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He called Mr. Jinnah a "secular" leader. This provoked outrage not only amongst the VHP and RSS but also amongst the members of of the Congress Party.
Leaders of the RSS and the VHP, two Hindu organizations, said that his remarks were not really needed. One leader even called him a "traitor".
In my opinion, by making irresponsible statements in Pakistan, Mr. Advani has not only hurt himself but he has also hurt his own Party, the BJP, and also the Hindu people everywhere.
I had great regards for Mr. Advani, but after reading his remarks, I have lost some respect for him. I thought that being in such a high post, he would weigh his words before uttering them.
Mr. L.K. Advani has perhaps forgotten that the BJP became very strong in he past two decades, not by copying the agenda and the policies of the Congress Party but by following a policy of trying to serve the interest of the Hindu religion and people, which had been ignored by the Congress and other parties, e.g. the Socialist and the Communist parties.
If the BJP tries to become like the Congress Party, and starts to call people like Mr. Jinnah secular, people will find that there is little difference between the Congress and the BJP and they will find little reason to support the BJP.
In my last vacation in India, I found that many people expressed support for the Hindu nationalist policies of the BJP, while some people said that the BJP lost because they did not fulfill their promises to the people, for example, their promise of building a temple at Ayodhya. One man from Bihar angrily told me that the BJP deserved to have been kicked out of power because they failed to deliver on the promises they made to the Hindu people prior to gaining power.
Mr. L.K. Advani has proved that he is not a stateman but only a politician, albeit a successful politician. He lacks consistency and can not be trusted. Perhaps he thinks that by changing his tune he will be considered a moderate leader and has greater chance of becoming India's Prime Minister in the future.
But it seems that gaining power is more important to him than serving the interest of the Hindu people, who are his constituency. But what will he do if he gains power? If he does not use his power to serve the people, what good is his power, and why should the people elect him to the highest office in the land?
*** The End ***
Please send your feedback about this essay to Nirmalb@HotMail.com.
Personally I think polititions are are just salesmen selling themselves and Mr. Advani's statements are just a ruse to get him back into the news. Public reaction, good or bad is a workable situation whereas no reaction means no one cares about your product (the politician). Apparently Mr. Advani is about to make some play to get back into the political sphere himself or help BLP regain some position in the government in India.
KKdas
Dear Nirmal Sahib,
Your article about Advani is all right.
From my personal point of view, Advani tried to cut BJP from Hindutva brigade. Unfortunately, the Macaulayan education crust is ignorant that our true Vedic heritage is Advaita of Vedanta and its mind purifying Brahmacharya disciplines. Both are now the property of millions of followers of eight religions in India. Macaulahyan mind does not know and so has no proper understanding of the immense value of this empowering spiritual heritage. Advaitic disciplines empowered Mahatma Gandhi, Maualana Abul Kalam Azad and Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan.
So the mind of Hindus of Secular and Hindutva brigades do not know and so cannot understand Advaita and Brahmacharya and both as Quranic Vahdat (Oneness of the Creation and of Existence and Saif al Nafs or jihad by the sword of Control on inward passions, respectively.
So poor Advani could not cut off the BJP from Hindutva and secularism both to set empowered oneness of India on BJP flag as Advaita and Vahdat and not Hindutva or only Advaita.
From my personal point of view Advani lost an opportunity to become a statesman of Indian true and golden heritage of spirituality for empowered unity for India’s world leadership by the empowered mind.
I thank you for reaching me.
With best regards,
Prakash Narain
I fully agree with all that you have written, and hope a lot of people think in the same way. What I appreciated about the BJP, and no regrets for that, was that they had very clear policies, some of them may seem like non-secular, but even then, promising something, and going after that, with honesty, projects something positive. Mr. Advani lost some of my respect also, when he said all that, about Jinnah. It seems the BJP is making herself acceptable to people from all religions and creed. But, given the policies of Congress and a large number of other political parties of India, policies of impressing minorities, especially the Muslims, a Genuine Nationalist Pro-Hindu Party is bound to emerge on national scene, and get power in future.
If BJP doesn't want herself to be in this position, no problem, sooner or later this revolution will happen. Changing color was not the profession of Swayam-Sewaks of RSS at least! Mix with others and make yourself acceptable to all, but never lose your own identity. This is all I can say about the BJP. Thanks for the article. It made a thoughtful read.
Have a nice day!
Leaders like Maulana Azad and Mahatma Gandhi were deeply religious in personal life. But they were not the type who would use religious antogonisms for political objectives. Religous in personal life but secular in political life is the best way to sum up their lives.
Jinnah was a stark contrast to leaders like Maulana Azad and Mahatma Gandhi. The "Qaid-e-Azam" was not particularly religious in his personal life. But he was was certainly not above pandering to religious hatred to achieve his political objective. And he did that even after he had seen the massive ethnic cleansing in the aftermath of the partition.
West Pakistan had been cleansed of Sikhs and Hindus within months, nay weeks, of partition. An overwhelming majority of the country's Hindus were in East Pakistan. The rulers from West Pakistan soon realized that they have nothing to lose and everything to gain by demonizing the Hindus left in Pakistan. If nothing else, it was the means to disenfranchise a significant section in East Pakistan and turn East Pakistanis into a minority. It was this evil urge to contain the perceived threat, from Pakistan's majority wing in any democratic setup, that led rulers in West Pakistan to talk of "parity" and of "separate electorates."
On March 21, 1948, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan and its first Governor-General, while on his first and only visit to East Bengal, declared in Dhaka University convocation that while the language of the province can be Bengali, the "State language of Pakistan is going to be Urdu and no other language. Any one who tries to mislead you is really an enemy of Pakistan."
The use of the phrase "enemy of Pakistan" was deliberate. It was a loaded phrase, particularly mischievous in view of the massive ethnic cleansing in West Pakistan in the last seven months.
Jinnah's demagoguery was deplorable but not surprising. He was merely repeating what Liaqat Ali Khan and his cohorts had been saying in the Constituent Assembly for the last one month. On February 23, 1948: Dhirendra Nath Datta, a Bengali opposition member, had moved a resolution in the first session of Pakistan's Constituent Assembly for recognizing Bengali as a state language along with Urdu and English.
Non-Bengali Assembly members, led by Liaqat Ali Khan, had immediately pounded on Mr. Datta's religion to denounce the claim of Bengali as nothing but a Hindu conspiracy. Many a snide remark was made on the "Hindu" character of the language that was the mother tongue of the majority of Pakistanis.
But, fortunately, most East Pakistanis were not fooled. They realized that these non-Bengali members had deliberately chosen to forget that a language may have grammar but it has no religion. Any competent language is capable of expressing a gamut of religious beliefs. It is as easy to translate the Geeta into Arabic as it is to translate the Koran into Sanskrit. There was absolutely no basis for denouncing Bengali as a Hindu language. If anything, it was a Muslim language because a majority of the Bengalis were indeed Muslims.
But the ruling class in West Pakistan had its own agenda. And it certainly did fit that agenda to denounce Bengali as a Hindu language and to look down on East Pakistan's majority as less than "good Muslims."
It is not surprising that, during the genocide in 1971, the Shaheed Minar was one of the first targets of Yahya Khan's barbaric army. Nor was it surprising what they did to Dhirendra N. Datta. He was an octogenarian by that time. The barbaric soldiers chose to drag this old man out of his house in Comilla and to summarily execute him in front of his neighbors and family. It was, thus, that West Pakistan's ruling elite punished Mr. Datta for having proposed Bengali as a national language of Pakistan some 23 years ago.
Mr. Nirmal: Thanks for sharing your views. I am a "HINDU" and even though we hear in our spiritual understanding that there is no such thing as the word Hindu but rather it should be Love of God, we all (including myself) use the word Hindu. We are all human beings and as such should respect each other as humans. I do not believe in Hindus and Muslims or Christians, etc. To me, they are all people and we see God in everyone. I read in Bhagawat Geeta (chapter 13) specifically about us being sensible and not seeing different identities due to different material bodies. I really believe in that and therefore I disagree with your opinions. As we live in this country, I do not have much information to provide any opinion of Mr. Advani. I hope your request to provide feedback to you was just that and you will accept my feedback as just that - my opinion. I am not trying to offend you in any way because I see God in you also. If I did, please forgive me.
Chirag Bhatt