Must read 😈😈how majority is trying to prove that Bhagat Singh was a Hindu Indias Right Wing Eyes Sikh legacy VISHAV BHARTI, I P SINGH, et al It’s fascinating to see how Hindu fundamentalists and extremists, while clawing at each other to gain advantage in the coming elections in India, lay claim to a monopoly to patriotism by tripping over each other in a race to align themselves with … yes, a Sikh martyr, who became the rallying point for the independence movement, much more so than any other man or woman on the subcontinent. They work hard at down-playing the fact that Bhagat Singh was a Sardar -- he was born a Sikh, and died a Sikh -- through mischief that comes easy to them because they are a majority. They love, for example, to repeatedly depict him without a turban -- over the vociferous protests by Sikhs -- revelling on the fact that he had shed his external Sikh articles of faith and donned a hat as part of a disguise in order to evade capture while being hunted by the British Police. He was eventually caught and hanged, after having reclaimed his Sikh heritage. The following news story is yet another sordid chapter from India’s love-hate relationship with Sikhs. An invitation to Narendra Modi to release a new publication of martyr Bhagat Singhs jail notebook, extended by remote kin, has irked scholars and the family of the martyr. In May this year, a Haryana-based distant relative of the hero, announced at a press conference in Chandigarh, Punjab, that the jail notebook of Bhagat Singh, the original copy of which is in the possession of the family, will be available in the form of a glitzy coffee-table book format. Now, the book is ready for circulation and an invitation has been extended to Modi to release it. Confirming the development, the kin said revealed that mass-murderer from Gujarat -- now a contender for the Prime Minister’s job in the coming elections -- would release the book. We have sent him two to three dates and will get the final schedule soon. The book will be released at a function at Talkatora Stadium in Delhi, he said. Understandably, the invitation has irked the other family members of Bhagat Singh as well as the scholars who have written about Bhagat Singh. Prof Jagmohan Singh, a Ludhiana-based nephew of Bhagat Singh, has initiated a campaign against the move with a letter appearing in the latest issue of the weekly, ’Mainstream‘. He said Modi should not be invited for the purpose as Bhagat Singh and his comrades were firmly opposed to communalism and communal violence. He said that in the present context it was important that the literature belonging to Bhagat Singh should be released only by a person whose life is in conformity with the values and principles for which Bhagat Singh lived and died. Clearly, Modi does not qualify for the role, he said. Lashing out at the relative who seems to have solf his soulf for a few pieces of silver, he said the diary is already a public document, the need for its release does not arise and the entire exercise appears to be guided by a selfish motive. Not just the martyrs kin, the move has also irked a section of scholars and historians. Chaman Lal, former Professor of Indian Languages at Delhis JN University and an expert who has edited and penned several books on him, said in a letter to other scholars that the invitation to Modi to release a book on Bhagat Singh is like Hitler being invited to release Lenins book or Bush being invited to release Che Guevaras book. The family member is trying to hog limelight by this irresponsible move; none of the other members of Bhagat Singhs family approves it, he said. Shamsul Islam, Associate Professor, Department of Political Science, Satyawati College, University of Delhi, opposed it saying it was a second hanging of Bhagat Singh in a letter that appeared on the website Counter Currents. I strongly feel that no person should be allowed to betray the great legacy of Shaheed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh. It is hoped that [the offending party] who claims to be a relative of the martyr will not be party to the second hanging of Bhagat Singh, he said. THE BOOK Bhagat Singhs notebook was handed over to his younger brother Kulbir a day before the 23-year-old revolutionary was executed by the British at Lahore Central Jail, on March 23, 1931. The revolutionarys jail notebook was first published in Hindi in the early 1990s and again towards the end of that decade. It was published in Punjabi a few years ago. The 288-page coffee-table book will have a scanned version of the original manuscript and a printed version of the text on the facing pages. * * * * * Modi’s party, the Hindu right-wing fundamentalist BJP, may have leapt at the idea of claiming martyr Bhagat Singhs legacy, but its content may not exactly be music to the extremist brigades ears. The book reproduces extensively the martyrs diary jottings, essentially quotes from Marx, Trotsky and philosophers like Bertrand Russell, laying bare his love for the Leftist ideology and his strong views on religion. Those familiar with Bhagat Singhs thoughts and writings say the contents of the book, with its strong views on religion and capitalism, may not be to the liking of the Hindutva mascot. On page 40 of his jail notes, Bhagat Singh had reproduced Marxs quote on religion: Man makes religion; religion does not make man. Religion, indeed, is the self consciousness and the self feeling of man who either has not yet found himself or else has lost himself once more ... Religion is the sigh of oppressed creature, the feelings of a heartless world just as it is the spirit of unspiritual conditions, the note continues on the next page, where he underlines the famous quote: Its the opium of the people ... People cannot be really happy ... until it has been deprived of illusory happiness by the abolition of religion ... His study about the Left worldview is further reflected from a quote from Trotskys work The Lessons of October 1917 from which he quoted the preface by Susan Lawrence: ... And it is ... rather curious to note that even Trotsky is not revolutionary enough to say that Marx had made mistake; but feels obliged to devote a page or so to the task of exegesis -- that is, proving that the sacred books meant something quite different from what they said. Another quote from the same work referred to Lenin, written in 1917: It so often happens, that when events take a sudden turn, even an advanced party cannot adapt itself for some time to the new conditions. It goes on repeating yesterdays watch words which under the new circumstances have become empty of meaning and which have lost meaning unexpectedly, just in proportion as the change of events has been unexpected. Bhagat Singh quoted Bertrand Russels views on religion in the beginning of his Notes on Page 12: I regard it a disease born of fear, and as source of untold nuisance to the human race. I cannot however deny that it has made some contribution to civilization. It helped in early days to fix the calendar and it caused the Egyptian priest to chronicle eclipses with such care that in time they become able to predict them
Posted on: Wed, 23 Oct 2013 09:01:14 +0000
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