It is sad that the Supreme Court has again opened the case of the Babri Masjid’s against LK Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi. Whatever can be said about the merits of razing the Ayodhya mosque, no Muslim was kiIled there, whereas the ‘revenge’ bombings of Mumbai killed nearly a thousand innocent people, mostly Hindus, without speaking of the thousands of Hindu temples razed in Bangladesh and Pakistan, post Ayodhya.
I have known these two men for more than 30 years. Mr Advani is an upright, honest, dedicated and non-corrupt politician, who has been labelled all kinds of names by the Media. Yet, I have never seen him ask anything for himself or his family and he always lived a simple life. Indeed, his spartan habits have carried him to an advanced age, where he still has all his physical and mental abilities.
Politics is something of a Russian Roulette: sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. There is no doubt that Mr Advani would have made a good Prime Minister. But Mr Vajpayee always kept him in check, and when Mr Modi came on the scene, Mr Advani was already in his 80s. This is why I would have liked to see Mr Advani as the next President of India, for he would bean honourable, active and pro-India one. Let us see what the future holds, but I want to here pay my respects to Mr. Advani and Joshi, because 30 years ago, when it was not fashionable, they were pioneers of Hindu Power and led the way for the coming of the BJP and Mr Narendra Modi to form this strong Government that is now spreading its wings all over India. The @BJP4India owes them a lot, and in true Indian traditions, it should honor them, as elders have always been honoured in India. I remember Mr Murli Manohar Joshi being mocked by the entire media when he went to raise the Indian flag in Srinagar, something that would be totally acceptable today. Mr Advani was equally made fun of by Indian journalists for his Rathyatra, but I thought then that these two men had courage and dedication and this is why I always stood by them in my writings.
These habits of the media to debase its Hindu politicians, also applies to Hindu gurus. As the great actor Vinod Khanna has just passed away, one of the most intelligent and creative Bollywood players, we recall that he also had the courage to give up everything, fame and wealth, to follow his Guru Osho. Who remembers today that Osho was the target of ridicule by Indian journalists, that he had to flee to the United States, where there he was also hounded and even thrown in jail. But for sure, he is not the only Hindu Guru hassled in India. Maharishi Yogi also left his native country, as he was harassed and took refuge in Holland. Sai Baba one of the great gurus of the 21st century, was beleaguered relentlessly by the media. And so are many other gurus who have also been ridiculed or pursued by the Media and Indian Intelligentsia. It is thus no mystery that many gurus even went to jail. We think about the Shankaracharya, who spent quite many months in prison, without ever been charged, or even today Asaram Bapu, who is still in jail.
Lately the Intelligentsia, the NGO’s and the media have been going out all guns blazing against Sri Sri Ravi Shankar for his World Cultural program, which gathered 3 million people in Delhi the capital, coming from all over the world, and bringing precious foreign exchange to the government. @SriSri is supposed to have damaged the fragile Yamuna ecological system, but everyone who lives nearby knows that it is mostly a sewer, that stinks to heaven and that not much can survive in its black waters, even jungle fish. The irony is that Sri Sri is the only one that tried to do something for the Yamuna river when five years ago, thousands of his volunteers embarked upon a project to clean it. I was there. Yet the NGT, whom we never heard before did much to clean India’s damaged ecology, its rivers and forests, is doing a witch hunt on the Art of Living.
Why is it that the intellectuals, the NGOs and the journalists always go after Hindus, their politicians and their gurus? Well, firstly, Hindus have always taken insults lying down, that is they hardly react to them – not like Muslims, who, if you say anything about the Prophet or the Koran, go down in the streets and riot, or even kill, as it happened in Paris after the Charlie Hebdo cartoons. Then, Hindus however many wonderful qualities they have, are a very very disunited lot, either out of selfishness, or because Hinduism is too much of an individualistic religion.Finally, it is actually the British, who, when they were masters of India,started in their newspapers to make fun of the Hindus and their customs, derided cow worship & Hindu pujas, or always harped on the ‘evil’ caste system. Is it not then that today’s Indian journalists are true children of the British, who planted in their forefathers the seeds of Hinduphobia ?
Furthermore, it must be said that Nehru, the first Prime Minister of India, adopted at Independence a socialism that was heavily inspired from the Soviet Union. He felt that this socialism was the best way to level all the inequalities, social, economical, and of caste, that were then prevalent in India. He also had to deal with an important Muslim minority that had chosen to stay in India and not join Pakistan. It is for these two reasons that he asked his historians to prop-up Muslim rulers such as Akbar or even the terrible Aurangzeb and denied the greatness of Hindu warriors such as Shivaji Mahjaraj or Maharana Pratap, knowing that Hindus would stay quiet
Nehru also pampered Christians and Muslims, giving them not only freedom of worship, which Hindus do not get in Pakistan or Gulf countries, but also allowed them total control of their places of worship; whereas the government took over most Hindu temples. He also fashioned a generation of scholars, intellectuals, journalists and even NGO workers, that looked down upon Hinduism as a religion that was backwards and would brake India’s economy growth. Indeed one remembers his famous quote: “Dams are the new temples of India”.
Hinduphobia thus attained a peak that even the British had not dreamed off under Nehru and continues to rule today as subsequent nehruvian generations,in schools, universities, families,,either bred total ignorance about Hinduism, or outright contempt. This is why today we find that the media always attacks or mocks Hindus,their gurus or even their politicians. Let us hope that Mr Narendra Modi will effect in India a tremendous transformation, that will recognise that not only Hindus have the overwhelming majority in this country, but that Hinduism is the only religion today that accepts and respects all the other religions of the world, including Islam.
Hindu gurus are one of the most ancient and sacred traditions of this land and the media should at least respect that, so that western correspondents posted in Delhi, take notice and pay a little more respect to Hindus, who are the descendants of one of the most ancient and wisest civilisations of our History
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