Thoughts on the passing of Tarek Fatah

Tarek Fatah's recent death met with mourning in Indian nationalist circles. Those not aware of Indian (especially Hindu-Muslim relations) politics might not know Tarek Fatah's name, but even as a member of the Muslim community (a Pakistani immigrant to Canada) he was one of the most outspoken critics of Islamicism, especially as it exists in the subcontinent. He was a great friend to Bharata and I certainly hope that there will be others who will step in to fill the void he leaves behind.

I subsequently watched a number of videos like the following, all of which give a rather good idea of what I wrote above. In this one, Jaipur Dialogs 2016, is in mixed Urdu and English. The English bits are worth the wait. The jokes are in Urdu. His sense of urgency about the Islamicist threat and a criticism of Indian and Hindu weakness in the face of intransigent Muslim nihilism. It is a very good critique of Islam from the point of view of an enlightened Muslim. He calls himself an Indian born in Pakistan and says, among other things, that all Pakistanis are Hindus who just don't want to admit it. He is a fount of historical knowledge, he knows of Islam's baggage.

This relevant clip of Rajiv Malhotra about hard and soft power and the need for a revival of kshatriya culture in Hinduism. The necessity for it. In a way, he echoes many of the things that Fatah mentions in the previous clip and berates Canadians for their complacency.

This last one is from four years ago, a short lecture in Toronto at a rather prestigious venue, hosted by Moses Znaimer. In this one, Fatah speaks to a Canadian audience about the dangers of Islamicism or political Islam. He says what no one wants to say about Islam, what no white Canadian would dare say aloud.

I had the following thoughts on what little I know of recent Indian and Hindu history, brought into focus somewhat by Tarek Fatah's departure.

I am repelled at the thought that Westernization and globalization mean that there should be more Christianization and Islamization of India, what to speak of secular atheism, the consumerist mentality, and disintegration of the family structure, and all the rest of the fallout from our Western so-named "progressivism."

A just saw in an article in Le Monde that India is now the most populous country in the world, surging ahead of China. The report itself focuses on a village in Kashmir where there is a dependency on revenue from migrant workers. The village is photographed and looks very nice and the people also look peaceful, serene, not too bad even by the look of it compared to many similar villages around India. 

The writer said that India is still rural in the majority. Although literacy is higher than it ever has been, it is still not high enough. Most people still are very much tied to the land. The husbands are wandering in the city landscapes while women manage the home front and do most of the farming. 

The idea of course was to show a French audience the backward state of most of India, the challenges of bringing people out of the stone age into the 21st century. Basically an old story. By comparison a soft job to the kinds of things you might have seen in the 40's or 50's or read about in a Naipaul travelog. Though it might remind you that this may just reflect nervousness at India's rise.

Anyway I have seen good and bad villages in India. I was very impressed I remember with the two story mud houses in Bengal, some very old, like in Shrikhanda. I saw other villages where highly educated people still lived in mud houses. Where even the temples were just mud huts.
But mostly not. I am a city boy. Even in Vrindavan, you are a city boy. There is just too much action going on. And the Jiva operation and ISKCON and the rest are all global operations, linked by global systems.

In the midst of it all, India is undergoing unique growing pains. Or, rather, it may better be said that India has decided to have an identity, or better yet, India is starting to grow into its own identity. And that identity is directly related to the history of the Hindus.

Hindus do in fact have the philosophy that is most accepting of diversity, tolerance based on the One God theory. That your God and my God are the same God. And that as soon as you recognize that, you will be a lot further not only to knowing God, but to knowing Love.

Hinduism is not about establishing a theocracy. Hindu nationalism is about bhārata-svābhimāna, being proud of one's identity as an Indian. In China, Communism destroyed the cultural and religious aspects of the old, backward China. Just as they are attempting to do in Tibet and with the Ugyurs. That is NOT the road India wants to take with Islam. But India is caught in the tolerance trap: How far should you tolerate the intolerant?  

India is surrounded by belligerent enemies. Pakistan is propagandized to the extreme against India. The two countries are separated because the Muslims wanted their own country and would happily produce mayhem to get it. So they got it, but the Hindus happen to be doing better than them economically.

The Pakistani raison d'etre is India. It came into existence precisely because it could not accept living in Dar al-Harb. It is defiantly anti-India. Its people fear India and think it is trying to take over and undermine their national integrity. They believe every bit of propaganda about Hindu mistreatment of Muslims when they have ethnically cleansed Pakistan of nearly every Hindu who was left after Partition.

Islamism still rules in Pakistan more than in any country in the world, except perhaps Afghanistan. The current internal political situation there appears to be quite dire, and when that happens, the old bugaboo India will be raised and Kashmir will be raised and nits will be picked. 

Moreover, India is doing much better economically than Pakistan, thank you. And Pakistanis are jealous of it. And with that knowledge, India is becoming stronger in its Hindu identity. Whatever Nehru's India was in terms of secularism and Hindu identity, the general feeling grew steadily that the Congress was constantly appeasing the Muslims in order to get their votes. The basic idea was that a secular and scientific education makes people less superstitious and thus reduces communal tension. The Hindus were mostly on board, but the Muslims not so much. 

So that kind of weakness grated on many self-respecting Hindus and so it was quite natural that they should try to strengthen India and its kshatriya heritage. And the Bhagavad Gita is the Bible of such people. Krishna says he taught it to the original king, the Sun God, who transmitted it to his sons and on to the rajarshis. It is the science of governing in the light of the purpose of human society and human life, in a nice concise form. It contains plenty of other fundamental descriptions of human reality that, with the development of many sampradāyas of varying religious flavors has turned into the "Indian way of thinking" about the world and social organization.

India's religious identity is indeed at play here. The Abrahamic religions insist on world domination of one kind or another. They consider their own truths to be absolute and those that are promoted elsewhere to be flawed basically because they are not true. They are convinced that their conviction that theirs is the truth is what makes them great, gives them strength and righteousness in this world and a reward in heaven in the next. And there is no other way, no other way, no other way.

This has always been the problem for the Hindu. It is not that satyam eva does not jayate. It does indeed, and it is through Truth and in defending the Hindu truth that Indian identity will be forged.

But this Indian identity must be based in an Indian way of thinking,