[sacw] sacw dispatch (29 May 00)

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Web - Dispatch
29 May 2000

------------------------------------------

#1. Pakistan: Appeal from Labour Party of Pakistan
#2. Pakistan: Communal harmony didn't begin at hom
#3. India: RSS forays into Punjab
#4. India: The Sikhs and the Sangh Parivar's Agenda
#5. India: Excerpts from Hitler's Priestess

__________________________

#1.

29 May 2000

[Pakistan] LPP leader Bashir Botter arrested

Rawalpindi police arrested a known railway workers leader and president
of Labour Unity Rawalpindi, Bashir Botter, on 26th May. The police are
looking for eight more railway workers including LPP Punjab
vice-chairperson, Abida Bashir Botter. Abida is not a railway worker. Her
only crime is that she is wife of Bashir Botter.

Bashir Botter was earlier terminated by the railway administration on the
charges of organizing illegal strikes and demonstrations.

The police have charged him under section 506, 147, 109, PPC, 49 Defense of
Pakistan Rule, and section 120, 121 Railway Act. Pakistan Penal Code
section 506 means intimidation, 147 mean rioting, 109 means abetment, 120
and 121 of Railway Act deals with acts destroying the peaceful atmosphere
at the railway premises.

These nine accused are paying the price to organize a movement of railway
workers and their families against the demolition of encroachments in front
of railway workers quarters, the cancellation of peace work and withdrawal
of some of the facilities that railway workers enjoyed in the past.

A peaceful demonstration was held on 22nd May in front of administration
office of the Railway Carriage factory organized by Labour Unity. Labour
Unity is an alliance of several trade unions and community-based
organizations supported by LPP and other progressive political parties.
Over a thousand men, women and children participated in the demonstration.
The main demands were restoring the peace work and the withdrawing of the
notices to demolish the houses of railway workers. They were demanding the
reinstatement of Bashir Botter to his job. They also raised slogans of the
real accountability of the railway administration.

The demonstration forced the railway administration to come to the rally
and announce the acceptance of the main demands. The deputy Chief
Mechanical Engineer Mr. Asad Ehsan on behalf of railway administration
addressed the demonstrators. He assured that the houses would not be
demolished. He also announced the restoring of peace work.

But contrary to his claims, the administration of Railways registered a
criminal case against Bashir Botter, his wife and other leaders of Labour
Unity. On 26th Bashir Botter was arrested at 9pm on his way home house.

He was brought to woods in Texila area, about 30 kilometers from Rawalpindi
and was asked to run away. This was a tactic to shoot him or to harass him.
He refused to escape from the police custody. It is a normal practice of
police in Pakistan that whenever a person escapes from police custody, he
is shot at immediately.

On next day, he was brought to a magistrate and his advocates, Aftab Ahmed
Abbasi and Jehangir Awan (both LPP leaders), appeared before the court and
asked the magistrate for bail as all the offences mentioned in the FIR were
bailable. I n bailable cases, the accused have rights to be released on
bail, when he is presented before a magistrate. But surprisingly, two days
physical remand of Bashir Botter was granted on the request of the police.
No physical remand can be granted to police in bailable cases. The police
said since they have to arrest of the wife of Bashir Botter, therefore the
physical remand may be granted. Aftab Abbasi, Adocate for Bashir Botter,
argued that physical remand could only be granted in non-bailable cases in
which some offence weapon or other thing relating to the offence is to be
recovered. A physical remand cannot be granted to the police to help in the
arrest of any other person, he said. But the plea was rejected.

Earlier on 15th May, an army officer deployed at the railway ordered an in
charge of security at the railway to shoot Bashir Botter if he is seen at
the premises of railway factory. The security in charge refused to do so
and the Army major also threatened him that he might loose his job as well.

Most of the trade unions and political parties have demanded an immediate
release of Bashir Botter and the withdrawal of the cases against the
workers.

Please make appeals and send protest messages at the following email address=
:

ce@p...

=46raternally,
=46arooq Tariq
General Secretary , Labour Party Pakistan

________

#2.

DAWN / Magazine
28 May 2000

Communal harmony didn't begin at home
By Omar Kureishi
WAS there such a thing as a Hindu mindset or a Muslim mindset? Could
generalizations be drawn about behavior and conduct and responses on the
sole basis of a person's religion? Were these mindsets, if they existed,
mutually exclusive and inherently confrontational. Nirad Chaudhuri in The
Continent of Circe, which is a book whose main feature is the
interpretation of the Hindu personality, writes: "There is something
unnatural in the continued presence of the Muslims in India and of the
Hindus in Pakistan, as if both went against a natural cultural ecology.
Whether a person is Hindu or Muslim makes a substantial difference ..."
Such a "substantial difference" was not highlighted in the difference
between a Hindu and Christian. At any rate, it was not the cause of
automatic hostility, it was, as if, the Hindus and Muslims were created to
be sworn enemies. Indian nationalism had tried to sweep this inherent
hostility under the carpet, but whence chips were down what was bred in the
bones came out in the flesh, even for the Nehru family, the great champions
of secularism, wealthy, broad-minded, worldly, Motilal the leading
barrister of his time, his son Jawaharlal, educated at Harrow and Cambridge
who had been called to the bar from Inner temple, the socialist who was to
tell John Galbraight, the US Ambassador, that he (Nehru) was "the last
Englishman to rule India". Jawaharlal Nehru's sister Vijaya Lakshmi (Nan)
fell in love with a handsome, brilliant, English-educated man who had been
hired by Motilal to edit a nationalist newspaper, The Independent, he had
started in 1917 in Allahabad. It should have been a perfect match, but for
one fact. The young man, Syed Hossain, was a Muslim. Stanley Wolpert in
his book on Nehru, A Tryst With Destiny (more hero worship than biography)
is almost embarrassed as he takes up this star-crossed romance: "What did
it matter to the young lovers that he had been born a Muslim, and she a
Kashmiri Brahman? Weren't Bhai and Gandhi always saying that 'Hindu-Muslim
unity was the first prerequisite to India's freedom?' What better antidote
for communal hatred and conflict than love? But to Motilal and Swarup Ram
(Jawaharlal's mother), Hossain being a Muslim mattered as much as Jawahar's
wanting to marry a British barmaid. All of them, including Jawahar, tried
talking sense into Nan. Nothing they said, however, brought any response,
but silence and tears. Finally Motilal called in Gandhi, who came to Anand
Bhavan in 1920 to take Nan with him to his Gujrati ashram (village
community) in Sabarmati, on the outskirts of Ahmedabad in western India."
Vijaya Lakshmi was all but exiled to the equivalent of a nunnery. The
ashram therapy was meant to dampen her ardour for Syed Hossain. It worked
in the sense that when she returned home almost a year later, she was
prepared to accept the Hindu Brahman Ranjit Pandit, whom her mother and
father and Gandhi had found and arranged for her to marry. Syed Hossian
left, or was spirited away, for the United States where he became a
lecturer in international relations at the University of Southern
California. Whether Vijaya Lakshmi ever got over Syed Hossain, only she
knew. When I met her in New Delhi in 1947, I was planning to bring out a
magazine and wanted her to write for it. She asked me to go and see Syed
Hossain who happened to be in Delhi and staying at the Imperial Hotel.
"Tell him I sent you," she said. Was there a certain sadness at the mention
of his name? She said it matter-of-factly, but she must have noticed a
certain surprise in my look. I thought about the film Casablanca and the
song As Time Goes By, "a sigh is just a sigh, as time goes by". Not quite
on the same scale and certainly without the intervention of a saintly
figure like Gandhi, my brother Nasir had expressed his love for the lovely
Champak, who was the daughter of Pandit Santanam, a prominent Congress
leader, and Champak, in turn, reciprocated this love. I think it would be
too banal to say that they were in love. Nasir was a reserved figure and
felt a loss of dignity in admitting to something like this. My father
wrote to Pandit Santanam, who sent his respectful thousand apologies, but
the religious differences made it a bridge too far. I was not on such terms
with Nasir, there was a 17-year gap between us, to give him advice. I would
have told him to elope. Champak, at least, was spared from being sent to
Gandhi's ashram. Unlike charity, communal harmony didn't begin at home. It
was an irony of some sorts that Nehru's daughter Indira, married a Parsi.
But then a Parsi was not a Muslim, or am I being a straight forward bigot?
My interest in politics was marginal though a college-going young man in
his late teens, I tried to keep in touch so as not to appear an ignoramus.
But I had an instinctive distrust of politicians and given the choice of
meeting one or a Test cricketer, I would unhesitatingly choose the Test
cricketer. The two dominant political figures had been Gandhi and Jinnah.
Nehru one saw as a romantic figure and I had read his books. I found the
prose pedestrian and his attempts at self-discovery somewhat bogus. He saw
himself as a tortured soul trying to reconcile his own affluent background
with the desperately poor of his beloved India. What he tried to mask was
his driving ambition and he had hung-on to the coat tails of Gandhi, his
Bapu, but by 1946 he considered Gandhi "out of touch" with post-War
"reality" and a "spent force" whose preoccupation with non-violence had
only led them, sheeplike, into years of incarceration. Nehru was on the
warpath. He had turned rabble-rouser. Wavell warned Pethick-Lawrence that
"Nehru is very bitter against the British regime in India and against the
Muslim League ... Some people believe that Nehru's plan is to make use of
the INA. ... both to train Congress volunteers and as a Congress striking
force; and possibly to tamper with the Indian Army ... but Nehru's
uncompromising attitude implies that he is not opposed to a violent mass
movement." And so India was poised for not one but two civil wars. One the
Congress would wage against the British and the other against the Muslim
League whose growing popularity and increased strength was mainly
responsible for Nehru's militant mood. But life has to be seen in the
round, the show goes on. And even as the British Empire was unravelling and
India braced itself for bloody conflicts, preparations were afoot for
India's cricket tour of England. It was like a scene played out in the
film A Night To Remember, the band continued to play even as the ship was
sinking and the hero and the heroine exchanged vows of undying love. Many
years later, I would meet the producer of this film, Bill MacVitty (I may
be doing him an injustice by spelling his name wrong), and he became a good
friend and whenever I went to London, he would take me to lunch at the
Garrick Club. He had become a world class photographer and he even
discussed with me the possibility of co- writing a film set in Pakistan.
The prelude to the cricket tour was typical of the way that the game had
fallen in the hands of warring cliques. The Indian Cricket Board met for
its annual meeting at the Connemara Hotel in Madras. Bombay went into the
meeting confident it would have its way, Homi Contractor as manager and
Vijay Merchant as captain. But within a few hours, it became apparent how
well Bombay's opponents were organized. Instead of Contractor, Pankaj
Gupta was appointed manager, a man better known for running hockey, and
instead of Vijay Merchant, the Nawab of Pataudi was brought out from the
moth- balls and appointed captain. What was intriguing was the Nawab, till
then, had never played for India. Mihir Bose, in his A History Of Indian
Cricket, insinuates that the reason Pataudi wanted the job was political.
His father-in-law, the Nawab of Bhopal, was Chancellor of the Chamber of
Princes and the ruling princes were greatly concerned about their future.
Negotiations with the British were entering a crucial phase and "at this
stage, a prince, his own son-in-law, as captain of the Indian team in
England could prove immensely valuable." It seems far-fetched though
Pataudi's choice outraged many cricket fans and the Press was full of
reports of how the coup was organized. Pataudi himself seemed unperturbed
and said that it would do no harm if a lot of dirty linen was washed in
public, it would at least "enable us to go to England with clean shirts."
The team chosen was a strong one and included Abdul Hafeez who, at the end
of the tour, would enter Oxford and re-emerge as Abdul Hafeez Kardar. But
there were two glaring omissions, it so happened both Muslims, Ghulam Ahmed
and Fazal Mahmood. Pataudi had wanted both of them. Pataudi's selection had
prompted suggestions that Merchant may not tour and even the sedate Times
of India advised Bombay to break from the Indian Board and declare its
independence. But just as well for India that he toured. He topped the tour
batting averages with 2,385 runs with an average of 74.53, and the Tests
with 245 runs, averaging 49. It had been a cold and wet summer and there
was severe rationing in England. But the high point of the tour was not the
Test matches, but quite a remarkable partnership between Shute Bannerjee
and Sarwate against Surrey. India were 205 for 9 when Bannerjee, the number
eleven batsman, joined Sarwate, the number ten batsman, who had yet to open
his account. They put on 249 runs, Sarwate 124 not out and Bannerjee 121. I
remember this partnership caused quite a stir in India and earnest
discussions were held about whether Pataudi had got his batting order
right. Kardar did nothing of note, neither did Rusi Modi. It seemed quite
extraordinary how we could operate on twin tracks. We should have been
frightened out of our wits about what appeared to lay in store for India.
On the contrary, we were focused on the cricket tour. And though I did not
know it then, what an influence he would be on me, both as a cricket
commentator and someone who helped me love the game, the 1946 tour saw the
debut of John Arlott as a cricket commentator, he of the distinct voice
that was his signature, a goldsmith of words and whose friendship I valued
as if it was a medal of honour.
________

#3.

=46rontline
Volume 17 - Issue 11, May 27 - Jun. 09, 2000
RSS forays into Punjab
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh's campaign to reinvent the Sikh
identity within a Hindu-nationalist paradigm and the aggressive response
from Sikh chauvinist organisations against it could have serious
consequences for the already fragile commun al peace in Punjab.
PRAVEEN SWAMI in Chandigarh
THE first rustle of a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) campaign began to
be heard in Punjab's political undergrowth early this year. In January, RSS
workers visited Gopalpur, a village near Majitha in Amritsar. Its mainly
Dalit Sikh and Hindu residents were urged to bring down a local mosque
which fell into disuse after Gopalpur's Muslims left for Pakistan after
Partition. Soon afterwards, children at a State-run school in the Chheharta
suburb of Amritsar were handed out questionnaires about Sikh relig ious
history and the RSS leadership. Prizes for the winners of this quiz were
sponsored by a local RSS front organisation. By spring, Rawanni, a new
Jalandhar-based magazine that regularly carries anti-Christian propaganda,
was in circulation thro ugh the border districts.
BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT At a protest demonstration against the RSS'
activities in Punjab.
Few people paid much attention to these early signs that the RSS had
resumed its historic campaign to reinvent Sikh identity within a larger
Hindu-nationalist paradigm. That had to wait until April 29, when RSS chief
K.S. Sudershan arrived in Chandigarh for the first National Executive
committee meeting of his organisation's newly-formed front body, the
Rashtriya Sikh Sangat. Sikhs, Sudershan proclaimed, were part of the "Hindu
mainstream", and he charged that organisations which claimed that the
commun ity had an "exclusive identity" were secessionist. Describing the
tenth guru, Gobind Singh, as a "national hero", Sudershan said that the RSS
was "working hard to revive the custom of the eldest son in every Hindu
family being raised as a Sikh".
Unsurprisingly, Sudershan's foray provoked aggressive protests from Sikh
chauvinist organisations. "Sikhs are a separate nation, and any attempt to
change this status will be contested and resisted," proclaimed the
right-wing Dal Khalsa's Kanwarpal Singh Bittu at the April 29 protests.
"Though Sikhs are a peace-loving and god-fearing people," he continued,
"when all peaceful methods fail, then, as ordained by Guru Gobind Singh, it
is righteous to take to the sword." Such polemic is, in part, driven by t
he battle for power between Chief Minister Prakash Singh Badal's Shiromani
Akali Dal (SAD) and the alliance of Gurcharan Singh Tohra's All India
Shiromani Akali Dal (AISAD) and Simranjit Singh Mann's Shiromani Akali
Dal-Amritsar (SAD-A). But the competin g chauvinisms now at play could have
serious consequences for communal peace in Punjab, which is quite fragile.
The Rashtriya Sikh Sangat's emergence has its origins in the celebrations
of the tercentennial of the foundation of the Khalsa order which began in
April 1999. In an effort to enrich the theocratic credentials of his
regime, Badal ensured that the State government played a central role in
the celebrations. The Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic
Alliance government in New Delhi proved only too happy to help out, putting
up some Rs. 300 crores for the event. At least some of that money went to
organisations such as the Sikh Sangat, ostensibly to help promote knowledge
of Sikh religious history through events like the school quiz programmes in
Amritsar.
By early April, the Sikh Sangat's activities were in full flow. RSS cadre
joined in Sikh rituals at Dharamkot near Moga on April 3, and sponsored a
langar (community meal) to mark the conclusion of the tercentennial
celebrations. A week later, Sik h Sangat chief Chiranjeev Singh was in
Muktsar to attend a similar RSS-led celebration. And by mid-April, the Sikh
Sangat was sponsoring at least seven training camps for Sikh recruits.
Among the major issues raised at these camps were the expansion of t he
Punjab government's shagun programme, a controversial cash grant scheme for
Dalit women marrying Christians. The camps, Punjab RSS general secretary
Devinder Kumar Gupta said, were organised in order to "caution the youth
against the threat fro m imperialist forces, such as Islamic extremists and
Christian missionaries".
If SAD centrists maintained a stoic silence on these developments, their
detractors on the far right saw an opportunity here to launch an attack. An
RSS translation of the Dasam Granth, a religious text which claims among
other things that the Sikh gurus were descendants of the Hindu
mythological figures Luv and Kush, became the first ground for battle. At
an April 9 seminar, members of the Institute for Sikh Studies claimed that
portions of the Dasam Granth were not authentic, arguing that they encoura
ged belief in reincarnation and other beliefs that are irreconcilable with
theological tenets. This assertion in turn sparked off a furore within the
Sikh community, with the Nihang sect, members of which claim descent from
the army of Guru Gobind Singh, charging the Institute's scholars with
heresy. "By denouncing the Dasam Granth," Nihang leader Baba Santa Singh
said, "they are aiming to divide Hindus and Sikhs".
RSS leaders have for long seen the assertion that the Sikh faith is in
essence Hindu as a key component in their struggle for the creation of a
theocratic state. Indeed, on these grounds their ideologue M.S. Golwalkar
had advised Hindus not to oppose the Punjabi language. But the
organisation's current programme has at least as much to do with its
concerns about its core constituency as its expansionist agenda. Through
the tercentennial celebrations, the RSS' Hindu chauvinist constituency had
been incen sed by the SAD's aggressive identification of the state with the
panth (Sikh community). Sikh rituals had, for example, preceded the
national anthem at district-level Republic day functions last year, and
senior SAD Minister Manjit Singh Calcutta had raised eyebrows by promising
to introduce Sikh prayers in schools. The RSS had to vest the BJP's
affiliation with the SAD with some legitimacy in order to contain its
cadre's discontent.
SIKH chauvinists had similar compulsions, for as in the case of the RSS
their own real faithful were becoming increasingly restive. Despite growing
resentment against Badal among the SAD MLAs, the Chief Minister has so far
managed to resist efforts by To hra and other dissidents like Ravi Inder
Singh to bring down his government. And, as the triumph of the Badal
faction in the Delhi Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee (SGPC)
elections in mid-May illustrates, Tohra's control of his own traditional
bas es of support is under threat. If Badal had used religion to establish
his political legitimacy, Akali dissidents needed to establish that the
Chief Minister, because of his alliance with the BJP, was in fact
cohabiting with the enemies of the faith.
As the Sikh Sangat controversy developed, Badal's detractors discovered
that they had the platform which they so badly needed. Even centrist Sikhs
affiliated with the SAD mainstream were deeply uncomfortable with the RSS'
characterisation of their faith as a component of Hinduism. Fears of Hindu
hegemony run deep in Punjab's Sikh communal politics, and in this case,
Badal was in no position to address them. Dependent on BJP support for his
continued survival as Chief Minister, all that Badal could do wa s to call
for restraint on the issue. The Sangat's Chiranjeev Singh, for his part,
attempted to undo some of the damage, conceding at the end of the national
executive meeting that Sikhs did indeed have a separate identity. This
separate identity, he sug gested, was a "shield to protect national
identity, as Sikhs were the sword arm of Hindus".
Chiranjeev Singh's strenuous efforts did little to help matters. Dissident
Akali politicians responded by calling for a ban on the RSS in Punjab, a
demand that was backed by a spectrum of far-right voices. "The absence of a
strong Sikh leadership, both i n the religious and political field, has led
the RSS to try and infiltrate Sikhism," the World Sikh Intellectual
Council's S.S. Nishan claimed.
For reasons the Congress(I) best understands, its State chief, Amarinder
Singh, chose to enter the fray. At a press conference in Ludhiana, he
attacked Sudershan, arguing that Sikhs did indeed have a separate identity,
one that came into existence after the foundation of the religion by Guru
Nanak. But he remained silent on the revanchist postures taken by Badal's
detractors.
Predictably, the matter made its way to the Akal Takht. Despite Badal's
efforts to ensure that the issue was underplayed, the recently-appointed
acting Jathedar, Joginder Singh Vedanti, proclaimed Sikhs to be a separate
qaum (nation) with "a disti nct ideology and physical characteristics".
This he did at a May 14 gathering, made up almost entirely of Badal's
far-right opponents. Vedanti ordered the SAD to participate energetically
in the ongoing review of the Indian Constitution, and ensure that the Sikh
distinctiveness be reflected in a revised Constitution. Politicians of the
SAD-A, the AISAD and the Dal Khalsa proclaimed triumph, and promised a
renewed campaign against the RSS and the Sikh Sangat.
Badal's problems are replete with irony. The politician made his career
two decades ago by burning copies of the Constitution. He had then charged
that sections of the Constitution which made Hindu personal laws applicable
to Sikhs were offensive and dri ven by communal hegemonism. Now his
alliance with the BJP compelled him to remain silent. Through Punjab's
decade-long Khalistan insurgency, Badal had flirted with far-right
terrorists, only to abandon them for the BJP when peace returned. And
although B adal had historically opposed the Hindu right's assertion that
Sikhs were simply keshdhari (those who do not cut their hair) Hindus, he
had sent his party cadre to Ayodhya in 1993 to participate in the Hindu
fundamentalist mobilisation that led to the demolition of the Babri
Masjid.
If the far-right Akalis have used religious issues to gain political
space, they are deploying tactics pioneered by their centrist counterparts
a decade ago. Just as Badal joined the campaign by revanchist preacher
Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale against the Nirankari sect in the late 1970s,
Tohra's AISAD has now demanded the expulsion of the Namdhari community from
the Sikh fold. On May 12, AISAD general secretary Sukhdev Singh Bhaur
demanded a ban on a 1979 Namdhari book by Mehar Singh Kanpuri which, he cl
aimed, threatened the "distinct identity of Sikhism". Bhaur, whose calls
were endorsed by Punjab University Vice-Chancellor Jasbir Singh Ahluwalia,
said the Namdhari belief in a living Guru excluded them from being part of
the Sikh panth. The Namd hari community, traditional supporters of the
Congress (I) in Punjab, evidently incurred Tohra's wrath for backing the
SAD in recent months.
Feuds involving Akali factions have already led to violence. On May 13,
AISAD and SAD workers attacked each other at a meeting of the SGPC-funded
Sikh Educational Society at Guru Gobind Singh College in Chandigarh. The
violence was provoked by the SAD's efforts to purge Tohra faction members
from the society, and ended in the spectacle of State Minister Suchcha
Singh Langah and AISAD leader Prem Singh Chandumajra attacking each other.
The prospect of violence between Sikh communal formations and the RSS '
lumpen cadres too is real. These efforts could prove dangerous; it was the
process of sharpening the boundaries between Sikhs and Hindus on the one
hand, and among Sikh sects on the other, that drove the carnage of
1983-1993. The SAD centrists have no one to blame but themselves. Ever
since the tercentennial celebrations, the SAD has repeatedly sought to
counter the fall in its popularity by striking aggressive communal
postures. In recent months, for example, SGPC president and Badal
confidante Jagir Kaur initiated a battle to move away from the Bikrami
almanac to a new Nanakshahi calendar. In practice this meant that Sikh
festivals, which are now celebrated along with Hindu religious events,
would fall on different dates. Badal went along with the proposal, despite
bitter opposition from then Akal Takht Jathedar Puran Singh and other
religious leaders. (The SAD-controlled SGPC has sought to hold sway over
almost every aspect of civil society, even proclaiming on May 4 that
non-Sikh actors would no t be allowed to perform Sikh roles without its
permission.) "Under Badal," says veteran Communist leader Satpal Dang, "the
affairs of the state and the affairs of the panth have become
indistinguishable. Punjab has in effect become a theocratic st ate. And
this is at the root of the crisis we see today."
Union Home Minister L.K. Advani's offer on May 14 to release Khalistan
terrorists held in jails, an unconcealed effort to gain support from the
far-right Akhand Kirtani Jatha and Damdami Taksal seminaries as well as
other Sikh communal organisations, is just one sign of how far the Hindu
right is willing to go to give legitimacy to the Sikh Sangat. As Sikh
communal organistions scramble to ward off this new threat, and to
undermine the Akali centrists, the intensity of their polemic could
sharpen.
Mercifully, despite this charged discourse on Sikh separateness and Hindu
hegemony, ordinary people in both communities appear little exercised by
the issue. The Rashtriya Sikh Sangat has found few Sikh members, and even
fewer recruits among Hindus outsi de the RSS cadre. The protests against
it, too, have attracted thin participation. It does not take a lot,
however, to set off avalanches. If one does not take place, it would not be
for lack of effort on the part of Punjab's politicians.
________

#4.

29 May 2000

=46rom:
Ram Puiyani
Secretary EKTA (Committee for Communal AMity)
Ph-5723522, 5725045,5768763 (R)
5767763 (O)

Sikhism : Religion or a Sect

by Ram Puniyani

Recently RSS Chief K. Sudarshan while participating in the Rashtriya Sikh
Sangat (Sangat) Convention in Amritsar said that Sikhism is a sect of
Hinduism, Khalsa is a part of mainstream Hinduism and that Sikhism was
created to protect Hinduism from Mughal tyranny. Many a Sikh organizations
undertook protest march against Sudarshan and pointed out that Sikhism is a
religion in its own right and that they will not tolerate RSS efforts to
undermine their separate Sikh identity. The spokesperson of Dal Khalsa went
on to say that RSS is trying to impose a centralized monolithic society in
India and that they will oppose this hegemonic agenda of RSS. Meanwhile
many other Sikh organizations said that RSS is interfering in the
religious, cultural, social and political matters of Sikhs, which should be
condemned and opposed. In Lok Sabha one MP alleged that RSS is distributing
anti-Sikh literature through Sangat, which is disturbing the religious
harmony in Punjab. This MP also criticized the MHRD ministry for giving RS.
17 crores to Sangat for pro-RSS propaganda work.

If RSS assertion about the nature and historical role of Sikhism and Khasla
is correct why this massive protest against the RSS chief and the move of
MHRD ministry to fund the pro-RSS propaganda? Like other distorted and
communalized perceptions of History the one pertaining to the understanding
of Sikhism is no exception.

Guru Nanak and origin of Sikhism:

Nanak's preaching's came in the backdrop of Bramimical domination on one
hand and the spread of teachings of Sufi and Bhakti saints, on the other.
He rejected Brahmincal values and caste domination and concluded that
teachings of Bhakti and Sufi differed in form, not in content. It was from
the teachings of Muslim Sufis (notably Sheikh Farid) and Sant Kabir that
Guru Nanak drew his inspiration. He preached monotheism and quiet devotion
to God. His hymns were drawn from different sources. Out of Nanak's
teachings came an enduring religious community with distinctive history and
evolution separate from Hindu and Muslim religions but drawing the
egalitarian aspects from both. Nanak denounced orthodox practitioners of
Islam as well as Hinduism and placed his emphasis on the vibrant
intercommunity relationships based on the subaltern versions of Islam and
Hinduism. His teachings at one level are a synthesis of the values of both
the religions like reincarnation and the doctrine of Karma from Hinduism
and oneness of God and congregation in worship from Islam.

Sikh Community and Kingdom:

Nanak was to be followed by nine more Gurus. With fifth Guru, Arjan,
Sikhism was established as a separate religious system. He put together the
writings of his predecessors, his own and those of Hindu and Muslim saints
in the Adi Granth, which is the guiding spirit of Sikh religion. Meanwhile
due to the efforts of the Gurus Amritsar emerged as the Religious and trade
center. It is important to remember that Sufi saint Miyan Mir was requested
to lay the foundation stone of Golden temple. This was the time when
organization of Sikh community as a political process was also in
progress,and their relationship with the Mughal sultanate was becoming
quiet complex. Guru Arjan had become important religious and political
leader. He was socially very close to Miyan Mir, while his chief opponent
was a Hindu, the finance minister to Muslim governor of Lahore. During the
seventeenth century this community underwent a transformation into a
military community. The gurus went into Mughal politics and soon found
themselves in opposition to the factions, which won in the battles for
succession. Initially Guru Arjan entered a liaison with Khusarau. In 1606
when Prince Khusarau rebelled against his father Jahangir, it was suspected
that Guru Arjan had supported Khusarao. He was arrested on this charge.

Another Guru Hari Rai entered into relations with rebellious son of
Shahjahan, Dara Shikoh. With Dara Shikoh's defeat at the hands of his
brother Aurangzeb this Guru again found himself on the wrong side of the
power equations of the ruling Mughal family. So he had to send his son to
Delhi to negotiate a pardon. The cycle of conflict with Mughal rulers
continued and took extreme form with the Tenth Guru Govind Singh. Guru
Govind wanted to establish his own kingdom while Aurangazeb was brutally
suppressing all the rebellions against the Mughal Sultanate. His immediate
tussle was with the Raja of Bilaspur, whom he refused to pay any tribute.
This led to the battle in which the Raja of Bilaspur was defeated. Also
this brought in the hostility of many of the Rajas of hill states towards
Guru Govind Singh. He also had the allies in the plains the most notable
amongst them being the pir of Sadhura. Aurangzeb in conjunction with Hindu
Rajas of plains drove Guru Govind away from Anandpur and in the battle his
children were caught and tortured. Later there was an attempt at
rapprochement from Aurangzeb's side and he invited Guru Govind to meet him
in Deccan. As Guru was on his way to meet him, Aurangzeb died, but the
process of reconciliation with Mughal sultanate continued and in due course
Guru struck an alliance with Aurangzeb's son Bahadurshah Jafar.

In this sea-saw, ding dong battle between Sikhs and Mughal Kings the lines
of alliances were regularly blurred. Mughals having liaison with Hindu
Rajas, Gurus having alliances with Muslim kings and pirs etc. This was a
political fight in which religious element got mixed up. Same Govind Singh
who had a rough patch with Aurangzeb allied with his son Bahadur Shah Jafar.

Sangh Parivar's Agenda and Sikhism:

RSS has the goal of Hindu Rashtra. For its agenda, it asserts that the
people can be united only with the Hindu identity to the fore. It is in
this direction that it claims all the religions, which arose in the
subcontinent as mere sects of Hinduism, and not full religions. Be it
Buddhism or Sikhism RSS is prompt to label them as sects of Hinduism. Again
the RSS version of Hinduism is the elite Brahminical version while these
religions arose mainly as a reaction against the Brahminical values. Those
who are protesting against RSS designs are clear about the hegemonic RSS
designs. Does it mean that the Indians cannot be united in to a single
national thread as RSS claims? On the contrary Indians ARE united by the
overarching Indian National identity. The attempts of RSS to make Hindu
identity as the primary identity is fraught with dangers not only for
minorities and the weaker sections of society but even for those who will
like to retain the identity of Sikhism or Buddhism and that's what explains
such a hostile response to the efforts of RSS affiliate Sangat's efforts to
project Sikhism as a mere sect of Hinduism.

The attempt to selectively highlight Guru Govind's struggles against the
Mughal Empire and to hide his alliance with same rulers, is aimed to boost
its anti-Muslim agenda. Similarly his fights against Hindu Rajas are
suppressed from the popular memory. One more example of selective
historiography at the service of Hindu Nationalism.

________

#5.

Outlook, May 2000
Book reviews and extracts

Brought to book
The Vedic deities and caste systems of the Aryans, the
Ramayana and Mahabharta epics, the Bhagavad Gita,the concept of the Avatar,
and Vaishnavite Hinduism as practiced in contemporary India formed the
essential corpus of Hindu doctrine and scripture familiar to Savitri Devi
by the end of 1930s. From 1937 until the early 1940s, her work on behalf of
the Hindu Mission involved her lecturing widely on popular Hinduism in
Bengali and Hindi throughout the states of Bengal, Bihar, and Assam. This
formal involvement with the traditions and texts of Hinduism, coupled with
plentiful opportunity to observe and learn firsthand about Hindu customs
and beliefs, leaves no doubt as to her knowledge of Indian religion.
However, even at this time she was already developing her own Aryo-Nazi
religion, sprinkling her lectures with references to Meinf Kampf,and
seeking correspondences between Hitlerism and Hinduism as supposed joint
heirs of ancient Aryan wisdom. She received encouragement in this project
from a number of highly educated Hindus. During the 1930s, when India was
chafing under British rule, the restrictions imposed on Indian nationalists
led many to regard Soviet communism and the Third Reich with its Aryan
racial doctrine and holy swastika sign as potent alternatives. Those who
were religiously inclined even saw Stalin and Hitler as possible redeemer
figures and made them objects of bhakti devotion by displaying their
photographs on the family of shrine alongside the images of their personal
deity , be this Vishnu, Shiva, or another god. It was with amazement and
joy that Savitri Devi first observed pictures of the Fuhrer on the
households altar of Indian families.
(Excerpted from Hitler's Priestess by Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke, published
by Oxford University Press, price:Rs 495)=20
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