In 1947, the Indian National Congress Party opted for a secular republic in preference to a Hindu Rashtra. The Congress party was then headed by 2 leaders Nehru and Gandhi who wanted to win over the Muslims. Gandhi in particular had a great desire to be a mascot for Muslims as well and was thus not averse to stooping low to placate them. This also rubbed off on  the second line leadership and a culture developed to pander to minority issues in the hope that they will accept being part of a national identity. Unfortunately Gandhi failed and despite a million acts of appeasement he was never recognised as a leader by the Muslims and Jinnah often contemptuously  referred to him as a "Hindu Leader".

Nehru had always Muslim leanings and many rumors float around about him and his father Motilal Nehru. These have a meaning as it shaped his thinking and in the ultimate analysis the Hindus were put in the back seat of the republic. 

Part of the problem was the docile nature of the Hindu  religion itself that made its followers more accommodating than combative and thus Frank Moraes coined the world " The meek and Mild Hindu". This meekness has manifested itself in many ways and also in everyday life. There are many examples to show that though Gandhi and Nehru were inclined to support the cause of the minority, the Hindus themselves at no stage displayed any single minded devotion to their cause  or issues affecting them.

An example that comes to mind is the Hindu reaction to the paintings of M.F. Hussain. This man who was a painter of some standing, depicted Hindu deities in a very demeaning manner.He showed the Prophets mother, and others fully clothed, yet he showed Hindu Deities unclad  and in the nude. The point to note is that despite such an affront no Hindu propagated a prize money for his head. There was no violence anywhere and except for a few sporadic sessions of burning his paintings nothing much happened. This shows the tolerance of the Hindu. The point to note is that there were no cases of burning Muslim houses and Hussain's houses in Mumbai were left untouched. Needless to say no Muslim or any Muslim organization thought it fit to reprimand Hussain or support the Hindus. In return we had sermons that acts of Hindus against Hussain were a sign of intolerance.

The above attitude of the Hindus can be contrasted with the action at the Azad Maidan riots in Mumbai. The rioters who were from the minority community desecrated the Amar Jawan Jyoti,  a war memorial dedicated to the first freedom struggle of 1857. The net result during this riot was that 2 people died and 54 were injured and that included 45 policemen. Property worth Rs 2.74 crores was damaged. Worse not a single Muslim leader or organization condemned this vandalism.

Akbarudin Owaisi is an intelligent man, yet he talks all rubbish about Hindu gods in his speeches. He sometimes mocks them. Yet this man roams around the country articulating his views and nobody from the Hindu community has ever asked for his hanging for uttering lies and profanities.

The Hindu community is in fact cowed down in their own land. They are perhaps gripped with a psychosis of fear as they find their own leaders from Lalu Prasad to the Congress  championing the cause of the minority. This has resulted in the minority community being emboldened and resorting to strong arm tactics everywhere, knowing fuly well that the Hindu reaction whether led by BJP or Congress will be a muted one.

Thus the arson and looting at Purnia and Malda is food for thought. Muslim mobs with a  purpose  fired bullets at Hindu homes, beat up police, burned vehicles and looted Hindu shops. It was a preplanned carnage and the icing on the cake was a statement by the Hindu Chief Minister of Bengal Mamta Banerjee that this riot was nothing,  but a clash between some locals and the BSF. One can't get sillier than that.

These riots were activated by some sleeper cells of Muslim  extremists in India, notably Hyderabad and was funded by the Muslim world. India as I had earlier written is labelled a soft state and the fact is that it's 100% true. The fault lies with the Hindus themselves as most believe in the inevitability of life and death and are content to let things pass. This approach led to their complete subjugation by Muslims for 900 years. One wonders how a race which constituted 95% of the population of the land allowed itself to be ruled by a alien force consisting of just 5% of the populace. The fact is the Hindus had lost the will to oppose and fight. Part of this belief was fostered by the ills of Hinduism and the failure to present a cohesive force to the invader. This resulted in  defeats galore and that further demoralized the Hindus.

After 1947, one  expected a change. However we now know that Sardar Patel was sidelined and died soon after independence. ( Read Last Days of the British Raj by Leonard Mosley). With Patel out the way Nehru had a field day and charted a  secularism that literally meant appeasement of the minority. He did not follow the Directive Principles of the Constitution for a common Civil Code and allowed the Muslims to be ruled by the Sharia in personal law.  He failed to look beyond his nose and observe that the Portuguese in Goa  had abolished the Sharia and applied the Uniform Civil Code to all and sundry including Muslims. The Muslims accepted the diktat there and perhaps they would have accepted a common civil code in India when the republican constitution was ushered in 1950. But, now too much water has gone down the river and one cannot see how equality of all religions can be restored.

Secularism really means a freedom to worship ones religion or practice his belief. It does not mean that a community is to be pampered. Another case is the ban on beef. Many Hindus are also going around saying that such a ban  is a sign of intolerance. They forget that 56 nations in the world have banned the slaughter of pigs and pork. Nobody has raised a finger on that. Yet if ONE nation bans cow slaughter, a hue and cry is made. One gets confused as to what real and what is artificial.

India missed the bus when a Hindu Rashtra was not declared in 1947. After all the division of India was on the basis of the "Two Nation Theory". The history books and Jinnah trumpet this and the fact is Gandhi and Nehru also accepted this religious divide. Who can contest it ?

The future is stark and unreal. Justice Katju is clear that India will have a revolution. Maybe be it will be 200 years late, but the Augean stables have to be cleaned and there is no way it can be done.

Background

America is the largest ( area wise) democracy in the world.To get an idea of its size, one can compare it to India and see that it covers a land area which is 5 times the size of India. America has been a democracy since 1776, when American War of Independence took place against the British. George Washington became the first president. Over almost 240 years the basic structure of American democracy is the same and consists of both direct and indirect election process.

The American election is a two tier system, where an electoral college elects the  president The electoral college consists of all the states of the union and each state is allotted a particular number of votes depending upon its population and area. Direct elections are held to determine which candidate wins a particular state. Thus a candidate will win all the electoral votes  of a state in case he wins by even one vote. This in effect is in a way a flawed syatem, as it can lead to a situation where a candidate may win in the USA on a minority vote, by virtue of him having bagged the electoral votes of a particular state. In 1984 Ronald Reagon became US president on a vote of just 25% of the eligble voters 

The American election is however a fairly representative election, but is a closed world as basically the entire scenario is dominated by 2 parties, namely the Republicans and Democrats. The proliferation of parties on liguistic and religious lines is not there , like in India. It is basically a two party system.

The Present election

The US will face another election as President Obama would have completed his term of 8 years. This is the maximum allowed by the US constitution. This limitation of two terms or 8 years was incorperated in the US constitution after World War II. Earlier there were no restrictions and President Roosevelt was able to get elected for 4 terms. 

Obama won the election on a splintered vote. The New York Times has noted after an analysis that Obama won as he polled 95% of the vote of Hispanics, coloreds and migrants. All he needed was a  minority of the white vote to sail into Parliament. The Blacks, Hispanics and other migrants constitute 27% of the US population and as such Obama won riding on their heads.

As President he was in a way divisive and many felt his loyalty to the US constitution was suspect, because of his Muslim  background. His family has been Muslims for generations and he himself admitted that he had gone to a "Muslim School"  while he was in Indonesia.

Obama toned down the war on terror and repeatedly emphasised that Islam was a peaceful religion. He also announced that America was no longer a Christian nation, when 90% of all Americans are Christians. Many Americasn are thus happy to see him go. I have during my visits to America been told by many Americans that the rise of Obama was an aberration and such a thing won't happen again.

The rise of the extreme right and Donald Trump

The period of Obama's presidency has led to a rise of the Muslim extremists who are what is known as Salafists( followers of hard line Islam).These groups fired with a zeal to restore the Caliphate all over the world have risen like the 9 head Hydra. During the term of Obama the ISIL and Daesh  have occupied a large area in Iraq and Syrai and tried to establish their rule. The area  is huge and is more than the area of France.

The leader of the ISI is Abu Baghdadi, a charismatic figure. Not many know that he was in detention in  US army custody , till ordered to be released by Obama in 2009. This man considers himself as the Caliph and despite many attempts to kill him by drones and other methods has survived. He has built up an aura of invincibility and his message has tremendous appeal for Muslims. The result is that Muslims from all over the world have enlisted to join the forces under Baghdadi. The ISI also spreads fear and this is enforced by mass killings and beheadings, duly recorded and broadcast on video.

Many American workers doing humanitarian work have been caught and beheaded. Baghdadi himself captured an American grl working as a aid worker and forcibly married and impregnated her. She was killed in a drone attack. In addition his appeal which transcends boundaries has led to terror attacks all over the world. In these attacks the local Muslim population acting as a fifth column, have facilitated these acts of carnage.

The result of all this is that the American people ( a large number of them) are bewildered. They are wondering whether their life style would be disrupted by infilteration of Muslims in all walks of life. They are further not reassured by the rhetoric of President Obama, that Islam is a peaceful religion.

Acts of terrorism and being a peaceful religion do not gel together and most Americans have realised the Pan World nature of Islam and the result is that 26 governors of US states have refused to take in Muslim refugees from the Middle East.

This is the reason that the leading contender at the moment for the Republican nomination is Donald Trump. Donald Trump may or may not get the nomination, but there is no doubt that he articulates many of the fellings of the US populace. Donald Trump has minced no words and feels Muslism in the USA are a threat. He has called for all Muslism to be registered and a ban on construction of mosques. The mosque is the symbol of Islam and one can see that Saudi Arabia offered to  build 1000 mosques in Europe for the Muslim refugees. In a way it acts as a divisive symbol as it is used to further the Wahabbi concept of Islam

Donald Trump is the leader at the moment among the republican candidates. He has also called for internment of suspected Muslims indulgimg or likely to indulge in activities of a prejudicial nature like Roosevelt did to the Japanese in the US during World war II. In a TV debate Trump was forthright and despite being called a fascist, has stuck to his views.

The American public at large are wary of Muslims who presently are a microscopic minority in the USA.( about2%). They fear that in case this number increase, the Muslims will  disrupt the life of an average American. America is a violent society and killings by guns is endemic. But Americans feel that guns by themselves are not the danger  and the real danger is a bigoted Muslim who may decide to destroy America from within.

Donald Trump represents a state of mind of the US voter and there is every chance that the next president will be one who will rein in Islamic fundamentalism and not allow Islam to flourish in America. Donald Trump may win or lose, but he has articulated the feelings of millions of Americans

In 2014, the nation was in a state of despair. The Congress party which had ruled for 10 years was guilty of many acts of misdemeanor and corruption had taken the drivers seat, with an ineffectual prime minister in ManMohan Singh who turned out to be a yes man of the Gandhi-Nehru family.  Worse Indian prestige was rock bottom in the world as India followed a policy of just reaction and proactive initiative was not visible.

In such a situation many like me voted for change and a promise of a better life with the catchy phrase launched by Narendra Modi " Ache din". Unfortunately 18 months down the line the nation is bewildered at the approach of the government  that had promised " Ache din". No " Ache  din" ( good days) have appeared and the country has sunk into an morass and one wonders what will happen next. It shows that greatness that one associates with a leader is not for Narendra Modi.

The one visible aspect of the Indian Prime Minister is his frequent foreign jaunts and misplaced priorities. This has not borne fruit and some of his policies are definitely questionable, like giving one billion dollars to Mongolia, when there is rampant poverty in India and over 4000 farmers have committed suicide. What was the justification for it ? His initiative in Nepal has come a cropper and Nepal is more hostile now and turning more and more to China. Lanka cocks a snook at India and routinely arrests Indian fishermen. Can any one arrest even one American ? This is because Modi has negelcted the one reason that the world listens to a nation and that is military power.

Modi like Nehru has failed to realise the importance of the military. He is also not aware of the bond between serving and retired soldiers. He has opened a hornets nest by his backtracking on his promise of OROP; the announcement for which he had made from rooftops. Yet 18 months down the line the demand is not addressed and new factors have been brought in that negate the approval of parliament and the Koshyari commission which had clearly spelt out what OROP is. With his infantile approach he has at one stroke demoralised the armed forces and the only persons who will be happy are China and Pakistan.One hopes India does not have to fight a war now as that may bring a very different result. Another thing that has intrigued me is that when President Obama and Prime Minister David Cameroon can ceremonially recieve coffins of soldiers killed in action, why could not Modi recieve at least one coffin of an Indian soldier killed by Muslim insurgents? His taking a guard of nonor in chappals is also an insult to a soldier.

It is not only on the question of OROP, but despite his frequent foreign jaunts the situation is a live wire  in India's proximity. China has amassed 30 divisions in Tibet and Pakistan remains an intractable foe. What does Modi plan to do here. Even Nepal is gravitating closer to China and Sri Lanka feels its a  David vs Goliath. Kashmir remains a bone of contention and the valley is simmering with pro Pakistan sentiments. Something is definitely wrong some where. How can Pakistan which i/5th the size of India claim military and political parity with India. Who is responsible? One expected Modi to turn the tide but it has not happened.

There is lot of talk of FDI flowing in. One must remember that FDI does come only with strings and in any case FDi alone will not solve the economic ills. Prices of food stuffs have shot through the sky and dal the staple diet of Indians for protein( as Indian can't afford meat which is exorbitant in cost) is selling at astronomical prices.  One wonders whether the BJP and Modi realise that the common man is more interested in the price of dal and other foodstuffs than in rhetoric on cow protection and cow slaughter.  Modi has thus let the nation down. The honeymoon is over and now we have come face to face with the real Modi. He certainly is not the great man India expected to lead, but a small time man who in some ways does behave as a RSS pacharak.

One could see his discomfiture at the press conference in London , when he was asked questions on intolerence. He fumbled and side stepped some answers, before saying that India was the land of Gandhi and Buddha and thus there would be equality for all. Why couldn't this man make the same statement in India ? Why he had to make a statement only in London after months of the pot simmering at home.?

Modi is a perhaps not a  great man. His actions look like he is a narcissist, intent only on his own image, other things be dammed. This is dangerous for India and with Pakistn and China challenging India and food stuff prices rising and poor not having enough to eat and farmers committing suicide, Modi better do something before he goes into the dustbin of history

Last Saturday I was at the Singapore Club( I am on an official visit ) and had an animated discussion with an old friend, a member of the service fraternity, an English Major settled in Singapore.

Over glasses of  beer the Major mentioned that many writers and poets were returning the awards bestowed on them by the Indian government, on the plea that with Narendra Modi at the helm of affairs, intolerance had crept in the Indian society. He wondered what was the motive as he could not  recollect a single instance over a 100 years where an award bestowed on an individual for excellence was returned in England. I asked him as to what he felt about all these incidents. He had a crisp answer and clearly articulated" Man, this is an orchestrated demand and these men do not have the honor of the Indian nation in mind".

This is the opinion of a foreignor, who is not attached to any political party or system in India. I began a look at history and could not find a single instance of an award being returned in any country.  The fact is the writers and so called men of letters did a great disservice to India by returning awards, bestowed on them.

I further had a look at some of the awardees and was shocked at what came before me. Take the case of Ms Leela Samson. At one time she headed  3 prestigious centres of creative art simultaneously- Kalakshetra Foundation, Sangeet Natak Akademi and Central Board of Film Certification. She was evicted from all these 3 appointments one by one and had an axe to grind. She was a protege of the Congress party. 

Before I write anything further I will quote  Kerala's renowned lady litterateur P Valsala who commented that the awards were returned by those who bought them and there is big politics behind this drama. 

I am also reminded of watching the Urdu poet Munnawar Rana holding a blank cheque before the TV camera and grandly announcing that he was "ready" to return the monetary benefit that came with the reward. I ask, is this the way to return a monetary benefit? why could not this man just post the cheque to the Sahitiya Kala Akademi? This man also announced that he was ashamed to go to Pakistan after the killing of a Muslim in Dadri in UP.  I wonder whether  Rana felt any sense of shame when Hindus who came on a visit to India refused to go back to Pakistan as they felt insecure and scared? Obviously not as Rana was playing a game with  his political masters in the back.

The fact is that all the awardees who have returned the awards have not returned the monetary compensation that came with the award. This shows the hollow nature of the protest movement and is a clear sign that all this is just smoke and there is an invisible hand behind this entire drama of returning awards.

Take the case of Ganesh Devy, who returned his Sahitya Akademi award. This man recieved funds to the tune of 12 crores of which the Ford foundation played a big part. After the government tightened the screws on these foundations  Devy woke up to "intolerence" in Indian society after the BJP came to power.

The real reason for returning the awards is something else and not the so called intolerance seen by them. Look at the film Industry, this is completely dominated by the Mafia from Pakistan and Dubai. This was brought out by RN Singh yesterday on prime time on the IBN news channel. RN Singh is a senior officer ( now retired ) from the Indian Intelligence Bureau. He mentioned the case of one film superstar who thought it fit to articulate that India was heading towards an intolerant  society. A per Singh, this same Super Star was dancing at the party of the Don, Dawood Ibrahim in Dubai after the  Mumbai blasts.

What can you expect? The fact is as brought out by Chetan Bhagat in his address at Indore on 3 November  that had Modi and Amit Shah been from Doon School, such things like returning of awards would not have happened. In a way, I think Bhagat is correct as the so called men of letters  are chagrined that their mentor the Congress party is defeated , nay decimated by a man who is not 'educated' in the classical sense. The Congress party and their ilk have not been able to stomach their complete rout in in the 2014 election, hence resort to drama of returning awards. Prestige of the country be dammed.

I hope readers can see through the entire game. It is a curse of history that Nehru and the Congress ( with blessings of Gandhi) came to power after 1947 and reduced the state to an appeaser of minorities. I have yet to understand how the death of one Muslim and 3 rationalists has prompted these pseudo secular writers to retrn their awards. Not one writer returned any  award when 10,000 Sikhs were butchered in Delhi, with the Congress party in power. Reports now suggest that orders for the massacre was given  by the highest authority of the Congress party.

Retrning awards is self defeating and this has polarized Indian society, not Narendra Modi. These men are just pseudo secular and have insulted the Indian people by returning the awards. I do believe that there is always light at the end of the tunnel and these men will have to pay for this sin of insulting the Indian nation.