Distorted Indian History Part 1

Please also read

1. "Distorted Indian History Part 2"


2. "Distorted Indian History Part 3"


3. "Distorted Indian History Part 4"


4. "Distorted Indian History Part 5"


5. "Distorted Indian History Part 6"


6. "Distorted Indian History Part 7"


7. "Distorted Indian History Part 8"


8. "Distorted Indian History Part 9"

-----------Forwarded Message------------

Distortion of Indian History for Muslim appeasement, Part 1
By Dr. Radhasyam Brahmachari

The Red Fort in Delhi:

Whenever we visit the historical monuments of Delhi and Agra, the guides tell us - this is the fort built by Emperor Akbar, or that is the palace built by Emperor Shah Jahan, or here is the minar made by Sultan Qutb-ud-din and so on and so forth. They try to convince us that all the forts, palaces and other monuments of excellent architecture in Delhi and Agra were authored by the Muslim invaders. We also give them a patient hearing and believe in what they say, as our history books also give similar accounts. Above all, by going through such history books from our childhood, the claim of Muslim authorship of all these edifices has penetrated our mind so deeply that we never apply simple common sense to estimate the credibility of the said claim.

Our history books also tell us that Delhi fell to the Muslim invaders, for the first time in history, in 1192 AD, when Muhammad Ghori defeated Emperor Prithviraj Chauhan in the Second Battle of Tarain. So, it becomes evident that before this incident, Delhi was ruled by the Rajput kings and common sense tells us that Emperor Prithviraj Chauhan and his ancestors also had forts and palaces as dwelling places as well as the seat of their governments. Definitely they did not live in mud houses or thatched cottages. So the question is - What happened to those forts and palaces and where they have gone?

Our historians also tell us that after capturing Delhi, Muhammad Ghori conquered the fort at Ajmer (Sanskrit: Ajeya Meru) in the same year and thereafter, he entrusted to his slave Qutb-ud-din the conquered territory and left India for Ghazni. Later on, Qutb-ud-din captured the forts at Gwalior, Meeut, Ranathombhor, Benares and so on and all these forts belonged to Hindu kings. Again the question arises- In pre-Islamic India, the Hindu kings had so many forts and palaces at so many places, how come then they had none in Delhi? Hence a group of historians believe that the Muslim invaders did not build a single fort or a palace, or any other mansion eiher in Delhi or in Agra and that all the existing forts and palaces, as we see them today, were originally built by he Hindu kings well before the arrival of the barbaric Muslim invaders. These Muslim aggressors only occupied those forts and palaces by force and utilised them as their dwelling places and as royal courts.

Qutb-ud-din’s court chronicler Hasan Nizami in his Taj-ul-Masir writes, “When he (Muhammad Ghori) arrived at Delhi, he saw a fortress which in height and strength had no equal nor second throught the length and breadth of seven climes”.[1] The question is - Which was the fort Muhammad Ghori saw? Had he seen the Red Fort? There was no other fort that could match the description of Hasan Nizami. But our historians say that Shah Jahan, after ascending the throne of Delhi, decided to set up a new capital to be called Shahjahanabad in Delhi and as a part of that plan he built the Red Fort. Hence they write, “In 1638, Shah Jahan began in Delhi the construction of a new capital, that of Shahjahanbad, to contain within its perimeter a sumptuous palace-fortress fot the accommodation of the imperial household and the court. The palce-fortress, the Red Fort as it is known because of the red sandstone fabric of its rampart walls, has been designed on an unprecedented scale with all the amenities of the busy and luxurious life of an imperial house and court provided for within its walls in a regular and systematic order”. [2]

Our historians tell us that it took ten years to build the fort and write, “The fortress with its halls, palaces, pavalions and gardens was completed in 1648 when on an auspicious day the Emperor entered it ceremonially and formally inaugurated the capital city”.[2] Surprisingly, the same historian writes in another place, “The Diwan-i-am in the Delhi fort, it has to be noted, is also in red sandstone, and it is definitely known to have been the work of Shah Jahan. Behind Diwan-i-am and separated from it by Machchhi Bhavan, stands the Diwan-i-Khas that was erected by, according to the inscription it bears, in 1636-37″.[3] The question therefore arises- How could Shah Jahan complete the construction of Diwan-i-Am and Diwan-i-Khas, which were the integral parts of the Red Fort, nearly two years before the commencement of the construction of the Red Fort itself in 1638 AD?

At he same time, our historians say that while the construction of the Red Fort was in progress, Shah Jahan undertook a massive renovation and repair work of the older palaces and write, “Shah Jahan’s alteration and replacements in the earlier palace-fortress were carried out on a grandiose scale and apparently inspired by the desire to impart to the palaces nnd other appurtenances an appearence to suit the prevailing character of the court”.[4] They also say that, as a part of that reconstruction work, Shah Jahan built a Naubat Khana near the Diwan-i-Am and had a Persian couplet inscribed- “If there is paradise on the face of the earth, it is this, it is this, it is this”, on Diwan-i-Khas.[5] These descriptions make one wonder about Shah Jahan’s authorship of the Red Fort. Had the Red Fort, with all its appurtenances, been a new creation of Shah Jahan, how could the need for reconstruction and remodelling of those newly built mansions and palaces arise? Furthermore, where were the older palaces mentioned above and what was their origin?

So, if we piece together all the information mentioned above, it becomes evident that there was an existing fortress in Delhi, built probably many years before the time of Shah Jahan, and Shah Jahan undertook a massive reconstruction and renovation work, mainly to remove all stone carvings bearing Hindu symbols and possible Sanskrit inscriptions and to convert all Hindu temples inside the fortress into mosques, with a view to giving the entire edifice a Muslim face which our historians describe as an attempt to give the fortress “an appearence to suit the prevailing (i.e. Muslim) character of the court”.

Shah Jahan’s authorship of the Red Fort becomes all the more suspect when one finds that there is an indirect mention of the Diwan-i-Khas in the Tabaquat-i-Nasisri by the Muslim chronicler Minhas-us-Siraj. He writes that nearly 400 years before the time of Shah Jahan, Bukhtiar Khilji, the then chief warlord of Bihar, came from Bihar to Delhi to meet Sultan Qutb-ud-din. During this visit Bukhtiar Khilji fought a duel with an elephant which took place in a white marble palace in Delhi.[6] The question is - What other marble place, big enough for holding a duel with an elephant, could be than the Diwan-i-Khas in the Red Fort?[7] The incident conclusively proves that the Red Fort in Delhi, with Diwan-i-Khas as its integral part, existed more that 400 yers before the time of Shah Jahan.

Moreover, another Muslim chronicler Zia-ud-din Barni in his Tarikh-i-Firozshahi writes, “Towards the end of the year 695H (1296 AD), Alauddin (Khilji) entered Delhi in great pomp and with a large force. He took his seat upon the throne in the Daulat khana-i-Julus and proceeded to the Kushk-e-Lal (red palace), where he took his abode”.[8] To describe the sme incident, our historians write, “Ala-ud-din then made his triumphal entry into the capital on October 22, 1296, and took up his residence in the Red Palace of Balban, where he was enthroned”..[9] Who was this Balban?He was no other than Ghias-ud-din Balban, whose original name was Ulugh Khan and became a commander under Sultana Razia. Ulugh Khan belonged to the Khakan tribe of Albari in Turkestan, who was captured by the Mongols as a slave and later on sold to Khwaja Jamaluddin in Ghazni, who brought him to Delhi. Ulugh Khan definitely did not bring a red palace from Turkestan and our history books nowhere mention that he built a red palace in Delhi. So, what could that Red Palace (Kushk-i-Lal) be if not the Red Fort?

It has been stated earlier that the fortress, now known as the Red Fort, fell to the foreign invader Muhammad Ghori, for the first time in history, in 1192 AD. Later, several Muslim dynasties used that fortress, built by the Rajput kings, as their royl court and residence. Quite naturally, for some time it went to Ghias-ud-din Balban, alias Ulugh Khan. But it is a pity that despite all such infallible evidences, our historians persist in writing that the sais Red Fort was built by Shah Jahan.

Today, there are two forts in Delhi, the Red Fort and the Purana Quila and our historins believe that the Purana Quila was built by Sher Shah [10]. So, according to their version of history, Delhi did not have a fort before the time of Sher Shah. Again the question is - Which fort Muhammad Ghori had seen, nearly 350 years before the time of Sher Shah, after setting his feet in Delhi? And which fort did the Muslim rulers of Delhi, before the time of Sher Shah, use as their royal court and residence? Above all, how could Delhi play the role of the capital of Delhi Sultanate without hving a fortress?

From the above discussions, it becomes evident that the real authors of today’s Red Fort were the Hindu kings of India, perhaps several centuries before the times of Shah Jahan. But after the defeat of Emperor Prithwiraj Chauhan, it fell into the hands of the Muslim invader Muhammad Ghori. Later on, Shah Jahan undertook a massive repairing and renovation work, mainly to remove all stone carvings bearing Hindu symbols and possible Sanskrit inscriptions and to convert all Hindu temples inside the fortress into mosques, with a view to giving the entire edifice a Muslim face, as we see it today.

To settle all the above mentioned disputes, it is urgently necessary for the Government to ask the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) to ascertain the age of the edifice, now known as the Red Fort, through scientific methods. Only such a step can help the truth come out.

References:

[1] H. M. Elliot and J. Dowson, The History of India, as told by its own historians

(in 8 Volumes), Low Price Publications, New Delhi (1996) II,216.

[2] R. C. Majumdar (Gen Ed), History & Culture of the Indian People (in 12

Volumes), Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, Mumbai (1996), VII, 787.

[3] R. C. Majumdar (ibid) Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, VII, 784-85.

[4] R. C. Majumdar (ibid) Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, VII, 783.

[5] R. C. Majumdar (ibid), Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, VII,789.

[6] H. M. Elliot and J. Dowson (ibid) II, 306.

[7] R. C. Majumdar (ibid), Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, VII, 790.

[8] H. M. Elliot and J. Dowson (ibid) III, 160.

[9] R. C. Majumdar (ibid), Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, VI,18.

[10] R. C. Majumdar, H. C. Raychaudhury and K. Datta, An Advanced History of India, MacMillan & Co (1980),578.

Walmart in India: High Cost Of Low Prices

So the monopolizing giant Walmart has finally opened its first store in Amritsar, Bharat (misnomer: India) on May 30, 2009 by the name of "Bharati Wal-Mart". Bharti Walmart is a joint venture between Bharat's Bharti Enterprises Ltd. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) of the U.S. Bharti Enterprises is the parent company of Bharti Airtel Ltd., Bharat's largest mobile company by users. Bharatvaasi (misnomer: Indian citizens) oblivious of the effect of the store on local community and jobs seem to be welcoming it or so reports the sellout biased immoral section of Bharatiya (misnomer: Indian) media.

I ain't supporting no socialists nor communists on this issue, but it is the duty of Government of Bharat, with out their known prejudices against majority community, to protect the local communities, local businesses and see to it that local Walmart employee gets a decent wage with respect.

US has tough Labor Laws and has comparatively much better grievance redressal system to hold companies accountable (irrespective of Company's market size or contacts in the Government) for mistreating their employee. Bharat on the other hand, unfortunately, does not. Government of Bharat has to ensure that Labor Rights of employees are upheld and they are not exploited. There are Environment issues also.

Below are some documentaries about the effect of Walmart on local communities in United States.

Frontline: Is Wal-Mart Good for America? (Official Website)

FRONTLINE explores the relationship between U.S. job losses and the American consumer's insatiable desire for bargains in "Is Wal-Mart Good for America?" Through interviews with retail executives, product manufacturers, economists, and trade experts, correspondent Hedrick Smith examines the growing controversy over the Wal-Mart way of doing business and asks whether a single retail giant has changed the American economy. If copyright becomes an issue on this video upload, it will be deleted immediately.

Walmart: The High Cost Of Low Prices (http://www.walmartmovie.com/)

WAL-MART: THE HIGH COST OF LOW PRICE is a feature length documentary that uncovers a retail giant's assault on families and American values.

The film dives into the deeply personal stories and everyday lives of families and communities struggling to fight a goliath. A working mother is forced to turn to public assistance to provide healthcare for her two small children. A Missouri family loses its business after Wal-Mart is given over $2 million to open its doors down the road. A mayor struggles to equip his first responders after Wal-Mart pulls out and relocates just outside the city limits. A community in California unites, takes on the giant, and wins!

CNBC Originals - The Age of Wal-Mart

The Age of Wal-Mart interviews CEO Lee Scott, explores the circumstances that led founder Sam Walton to create Wal-Mart, highlights the innovation that Wal-Mart has engaged in to apply robotics and logistics in it's mammoth distribution centers is shown, exposes it's business practices in dealing with manufacturers, and shows it's ongoing expansion–now internationally into countries like China.

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2. अतिरिक्त समाचार के लिए गूगल समाचार पर जाएँ।


3. Bharti Wal-Mart: To Open 15 Wholesale Stores In 3 Yrs


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Dr. Ali Sina calls India a Banana Republic

Dr. Ali Sina during his debate with two Pakistani Muslims, Mr. Javed Ahmad Ghamidi and Mr. Khalid Zaheer, referred to the death threats that he is receiving from Indian Muslims who live in the so-called "Democratic" and "Secular" India. He called India, a banana republic where radical fundamentalist goons roam around freely, suppressing freedom of speech and giving death threats to whosoever doesn't agree with their fanaticism.

If you look at his website, there is a section where he posts all the general comments and hate mail that he receives. Interestingly, most of the hate mail that he receives is not from some theocratic Islamic state but from "Secular" India and "Secular" Indians.

Please read the complete debate here: Probing Islam

I have received words that according to a Hyderabad (India) local news magazine “Muslim Jagaran”, Syed Yousaf Bin, the chief patron of the Ulema Board, in Hyderabad has issued a fatwa against my person. According to the sources he has decreed, “if anybody kills Dr. Ali Sina, he will be rewarded with Rs.1,000,000 (Indian rupees one million)”. Syed Yousaf Bin was the person behind the fatwa against Indian tennis sensation Sania Mirza.

Haseeb-ul-hasan Siddiqui, a leading cleric of the Muslim organization, the Sunni Ulema Board has also warned me and others behind faithfreedom.org of the consequences that we would have to face if we don’t close our website. “According to Islam, the criticisers of Islam should be stoned to death,” he is reported to have said.

Safdar Nagori who was the secretary-general of the extremist Islamic outfit S.I.M.I (Students Islamic Movement of India) till the organization was proscribed under the Prevention of Terrorism Act, 2002 has been reported to have said, “Dr. Ali Sina would be killed within a month, irrespective of wherever his hideout is.”

This is happening in the secular India. If anyone issues such blatant death threats and solicit murder in a real democracy, he would have to spend years in jail. India, the largest “democracy” of the world is obviously a banana republic. Muslim goons roam around freely issuing fatwas and offering rewards for the assassination of the critics of Islam and no one dares to call them to account.

How poorly this reflects on India and Indians who bend backwards to appease Muslims in their country! Now Muslims in India constitute only 12% of the population. But they are procreating faster than the Hindus. What they would demand when they become 20%? Another partition?

This is happening in India, which is allegedly a democracy. What they would do to you in Pakistan, which prides itself to be a fanatical Islamic country and a dictatorship if you agree with anything I say?

One million rupees are just $21,893 US dollars in today’s rate. I thought I was wroth more. But I am not complaining. Jesus was worth only thirty pieces of silver. This is way more. However, why kill me? I am offering $50,000 US dollars (more than twice what these mullahs are offering) to anyone who can disprove me with the promise to remove the content of this site and publish in each existing page one message saying, “I stand corrected on Islam. Islam is a true religion. Allahu Akbar.”

Video: Step-by-Step Guide to Election Fraud

In US, an election fraud happens and people make a documentary to expose it.

In Bharat (misnomer: India), an election fraud happens and people particularly Hindus are attacked and beaten by police for demanding by protest their Democratic Rights and Civil Liberties.

Policemen cane charging Kashmiri Hindus refugees belonging to Jammu and Kashmir Nationalist Movement (JKNM) to prevent them from marching towards the camp polling booth at Muthi while they were protesting against the denial of their voting rights - in Jammu on Thursday, April 30, 2009. Photo by Raman Raina, courtesy Shehjar. Read report "Hindus denied Voting Rights" here.

The very fact that these Indian Hindu citizens are called "Refugees" in their own country is a blot on the so-called Indian Democracy. We don't need a voting fraud to prove it. But anyways, Please watch the following documentary "How Ohio Pulled it Off" which shows how easy it is to hack Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs). It shows testimony given by various Computer Scientists, NASA's Ex-employee, etc testifying that electronic voting cannot be trusted and votes can be flipped easily. NASA's Ex-employee actually shows how it is done.

But in Monarchy ruled Bharat, its just another day. Everything is fine because the empress won. Its a Democracy on paper but not followed in letter and spirit.

Please go to BanVotingMachines.org, Black Box Voting and CountTheBallots.org for more.

The Unholy Legacy of Abraham by G.M. Woerlee

The alternate point of view that no one tells us...

The Unholy Legacy of Abraham
By G.M. Woerlee

How I Became Hindu

Following is an eye opening autobiography of noted & renowned author Sita Ram Goel and his journey from a hardcore Marxist & a militant atheist to an enlightened devout Hindu. A must read for all the confused mortals out there. Please also read "Spiritual Democracy in Hinduism"
--

How I Became Hindu
BY Sita Ram Goel

How I Became Hindu

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Religion-Hinduism how i became hindu

Veer Savarkar Jayanti on May 28

वीर सावरकर जयंती की बधाई। Happy Veer Savarkar Jayanti to all. May we all learn from the great soul and do whatever it takes to protect our Matr Bhoomi (Mother/Home Land) and protect & reinstate Dharm (Righteousness, Ethics, Morality). Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, commonly known as Swatantryaveer Savarkar was a fearless freedom fighter, social reformer, writer, dramatist, poet, historian, political leader and philosopher. Please read more about him here: "28th May - Veer Savarkar Jayanti".

Christian Taliban strikes: Hanumanji statue demolished

Christian Taliban strikes again. After renaming Kanya Kumari to Kanya Mariam, Chrisitan Extremists took down Hindu God Shri Hanuman ji's statue just like how Taliban destroyed Bahamian Buddha statues in Afghanistan.

Overrated World Renowned Mythical Economist and Dhimmi Regent PM Mr. Manmohan Singh wouldn't loose his sleep on this, would you?

Kanyakumari declared a Christian district

I maintain that the separatist state of Tamil Eelam will be only a Christian state like east Timor.

When you allow the church and Islam to alter the religious demography in any place, the first thing these rascals do is to destroy all vestiges of non-Christian and non-Muslim presence in public spaces.

- Radha Rajan

Photo Courtesy: VivekaJyoti

Please also read,

1. Vedanta Kesari Swami Laxmananda Saraswati murdered by Christian Terrorists


2. Video on Hindus being tormented by Christists in Kanyakumari


3. See how Kanyakumari voted: Secularism in full force


4. Deceptive world and the Pizza effect


5. बौद्धिक आतंकवाद / Intellectual Terrorism by Christians


6. Christian Taliban: Hindu Temples set on fire in Silchar


7. Book by Christians abusing Hindu Gods


8. Convert Asia next: The Pope lets down secularists


9. Communal Anti-Hindu Christians are unmasked


10. Christian Missionary's radical activities against Hindus in India


11. Christian Strategy on how to Convert Hindu College Students in the US


12. This war is against Indian culture


13. Modern India’s modern myths


14. Congress makes its official Anti-Jew policy loud and clear


15. Government Torture of Shankaracharyas and assault on Hindu Society's religious institutions


16. From Tainthood to Sainthood


17. Pope interferes again

Muslims attack on Hindus increase in Bengal

Overrated World Renowned Mythical Economist and Dhimmi Regent PM Mr. Manmohan Singh wouldn't loose his sleep on this, would you?

Please also watch,

1. Hindus genocide in Bangladesh, Bengal, Kashmir


2. Tarun Vijay on History of Terrorism in the World

--------Forwarded Message-----------
From: BJ Mistry

Hindus in West Bengal under Attacks by Muslim
By Ranjit Roy

Hindus in West Bengal are now under attack from Muslim fundamentalists, who are mostly Bangladeshi infiltrators, with an active support from the ruling CPM. The communists in the state are desperate to woo Muslims after their humiliating defeat in the recent panchayat and civic body elections. The communists believe that due to the state government’s agricultural land grab policy for industry has alienated rural Muslims from the party and responsible for poll debacles. The party and its government are now liberally distributing favours to Muslims in the state such as setting up of Muslim religious university, named Alia University, in Kolkata’s Muslim populated area Park Circus. The chief minister, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, has offered his government’s financial assistance only to Muslim students seeking higher education. Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamul Congress is not lagging behind in Muslim appeasements. She has announced that gram panchayats and panchyat samities won by her party in South 24 Parganas district will be run by local Muslims only.

Emboldened by the appeasement policy of the ruling party as well as the main Opposition party in the state, a section of Muslim fundamentalist outfits are gearing up an unprecedented attacks on Hindus in South Bengal districts. The first major attack was reported in Gangasagar, the holy confluence of the river Ganga and Bay of Bengal, on June 12 this year. About 200 Hindu pilgrims were assembled there for a holy dip at the confluence and listen to discourses on Hindu religious texts by leaders of Hindu Samhati Mancha. The peaceful Hindu assembly was attacked by a frenzied 3000-strong Muslim mob led by a local CPM leader Sheikh Ismail. Like infamous Godhra train burning incident in Gujarat, the heavily armed Muslim goons set fire to bamboo pavilion erected for the pilgrims assembled in the evening to listen to religious discourses. The goons also set fire to Viswa Hindu Parishad’s guest house where some pilgrims had taken shelter. The VHP guest house was badly damaged due to fire and ransacking. Strangely, the police remained onlookers during the murderous attack on Hindu pilgrims and later arrested only the leaders of Hindu Samhati Mancha and a few injured pilgrims. It is really a shame for Bengal’s media that suppressed the incident to appease the ruling CPM and its Muslim stooges. It was only the Bengali weekly Swastika that came out with detail reorts and pictures. The West Bengal unit of the VHP had also organized demonstration in protest. It may not be known to many outside West Bengal that the sacred Gangasagar Island is now dominated by Muslim majority population migrated from Bangladesh illegally thanks to the CPM’s policy of Muslim appeasement only to get their votes.

The second major attack on Hindus was reported on July 8 when Swami Punyalokanandaji, a monk of Ramakrishna Order and Adhyaksha of the Ramakrishna Ashram at Gorehat under Joynagar police station in South 24 Parganas was stripped and beaten up by CPM goons. Revered Swamiji is a Hindu social reformer who was initiated in sannyas by Swami Gambhiranandaji Maharaj, the 11th President of Ramakrishna Math and Mission, Belur, Howrah. Swami Punnyalokanandaji is devoted for the upliftment of the poor and underprivileged people at Gorehat since he has taken over as the head of the ashram. Swamiji was trying hard to start a free coaching centre for the primary school boys and homeopathic dispensary in the ashram campus. But Mohammed Abdur Ali, a local CPM leader and his associates have planned to set up a country liquor shop in the ashram campus capturing the ashram room for coaching students and the dispensary just by flexing their muscle power. The local Muslim goons, led by the CPM leader Abdur Ali, attacked Swamiji with iron rods and lathis and tied him with a tree before stripping him off his saffron robes and beat him mercilessly till he became senseless. This ghastly scene was witnessed by hundreds of local people as the attack was made by the Muslim goons in the morning. But none came forward to save Swamiji fearing reprisal from the local Muslim goons sheltered by the CPM bosses. The police came to the spot only after the Muslim fanatics had satisfied themselves by blood-shed of a peaceful Hindu monk. Strangely, again, the police did not arrest a single culprit so far except registering a general diary (No. 168/08) about the attack on Swamiji at the Joynagar police station. Swamiji had many injuries in his body including scull. Some devotees of Swamiji took him to Kolkata’s SSKM government hospital for C.T Scan of brain and necessary treatment. Swamiji is now out of danger. Swamiji had earlier met the district magistrate and the district superintendent of police apprehending murderous attacks on him and on the ashram and requested them in writing for protection. But they did not take steps to protect the Hindu monk mainly due to fearing backlash of the Muslim fundamentalist groups and red eyes of the ruling communists. The two successive barbaric incidents and complete police inaction led to a panic among peace-loving Hindus all over West Bengal. The incidents have clearly showed that the CPM has adopted a tactic of torture against Hindus only to win the hearts of the Muslims to regain their support in the Lok Sabha elections.

Picture courtesy: NDTV/India World Report

Ayodhya: Muslim Argument Examined

Please also read

1. "Arey Bhai, Masjid Hai Hi Kahaan?"


2. Ayodhya: THE indisputable evidence of Shri Ram Mandir


3. श्री राम सेतु / Shri Ram Setu evidence


4. Shri Ram Sethu: What the apex court said


5. Mathura: Evidence of Shri Krishna Mandir


6. 23000 yrs old Evidence of Dwarka city found underwater


7. Scientific Verification of Vedic Knowledge and its proofs


8. The Myth of the Aryan Invasion


9. Hindu Genocide: Largest in World History


10. Ongoing Hindu Genocide in Bangladesh, Bengal, Kashmir


11. Hindus & Jews are Friends indeed

Ayodhya: Muslim Argument Examined
By Arun Shourie

At first, the demand-cum-assurance was, "If you can bring any proof showing a temple had been demolished to construct the mosque, we will ourselves demolish the mosque". A host of documents -- reports of the Archaeological Survey of India going back to 1891, Gazetteers going back to 1854, survey reports going back to 1838 were produced which stated unambiguously that a Ram temple had been demolished to construct the mosque".

The demand suddenly changed. "These are all British documents", it was now said. "The British concocted this story to divide and rule. "Show us some Pre-British documents" was an invention to get over inconvenient facts. It became evident soon enough, when in response to Chandrashekhar's initiative the All India Babri Masjid Action Committee submitted documents, most of these turned out to be nothing but the rulings of sundry British magistrates. Worse, they confirmed what the Vishwa Hindu Parishad had been saying: that the mosque had not been in use since 1936;that it has been built by demolishing the Ram temple: that the Hindus had, at the cost of many lives, been trying throughout to capture the spot, as they held it to be the sacred birth place of Lord Ram.

In any event, non-British, specifically Muslim documents as well as pre-British documents, including the account of an Austrian Jesuit priest who had stayed in Ayodhya in 1766-71 were produced. Each of them stated the same facts.

But each of these is only repeating what the other is saying. It was demanded that show some contemporary document". The demand for such a document was manifestly a dodge : the one document -- the Babarnama -- which could have settled the matter is truncated: Babar records his reaching Ayodhya on 2 April 1528. The pages from then to 18 September 1528 are missing, and are surmised to have been lost in a storm in May 1529, or during Humayun's subsequent wanderings in the desert as a fugitive. The matter, however, was soon nailed. If the absence of a contemporary accounts - the very day's Court bulletins recording the destruction of the temples of Mathura, Kashi, Pandharpur and scores and scores of other places and their replacement by mosques are available proof enough to propel Shahabuddin etc to demolish those mosques?

No answer was forthcoming, instead, there were demands for more concrete proof. This was soon available in the results of the archaeological excavations which had been conducted in 1975-86, when attention was drawn to the pillars on which the domes etc. of the mosque rest to this day. to the carvings on these, it was said that these could well have been brought from elsewhere. But that alibi too floundered. It could not account for the pillar bases which were found three to four feet below the surface just outside the boundary wall; these were in perfect alignment with the pillars inside the mosque, and it was clear that, along with them, there must have been pillars on these bases which supported the larger structure of the temple; no one would have dragged bases of pillars from a distance and buried them outside the mosque to align with pillars inside the mosque!

So, archaeology itself was denounced. And sophistry was put out. Irfan Habib led the charge. But his own howler showed his arguments to be special pleading: if one went by the dates he ascribed on the basis of "Carbon dating" and all. Babar would have expired in 1965 instead of 1530, the reign of Akbar would commence in 2001 instead of having ended in 1605.

Since then, the case of these pleaders has been made worse by the new finds: entire walls and floor levels have now come into-view, twelve to fourteen feet below the surface. No one could have picked these up from a distance and planted them below the structure.

Shahabuddin�s Latest Argument

At the discussion on Ayodhya which Newstrack organised on 1 August Shahabuddin produced yet another argument. I had just quoted a signed statement he had distributed to the press as late as 15 June 1989 in which he had said. "But the Hindu chauvinists are totally confused about their own case... "Whatever the Hindu chauvinist case, the Muslim community has, without any legal obligation, offered, as a moral gesture, to demolish the Babri Masjid -- if it is proved that a temple stood on the site of the Babri Masjid and it was pulled down to construct the mosque. As the point at issue accordingly was whether there had been a temple at the site, I said, we should focus on the archaeological evidence to settle the matter.

Shahabuddin said that he stood by the statement. His argument was that The temple just could not have been pulled down as pulling down a place of worship to construct a mosque is against the Shariat. Incredulous, The principal correspondent of Newstrack, Manoj Raghuvanshi, later asked Shahabuddin whether in that case no temple had been demolished by Muslim rulers. "It is not a historical fact", said Shahabuddin, "that a standing temple in peace time was demolished by any Muslim ruler". "Assertions to the contrary", he said, "are all chauvinist propaganda"; Even with the hedging -- "standing temple", "in peace time" -- that was quite a lump to swallow. "You mean even Sonmath was not demolished". Raghuvanshi asked, "Sonmath was disintegrated," said Shahabuddin, and reaffirmed his thesis that temples could not have been demolished because pulling them down to build mosques was against the Shariat.

"Disintegrated", not "demolished"? A disingenuous give-away. I thought the VHP would be quite satisfied with that kind of disintegration now. Even if one accepted his contention about Shariat, the Inference Shahbuddin had drawn was indefensible; it was like saying that no murders take place today because murdering is prohibited by the law.

But there is a more conclusive point. Is it at all the case that demolishing a place of worship to replace it with a mosque is prohibited by the Shariat?

Encyclopedia of Islam

Every single Muslim historian of medieval India lists temples which the ruler he is writing about has destroyed and the mosques he has built instead. In his famous work, Sita Ram Goel reproduces some of these account verbatim1. Doing nothing but this, without any comments at all, takes over 170 printed pages of the book.

Nor was the practice confined to India, or to temples. Here are just two paragraphs from the 75 pages long entry. In the Encyclopedia of Islam2 "...it is rather doubtful whether the process (of acquiring churches) was a regular one; in any case the Muslims in course of time appropriated many churches to themselves. With the mass-conversions to Islam, this was a natural result. The churches taken over by the Muslims were occasionally used as dwellings3. At a later date, it also happened that they were used as government offices, as in Egypt in 146.4 The obvious thing, however, was to transform the churches taken into mosques. It is related of �Amr b, al-Asi� that he performed the salat in a church (Makrizi, iv. 6) and Zaid b. �Ali says regarding churches and synagogues, �Perform thy salat in them: it will not harm thee5. It is not clear whether the reference in these cases is to conquered sanctuaries; it is evident, in any case, that the saying is intended to remove any misgivings about the use of captured churches and synagogues as mosques. The most important example of this kind was in Damascus where al-Walid b. �Abb al-Malik in 86 (705) took the church of St. John from the Christians and had it rebuilt; he is said to have offered the Christians another church in its stead6. He is said to have transformed into mosques ten churches in all in Damascus. It must have been particularly in the villages, with the gradual conversion of the people to Islam, that the churches were turned into mosques. In the Egyptian village there were no mosques in the earlier generation of Islam7. But when al-Mamun was fighting the Copts, many churches were turned into mosques8. It is also recorded of mosques in Cairo that they were converted churches. According to one tradition, the Rashida mosque was an unfinished Jacobite church, which was surrounded by Jewish and Christian graves9. In the immediate vicinity al-Hakim turned a Jacobite and a Nestorian Church into mosques10. When Djawhar built a palace in al-Kahira, a dir was taken in and transformed into a mosque11. Similar changes took place at later dates12 and synagogues also were transformed in this way13. The chief mosque in Palermo was previously a church14. After the Crusades, several churches were turned into mosques in Palestine15.

"Other sanctuaries than those of the �people of the scripture� were turned into mosques. For example a Masjid al-Shams between Hilla and Kerbela was the successor of an old temple of Shamash16. Not far from Ishtakhr was a Masjid Sulaiman which was an old 'fire-temple'. the pictures on the walls of which could still be seen in the time of Mas�udi and al-Makdisi17. In Ishtakhr itself there was a djami�, which was a converted fire-temple18. In Masisa, the ancient Mopsuhestia, al-Mansur in 140 built a mosque on the site of an ancient temple19. The chief mosque in Dihli was originally a temple20. Thus in Islam also the old rule holds that sacred places survive changes of religion. It was especially easy in cases where Christian sanctuaries were associated with Biblical personalities who were also recognised by Islam: e.g., the Church of St John in Damascus and many holy places in Palestine. One example is the mosque of Job in Shekh Sad, associated with Sura xxi. 83, xxxviii. 40; here in Silvia's time (fourth century) there was a church of Job.

Prophet and Shariat

But could it not be that, like the Muslim rulers in India, these Muslim rulers of the Middle East were also doing all this in violation of the Shariat? As we know, the Shariat is based on what the Quran says and on what the prophet did, that is on the Sunnah. The Quran is sanguinary in the extreme, there can be little doubt on the matter. The only question therefore is about what the Prophet himself did.

The evidence is incontrovertible -- it leaves nothing of Shahabuddin's latest argument. The Prophet's companions as well as his biographers -- the earliest. all devout Muslim, whose accounts are the most authoritative sources we have of the Prophet's life -- report his ordering the destruction of a mosque as it had been set up by persons he did not think well of, they report his ordering new converts to demolish a church and establish a mosque instead at the site, they report his converting what had on all accounts become a pagan temple, with idols, paintings and all, into the greatest mosque of all -- that is, the Kaba itself. There is space to recall just an incident or two.

We learn from Ibn Sa�d�s book and widely used collection of Hadis, of a delegation of 13 to 19 members of Banu Hanifah calling upon the Prophet. We learn of them being looked after generously -- with bread, meat, milk, butter, dates. They receive instruction in Islam. They swear allegiance to the Prophet. It is time to leave. Talq b. Ali, who was in the delegation, states: "We went out as a deputation to God's messenger and swore allegiance to him and prayed along with him. We told him that we had a church in our land, and we asked him for some of the leavings of the water he used for ablution. He called for water, performed ablution, then poured it out for us into a skin vessel, and gave us the following command. �Go away, and when you come to your land break down your church, sprinkle this water on its site, and use it as a mosque�. We told him that our land was distant, the heat severe, and that the water would evaporate, to which he replied, �Add some water to it. for it will only bring more good to it23.�

Upon returning they did as the Prophet had commanded. Our narrator. Talq b, Ali, became the muezzin of the mosque and recited the azaan. The friar of the church. the reverential Ibu Sa�d records. "heard it (the azaan) and said, �It is a word of truth and call to truth�. Then he escaped and it was the end of the regime�24. Any ambiguity there?

Nor can Shahabuddin's claim that Shariat forbids the destruction of temples etc. in peace time be sustained in view of what the Prophet himself commanded and did. His earliest biographers -- Ibn Ishaq and Ibn Sa�d, for instance -- record instance after instance in which idols and temples were smashed, destroyed and burnt down at his orders. The temples of al-Uzza, al-Laat, and al-Manaat -- the three goddesses who are subjects of the Satanic verses in the Quran -- the temples around Ta�if, those of Fils and Ruda in Tayys -- are all reported by them to have been destroyed on the direct orders of the Prophet. Similarly, the biographers report the Prophet's joy when converts came and reported to him that they had destroyed this temple or that, or smashed to smithereens this idol or that. These were not instances when during a battle an army over-ran a site which happened to be a temple. These were instances of persons or tribes having come over to Islam, and then, as part of their new commitment, destroying the places of worship.

Nor, it must be noted, was the Prophet less stem about some refractory party setting up even a mosque. His orders at Dhu Awan are well known. Ibn Ishaq reports that as the Prophet approached the town, the devotees approached him saying, "We have built a mosque for the sick and needy and for nights of bad weather, and we would like you to come to us and pray for us there". The Prophet, Ibn Ishaq records, said that "he was on the point of travelling, and was preoccupied, or words to that effect, and that when he came back, if God willed, he would come to them and pray for them in it". But at Dhu Awan, upon hearing about the mosque, he summoned the followers, "and told them to go to the mosque of these evil men and destroy and burn it". That is exactly what the followers then did. A revelation came down from Allah and sanctified the destruction25.

I just do not see where Shahabuddin derives his cumenical rule from.

A Conclusive Example

But the most telling example is that of the Kaba, and the Masjidal-Haram, the mosque -- the most revered in Islam around it. And it is to this that we should turn to settle the matter.

As we saw, Shahabuddin�s latest argument is that no Muslim ruler could ever have destroyed a temple to build a mosque as doing so is prohibited by the Shariat. The Shariat is derived pre-eminently from what the Prophet himself did and said. So, the question is; how does that argument fare in the light of what the Prophet himself did?

The conclusive answer to this matter -- as to several others which have cropped up in the Ramjanmabhoomi controversy -- lies In the history of the Kaba and the Masjid al-Haram in which it is situated.

Mat the Kaba was

Till the very day the Prophet took it under his control after his conquest of Mecca, the Kaba and the structure around it were a place of pagan worship with idols and paintings of all sorts of gods and goddesses.

From the earliest to the most recent biographers of the Prophet, all speak of it as such. Recalling days long before the Prophet, Ibn Ishaq reports the answer of the Hudhaylis to the king when he asked them why they too would not do in regard to the Kaba -- circumambulate the temple, venerate it, shave their heads etc. -- as they were exhorting him to do , "They replied that it was indeed the temple of their father Abraham, but the idols which the inhabitants had set up round it, and the blood which they shed there (by sacrificing animals) presented an insuperable obstacle. They are unclean polytheists, said they -- or words to that effect". We learn of the Prophet's arguments with the Controllers of the shrine about the idols. We learn of their fear that should his iconoclasm prevail they would lose the livelihood they now secured out of the pilgrims who came to worship the idols, and accordingly their fierce opposition to the Prophet. We learn of his returning to Mecca for "the lesser pilgrimage" and going to the Kaba "cluttered with idols though it was." Such are the accounts in the earliest and most authoritative of his biographies. The accounts continue to this day.

An Iranian Scholar�s views

"Why did so many tribes sustain the wealth and power of the Qoraysh by coming to the Kaba?", the Iranian scholar, Ali Dashti, asks about pre-Islamic times in his justly-acclaimed book Twenty Three Years 26, "The reason was that the Kaba housed famous idols and contained a black stone which the Arabs held sacred... Each group of pilgrims had to shout its entreaties to its idol while circumambulating the Kaba and running from Safa to Marwa". "The Kaba," he writes, recounting the setting in which Islam was established, "was an important idol-temple, much visited by Beduin tribesmen and greatly respected as a holy place... The livelihood of the Meecans and the prestige of the Quoryash chiefs depended on this coming and going. The Beduin came to visit the Kaba, which was an idol temple. If the new religion required destruction of the idols, they would not come any more..." Ali Dashti refers to the Kaba repeatedly as "the idol-temple which the tribes had revered..." as "the famous idol-temple."

The temple had several idols, among them 360 statues. The Quran itself mentions the three goddesses -- al-Lat, al-Uzza and al-Manaat -- who were worshipped there. The most prominent idol however was that of Hubal, "who", the first Encyclopedia of Islam states, "may be called the God of Mecca and of the Kaba". A male figure, it was made of red carnelian. The statue stood inside the Kaba, says the new edition of the Encyclopedia, above the sacred well which was thought to have been dug by Abraham to receive the offerings brought to the sanctuary. Though a stellar deity, its principal function was that of a "cleromantic divinity", it being the custom to consult the idol by divining arrows. Hubal, the number of idols -- 360 -- as well as the rites associated with them, have all been taken to point to an astral symbolism, and the temple has accordingly been taken to have been dedicated to the sun, the moon and the planets.

How it was transformed

The temple continued in this condition till the very day on which the Prophet re-entered it upon capturing Mecca. That moment of triumph is recorded in great detail by the biographers. The accounts establish both sets of facts -- they establish what was in the temple at that moment, and what the Prophet did to it. Notice that the moment was exactly the kind of moment which would test Shahabuddin's claim about what is and what is not allowed by the Shariat; this was not a situation of war, quite the contrary -- the Meccans had surrendered without a real fight; the protagonist was the Prophet himself, so there can be no doubt about what the Shariat -- based as it pre-eminently is on what he said and did -- would entail; the structure had, as we have seen, been a house of worship of an altogether un-Islamic kind forages.

Upon entering, the Prophet went round the Kaba seven times on his camel. He then climbed into the cube -- the Kaba proper. Inside he found a dove made of wood, said in the Encyclopedia to having been possibly devoted to the Semitic Venus. "He broke it in his hands," records Ibn Ishaq, "and threw it away," He then saw paintings of Abraham. Jesus and Mary inside the structure; by one set of traditions he had all of them destroyed, by another he had all except those of Jesus and Mary destroyed. At the noon prayer that day "he ordered," Ibn Ishaq reports, "that all the idols which were round the Kaba should be collected and burned with fire and broken up." That was done. Soon enough idolaters were forbidden from the shrine.

Here then was a structure which before the Prophet had been for several generations a place of worship of an altogether inclusive, pagan kind. The Prophet took it over -- or reclaimed it, as the faithful would say -- and transformed into the greatest mosque of Islam. Where does that leave the Shahabuddin thesis - "No temple could have been destroyed to build a mosque as doing so is against the Shariat"?

Prophet Adopts Pagan Rituals

Nor does the story end there. While, as the Encyclopedia puts it, "all the pagan trappings which had adhered to the Kaba were thrust aside," "it is incontrovertible that an entire pre-Islamic ritual, previously steeped in paganism, was adopted by Islam after it had been purified and given a strictly monotheistic orientation. "Treating the area as consecrated ground, treating it as a refuge, the sacrificing of animals (shifted now from the Kaba to Mina), the various elements connected with the Haj, including among these, the stoning of the Devil by throwing pebbles, the rushing between Safa and Marwa, the halt at Arafat -- all these, as the Encyclopedia and Ali Dashti etc. point out, date from the pre-Islamic period. Some things, as Ali Dashti notes, were just a bit transformed. The pre-Islamic Arabs approaching for instance the goddess Manaat would call out, "Here I am at your service, (labbayka) O Manaat." The same call was now addressed to Allah; "Labbayka Allahomma labbayka." "Here I am at your service, Allah, at your service". The retention of these -- even after transformation -- led to great disquiet. Even Umar, one of the most devoted adherents of the Prophet, is said to have exclaimed on approaching the Black Stone, for Glance. "I know that thou art a stone, that neither helps nor hurts and if the Messenger of Allah had not kissed thee, I would not kiss thee". The special veneration accorded to the stone, to the structure, to everything which comes in contact with it -- for instance, the rain water which falls off it through the spout, the cloth which is used to cover it and which is cut into pieces and sold to the pilgrims after being taken down -- have continued to be contrasted with the strict admonitions against idolatry. The disquiet has not settled. Here is Ali Dashti on the decisions the Prophet handed down upon entering Kaba:

"The Prophet Mohammed's decision to set out on a visit to the Kaba in 6 A H / 628 A D is puzzling. Did he really believe the Kaba to be God�s abode? Or did he make this move in order to placate followers for whom the Kaba-visitation was an ancestral tradition? Was his decision, which came unexpectedly in view of the resolve of the hostile Qorayshites to prevent Moslems from entering Mecca, and which led to the disappointing truce of Hodaybiya a political stratagem designed to impress the Qoraysh chiefs with Moslem numerical and military strength and to draw ordinary unfanatical Meecans to the new religion? How could the man who had introduced the new religion and laws and had repudiated all the beliefs and superstitions of his own people now revive the main component of the old tradition in a new form? Islam's zealous founder and legislator had above all insisted on pure monotheism, telling the people that belief in the One God is the only road to happiness and proclaiming that 'the noblest among you in God's sight are the most pious among you." 27 Had he now succumbed to national or racial feeling? Did he want to make veneration of Ishmael�s house a symbol of Arab National identity?

Why Pilgrimage to Mecca?

"However that may be, the decision was so surprising and so inconsistent with Islamic principles that many Moslems were upset. Several believers objected to the running between Safa and Marwa because it had been a pagan Arab rite; but its retention was imposed by verse 153 Sura 2, "Safa and Marwa are among God's waymarks". According to well authenticated reports, Omar b, ol-Khattab, who was one of Mohammad's greatest and wisest companions, said that he would never have kissed the black stone if he had not personally seen the Prophet kiss it. Ghazzali, whose authority in Islamic matters deserves respect, wrote frankly that he could find no explanation of the hajj ritual but obeyed because it was an accomplished fact.

"There is one verse in the Quran which sheds some light on the matter and is perhaps an answer to questions about it. This is verse 28 of Sura 9 (ot-Tawba); "O believers, it is a fact that the polytheists are unclean. Therefore they shall not approach the mosque of the Sanctuary (i.e. the Kaba) after this year of theirs. If you fear poverty, God will enrich you from his bounty". According to the Tafsir Ol-Jalalayn, this meant that God would compensate the Arabs with victories and receipts of tribute. The Sura of repentance (ot-Tawba) is chronologically the last in the Qoran, having been sent down in 10 A H / 631 A D, well after the Moslem conquest of Mecca. The ban on visitation of the Kaba by non-muslim tribes was likely to disquiet the people of Mecca, whose livelihood and flourishing trade depended on the coming and going of Arab tribes and groups. Although the Meecans were of the same tribe as the Prophet, most of them had only become Moslem under duress. If Mecca should lose its prosperity, there might be a risk of widespread apostasy. That risk would be averted by making pilgrimage to Mecca incumbent on Moslems.

"This explanation is of course a mere hypothesis; to what extent it corresponds to the reality can never be known. In any case no rational or religious justification can be found for the retention of ancient pagan practices in the ritual of the Islamic hajj..."

And it is said that it is Hinduism which "swallows" other religions by incorporating their rituals and making Avtaars of their deities; However that may be, the Black Stone -- the veneration in which it is held, the powers which are attributed to it, the benedictions which are assumed to flow from seeing, touching and kissing it; the fact that the rituals followed can so directly be traced to pre-Islamic times, and that their retention has continued to bewilder devout Muslims like Umar and Ghazzali -- all these themselves put two things beyond doubt; the Kaba was a place of pagan idol worship with an elaborate set of rituals and an entire mode of life to go with it; second, the Prophet took it over and made it the holiest shrine of Islam.

Where does that leave Shahabuddin's latest argument?

"But where is the proof?"

When Shahabuddin was expounding his thesis about the Shariat not allowing the destruction of a temple for constructing a mosque, I alluded to what the Kaba had been and how the Prophet himself had made it into a mosque.

Not true, said Shahabuddin. The Kaba was not a temple. It was a mosque from times immemorial, the foundations of it having been laid by Abraham and Ishmael -- the latter are prophets of the Jews but have been proclaimed by the Quran to have been the forbearers of the Prophet.

If the VHP had said something like that about the Ram Janmasthan, Shahabuddin, and of course our "Secular" polemicists, would have asked. "But what is the Proof that Abraham and Ishmael built the Kaba?" Well, what is the proof?

"The Arabs possess no historical or semi-historical records of the origin of the Kaba," says the Encyclopedia", and we as little. "For the entire period of the Prophet's stay in Mecca after he began receiving the revelations -- thirteen years -- and for the first year and a half after he went to Medina, the faithful were required to bow in prayer, not towards the Kaba, but towards Jerusalem. Then came the revelation to change the Qibla to Kaba. From the point of view of dogma, the Encyclopedia notes, "this volte-face was justified by an appeal to the �religion of Abraham� which was specially invented for the occasion.28

The "proof" of Abraham and Ishmael laying the foundations of the Kaba therefore is just the fact that it is so stated in the Quran29. Now, whether an affirmation just because it is in the Quran is to be regarded as proof is entirely a matter of faith. To insist that we must accept it as such would be to urge that exact kind of proof which the Babri Masjid protagonists have been rejecting so emphatically in the case of Ram's birth-place.

The only other circumstances bearing on the affirmation in the Quran is the Makaam Abraham a sort of mark on a stone which lies near the Kaba. The faithful believe that once, after the building had risen to some height. Abraham stood on that stone, and the mark on it is his footprint. The Muslims look upon the footprint with the same reverence with which Hindus would views similar marks believed to be of their Avtaars. But that mark in the stone does not settle the matter -- for it is as difficult to prove that the maker in that stone is indeed the impress which Abraham�s foot made on it as it is to prove the original affirmation in the Quran that Abraham built the Kaba. One has thus to fall back on the continuity of the tradition over such a long period, we have to fall back for proof on the fact that Muslims have long believed that Abraham built the Kaba. But that is exactly how the Hindus have long believed the spot now occupied by the Babri Masjid to have been the place at which Lord Ram was born.

The Navel of the Earth

Why is the Kaba vital? After all, a point to which I shall revert in a moment, had the Prophet not said that every spot on earth is sacred, that Allah has made the entire earth a masjid? There are two views regarding the importance of Kaba. One is that the Kaba is the navel of the earth. It is believed to have existed before the earth was created by Allah -- on one account 40 years earlier, on one 2000 years earlier. Allah created heaven, we are told, and then the earth by stretching out the substance of the earth around this navel. Creation competed, the Kaba we learn, now is the highest point of the earth, and its position corresponds exactly to that of the Pole Star, which we also learn, is the highest point in the heavens. As heaven is above the earth and as Kaba is the highest point on earth, it is the place by being in which one is nearest to heaven.

The other view is that it is not just the centre of the earth, but of the universe. The universe, in this account, consists of seven heavens -- one above the other -- and seven earths -- one below the other. All the fourteen levels are perfectly aligned -- the highest point in each lies perfectly in line with the highest of other levels. Now, the highest point of the seventh heaven is the Throne of Allah, the highest point on earth -- and exactly in the centre of the universe -- is the Kaba. The Kaba we see in Mecca, we are further instructed, is an exact replica of the original structure which is in heaven and which is made of gold.30

Myths or History?

But why was it necessary to create this replica on earth? The accounts differ. As we have seen, on one account it is Abraham who laid its foundations and with Ishmael built it one the prompting of Gabriel, the angel who, as we know, was later to transmit the revelations from Allah to the Prophet. On the other account, the structure was built by Adam.

Originally Adam was so tall that he could hear the heavenly songs around Allah's Throne directly. But after his fall he shrunk so much that the upper realms were out of his reach. Upon his importuning God sent him the tent around which and through which he could attain to the beatitudes, and this later was made into the Kaba, in answer to his pleas that Mecca had no one, that the shrine had no worshipers Allah promised that it would become the centre of pilgrimage, and that promise Allah fulfilled. The original structure was later washed away in the Great Flood. The angels spirited away and kept safe the Black Stone. That is how Abraham came to rebuild the structure later on, and Gabriel brought the Black Stone, back to him. We learn that the Stone itself -- now in three large and several small pieces held together by a silver band as it split in the course of a fire -- was originally white; it became black upon contact with the sinfulness of the pagan period31.

Such are the reasons on account of which the Kaba and the Black Stone are of such extraordinary holiness.

Now, which of these elements of the legends can be "proved" in the way proof of Ram's birthplace is sought? Yet it is precisely because of them that the Kaba is so sacred.

The Al Aqsa Mosque

After the Masjid al-Haram in which the Kaba lies, the mosque held most sacred by the faithful is the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. And why so? The rock around which it is built has a mark. It is believed to be the imprint the Prophet's foot made as he alighted from the winged horse after his night's journey to this point in Jerusalem and thence to heaven : in heaven, as is well known, he met Moses and Jesus etc. Which elements of this can we prove? Heaven? The winged horse? The night's journey? That the mark is the imprint of a human foot? That the foot of which it is an imprint was that of the Prophet? (Incidentally the mosque is built on the site where according to the other set of beliefs stood the church built by Justinian). The Masjid al-Khaif in Mina is also built around a stone which the devout hold sacred; they put their heads on it, why? Because the stone has a mark which, it is said, was made by the Prophet placing his head on it. The Masjid al-Baghla in Medina enshrined the footprints of the Prophet's mule in stone. The Mosque of Ibn Tulun in Egypt was built where Musa, that is Moses, talked with the Lord... And so on. In each instance, ask that what proof can I provide for the proposition on which this structure is built?

The Prophet's distinction

Today we are being told that a mosque can never be dismantled or shifted. It is not just that the inviolability which is being attached to the structure of a mosque is a later -- much later -- accretion into Islam; the first mosque in Basra, the place being an encampment then, was built of reeds so that, as the Encyclopedia notes, it could be taken down with the camp. It is not just that even the most revered mosques -- the Kaba itself, the Prophet's mosque in Medina -- have been dismantled more than once so as to replace them with more imposing structures. It is not just that to this day in the Middle East mosques are broken and then another structure bearing that name built elsewhere for purposes as mundane as widening highways. It is that doing so would seem to accord with the Prophet's view of the matter.

"I have been given five things," the Prophet said, "which were not given to any amongst the Prophets before me". Among these he said was; the fact that "The earth has been made for me (and for my followers) a place for praying and a thing to perform tayammum. Therefore my followers can pray wherever the time of a prayer is due". (The other four things were: "Allah made me victorious by awe (by His frightening my enemies) for a distance of one month's journey"; "Booty has been made halal (lawful) for me (and was not made so for anyone else)"; "Every Prophet used to be sent to his nation exclusively but I have been sent to all mankind"; and, "I have been given the right of intercession (on the Day of Resurrection)"32. There are interesting variations in the precise words in some traditions, the words 'the earth (which) has been made clean and a place of worship' become 'the treasures of the earth which were placed in my hand."

In accordance with this view that the whole earth was a place of worship, the very first mosque he founded -- the one in Medina -- was constructed at a site which because of accretions to Islam since then, in fact in large part due to what it has adopted of other religions, would leave our protagonists looking askance. Soon after his arrival in Medina, the Prophet asked the Banu-An-Najjar to sell him a particular plot of land so that he may build a mosque on it. They would not accept a price for it saying they would seek it from Allah, and they turned the plot over to the Prophet. "There were graves of pagans in it", the hadis goes, "and some of it was unlevelled and there were sonic date-palm trees in it. The Prophet ordered that the graves of the pagans be dug out and the unlevelled land be levelled and the date-palm trees be cut down..." All this was done and the mosque built in land which till that moment had contained the graves of pagans in it. The adherents today would regard such a site polluted, and yet that is where the Prophet himself constructed his mosque33.

Conclusions

Our brief survey suggests three conclusions. Each of these strikes at the very root of the arguments which are being asserted by the Babri Masjid protagonists, and each does so in a different way:

*
The latest argument -- that no Muslim ruler destroyed any temple simply because doing so is against the Shariat -- does not hold, not only because of what Muslim historians have themselves recorded abound. innumerable instances, but also because there seems to be no warrant for the rule in view of what the Prophet himself did:
*
It is as difficult to prove the reasons for holding the most revered mosque sacred as it is to prove that Lord Ram was born at a particular place;
*
The shifting of mosque is permissible not only in view of the practice to this day in the most orthodox Islamic countries, but also in view of the Prophet's acclamation that Allah had made the entire earth, that is each and every spot in it a place of worship.

These are conclusions which follow in regard to the immediate issue at hand. But I think an even more important lesson is implicit in the foregoing.

I have all too often seen persons lose patience as protagonists of the Babri Masjid shift their arguments, as they obfuscate what they had said earlier, as they adopt one set of criteria for one issue -- to justify overturning the Shah Bano verdict for instance -- and another set for another issue -- in regard to adhering to the court verdict on some aspect of the Ayodhya issue for instance. But such exasperation must be eschewed. Instead, every assertion of the protagonists must be examined in detail. Every argument they advance must be examined logically and in the light of evidence.

Whatever be the outcome in regard to one structure, such an exercise -- of treating the arguments seriously, of dealing with them rationally, of examining event statement thoroughly, of looking up the law, the history books -- such an exercise will itself yield inestimable returns; instead of hurling calumny and threats at each other, we will learn to talk to each other: we will learn to settle issues rationally and by evidence: we will -- all of us, Muslims as much as-others -- will get to know these leaders and their politics: most important, we will open up all parts of our heritage -- Islam as much as Hinduism -- and every aspect of each part to exhumation, and thus to discourse.

Footnotes:

1. Sitaram Goel, Hindu Temples: What Happened to them (New Delhi, Voice of India, 1991)

2. "Masjid", Encyclopedia of Islam, pp. 1931-36.

3. Tabari, i. 2405, 2407.

4. Makrizi iv.35; of for Kufa, Baladhuri, p.286.

5. Corpus jurisdi Zaidb. �Ali, ed Griffini, No. 364.

6. ibid, Bi; and also J.A. 9 Sec., vii 369 sqq. Quatremere, Hist. Sult Mamt. 11/1,262 sqq. and the article "Damascus"

7. Makrizi, iv. 28 sq.,30.

8. ibid., 9.30.

9. Makrizi, iv.63,64.

10. ibid. p.65.

11. ibid. p. 269.

12. ibid. p. 240.

13. Masjid Ibn al-Banna, ibid., p. 265.

14. Yakut, Mu�djam i. 719.

15. Sauvaire, Hist. De Jerus, it d�Hibron,, 1876, p. 77; Quatremere, Hist. Sult. Maml., I/II., 40.

16. see Goldziher, Muh, Stud., ii.331 sq.

17. Mas�udi, Murudi, iv. 77; B.G.A., iii.444.

18. ibid., p. 436.

19. Baladhuri, p. 165 sq.

20. (Ibn Battuta, iii.151); as to Ta�if of. Abu Dawud, Salat, bab 10.

21. Mas�udi, 1.91; Baedeker, Palast, u. Syrun, 1910, p. 147.

22. Kitab at-Tabaqat Al-Kabu, (Pakistan Historical Society, Karachi, Publication No. 46, Volume I. Pp 373-4) Mishkat Al-Masabih

23. 1 ibid.

24. Kitabal-Tabaqat at-Kabir, op.cit., Volume I, pp. 373-4.

25. Quran 9. 108.

26. Twenty Three Years, A Study in the Prophetic Career of Mohammed (George Allen and Unwin, London, 1985).

27. Sura 49, verse 13.

28. Sura ii, 129, iii, 89 etc.

29. Quran 2. 121.

30. The Quran too, as is well known, is an exact reproduction of the text of two tablets - also of gold - which are lying in heaven.

31. On all this see, for instance, the Encyclopedia of Islam�s entry, Ka�ba.

32. Shahih Al-Bukhari, the Book of Salat, tradition 429; also Sahih Muslim, the Book of Salat, traditions 1056-1067.

33. Sahih -Al-Bukhari, the Book of Salat, tradition 420; also Sahih Muslim, the Book of Salat, tradition 1068.

(The author is an eminent Indian Journalist.)

Manthan
October-December 1992

Dr. Subramanian Swamy on Secular extremism

Noted Economist, Historian, Harvard Faculty, former Union Commerce Minister and a great Hindu Warrior Dr. Subramanian Swamy short speech in Chandigarh on Secular extremism.

Please also watch,

1. Deceptive world and the Pizza effect


2. श्री राम सेतु / Shri Ram Setu Case


3. Bharatiya Hindu Americans -vs- Sonia Gandhi

Tarun Vijay on History of Terrorism in the World

Please also read "Timeline/Chronology of Major Terrorist attacks in Bharat" for complete list of terrorist attacks in Bharat (misnomer: India) especially 46 major terrorist attacks in 67 cities under Congress in past 5 years.

Mr. Tarun Vijay on how Indians celebrate their own Demise because they have no sense of History, let alone True History. No wonder Dhimmi Mullah Arjun Singh of Muslim-Christian Rightist Congress has Toxified, Secularized and Talibanized every line of doctored History taught to new generation of Indians. Who will, understandably, have absolutely no sense of pride in nationalism or any idea about their actual glorious past except only a few conveniently selected shameful incidents which will kill the self-respect of the child from the get-go. Indians are of course their own worst enemies.

Live in denial and things will improve automagically

Please also read "When Indians SCREWED India..Again! Desi Bush re-elected"

----------------Forwarded Message------------------

Karmanye Vadhikaraste.....

Verdict 2009: Live in denial and things will improve automagically

Of frustrations, Denials & Disappointments... & Hope beyond

Verdict 2009 is out and I am frustrated too. I can't believe this. Things are just not adding up. We, at least I was blindly believing whatever, not to name any names, BJP senior karyakartas, campaign managers and spokespersons were saying about the ground realities, through Youtube videos, Daily Pioneer (I feel its the only unbiased newspaper in Bharat) and various Blogs. I was certainly not believing what majority of Indian media was saying because it is clearly 100% Pro-Congress. Why else do you think most of them got Padma Shri and a bailout package? Even damn NPR in US was interviewing Yogendra Yadav as a renowned psephologist, I mean give me a break. So then who was lying and/or was completely oblivious about the ground reality: media or BJP karyakarta?

The point is it can't just be media (although its a main cause certainly) and it certainly can't be Mr. Modi as some within the BJP are blaming to be which is completely ridiculous as the guy has done miracles in terms of development in Gujarat. Lets not be like Congress. If it wins then its because of Sonia & Rahul magic but if it loses then people are stupid, communal and it was because of Sardarji.

I guess the reason for BJP's loss is because of its party infighting, over confidence, no counter argument except silence of approval when defamed & slandered as "communal" or "persona non grata" for Muslims by media & congress openly on various TV debates, not being able to reach the masses effectively in time, confusion over successions (democratically not monarchically), lack of portrayal of young faces and most certainly biased CEC Navin Chawla. Please don't take me wrong. BJP is definitely more democratically structured than Congress's heir apparent monarchic structure. Its the ego of its own people which is not in BJP's control.

I mean seriously, 20 seats for Congress in UP now being credited to useless Rahul, the guy has not made even a single useful statement or speech in 5 years. He was partying till 5 AM on the night of 26/11 terrorist attack for God Sakes. Samuel Reddy voted back into power in Andhra. DMK wins in TN. Naveen in Odisha.

This just doesn't add up. I hope these were fair elections and no manipulation/rigging or EVM malfunctions happened, although I doubt that no malfunctions happened. I mean seriously, you want me to believe that Election Commission of India has strict Quality Control guidelines when their website for Electoral Name Checks was not working from the first day and Election Results website was down within first hour of going Live. May be they should outsource it some private Indian company because latter is certainly not going to get any business from overtly protectionist US, thanks to Obama. An action which will be countered by Sardarji's awesome one solution for all: Live in denial and things will improve automagically. Amazingly it is working out for them quite good. I am sorry BJP but this formula doesn't work for us because we are not "seculars" as we believe in Karm, Bhakti and Gyan Yog.

But seriously, what has happened is no less than a nightmare to say the least.

On a positive note,

कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेषु कदाचन।
मा कर्मफलहेतुर्भूर्मा ते सङ्गोस्त्वकर्मणि॥
- श्रीमद्भगवद्गीता २-४७

We did our Karm but the results are not in our hands. May be we didn't do our Karm better than the others. So we have to continue and build BJP again ground up in all the states. And seriously please hold on to the Assembly states that you are in right now, please don't goof up like Rajasthan and try to get in the states that you are not in, even if it means sitting in opposition. It may take time but BJP can attract/recruit young blood as there is no dearth of that.

Make the states that you are ruling an example model states like Gujarat that people will be forced to elect development over vote bank and advertise it in time, positively and please don't loose those states.

Please clear the misunderstanding people have about BJP like Kandahar, Parliament, Communal face, association with hooligans of SR Sene, no young blood, etc. more aggressively to the masses. Please continue with LK Advani forums & blogs as one of the medium for feedback from those who are privileged to access Internet in Bharat (number of privilidged masses ain't going to improve much under corrupt Congress in next 5 yrs) and outside. Please continue with connect with the masses exercises like Friends of BJP events, Bloggers for BJP and Advani@Campus. We started these very late. Had this been started more than a year ago, it would have had some very positive ripple effects. Certainly continuing with it now will have positive ripple effects for future. So please don't abandon them.

Too sad its certainly going to be an uphill task to save Shri Ram Sethu and Sanatan Vedic Dharm/Sanskruti. But we have done it in the past and by God's grace we will do it again. Just focus on development and cultural rejuvenation (civilly) in the states that you already have and don't let them go because of party infighting or corruption.

However, the first thing that BJP needs to do is to pull up its socks, don't let the sense of demoralization set in its Karyakata and Supporters/Voters like they did in 2004. We were so shocked and demoralized what had hit us that BJP was not on political map as it didn't accept the ground reality for over a year. Please send clear messages and put up offensive brave face and continue to build party base. Congress has proved lie said a thousand times becomes the truth and that is what BJP needs to do but the opposite. Say the truth a thousand times and people will eventually see it in clarity. We should have started Manmohan is weak campaign over 2-3 years ago. But no worries, now be so aggressive, hit them where it hurts. They have done that to us too. But make sure your message reaches larger audience and in positive manner. This is the era to be aggressive, offensive and assertive to counter the Christian-Muslim Rightist Congress by being a party for all. Make sure you tell people this because people want to hear it just to be sure as they are too dumb to notice it. But please don't let your party workers be demoralized and your core voters/supporters be disenchanted by this defeat. That would break the very back bone of the party. Some are saying BJP has lost its Urban voters which were its core vote bank, we have to work very hard to earn their respect back.

And watch out for this guy Navin Chawla with hawk eyes and please find out what did Congress know that we didn't about the ground reality.

Thank you Advaniji for all your selfless and tireless contribution to Bharat and Sanatan Dharm. May God Shri Ram bless you, us and May God Shri Ram always bless Bharat.

--

Please also don't think that since God Shri Krishna said "Karmanye Vadhikaraste..." so we should just take this result as it is, sit on our * and forget about it. Doing no Karm is also a sin and Nishkaam Karm (Adhyay/Chapter 3) doesn't mean doing no Karm.

I have been doing a lot of hard thinking and I couldn't sleep last night. BJP should get those EVMs checked by some third party.

How is it possible that if there was such a high under current in favor of Congress where we and most of the media were supposing it or its Allies will definitely loose in states like AP and TN but they won almost all the seats back or even more than before? Even after so much corruption by Samuel Reddy and A Raja. Money was also used to influence the voters.

20 seats in UP with almost no party infrastructure is almost unbelievable... this one is hard to digest. Even in Gujarat they one 11 seats including important Rajkot, the bastion of BJP. Are you kidding me? What were these people thinking while voting or is it EVM again? Please find out.

Chidambaram lost and then won his seat back after recount? Earlier he didn't loose by 1 or 2 votes. It was a difference of over 20000 votes on an electronic machine. If EVM can be wrong in that case then why not in other cases also?

How is that Kapil Sibal and other spokesperson including NDTV were projecting almost exact figures that Congress won? Clearly they knew something that BJP didn't. I can understand if it was a ballpark difference of 20-30 seats here or there but almost exact/accurate numbers? Kapil Sibal himself was having such a hard time in Chandni Chowk against Mr. Gupta but he still won again.

EVMs are not allowed even in most of US elections because they can be hacked or reprogrammed. Or if it is used, there is always some paper trail as a hard evidence. But in India, nothing. EVMs are nothing but magic of bytes. How can you be sure that the party that you voted for actually got the vote? Please read Rajiv Srinivasan's views on it: http://rajeev2004.blogspot.com/2009/05/election-results.html

Some will say, if we had to manipulate or rig the result then we would have gotten complete majority or 300 seats. That's absurd because that would attract even more attention. So you would rather keep the result subtle but enough to claim majority.

Look at it this way, only those allies that Congress claimed in the end during the elections that they are its allies got majority or won again. Like DMK and TMC. Rest lost. And lost Badly.

If we all got it right that Left is going loose, SP is going to loose, RJD is going to loose, why couldn't we get that Samuel Reddy of AP is going to win with even more seats than before.

If we let this one go without a fight. Think about it. With Navin Chawla at helms, every other election can be rigged the same way. The odds stacked against BJP will be much high and even more than what they are now since they have tasted the blood (figuratively).

How can you win a duel when the referee (EC) is from the other team?

But if these results are really genuine, which I seriously doubt, then someone was completely misinformed and lied to his Commander-in-Chief and to us who supported and worked in our capacity for Dharm (Morality, Ethics, Righteousness) in this battle.

Looking at all this it seems Congress didn't loose anywhere because of Anti-Incumbency. Seriously, what are Indians made of steel or they have no standards that nothing affects them?

Rajeev Srinivasan said this in his post and I agree:

the electorate is not stupid to vote in the kkkangress after
a) 12% inflation and massive budget deficits that will wreck the future of the economy
b) mumbai and other terrorist attacks
c) swiss bank slush funds and quattrocchi
d) taliban on the border, nepal gone, sri lanka in genocide mode
e) continued lying to the people on i) nuclear 'deal', ii) sacks-of-money-for-votes in no-confidence-motion

speaking of sri lanka, the results in tamil nadu are quite dubious.

we wuz robbed.