Sahadev, Go Bring some Fire ! Richard Eaton was interviewed by a lady named Revati Laul in Tehelka. A friend brought up the contents for a post. He slammed Eaton, but that was in Hindi on FB. You can read Eaton and Laul here : tehelka/its-a-myth-that-muslim-rulers-destroyed-thousands-of-temples/ The soldiers of peace brought down a lot of temples. The late Sita Ram Goel gave a long list, you can google for it if interested, but that’s not what I am writing about. Do you remember Dr Rafiq Zakaria? He had written an article in Mid Day, long ago. I haven’t preserved the reference, but the gist was that those who did so were primarily looking for loot and that destroying temples was more of a political act than religious. It is intended to emasculate the vanquished on a mental plane too. A people can rise again after a physical defeat, but a mentally defeated people will not. I agree with that, but the learned Dr Zakaria overlooked or neglected a small point. The Hindu mind could not be killed and the peaceful were always attempting to kill it. Do such wounds really heal? Let me tell you of a wound that’s really centuries deep. Islam ruled Spain. Andalusia, to be specific. And the rule lasted for long, right from 711 AD to 1492 AD. The Christians (not just Spaniards) finally kicked them out. The biggest city there was Cordoba. Remember this name, I shall return to it presently. As is their wont, the peaceful converted the Cathedral there to a Mosque. Many other churches too. However, after having kicked them out of Spain, the Spaniards did not wait for their permission to hand over their places of worship; they changed them forthwith into Churches and Cathedrals again. Now let us talk of Cordoba again, in the current context. Fast forward to New York, 9/11. CAIR (Council on American–Islamic Relations) came forward to buy the flattened plot of land. They wanted to build a massive monument to peace over there and of course, a mosque was also part of the plan. They were denied purchase, so they bought a nearby plot. Now known as Park 51. Americans, not being Hindus of India, have opposed it, calling it a deliberate insult to the memory of the martyrs, amongst other things. Ah yes; the name of the building was to be CORDOBA House, and the project is called The Cordoba Initiative. You may google for details. Let bygones be, eh? Is that only for Hindus? Let’s turn again to destroyed Hindu temples. Babri may have been a nearly deserted mosque, but symbolized a mark of oppression, that was sought to be done away with. That’s exactly why it had to go. And the reason why it disturbed the peace of the peaceful to the extent of rampant, well coordinated violence across the country was that they saw in that act an overthrowing of the fear, the terror that they symbolized. The feeling behind the unleashed violence : how dare these people that we have trampled under the hooves of our conquering steeds for over 1000 years, not only stand up to us but also look us in the eye? And are you not aware of the Kashi Vishwanath temple, also known as the Gyanvapi Mosque? What evidence is Mr Eaton averting our eyes away from? And today, when we are no longer serfs, why carry the mark of a tyrant’s shoe on our foreheads with pride, just that a bunch of hypocrites and liars certify us to be secular? Towards the end of the game of dice in Mahabharat, when Yudhishthir still restrained Bheem despite all manners of insults, Bheem lost it at one moment and roared : Sahadev ! Go bring some fire that I may burn off the hands of this gambler who cannot resist the dice!
Posted on: Thu, 04 Sep 2014 07:50:04 +0000