutional advancement in the then British rule in India. Yet, at the same time, there was a faction within the Congress party, which believed that the Indian Muslims were not amply patriotic as far as the Indian Nationalism feelings were concerned. Moreover, there was abundance of disbelief regarding the loyalty of the Muslims and their Pan-Islamic feelings also keeping in viewpoint of the sordid sagas and its recollections of the Muslim rule in perception.
The Congress party was set up in 1885 with the main aim in mind of representing all the communities living in India with the claim of being the sole-representative of Indian belief. However, the Congress Party adopted anti-Muslim stance no sooner national issues such as the Hindi-Urdu controversy, the Partition of Bengal, (1905), and the issue of separate electorates for Muslims cropped up. Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, the creator of two-nation theory had been sending the messages all the while that the Congress Party will always support the Hindu community when it would come down to selecting one party. Sir Syed's reading of the Hindu mind was right and there was nothing wrong in it too. Does the real cure lie in opposing great national institution for communal advantages or for appeasement of the minority at the cost of the majority? Alternatively, is it not to be found by supporting it for the good of the causes of all the communities living in a nation?
Hindu Sabha's sprang up in Lahore in 1882 and by 1906, it spread like mushroom. The all India Hindu Mahasabha held its first session in Hardwar in UP in 1915; several Congress leaders until 1930's continued to attend the sabha before partition. Hindu Mahasabha had a vast following considerably influencing the Hindu mind-set. It very soon began antagonizing the Indian Muslims in a variety of ways. The Mahasabhaites frequented the anti-Muslim movements like the Shuddhi and Sangathan with the goal of petrifying and converting Muslims back to Hindu- fold. The pleas used by Malaviya as well as Mahasabha extremists were that they were saving cows from being slaughtered at the hands of Muslims, trying at the same time to force the conversions of Muslims to Hinduism using the claim that majority of India's Muslim populace were originally Hindus who were forced to become Muslims during Muslim rule in India. These and various other national and international events influenced the relationship of Hindu-Muslims greatly, sowing the seed of discords in their mind ultimately culminating into partition and birth of Pakistan. What it took the two communities to parting of ways
It is futile to talk of the birth of Pakistan now, because it is becoming more and orthodox, hawkish and Talibani. Nevertheless, there are such liberal Hindus and Muslims leaders in both the countries as well as in other parts of the world, who want to raise this question that why despite living similar lives for centuries together treading on the paths of similar traditions, both the communities bid good byes to each other? The top Congress leader Maulana Abul Kalam Azad had warned the Muslims of Bihar, UP and Madras that they would one day suddenly find themselves overnight in another country as a foreigner after waking up in the morning. Those people, backward from the point of views of education, industries and economically would be dependent on the country, which would by then emerge up as Hindu Raj. Pandit Jawahar Lal had expressed his anguish by saying that problems do not get solved by dividing a nation in two parts, because Muslims and Hindus are omnipresent everywhere. Humayun Kabir was the secretary of Maulana Abul Kalam Azad. He had later divulged the fact that Azad was of the opinion that the Congress leaders (Nehru-58 and Patel-72 years old) had agreed to partition simply because they had grown old and tired and majority of more aged people did want this too, to devote their rest of lives in making an India of their dreams. No one had wanted division then
Division in totality was a flood of decampment. Flood of humanity had burst out from both sides. Nobody had wanted this, but nobody could stop this exodus. People had to cross borders without a penny in their pockets from both the sides. Such were the compulsions. This happened with the entire Hindus and Muslims who had this belief that one day, they shall return to their homes after this wrangle would be over. Alas, this did never happen! People in the fortress of Muslim League like UP and Bihar looked down upon the school of secularism with utter contempt unless Pakistan came into being. The same people are swearing in the name of secularism. How do they justify this in front of their children? Secularism is an idea of opposition to separation and division. Of late, the talk of secularization has reached crescendo eclipsing every other issues facing the nation. If the communities have no faith in it, they must peep into their hearts. Several Hindus are becoming victims to such anti national ideologies. It was presumed after the departure of British and formation of Pakistan, the fear of religion would disappear. What in effect is happening is that the pseudo secularists are stoking the fire in the name secularism just to woo the Muslim vote banks.
Wrap: Nevertheless, people had not paid attention to the separatist elements present in the midst of Hindus. In reality, fight for secularist administration will have to be undertaken again from afresh, because there is no other alternative other than this as the aggressiveness of majority could convert into dictatorship. People believing in democracy and diversity should not sit silently. It is high time for them to have acted and reacted .
This is a very elaborate and exhaustive article on the partition of India in 1947 and religious and social aspects attached with that. Historically, the Indian peninsula was ruled by many Indian kings in the ancient times and they had their own territories which they protected from each other. At that time wars were fought on the land with manual army and whoever had a good number of armed persons and associated facilities won the war and took control of other lands or other kingdoms. This went on for a long time and the major change took place when India was invaded by the Mughals, Mongosl and other invaders. That invasion changed the history of India forever. We remained under the control of those invaders for a long time and the whole Northern part of India was captured by them. It was only some areas in the southern India which remained protected from those in invading forces due to geographical and other reasons.
When two cultures are very different from each other as happened in this case then it is obvious that those communities cannot live together and even if live together one of them which is dominating will offend and make the other community as slave to it.
Another change came in the setup when Britishers invaded India and took control of everything and all the religious groups were under them. The condition of Hindus in fact improved in that system though it was not much better than the earlier one. In 1947, when India became independent then there were many political, social, and religious regions because of which partition was made. Different people will differ in there opinions about whether partition was right thing or wrong thing but the fundamental thing in this matter is that when two communities are very different from each other then it is advisable for them to live in separate territories.
Let us see the example of Europe where there are so many small-small nations having their own language and cultural attributes and other traditions. Most of them were carved out because of their culture and traditions while some of them came in existence based on the basis of their religions. If religion is not an important thing in the world then how is it that the Jews could not get a nation for themselves for a long time and it was only after the good efforts of United Nations that they got a country, that is, Israel for themselves.