REPUBLIC DAY MESSAGE Saturday, January 26, 2019 A message from.Mike Ghouse
Today is India's Republic Day, the day upon which India’s constitution was adopted. Thanks to Jawahar Lal Nehru, Mahatma Gandhi, Dr. Ambedkar, Sardar Patel, and Maulana Azad for laying a good foundation for our nation and nurturing a pluralistic democracy and placed a good stable sustainable nation in our hands. Had they not done the right thing, you and I would not have had the freedom and prosperity we witness today. It could have been a tinpot dictatorship or a banana republic, thank God they steered us in the right direction. Now it is the duty of our current Prime Minister Narendra Modi to dutifully sail the ship in the same direction set by our founding fathers. This is what they would say to the Prime Minister in handing over the nation, "Manzil pay aaya mulk her bala ko taal ke, Hum laye hain toofan say kishti nikal ke, es desh ko rakhna mere bachcho sambhal ke.”
I am proud of my mother country India and my homeland America and I will defend both nations with my last breath. We are inherently a democratic people with responsible capitalistic economies.* The strength of a nation lies on two solid feet to stand firmly – one is economic justice, i.e., sab ka Vikas and the other is social cohesion, i.e., sab ka Saath. It is how different groups function together for the common good without fighting among themselves.
At this time, India is struggling to stand on her feet – we do not have sab ka Saath neither Prime Minister Modi is doing anything to bring the communities together, let alone speaking out against the division. Sab Ka Vikas is a forlorn thing – when someone has seen 3000% increase in his wealth while the majority is going down, it is nothing but Kuch ka vikas.
Both my nations are working with the idea of democracy against temptations to rule people. You rule people when you don't believe they have the God-given intelligence to make fair decisions for themselves. That is what the British thought of us that we were incapable of ruling ourselves, which that SOB Churchill had verbalized and wanted to divide us and continue to rule, but failed... He laid the eggs that are hatching in the form of homegrown divisive Indian individuals. The only way to counter is to lay good eggs to overwhelm the bad eggs. Let each one of us do more good to one and all to reverse the fall.
Ask not what Modi can do for India; ask yourselves what you can to restore dharma (sab ka saath). And I ask each one of you to ask yourselves, what have you done to keep the nation together? What have you done to guard the freedom of fellow Indians? What have you done, to tell the truth? What have you done to develop harmony among Indians? What have you done to preserve the freedom of all? Remember, your freedom hinges on the freedom of others around you, if you bully others, you will always live in apprehension and fear of the other at the end no one will live in peace.
If you are a Muslim (or anyone from the minority communities), have you invited a Hindu to a dinner at your home and vice versa? Do you have at least 5 friends from other communities? If not, why not? Are you a contributor towards India's Vikas? If not, it is not too late to make a pledge to do the right thing – to respect every fellow Indian and let him or her live his life in the pursuit of his happiness. Live your life and let others live theirs. Let everyone have the God-given freedom to breath, eat, drink, wear or believe whatever the hell he or she wants. Be a contributor to the common good, it brings Mukti from ill-will.
India's culture has been around for 5000 years and every now and then it has faced temporary setbacks, and what we are going through now is a temporary face. Indians will wake up and restore India's glory of freedom, democracy, and pluralism.
India's pluralistic Ethos:
My Dear Fellow Indians,
We are Indians and nothing but Indian. An Indian is an Indian is an Indian, period. As a nation, collectively we are Adivasis, Atheists, Bahais, Bos, Buddhists, Christians, Dalits, Hindus, Jains, Jewish, Muslim, Sikhs, Tribals, Zoroastrians, and every possible grouping. We are Brown, Black, White, Yellow and green with envy, magar phir bhi dil hai Hindustani.
Our Motherland is represented by every race, nationality, ethnicity, language, culture, and religion. We see God as one, none and many; and in every form; male, female, genderless, being and none-being,. The only thing we need to do is to respect the otherness of the other and accept each other's uniqueness. True spirituality is not dressing up in colorful clothes and acting to be superior, but it is becoming one of the many and equal to all.
The Indian American
Immigrants and perhaps all non-white immigrants owe their gratitude to Martin
Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks. Without their effort and subsequent passage of
the Civil Rights Act, very few of us would have made it to America. Who would
want to sit in the back of the bus, drink from a separate fountain and be
humiliated?
One of the reasons the
earlier immigrants have come to America was the freedom to live their lives in
the pursuit of liberty and happiness. You can be who you want to be in personal
achievements and contribute to nation building. “That to secure these rights,
Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the
consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes
destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish
it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles
and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to
effect their Safety and Happiness.” Declaration of Independence.
The guarantor of such
rights is assured through electing the right candidates to uphold that
principle.
As Indian Americans, we
have a natural affinity towards anyone that resonates India and things Indian.
The discussions are taking place in American Indian homes across the nation
about whom to support between Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard and Senator Kamala
Harris.
No Indian American wants
to mess up what has been good for us; a cohesive America where all of us can
function together for common good, and want to elect the candidates who uphold
the dream of Martin Luther King Jr., to treat every human for his/her character
and not his/her faith or skin color.
Kamala is progressive and
inclusive in her approach. She will not buy into the prejudices that hold the
nation back. We need to explore if she
has faced exclusion from Indian Americans while growing up because her father
was black. Nikki Haley and Bobby Jindal have a reduced image among Indians
because many of them believed their rise was due to conversion which proved to
be wrong. Raja Krishnamoorthy, Pramila Jayapal and Ro Khanna and others have
made it.
Tulsi Gabbard, on the
other hand, has a questionable record that she needs to address. She seems to
be prejudiced against fellow Americans who are Muslims and perhaps LGBTQ
community and not sure who else. You cannot build a peaceful and prosperous
nation with such an attitude, in the end, everyone lives in apprehension.
She has an affinity for
authoritarians like Hafez Assad, Putin, Modi, and Trump. She is in the wrong
party; she belongs to the exclusive Republican Party rather than the
all-inclusive Democratic party.
Vox.com writes in an
article about Tulsi, “Gabbard’s fall from grace in the Democratic Party came in
a bizarre fashion: She picked a series of high-profile fights with the Obama
administration over foreign policy. Gabbard was an exception. As early as
January 2015, she started going on every cable channel that would have her —
including Fox News — and bashing Obama’s policy on terrorism. She sounded
indistinguishable from a Republican presidential candidate.”
She was pushing Obama to
acknowledge the oxymoron phrase, Radical Islam, without realizing that Radicals
exists in every group of people and Islam has nothing to do with it, if she did
not get this, I would be happy to coach her or she can read the book “American
Muslim Agenda.” Here is a video made in
June 2016 about the issue. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsnqLkRNI4U
In a tweet on Oct 1,
2015, she praised Putin, “Al-Qaeda attacked us on 9/11 and must be defeated.
Obama won’t bomb them in Syria. Putin did.” After visiting Assad, she came back
and parroted the regime’s line that there was no difference between the
mainstream anti-Assad rebels and ISIS.” She could have asked Modi to apologize
to fellow Indians for the massacre of nearly 2000 Indians particularly Muslims
as a part of repentance.
Many a parent inadvertently
poison their kids against fellow Americans, without realizing that when their
kids grow up to be adults, they have to work with the very people they were
told to keep away from, it must be painful for these men and women to form
trustful relationships. Not sure how
much of brainwashing her father has done to her to hold such views against
LGBTQ and Muslim communities.
I urge the Hindu
Americans to look for candidates who will build a bridge between fellow
Americans, at the end of the day, we owe it our children, grandchildren and
ourselves to have a cohesive America, where all of us can live in harmony and
not in suspicion of each other.
Dr. Mike Ghouse is
committed to building a cohesive America and offers pluralistic solutions on
issues of the day. His new book, the “American Muslim Agenda” is about
everything you wanted to know about Muslims. The book is available at Xlibris
and Amazon. Mike is a public speaker, author, interfaith wedding officiant, and
the executive director of the Center for Pluralism in Washington, DC. More
about him at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikeghouse/
The National Council of Asian Indian Associations, Inc.
cordially invite you to celebrate
70th Republic Day of India with a Banquet Dinner & Cultural
Program on Saturday, February 2, 2019, from 6.30 pm to 10.00 pm
at Martin’s Crosswinds 7400 Greenway Center Drive, Greenbelt MD 20770
Early Bird Registration by 1/20/2019 with Donation of $ 50.00 After 1/20/2019 by Donation of $ 55.00. Limited Seats. Check payable to National Council of Asian Indian Associations, Inc., and mail to Attention:
Arundhotee Goswami, 18918 Saint Albert Dr., Brookeville, MD 20833
For sponsorship opportunities please contact Mr. Baljinder (Shammi) Singh
Republic Day is a defining day in the nationhood of India, collectively, the people of India decided that India will be a democratic republic fashioned after the American constitution with liberty and justice for all. Thus, the constitution of the people by the people for the people of India was adopted on 26th January 1950.
As a nation, collectively we are Adivasis, Atheists, Bahais, Bos, Buddhists, Christians, Dalits, Hindus, Jains, Jewish, Muslim, Sikhs, Tribals, Zoroastrians, and every possible grouping. We are Brown, Black, White, Yellow and green with envy, Magar Phir bhi Dil Hai Hindustani.
Our Motherland is represented by every race, nationality, ethnicity, language, culture, and religion. We see God as one, none and many; and in every form; male, female, genderless and non-existent, being and non-being, nameless and with innumerable names.
We are proud of our heritage - a multi-faith, multicultural, multi-regional and multi-linguistic society, where we have come to accept and respect every which way people have lived their lives. For over 5000 years, India has been a beacon of pluralism - it has embraced Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Baha’i and Zoroastrianism to include in the array of the indigenous religions; Hinduism, Tribal traditions, Jainism, Buddhism, and Sikhism.
India has an impeccable history of welcoming the stranger and giving refuge to the oppressed, rejected and the evicted. She has welcomed Jews, Christians, Zoroastrians, and the Baha’is. Indeed the very first mosque built outside of Arabia was in India by a Hindu King in the state of Malabar. The Tibetan Buddhist refugees found a home in India; the Ahmadiyya Muslims felt secure, so were the displaced Bangladeshi and Afghan refugees.
This beautiful pluralistic 5000-year-old tradition of India is in peril now. BJP and its affiliates (The SanghParivar) that govern India “currently” are hell-bent on destroying that heritage. They want to force non-Hindus into obedience and tell them what they can eat or believe, and whom they can marry or live as 2nd class citizens. They want to free India from Christians and Muslims and plan to convert them by 2025 to Hinduism. Indeed, the ISIS had given similar options to the Christians and Yazidis.
Make no mistake about it; Hinduism is a religion of peace like all other religions. The problem is not between people of faith, but the radicals.
A few Indian American organizations linked to the SanghParivar want to whitewash the situation. They want to portray that everything is hunky dory in India.
Hunky dory it is not, the Congressmen and Senators are fully conversant of the harassment, lynching, raping and killing of Christians, Dalits, Muslims, Sikhs, Atheists and others in India.
It is time for the Indian Americans to save the honor of India and restore her pluralistic heritage that got derailed in the last four years.
The prosperity of a nation stands on her two firm legs; economic growth and social cohesion, one will not sustain without the other.
If the minorities continue to live in apprehension and fear, the whole nation gets engaged in useless battles and the prosperity will come to a grinding halt, and the country will limp until it reaches a new life or loses all that was achieved.
The confidence of foreign investments in a nation spurs the growth, India’s IT industry, call centers, and businesses have raised the standard of living for many. As long as the investors feel secure about their investments they will pump in more funds. However, when they see chaos emerging with the nations discriminative practices, harassment, lynching, rapes and killing of the minorities, they will pull out and everyone stands to lose.
It was embarrassing to note the missing presence of India at the religious freedom conference held by the Department of State in July 2018. If the violations continue, India may get stamped as a “Country of Particular Concern” for violations of religious freedom. It will hurt India, particularly the business community and the information technology sector.
The whitewash report produced by the Hindu America Foundation is understandable. No Indian wants India to lose, but neither should we compromise on the truth to look good. We hope to produce an accurate state of the union; after all, India’s emblem includes the phrase, SatyamevaJayate – Truth triumphs.
The majority of Indians of all faiths believe in Pluralism, i.e., respecting the otherness of other. It is not Hindus either, but the radicals among Hindus that are causing the problems with the subtle encouragement from the BJP government. “The Indian government provides “unprecedented” religious accommodations to its religious minority population, says a report by a US-based Hindu advocacy group.” The truth is far from it. It sounds like the majority is doing a favor to the minorities in ‘accommodating’ them. It is like saying “we give equal rights to women” who the hell are we to give them their rights, to begin with, the rights were theirs. Indeed, every Indian is guaranteed those rights; we are all equal citizens. No one has more privileges than the other.
“To bring greater stability to the region and prevent the growth of radical Islamist and Communist/Maoist terrorism.” This statement is too hypocritical and divisive to exclude radical Hindutva terrorism from the list. The issue is not with Hindus or Muslims; it is with radicals among them.
“Overall, it seeks to show the broader story of religious freedom and pluralism in India, which is often not, reflected in the media or US policy circles.” Indeed, India was a pluralist nation until the Hindutva brigade took over the country four years ago.
We need to come together and appeal to the Government of India, to issue visas to the commissioners of the USCIRF to investigate the Sikh Genocide, Massacre of Muslims in Gujarat, killing of Christians, Rapes, and lynching of Dalits, and harassment of Sikhs. If the commission gives a clean certificate, it will help boost the investor confidence in India; on the other hand, if India’s record is of particular concern, then it is time to fix it than pretending to be holier than thou.
I would appeal to the Hindu America Foundation to issue press releases condemning the lynching of Muslims, killing of Christians, harassment of Dalits and Atheists, by condemning each event, it will give them the credibility to be a legitimate pluralist organization for Human rights.
We will also write a letter urging Prime Minister Modi to speak out forcefully against harassment of any Indian and pledge that no Indian has more privileges than the other. Ambassador Sam Brownback says, if evil acts get condemned as they occur, they will be choked and will not see the light of the day.
(The writer is president of the Center for Pluralism and is committed to fostering cohesive societies where no human has to live in apprehension or fear of the other)
Is the Indian judiciary accountable? The people of India have never questioned the authority of India's judiciary. Indeed, they are the only branch of government, who have not been examined for their role in upholding the constitution and the rule of law. It is the time one questions their lackadaisical attitude towards growing lawlessness in the nation and hold them accountable for their action. What is holding the Supreme Court from rendering judgment, and bringing closure to the anti-Sikh genocide, Godhra burning, Gujarat massacre, Nellie massacre, uprooting of Kashmiri Pundits, Babri Masjid, and freedom of speech issues? The silence of the state when the liberties of the citizens are trampled has gone unpunished. The Supreme Court can put an end to the catalytic nature of these unfortunate and tragic events. Many things will be straightened if justice is delivered on a timely basis. If a concerted effort is made and the momentum is built to remind the Supreme Court to take their responsibility seriously, they can put an end to the fear that has grasped the nation. The politicians, legislators and the administrators may be corrupt, but the judiciary has remained intact and is still free in India. The decisions by the apex court on the issues of LGTB, Sabarimala, Triple Talaq, and Babri Masjid are good examples, people have accepted their decision with protests but not violence. If we can hold the Supreme Court accountable for preserving the constitution and restoring justice, it will restitute hope to the hopelessness that is prevalent in India. Dr Zafar Iqbal writes, “It is an unfortunate fact that many attempts were made to influence Supreme Court judges, still, compared to other institutions, the Indian Supreme Court's record is much better. The SCI is still the best hope we have. The venomous culture being supported and promoted by the people in power is spreading like metastatic cancer.” Supreme Court is the last resort and defender of India's constitution, and if they can make bold decisions, they can restore sanity and the rule of law to India. The Supreme Court's role is to interpret the Constitution and serve as a check to the abuse of powers by the legislative and administrative branches of government. The judiciary is set up to be an independent body free from politicians and the bureaucrats. India is a mature democracy when people decide to unseat a tyrant like Indira Gandhi, they have done it through the ballot. Not only Indira, but the Prime Ministers and Chief Ministers of India have honored the verdict of the people and have stepped down every time when they lost the elections, and respectfully handed the keys to the new person elected. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is no exception; he is one of the most attacked politicians of India, perhaps more than the combined attacks on all Prime Ministers. His biggest mistake is his inability to speak up when bad things happen in the nation. Since it is a pattern with him throughout the ordeals of rapes, lynching, murders, and harassment; one is inclined to think if there was merit in Sanjiv Bhatt’s statement that Modi let the goons have three days to finish killing as many Muslims as they could in a supposed revenge spree in Gujarat. Modi is not dumb, he can boldly speak out against miscreants that the rule of law would be applied to all those who lynch, harass, and rape, and will be punished severely. No murderer and rapist will get a ticket from his party to contest the elections. He knows he has the power and if he uses for good governance, it will substantially subside the cow vigilantes, lynching’s, rapes and murders and felicitation of criminals. Holding the Prime Minister accountable is the right thing to do. After all, it is the government of the people by the people for the people. Everyone is responsible in a democracy. Thank God, the era of dictators, kings, and tyrants is gone. Thanks to the Indian media, the first saviour of democracy, for protecting your rights to be free to pursue life, liberty, and happiness. Thanks to the “Indian Express”, the “Times of India” and the “Hindu” newspapers for standing up against the bullying by Indira Gandhi during her infamous emergency rule. The editor heroes went to jail instead of temporary protection that comes with sycophancy or silence. Now that awakening has come back, and we see the emergence of new heroes in the wire, squint, and other media outlets. They will be the new saviours of our freedom, and we need to celebrate them. Judiciary is a critical part of the governance if we write about the cavalier attitudes of the judiciary, things will start changing for the better. I welcome any criticism of the judiciary and solutions to go with them. --- *Public speaker, author, interfaith wedding officiant, executive director of the Center for Pluralism in Washington, DC. Click HERE for more Published at Counterview -https://www.counterview.net/2018/12/why-is-supreme-court-failing-to-decide.html
A tsunami of good news has just hit India, five of the 29 states of India held the elections in December 2018, and produced amazing results, and the winner is the Indian Democracy.
Parties come and go, but what is constant is our freedom. Freedom to speak, freedom to prosper, and freedom to marry whom you want, eat what you want, drink what appeals to you, wear what works for you, and believe whatever the hell suits you.
I am sure no Indian wants someone to tell him or her how to live. The BJP followers will not like what the Congress may tell them to do, and the same is true the other way around. The durable policy is to follow the principles of freedom.
Modi has time to show that he really believes in Democracy and is not authoritarian. He can do that by initiating three national awards; Patriotic Citizen, Patriotic Media and National Chamcha Award. The award goes to those individuals and News Media who relentlessly criticize the government to keep them on their toes, and National Chamcha Award goes to the individuals and who consistently equate support for Government as a Patriotic act. A true patriot would hold the feet of the government to the fire rather than do the chamchagiri and let the country make mistake after mistake.
If Congress were to wins elections in 2019, the BJP supporters will go ballistic against the elected government and that is the time Congress party needs to show its civility, and they will, as they have a proven record. Unlike our Goonga Prime Minister, the Congress Prime Minister will speak out against anyone calling the BJP supporters anti-National or anti-Hindu. No one is anti-National or anti-Hindu, it is the wild imagination of fanatics among BJP to sow the seeds of discord.
I am proud of India’s freedom and salute the men and women who went to jail, and took the beatings but chose to fight for freedom. They not only got the freedom but set up great institutions for India. Today India is among the top 7 powerful nations, and the credit goes to Gandhi, Nehru, Azad, Patel, Ambedkar and a few others who had the vision and laid the foundation of a great nation.
Whether you align with BJP, INC or other parties, you have the freedom to speak and prosper because the foundation of our nation was laid out on the principles of Democracy. We cannot let anyone curb those freedoms, the media needs to be free and people need to free.
I admire Modi’s supporters in America and their loyalty. I wish they show the same devotion to India by respecting every Indian without prejudice.
Do you recall a tyrant grandfather or even a father, who is all about control, he claims to live a simple life, but wants to keep everyone under his thumb? Our Prime Minister, under the guise of Sanyasi (hermit), claims that he has nothing to gain and wants nothing. How does he account for enriching his friends? Would a Sanyasi do that?
We cannot blame Modi for who he is, he is conditioned by the RSS schools where they teach exclusive ideology and disrespect to others who do not think like them. A majority of Hindus innocently believe that RSS is a service organization, but fail to see the poison it injects into the innocent children. I wish Modi frees himself from the petty Hindutva ideology and becomes an all-embracing leader and a giant like Nehru.
I pray that a handful of right-leaning Hindu Americans fight their temptations to support the forces in India who want to deny the freedoms to ‘other’ Indians. Their American born children think they are stupid to have such hatred towards the other.
A young Hindu Medical doctor doing his residency stayed with me for a month while attending a conference in Washington DC. We had terrific conversations on a daily basis. He wished his parents had the opportunity to know Muslims, Christians, Dalits, Sikhs, and the Blacks. He deplored their hatred towards them. He said, he has lived in the dorms, and everything they have said about others was wrong.
There are parents out there who are selfish and poison their kids by injecting ill-will towards others. Some Hindu parents tell their kids how bad Muslims, Christians and Sikhs are and vice versa goes as well, they even believe Dalits are untouchables. The dumb men (women are not as hateful) don’t realize that when the kids grow up in America, they have to work with the very people they were told to stay away from. It must be painful for the kids to work with others, many of them wish they did not have such ugly parents. I urge the Indian Americans not to poison their kids, the kids have sixty to seventy years to live, let them decide whom to love or hate based on their personal experience and not prejudice.
The Law of Karma does not spare anyone. Modi’s arrogance will bring him down in 2019. He has got to stop bullshitting Indians with issues that don’t put food on their tables or clothe their kids or have clean drinking water. Let him make one promise and keep rather than make ten and cheat.
All of us want the best for fellow humans including Modi. Mr. Modi can make a comeback in 2024 if he turns BJP into a party where every Indian, be it a Muslim, Sikh, Christian or Dalit wants to become a member of his party. He has got to do his praischit (repentance) for quietly letting a few goons to go on a killing spree in 2001. Indians will forgive him if seeks forgiveness. Hinduism is not a religion of violence or revenge, it is not about forcing others to eat, drink or believe against their will. It Hinduism is not a violent religion, then the moderate Hindus have an obligation to protect the image of Hinduism and not let the Hindutva guys tarnish it.
Indians are good people, they are as good as gold. They are clamoring for a leader who can bring jobs and don’t want to be fooled again.
Two BJP contestants in two states, a Minister for Cow Welfare and Minister for Happiness lost the elections badly. This is a major loss and a clear signal to the party that Indians cannot be fooled over and over again with the issue of cow or the building a temple.
India's First Cow Minister Loses In Rajasthan Election
Dr. Mike Ghouse is a public speaker, author and the Executive Director of the Center for Pluralism in Washington, DC. He is committed to building cohesive societies and offers pluralistic solutions on issues of the day. Mike is also an interfaith wedding officiant. More at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikeghouse/
The Indian-Americans have a moral duty to prevent India from being labeled as a “Country of Particular Concern” by the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF).
If India were to be ascribed with such a label, it would hinder the flow of foreign direct investments and subsequent reversal of economic prosperity achieved in the last twenty years. This label may not affect the poor Indians, but it will severely impact all those Indians working in information technology related jobs and businesses involved in software development and services.
South Africa once was an apartheid nation, and its prosperity came to a grinding halt when the foreign corporations realized that they are supporting a regime that discriminates her citizens. The harassment, lynching, and killing of Dalits, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs and others in India needs to stop; if not, it will hurt all Indians as the investors will start pulling out of the country. Who wants to invest in a place where their investment is not secure?
The success of the American economy is based on the rule of law, the law is enforced equally, and no criminal will get away with the power of his or he monies. If someone violates the rules, the individual or the company will pay the penalty, and this builds confidence and trust in the society and frees them from tensions. Every Indian should feel secure about his or her faith, ethnicity, language and culture.
The First Amendment of America’s constitution serves as a model of success for any government. “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
Ambassador Sam Brownback had once said that the prosperity of a nation hinges on religious freedom. Indeed, the success of a country is directly proportional to religious liberty. It frees people from the daily tensions of what to eat, drink, wear and believe. It allows them to become a productive employee to the company, and a fully participating member of the family by giving the family the full attention it deserves instead of worrying about a fellow employee at the place of work.
Furthermore, the quality of life is directly proportional to freedom from religious and cultural tensions.
The sense of security is diminishing rapidly. A Christian is apprehensive of going to the Church on a Sunday, and a Muslim is afraid of storing meat in his refrigerator should the vigilantes descend on him. The women including little girls are not safe either. The murderers and rapists got felicitated with Garlands from among the current leaders instead of sending them to prison. The man who lynched and brutally killed a Muslim man was videotaped and shared on WhatsApp, and the lyncher was rewarded with a party ticket to contest elections. This is shamefully a weekly occurrence.
Ambassador Brownback had once said referring to mob violence around the world. If the leaders respond immediately to such incidents and tell the nation that the lynching and harassment of fellow citizens will not be acceptable, then the violence will cease or at least mitigate. Unfortunately, the current Indian leadership has remained silent when vigilantes kill and maim the people, causing every Indian to live in fear – both the minorities and the ones who frighten.
Please note that Hindutva ideology propagated by RSS and its family of parties is not Hinduism. Hindutva is to Hinduism; what Islam is to Islamists. Hindutva and Islamist are anti-Hinduism and anti-Islam respectively. It may take a few generations for Hindutvadis and Islamists to see the value of respecting the otherness of the other and accepting the God-given uniqueness of the other. When we get there, conflicts will fade, and solutions emerge. Ultimately, every Indian wants to live in peace and feel secure about his faith and focus on contributing to the common good of the nation.
The Indian Americans have equal access to all the opportunities in the market without discrimination, and I hope the Indian Americans would want India to treat her minorities as America does hers. It is an embarrassment to note that a few Indian Americans don’t want Muslims, Christians, and Dalits to have equal rights in India. On top of it, they are poisoning their children with ill-will towards each other.
The good news is that most of the American Indian youth are rejecting the ugliness of their parents and choose to respect the otherness of the other. After all, they have to work with people of different faiths and races, and it would be a pain for them to work with others if their parents have dumped their biases on their children. Should parents poison their children?
We appeal to all the India oriented American organizations including the Hindu America Foundation, the Indian American Muslim Council, Federation of Indian American Christian Organization of North American to support our petition.
The petition will be addressed to the Government of India to issue Visa’s to the Commissioners of USCRIF. They can do the investigations about the plight of Kashmiri Pandits, Sikh Genocides, Gujarat Massacre, Lynching and harassment of Dalits, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, and others.
If India gets a “Clean Chit” it will ensure continued prosperity and investor confidence in India’s democracy. However, if the Indian government is found guilty of the violations of religious freedoms, then two choices left to deal with are; risk losing the confidence of the investors in the stability of India, or fix the problems and earn a clean chit. Every Indian American must ensure the sustainability of India’s democracy and prosperity.
In Washington DC, there are three Indians who regularly attend the meetings about religious freedom issues from among about seventy-five individuals to talk about the concerns in different nations. Jay Kansara has been representing the Hindu America Foundation, John Prabhudoss represents Federation of Indian American Christians of North America, and Mike Ghouse serves the Center for Pluralism, standing up for the rights of people from all faiths. Now, Ajit Sahi of Indian American Muslim Council has joined the group to address Religious freedom issues of Indian minorities. The Dalits and Sikhs have been represented on an off by different visitors.
Swami Agnivesh was in Washington DC and spoke to a group of defenders of religious freedom across the world. The Ambassador of religious liberty Hon. Sam Brownback presided the meeting. He was eloquent and precise, and it was an honor to meet the man whom I have come to admire for his stand on eradicating bonded labor, and fighting for religious freedom of all Indians.
Here is a short speech of Swami Agnivesh – https://youtu.be/eIwPXyQQi7g
Full speech of Swami Agnivesh.
Dear Ambassador Brownback and my fellow campaigners for human rights and religious freedom. I am grateful to you for this opportunity to speak here. Since the time allotted for me to speak is limited, I will get to the point immediately.
There is a grave threat today to civil liberties in general and religious freedom in particular in India. Indeed, the levels of violence we see in today’s India against the social and religious minorities are in many ways unprecedented in recent decades. The victims of such vicious violence are some of India’s poorest and most disadvantaged communities. They include Muslims, Christians, the Dalits, who are the former untouchables of the Hindu caste society, and the Adivasis, or the indigenous tribal people whose very existence is under threat.
Moreover, the perpetrators of this violence are directly linked with the RSS, which is the mother organization of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s BJP party. Especially since Mr. Modi became India’s prime minister in 2014, the attacks on the religious minorities have sharply increased. Armed mobs owing allegiance to the RSS and other Hindu groups have been lynching to death Muslims at will, accusing them of eating beef or slaughtering a cow. Such Hindu mobs also disrupt mixed-religion weddings in which the groom is Muslim, and the bride is Hindu because they don’t want Hindu girls to marry Muslim boys. There have been instances in which such Muslim grooms have been killed, too.
Similarly, these vigilante groups owing allegiance to the RSS have been attacking Christian Churches, priests, and congregants all over India. Once again, they blame the victims for the violence, accusing the Christians of converting Hindus to Christianity.
For thousands of years, the Dalits have suffered the worst violence and indignities at the hands of upper caste Hindus. However, now, that indignity is doubled because laws have been created to deny positive quota benefits to Dalits who convert out of Hinduism to Christianity and Islam. Converted Dalits face even greater violence and assault.
As for the Adivasis, the indigenous people, the RSS-BJP have for decades been forcing Hinduism on them even though millions of these Adivasis clearly state that they are not Hindus and they have their indigenous faiths. I have myself been a victim of their violence over the years. Twice in the last six months only I have been attacked by these violent mobs. Of course, it is futile to expect any police action against such violent perpetrators.
If I being a prominent human rights defender in India cannot expect the police to act against my attackers, you can imagine what would be the story of these social and religious minorities I have spoken about, the Dalits, the Adivasis, the Christians and the Muslims, who are being targeted in their hundreds of thousands across India.
Even more worrying is that some organizations in the United States that claim to represent the interest of the Hindus defend the highly divisive and violent activities of the RSS-BJP and instead blame the religious minorities. They try to create a false equivalence between the highly organized and structural violence of the RSS-BJP, who are in power in the federal government in India as well as more than a dozen and a half of India’s 29 states, and random acts of violence against Hindus that may occur.
The truth is that the biggest perpetrator of anti-minority violence in India is the RSS-BJP, which is now in power across India and is therefore grossly abusing its control of government machinery to provide impunity to its henchmen carrying out such violence. It would be a pity if the international community did not open its eyes and take notice of this worsening situation in the India of Mahatma Gandhi.
(Swami Agnivesh also added that he was coming from giving the keynote address at the Parliament for World’s Religions in Toronto, Canada and that the Hindu rightwing forces tried to prevent him from speaking there. He also said he had been a campaigner for justice for 50 years and had faced numerous attacks on his life, the most recent in Jharkhand in July, when hundreds of goons attacked him, and then again in Delhi in August. Swami Ji also spoke of his work with bonded laborers and said his organization had secured freedom and rehabilitation for more than 170,000 bonded laborers in India in the last thirty plus years.)
Dr. Mike Ghouse is a public speaker and the Executive Director of the Center for Pluralism in Washington, DC. He is committed to building cohesive societies and offers pluralistic solutions on issues of the day. More about him at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikeghouse/
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