Kabir, if there is no Islamic civil war why do India’s major Sufi, Shiite, liberal, and atheist muslim leaders have bodyguards and Indian government provided security?

Why is this also true in Europe and Australia?

Why do so many high profile leaders who happen to be muslim refuse to discuss the holy Koran in public? [They discuss the holy Koran, hadiths and theology in private.]

Why is demanding that the Crown police protect muslims from Islamists one of the main four demands of Quilliam–one of the UK’s largest muslim groups?

Why do muslims around the world fear Al Qaeda and Daesh so much?

I’m not defending anyone, simply pointing out how reductive it is to blame Partition violence on any one side. Muslims were ethnically cleansed from East Punjab. “Islamists” were not to blame for that. Hindus and Sikhs were the ones who did the killing.

It’s easy to throw out terms like “takfiri jihadi” and “Islamic civil war” but you clearly have no idea what you are talking about when it comes to Islam. Citing Sam Harris only goes to prove that point.

https://samharris.org/podcasts/154-jihadists-really-want-2019/

Punjabi Sufis, Irfan Shiism, Sikhims, Hinduism have been deeply intertwined for centuries. Listen to the Guru Granth Sahib for evidence. Sarva Dharma or all religions and paths being true has been deeply intrinsic to Indian culture for many millennia. Something very large was needed to supersede it.

What changed in 1947?

The main group of people the Jihadi Islamists attack, harm and kill are and always have been moderate and minority muslims. They also attack nonmuslims. Nonmuslims suffering is the collateral effect of the Islamic civil war.

Why are you defending people who are trying to attack you, your freinds and family?

“Quaid-e-Azam believed in treating non-Muslim minorities as equal citizens of Pakistan.”

Jinnah was culturally very British. I don’t doubt his sincerity to treat minorities equally. However, he hell doesn’t represent the majority of Pakistanis.

One Sikh leader asked Jinnah that once he was gone how could he guarantee their rights. Jinnah just said I give my promise. That was the end of the negotiations.

“One could argue that a Pakistan with a larger proportion of minorities would have had to be more tolerant.”

I think that is laughable speculation. History has consistently shown how kuffar are treated in most majority muslim countries, and it is anything but equal. Really every promise the Pakistani Muslim leadership gave to other minorities at independence like the Christians have been broken. Only a fool would believe hollow promises like that.

I agree that partitioning the states should not have ideally happened, however partitioning India on Muslim-non-Muslim lines made it a must. It could have been done on a much more civilised and planned manner which would have involved less bloodshed.

Really, autonomous states based on regional identity (punjabi, bengali, sindhi, kashmiri etc), not religion should have been the ideal. If people had been living for centuries side by side, it could not have been impossible to continue that. But religious nationalism stopped that.

Insulting anyone’s gods or holy figures is boorish and uncivilized behavior.

I don’t support people being jailed or put to death for blasphemy. A little mutual respect should not be too much to ask.

XERXES THE MAGIAN – “Indians look at Muslims almost as a caste ” – You are party right in a way, not 100%. The root is that Indians look at Muslims as they do with Islam. You understand that we didn’t exactly have a friendly interaction with Islam. Plus, I’ll go one level up. Since ages, under peace the Indian civilization challenged different philosophies (even our own). Each of them had to go through critique and intense debate. One of the reasons, now abrahimic religions are facing this “purvapaksha”, and because they are not dynamic, they and its followers will face tough questions within the social sphere. With more information being absorbed by individuals, I suppose people are getting to know about the intrinsic hate speech against other religions in their texts.

Second point – Integration into the ever improving economic situation in India. As a society they will have to accept a flexible framework and start putting in the extra effort where demographics are concerned (improved, but a long way to go), focus on modern jobs and social rules to interact with the majority. It cannot be always under certain terms.

My third point is about confrontation and which is alien to abrahimic religions. Its silly to even think about putting a cap on speech on confrontational issues. Exactly one of the reasons why abrahimic relgions are not dynamic. If someone important in abc religion is criticised because he did x and y, and these are documented too, there may rise counter points to it from the other end. In India, its common for certain sections in the media and abrahimic religions to curse hindu gods and holy individuals, but then there also exists an ecosystem (albeit very small compared to the leftist) which counters each criticism.

As per my experience, my educated muslim/christian acquintances have zero knowledge about hindusim (I don’t blame them either). Just merely explaining sanatana dharma concepts to them and drawing differences is enough for them to go into their shells, become quiet and defensive. Imagine if I start to critique their belief systems. So what does it signify? Is it a reaction to the degree of false knowledge that they had? This is the first stage of the typical escapist mindset which ultimately leads to demands for anti-free speech laws, blasphemy laws etc. Is this awareness within the social structure percolating among abrahimic religions in India, and hardliners trying to counteract that? Is there some degree of inferiority complex? There may be other opposing factors. So that constant churn within social interactions will always be there. The government or constitution etc have nothing to do here.

Note – Do realize I’m not justifying the false equivalence of comparing one person having a historical identity against a set of gods belonging to another religion or, that the highest god in all religions are the same. They are not equal. I’m merely using it for my explanation.

Riots happened on both sides. Let’s not forget all the Muslims who were ethnically cleansed from East Punjab.

But trust you to blame everything on “takfiri jihadi islamists”. Just reveals your own narrow prejudices.

Karan,

The Muslim League did not want Punjab and Bengal partitioned. Dividing these provinces had a huge human cost. You just have to read the debates of the boundary commission to realize what a flawed process it was.

Quaid-e-Azam believed in treating non-Muslim minorities as equal citizens of Pakistan (see the August 11 speech).

You cannot use the Aasia Bibi case to justify the division of Punjab in 1947. General Zia’s Blasphemy law was introduced in the 1980s. One could argue that a Pakistan with a larger proportion of minorities would have had to be more tolerant.

There is enough blame to go around on both sides.

Slapstik, you favored partition?

If so, would you rather the English left more gradually?

My view is that Takfiri Jihadi Islamists launched terrorist attacks in 1947 that set off the partition riots. One of the goals of the Islamists was to break the bonds between Sufis/Irfan Sufi Shia and their Hindu/Buddhist/Jain/Sikh/Christian sisters–enabling them later attack the Sufis, Shia, minority muslims and moderate muslims more easily.

This is the same challenge the world has confronted for 14 centuries.

If not for the global rise of Jihadi Islamist extremism after 1919 in the Ariabian peninsula India likely would not have partitioned. Even if partition happened partition riots would likely have been much smaller.

The infinitely better model than what we had in partition. And they achieved it 20, 30 years before 47. One would presume we could have done it bit better than what Turks-Greece achieved.