Something for all Indians to read, ponder and act upon!!! The secular Jaziyah tax: Contemporary India continues to entrap Muslims in the politics of fear -- Shahid Siddiqui, in todays Times of India. Jaziyah is the protection tax that non-Muslim citizens of an Islamic state have to pay to the Islamic government for their safety and wellbeing. In independent India minorities, especially Muslims, have to pay Jaziyah of a different kind. This Jaziyah is in the form of votes, paid to so-called secular parties, especially to Congress for ensuring protection to them, for not letting India become a Hindu nation and keeping it secular. Since Independence this game has been played both covertly and overtly. Media and intellectuals have, knowingly or unknowingly, helped these parties in extracting this electoral Jaziyah from insecure minorities. After partition, Muslims who remained in India were told both by Muslim and secular leadership that if they wanted to survive in Hindu India it was their duty to protect secularism, which in real terms meant voting for one party, which in return would keep India secular. In Indias political lexicon, thereafter, secularism became synonymous with Muslim vote bank. The Sangh Parivar parties used it conversely to mean appeasement of Muslims. Indian secularism therefore was neither sarva dharma samabhava (equal respect for all religions) nor the European concept of state above religion. It meant protecting minorities from possible violence and discrimination. In practical terms it meant verbal appeasement of Muslims, especially before elections. More timesofindia.indiatimes/home/opinion/edit-page/The-secular-Jaziyah-tax-Contemporary-India-continues-to-entrap-Muslims-in-the-politics-of-fear/articleshow/33404770.cms
Posted on: Tue, 08 Apr 2014 01:46:11 +0000
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