The point that developments in Indian Islam must be viewed in the larger context of the world of Islam cannot be over-emphasized. For central to Muslims in India, as anywhere else, is the ummah, the universal community of believers. This does not mean that Indian Muslims have been at the … Read More
To recognise the centrality of the umma (community of believers) for Muslims requires for non-Muslims, especially Hindus, an imaginative leap not many are able to make. That is one reason why so many Hindu intellectuals find it natural to equate Hindu ‘communalism’ with Muslim communalism. The word ‘communal’ has acquired … Read More
Since my personal interaction with educated Muslims is rather limited, I am not in a good enough position to assess their response to developments after the demolition of the Babri structure in Ayodhya on December 6last. But certain points emerge fairly clearly from what some of them are writing and … Read More
If the “new world order” of the flighty imagination of Mr Bush was a non-starter, his concept of “collective security” outside of well-defined alliance systems may also be consigned to the dust-bin. Indeed, the irony of it all is that the bloated rhetoric of both the “new world order” and … Read More
Even Caldwell, father of the theory of a distinct Tamil language, did not speak of a separate Tamil people in ethnic terms. It requires modern Indian ‘intellectuals’ to invent such a people. It is infuriating. And, it cannot be helped. That is stuff which our public discourse is made of. … Read More
In no discussion on the Hindu-Muslim problem have I seen Haji Shariatullah and Sayyid Ahmad Barelvi juxtaposed against Raja Rammohun Roy, though nothing else can help illuminate it better than such a juxtaposition. The Raja is well known as founder of the Brahmo Samaj and is appropriately regarded as father … Read More
The dual process of modernization and self-renewal among Hindus did not falter in the 19th century. The mutiny in 1857, with the last Mughal ‘emperor’ Bahadur Shah Zafar as the nominal head, made no difference to it. Hindus, on the one hand, took enthusiastically to Western education through the English … Read More
I wonder if others rubbed their eyes in disbelief as they read the headline “End socialist slogans hypocrisy, says Prime Minister” in The Sunday Times (January 21). I for one did and wondered what had persuaded the prime minister at long last to speak out the truth. After all, he … Read More
It is only natural for liberal Indians to empathise with Muslim academicians, journalists, lawyers, social activists and others who assembled in New Delhi on January 24. They had been shaken by the demolition of the Babri structure in Ayodhya on December 6 and subsequent riots, especially in Bombay, and were … Read More
