SV: RAJARAM EPISODE

[Lars Martin Fosse]

nanda chandran [SMTP:vpcnk at HOTMAIL.COM] skrev 30. september 2000 11:02:
> Yep, it is indeed very sad. But how can I help having such an attitude
> when professional historians whom one would expect to discuss issues
> objectively with courtesy, get down to gutter level polemic, personal
> slanging and vindictive abuse? Even common courtesy demands one to
> refrain from kicking somebody who's down.

I assume you are talking about Rajaram, and I take exception to this
attempt to present him as an underdog. I have followed Rajaram's polemics
in the Organiser for a year, and he is a ruthless propagandist and vicious
hatemonger who deserves firm and determined opposition. He is also
representative of a set of attitudes that cries at you from every page of
the Organiser, so attacking Rajaram's views is not simply a matter of
attacking him, it is also an attack on a whole set of political thinking.
Discrediting these views is every decent person's duty. Rajaram and his
fellow travellers are trying to take India and Indians everywhere down a
road that can only lead to social catastrophe and disgrace. It has happened
before in Europe, and it should not be allowed to happen in India.

> Outside academic circles many Hindus indeed view it that way. That
there's
> no resentment by the Hindus of the iconoclastic fanaticism of Islam is
> leftist propoganda.

I don't know who said this, but Muslim iconoclasm is well known. What
happened in India during the medieval period is also well known, noone has
tried to hide or deny it, at least not in the West. What Rajaram and his
ilk are trying to do, is to revive ancient conflicts and instrumentalize
them for their own political purposes, which essentially is a matter of
retaining a revamped version of the old society with the upper castes in
firm control. Unfortunately, the way to Hell is clogged with people trying
to profit politically from ancient conflicts. In Europe, the former
Yugoslavia is only the most recent example of this. Is this what you want
for India? A society tearing itself to shreds in order to take revenge on
past injustices and preserve the privileges of the privileged? I would
suggest that you drop the hints about your opponents being "communists" and
"leftists". There is a vast political space between communism and fascism,
and most of belong there, not at the fringes.

> The days of the Mughal empire are over. India is now a democratic
country.
> Let the truth about Islamic iconoclasm be known. Let the Hindus get back
> what is rightfully theirs. Even here the Hindus do not even want all the
> temples back, the thousands which were demolished to make way for the
> mosques - only the really important ones - only 3 or 4 - the temples at
> Mathura and Ayodhya, the Kashi Vishwanath etc - which are so integral a
part
> of the Hindu psyche - like the Vatican is to the Catholics. Surely this
is a
> reasonable demand! For this why should there be any violence at all?

And why should you reopen old wounds and pour salt in them? Surely, peace
and prosperity for the majority of Indians is more important than centuries
old conflicts and "putting right" ancient injustices. 300 years ago,
substantial Norwegian territories were ceded to Sweden after a war. We do
not try to take them back. It wouldn't be worth the trouble. Peace,
prosperity and good neighbourlyness are more important values that  a few
thousand square kilometers. What India needs is a new tolerance, which
means that leaders, both Hindu and Muslim, must work for mutual
understanding and peaceful solutions, not drag each other down into the
morrass of infighting and mutual terror through discrimination and
provocation.

Best regards,

Lars Martin Fosse


Dr. art. Lars Martin Fosse
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