In the eternal quest of the Indian Muslim to find a representative voice, new dilemmas appear to surface everyday. William Dalrymple points out that the Sepoy mutiny of the year 1847 had its religious overtones, with the majority Hindu rebels from the northern parts of India propping up an old and past his prime Bahadur Shah as their ruler. The cruel crushing of the rebel forces by the English forces saw Bahadur Shah being driven through the streets of Delhi in a bullock cart, the journey ended in Rangoon, where he eventually died. The Muslim community went into a sulk, created the Deoband madarsa, which embraced the shariyat, attributing the leaderless directionless movement of the community to divergence from the ways of Allah.
The community waited long, till the Khilafat movement, which was actually resisting the fall of the Ottoman Khalif in Turkey. The Khalif did fall, but the Indian Muslim soon found Mohammad Ali Jinnah as their leader. In a process of political hard bargain, Jinnah called for direct action day, probably to convince the English government his areas of influence. The violent fallout was beyond anybodies control, and resulted in the partition of India, with two flanks being designated the dream home of Muslims. Although a large exodus of humanity took place, many Muslims stayed back. The reasons could be financial or natural resistance of the human for anything new. However, Pakistan after Jinnah disappointed the community, mostly staying back in India, always resisting changes - even to the extent of resisting education. While a small portion of the community moved ahead with the country at large, Muslims in India are in fact at the bottom of the economic heap, as pointed out by Sacchar committee.
After sixty years of independence, the Indian Minister Kapil Sibbal proudly asserted that “India has over 140 million Muslims, and it has the second-highest Muslim population in the world, and yet you will not find even one Muslim joining international terror networks”. The most radical shift in these sixty years of the nation has been the rise of the Hindu fundamentalist. Taking the cue almost all political parties have become self-appointed custodians of the Muslim community. Congress, viewed as the Hindu mouthpiece during the partitions, has become the champion of Muslims. Communist, Samajbadi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party, the Marxists everybody is a custodian of Muslim cause.
A historic treaty, which could catapult India to the forefront of world economic power, is being sabotaged by the communists on the pretext that “it is against the people (read Muslims)”. The Communist party supports the ruling coalitions with the Communist party members mainly hailing from the two states of West Bengal and Kerala. The Nandigram incidence has already bared the face of Communists love for Muslims in West Bengal, even if one overlooks the fact that the West Bengal Muslims are the most economically backward section even among the Muslims, as per Sacchar committee report. In Kerala, curiously, a Muslim organization is up against the “Communist” scheme of making girls and boys sit on the same bench in the school, as per this report! The Communists are definitely not authorized to represent any of these state Muslims, then which Muslims are they representing? It is hard to believe that the whole Muslim community is apathetic to anything to do with US and Israel. These are just make believes, forced down the throat of nation in absence of an acceptable spokesperson for the community.
In an article in Sunday Times, Sobha De takes an incredible flight of speculation and suggests (strongly) that Shahrukh Khan, the super star of Mumbai film industry, has decided to take up politics. She sites the name Kabir Khan of the character played by Shahukh in Chak De India, and instances where he has started greeting with Salaam rather than the Namaste, as evidence of Shahrukh positioning himself as the representative of Muslim community. His upcoming film with buddy Karan Johar is apparently named “Mera naam hai Khan” in which he plays the role of a Muslim in USA post 9/11. One distinctly remembers Shahrukh reacting to the demonstration of people in front of his house “Mannat” to protest alleged incorrect remarks made towards Amar Singh, in an award ceremony saying, “remember I am a Pathan”. Shahrukh is a heartthrob of Young India, and this is the right time for him to take the plunge. The Indian Muslim community has waited for too long for an intelligent representative. Will Shahrukh bite the bullet? Very unlikely, as he says he has
“no interest, inclination, desire, requirement, feeling or ambition to be a part of politics. Maybe 15 years down the line, you can use this quote again.. when I become the Prime Minister of the country! But at this point of time, no I'm not joining politics.”
That was in 2006, so another 14 years, is it?
nice post.....
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