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Arvind Kejriwal jumped on the national scene in 2011 when Anna Hazare launched his anti-corruption movement against the UPA government. It has been a roller coaster ride for him since then, with few downs and more ups. He has been in the limelight and covered in a large number of newspaper columns. Here is our take on what makes him special:
1. Ambitious
Politics is for ambitious people and Kejriwal has shown a knack for it since his early IRS days by jumping from one job to another to reach where he is today. Given that he immersed himself head-on into the Varanasi Lok Sabha election against Modi without any preparation should clear doubts in anyone’s mind that he aims for the top position in this country.
2. Result oriented
Kejriwal wants to win at any cost and is ready to shake hands with anyone to achieve this objective, whether it is bigoted Maulana Taseer or Khalistanis. Are you listening Lalu and Mulayam — here is your replacement! The love that he gets from Pakistanis is not unreasonable after all.
3. Unapologetic
Although he pleaded sorry in front of Delhi citizens after his 49-day stint as Chief Minister to get re-elected, in general he does not care when saving his real ass-lickers or himself. He fought alongside Somnath Bharti after the Khirkhi raid as well as threw out BJP MLAs from the Delhi Assembly. If still not convinced, just look at his complete silence at the MCD worker strike and the resultant garbage mess in Delhi.
4. Master of forming social coalitions
He is the true inheritor of Congress social engineering skills. He has used auto-wallahs, Muslims and slum dwellers to form his core support base in Delhi. He has now added Khalistanis in Punjab to this list and will expand it as he goes into other states.
5. He knows that socialism sells
Who would have expected that one can fool Delhites with free wi-fi and electricity, but Kejriwal did it. He will sell other dreams in the future as nothing sells more than freebies during elections.
6. Knows how to play the victim card
Without knowing how to play the victim card, point 5 cannot be used again and again. Right now he blames the Government of India for all problems in Delhi. He will find new enemies to blame as he rises in political stature.
7. Knows how to use people
Poor Anna must be feeling left out today as Kejriwal has grabbed all the headlines from him. The way he chewed and spit out Yadav and Bhushan will form a textbook example on how to dispose of political rivals after achieving your objectives.
8. Makes his followers feel special
A leader is no leader if he cannot summon a charged group of followers. Every comrade wants to think that he is important and essential to achieve the grand objective of the beloved leader. Kejriwal ensures to give proper chances to his storm-troopers to feel important — sometimes in the form of enforcing the odd-even transport rule or in delivering mob justice. Do you now understand why Aaptards act crazy?
9. Master at deflecting issues
What did the CBI think before raiding the office of the Chief Secretary of the Delhi Government? They did not expect that Kejriwal would throw muck on Jaitley by alleging a DDCA scam and deflect attention. He is good at shoot-and-scoot, which gives him enough time to gather his thoughts and mount a counter-attack. Just ask Jaitley how he feels about it!
10. Messiah image
He knows that Indians put the dhoti-wearing Gandhi on a pedestal and this is the image he tries to live by every day. He does not wear a dhoti, but the muffler and slipper give him the perfect Aam Aadmi look he wants to cash upon. Also he does not mind getting slapped every now and then to get some sympathy and donation. There is no doubt that Indians are gullible and will fall for these cheap tricks.
All the above qualities mean that Kejriwal is there in politics for the long haul. BJP and Congress might reject him as a fool but he knows very well what he is doing. This misunderstanding will cost them a lot in the future — but the worrying part is how much will India have to pay for electing him? Since he is openly unapologetic and used his followers to enforce odd-even law and other policing duties, it means he would not mind unleashing them in the future to deliver mob justice. Also, his complete silence on the pro-independence stance of his old comrade Prashant Bhushan on Kashmir can make any nationalist uncomfortable about his belief in upholding the territorial integrity of India.
Given that Lok Sabha elections were marked by fractured mandates in the last three decades before Modi’s election, it would not be a surprise if Kejriwal gets the PM position in next elections if AAP does reasonably well in a few northern states and cities. The right ecosystem in India should form a reasonable strategy to contain him now — else he can prove to be a real threat in the future. He called himself an Anarchist once and it will be a grave mistake to not take him on face value about it.
Originally published February 10, 2016 on Yuga Parivartan.
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Modi was chosen as the 14th Prime Minister of India with great aplomb and his elevation was finally seen as the return of a strong PM after ten years of weak-kneed Manmohan Singh in the PM’s chair. While it was common knowledge that MMS was driven by the kitchen cabinet of the National Advisory Council (NAC), it is far from clear who is running the current PMO. Is it the same strong-willed Narendra Bhai from Gujarat or just a faded copy of him? While there are some areas where Modi and his ministers are doing well and deserve rightful credit, there are a large number of issues which his government has not touched even with a bargepole. There are a host of secular issues like repeal of RTE, freeing temples from government control and illegal immigration of Bangladeshis where his government has shown absolute silence or disinterest. But what is more worrying is that now the government has also started playing to the gallery and trying to win over city-bred liberals, who were never his core supporters.
The TRAI ruling on Net Neutrality is the latest gaffe which can be added to the list of policy blunders under Modi’s watch. Once again, the Modi government caved in to pressure and tried to please the generation of urban activists — the same crowd who held monopoly over public policy under Congress. If the rural areas had been so happy with Congress top-down policy making, Modi would not have got the massive mandate that he got from the hinterland. In one blow, the minuscule population who have grown up on a regular Facebook feed decided that such low prices for consumers would be bad for poor people because their western masters said so — and forced their own government to do away with Free Basics. The last line of a screenshot circulating on social media gives away the superiority complex of the urban activists, who are more than happy to use all these services themselves but have a problem if they get extended to the poor, even for free. Sadly, they have found support from Modi to pursue these initiatives which in the long run will hurt the rural folks — simply because they could not register their voice through online activism.
But Net Neutrality is not the first issue where the Modi government has tried to woo the city-bred liberal crowd. The decision to induct women in combat duties in the IAF is another appeasement policy by the government. It has been a failed and controversial policy everywhere in the world, but the MoD justified this decision by citing trends in other developed countries. Since India has many other pressing issues, it is a big mystery why Modi agreed to pursue this issue when it hardly comes up for debate in India. Is it just another attempt to play to the liberal gallery by picking up some of their pet issues?
The solar energy initiative is another wasteful effort by the Modi government and can seriously jeopardize the energy security of the country by diverting investments away from serious and time-tested energy solutions. While most developed countries have failed to cash upon solar energy because it is expensive and inefficient, it is surprising why Modi is still pushing for it. While it would have been understandable if the private or public sector made R&D investments in solar energy, given the current technology it does not make sense to set up expensive solar plants when other cheaper options are available. So it would not be far-fetched to say that PM Modi is trying to court the environmentalists — yet another group of liberals who derive their inspiration from the west.
These are only three policy initiatives out of a big list of policy blunders which show that Modi is trying hard to win the sympathy of the liberals while ignoring his core support base. Sadly the issues raised in this article do not even cover the so-called Hindu issues like temple management — which are actually secular issues — where Modi has maintained complete silence. If Modi continues to go down this path of appeasing non-entities, it would be a great waste of the historic mandate that he got in the summer of 2014. Unlike Vajpayee, who ran a coalition government, Modi would not even have the excuse of blaming coalition partners for his mistakes. It is high time that he wakes up and stops taking the endorsement of his core supporters for granted.
Originally published February 9, 2016 on Yuga Parivartan.
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The old debate has been reignited once again as an angry mob attacked a Tanzanian girl during their protest against a road accident. As is natural for Indian media honchos, the self-flagellation has already started and rims of papers have been wasted on explaining the racism among Indians. There are two big issues that need to be addressed head on in this context — over-hyped individual incidents, and buying the racism dictionary from the west. The first is a more pressing concern as the second will need changing the whole victimhood discourse copied by local coolies from their western masters.
So, let’s analyse the angle that MSM trumpets only negative stories about India. If you look at all the stories highlighted in the past, they were of very local nature and would have been brushed aside as stray incidents by any sensible media — Church attacks, Dadri and now this Tanzanian girl. All of these events were reprehensible but in no way a sign of collective malaise or failure and should have been reported sensibly without any stereotyping, as mentioned by Rupa Subramanya in her tweets:
“Need to accept we’re racists” bs is a convo few people have on social media & news TV. Avg Joe not involved. Navel gazing. Fix governance.
— Rupa Subramanya (@rupasubramanya), February 4, 2016
If you look at the current incident involving the Tanzanian girl, there was a policeman on the spot who decided to look at the incident as a helpless bystander rather than act. It is a failure of the state machinery but given that Karnataka is currently ruled by Congress, it is given a free pass. Instead the blame has been completely shifted to the whole Indian society rather than parading the inefficient Karnataka government — because that does not fit in the “Adarsh liberal” scheme to bash anyone other than the Modi-led government or the people who elected him. The identity of the mob has also been completely whitewashed by the media, but given that the accident victim was Shabana Taj, it is hardly any surprise for anyone to guess why MSM removed this fact from public attention.
While the event should have been used to build some pressure for changing the current state of law and order in India, the usual TV honchos have refused to notice the elephant in the room. The frequent interference of politicians has completely eroded the reputation as well as the functioning capability of the state police. But there is hardly any discussion on police reforms or the judiciary. Any attempts at serious reform will die down as quickly as they rose up and the prime time debate will go on throwing more muck on Indian society.
This brings us to the second and more important point about importing and super-imposing western concepts on India. Unlike the western imperialistic nations, India does not have a history of racism or slavery and there should be no guilt associated with it. For example, most Indians of the past and even the current generation have grown up facing the choicest of terms — kaala, patlu, motu (black, skinny, fat) etc. — and did not have any psychological breakdown. Rather than run away from their identity, Indians have learnt to not take them too seriously and grow out of it. Now Indians too have started to give too much importance to these western psychiatry concepts which has fuelled the victimhood narrative among western people and increased the number of depression patients. There is a perfect reason for Americans to feel guilty about calling their own blacks as niggers, but Indians do not have such past and there is no reason for them to associate themselves with this same guilt. Indians have known very well how to live in a diverse society and these imported terms that fuel victimhood narrative only vitiate the atmosphere and do not help in mutual respect and coexistence.
Although all Indians would love to have a white bride, given most brides in India are not white, this fetish for white colour is only apparent in the matrimonial and skin cream adverts and should not be blown out of proportion and equated with racism. Similarly the terms used for south, north or north-east Indians can be broken down easily and proved to be perfectly harmless. Sadly it is not true any longer as the politically correct crowd came and beat up everyone with their irrationality into submission. So next time you call your miser friend a “bania”, you have to be very careful.
But denial of racism in India also brings one directly in confrontation with people who will chant casteism at the top of their voice and equate it with racism. But even in the case of casteism there is no race involved — except in the mind of AIT proponents who think Aryans were a different race and constituted the current upper caste. There is discrimination there but it is not similar to racial discrimination as seen in the US. Indians need to take care of it, but should not use every incident to build fake victimhood as happened in the case of Rohit Vemula.
The way forward from here is to stop choosing the worst highlight of the day from stray incidents around India. It is a big country and has a much lower crime rate than the “so-called” developed countries of the world. Self-criticism is good but self-flagellation over non-issues does not help either. When the country should have been mourning the death of ten brave soldiers in Siachen, it is a shame that the top media houses decided to highlight this one incident for the whole day. Any other self-respecting country would have definitely chosen to give proper dues to its lost soldiers.
Originally published February 4, 2016 on Yuga Parivartan.
Editorial illustration for “Why India should not have a secular Army”.
One of the oft-repeated proud facts about the present Indian Armed Forces is that it is secular in nature and has no religious connotations associated with it. But is this a good thing? The question is — does religion and composition of army play any role in the defence of the nation? After all, religion is one of the strongest binding forces for any nation. From the North East to Kashmir, every state in India where Hindus are in a minority has an insurgency problem — a fact which cannot be brushed aside as a statistical anomaly. If not for the lack of geographical continuity with Pakistan and the role of Sardar Patel, Hyderabad would have definitely ended up with Pakistan due to the religion of its ruler.
The secular ayatollahs in India claim, without any sense of reason, that the Indian nation state is secular and hence the army of the nation — which is supposed to preserve and protect it — has to be secular as well. It should not discriminate on the basis of religion and allow Muslims among its ranks, even though our primary national threat is a Muslim majority Pakistan which positions itself as the caretaker of the Muslim world. But the question is — should the army continue with its secular hiring policy and appoint Muslims in high-ranking positions? To answer this question one has to look at the history of betrayals by Muslim soldiers when fighting against other Muslim armies, in cases where their own country was non-Muslim.
Evidence from Soviet-Afghan war
The Soviet Union is the best case study to look at Muslim behaviour, given it was the pinnacle of a secular and godless society — something India cannot ever hope to achieve. They monitored the mosques and used state-appointed bureaucrats to oversee the operation of all mosques in their country to ensure that Muslim kids raised in their schools got secular education and were taught to put Soviet interests over their own religion. However, despite their strong efforts, this secularization crumbled as soon as they entered the Soviet-Afghan war and got betrayed by a large number of Muslim soldiers.
At the start of the war, the Soviet high command bet heavily on its Muslim units of Central Asian origins and deployed them in Afghanistan to help their Afghan Communist allies — to ensure better coordination among the Soviet and Afghan soldiers in their fight against the Jihadis, given their language affinity. This was a huge miscalculation because desertions and betrayals from their Muslim units started as soon as the war broke out. The incompetence of these units was so high that the Soviet Union decided to pull them out just after three months into the war and replaced them with units formed by Slavic soldiers.
The threats posed by the Muslim soldiers were on different levels — some of them fraternised with the locals, while others were reluctant to fight and some outright showed open disloyalty and joined the ranks of the Jihadis. According to some estimates, the desertion rate was as high as 60–80% during the first year of the war. Since the Soviets had to replace all their Central Asian units with European units, it severely reduced the size of Soviet forces deployed in Afghanistan and left a long-lasting impact on the war. Although the Central Asian Muslim troops played a crucial role as interpreters on the field, post initial desertions they were only deployed in mixed units and formed a very small part of counter-insurgency operations. In hindsight one can say that the Soviets learnt their lessons the hard way.
Evidence from Medieval India
When the Islamic forces were running amok over entire India, the Vijayanagara Empire in the south held on to India’s Hindu roots. The Hindu kings of the empire were fair to all their subjects and did not discriminate on the basis of religion in their day-to-day activities — so much so that they even hired Muslim soldiers in their ranks. But they were in for a surprise and were betrayed at a crucial moment in the war with the Deccan Sultanate at the Battle of Talikota. The battle — which was going in favour of the Vijayanagara Empire — was lost when there was confusion in the middle of the Hindu army, as they got attacked from the back by their own Muslim commanders and soldiers.
Despite all these disadvantages, the greatest factor was the betrayal of the Vijayanagara Army by two Muslim commanders (Gilani Brothers). At the critical point of the war, Muslim officers in the Vijayanagara army launched a subversive attack. Suddenly Rama Raya found himself surprised when the two Muslim divisions in his ranks turned against him. The Muslim troops of the Vijayanagara army had opened a vigorous rear attack on the Hindus and captured several artillery positions. Several cannon shells landed near Rama Raya’s elephant and he fell from it as his mount was struck by a cannon shard.
These Muslim soldiers were all well decorated in the Vijayanagara army and were treated as equals — but that was not sufficient to stop them from betraying at the crucial moment. All that was needed to turn them against the kafir Hindu king was a call to safeguard Islam by their fellow Muslim army a day before the battle. The results of this war were far-reaching as the Muslim armies then marched and sacked the capital city of Hampi — which now lies in ruins — and set in motion the decline of the Vijayanagara Empire.
The same mistake of trusting Muslims was repeated by the Marathas and was one of the chief reasons for their loss at the Third Battle of Panipat. In the previous wars, Shuja-ud-Daula’s father was helped by the Marathas against his enemies and was supposedly one of their allies. However, when the Marathas needed his help against the invading Afghan army, Shuja-ud-Daula instead of helping the Marathas decided to backstab them and attacked their supply lines. This act of betrayal is also an interesting case study from the point of view of exploiting Shia-Sunni rivalry. Shuja-ud-Daula — a Shia — was often ridiculed and mocked by the Sunni Afghans and Rohillas for his un-Islamic beliefs, but he brushed aside these differences when the opportunity came to prove his loyalty to the Ummah and fight against the Kafir Marathas, despite constant goading from his mother who suggested he join the Marathas given the constant help they had given to his father.
Evidence from Indian National Army (INA)
The Hindu-Muslim riots form a crucial part of pre-partition history of British India. Since the political dispensation in post-independence India has belittled the role of the INA in the Indian independence movement, it ensured that people did not take a deep look at the INA’s shortcomings — especially the behaviour of its Muslim soldiers. To give some background, Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose was a big Islamophile himself and went out of his way to make Muslims comfortable, often claiming that Hindus being in the majority should be magnanimous while dealing with Muslims. However, Muslims being what they are only saw this magnanimity as a sign of weakness.
Muslims formed a core part of the INA led by Netaji and were present in most of its units. A large number of them joined the INA because the Allies were fighting against Turkey, which was still seen as the remnant of the old Ottoman Caliphate. Since Netaji ignored this fact, he was in for a big surprise during the latter stages of the war when the INA experienced Muslim desertions and betrayals on a large scale. The event which triggered this desertion was the change in Turkey’s stand as it joined the war on the side of the Allies. While some of them deserted the INA, others went on to rejoin the British army.
Netaji tried to give geopolitical reasons behind the change in Turkey’s stand but failed to stop this desertion. Once again the Muslims proved that they preferred their pan-Islamic identity over national identity and chose to be slaves under the British — an ally of Turkey — rather than fight for their national independence. Not to forget the fact that the newly minted Pakistani army in 1948 made a good harvest from these former Muslim soldiers in the INA. This is in sharp contrast with the behaviour of Tamil Hindus of Malaysia — most of whom had not even seen India — but joined Netaji in his fight against the British army and remembered him as their hero till the end.
Present and Future
Even today, there are many examples of Indian Muslims in the army working as spies for Pakistan. Despite being only 2% of the Indian army, Muslims contribute a much larger number of spies that are caught working for the Pakistanis. This is because nationalism is almost identical with iconoclasm in Islam. This was the reason why Deobandis at the time of partition did not want partition of India — as there is no concept of nation state or nationalism in Islam, only allegiance to Islam and Allah. This is the reason that we hear in everyday news about Muslims opposing even secular slogans like Jai Hind, as Islam does not allow praise of any other entity other than Allah.
This is not to say that all Muslims serving currently in the armed forces are traitors. There are brave Muslim martyrs who have won the highest military honours like the Param Vir Chakra. However, those numbers are too small in the grand scheme of things. Is the benefit of having a few Param Vir Chakra-capable nationalist Muslims worth the risk of betrayal that comes from assuming Muslim trust — especially when the risk is so huge that we might lose parts of our country to the Islamic barbarians in the west? In modern days the war is decided by intelligence reports rather than slug matches, which makes unit integrity even more important.
In the wake of the Sachar Committee report, there has been a debate about changing the religious composition of the army and increasing Muslim representation. But given the long history of Muslim betrayal in the past, this policy change will be a big compromise on Indian security. Instead of trying to create artificial secularity and give pseudo-justifications based on a false sense of moral righteousness, India should be pragmatic and limit the number of Muslim soldiers in its ranks. To quote George Fernandes:
The Muslim is not wanted in the armed forces because he is always suspect — whether we want to admit it or not, most Indians consider Muslims a fifth column for Pakistan.
— George Fernandes
If India disregards history and fails to learn from the experiments of Vijayanagara and the Marathas, it will soon join them as an entity in the history books of tomorrow and museums.
References:
Subhas Chandra Bose – Another Look Part 1: “The Seeds of Islamophile Secularism”
Christian Bleuer, Soviet Muslim Soldiers in Afghanistan
Contextual editorial illustration for the restored article.
The below video is a perfect example of Dhimmitude exhibited by the Hindus. Mohan Bhagwat was speaking at an event when a student posed him a question linking poverty and Ram Mandir.
[Embedded video: Mohan Bhagwat responds to student question on Ram Mandir and poverty] — restored contextual visual.
Random kid: Does making “Ram Mandir” ensure food for the poor? (Kya Ram Mandir banane se garib ki thali mein roti aayegi?)
Mohan Bhagwat: Ram Mandir has not been made yet — did it ensure food for the poor? (Kya ab tak nahi bani, to garib ki thali mein roti aa gayi?)
The above question had the spirit similar to The Economist’s cartoon when India launched the Mars Orbiter Mission two years ago. Then the theme was that India is so poor that it should not pursue space activities. Now the same logic is applied to building the Ram Temple.
Mohan Bhagwat explained it well in the last few seconds of the above video — that Ram is a cultural icon of India and his temple is just one way of remembering him and honouring our past. The Hindus need to stop chanting “Sarv Dharam Sambhav” in every situation and need serious lessons in nationality and religion to be able to answer such pointless questions.
There is an important story from Hitopadesh, where one of the characters reciting the “Vasudhaiva Kutumbkam” shloka is shown to be a brotherhood-preaching shrewd subversionist. It gives a clear warning against blindly welcoming any idea, individual or group without due diligence of studying their history, nature and intent. The story is about Subuddhi the Crow, Chitranga the Deer, and Ksudrabuddhi the Jackal. The moral of the story is that one should not blindly fall for calls of universal brotherhood.
A variant of the story from the Mahabharata is even depicted in Mahabalipuram, sculpted under the Pallavas, with an ascetic cat mimicking Arjuna’s devout pose.
While Babri Masjid is just another mosque for Muslims, the significance of Ayodhya for Hindus is very different — it being the birthplace of Ram. The only reason that this issue has dragged on forever is probably due to the Dhimmitude shown by Hindus and the iconoclasm of Muslims. While Muslim iconoclasm has been bolstered by various laws passed by the Indian state since independence, the Dhimmitude of the Hindus is the plain and simple result of too many “Vasudhaiva Kutumbkam” style shlokas that are often repeated in popular parlance. It is high time that Hindus teach their kids some solid worldly lessons from Panchatantra and Hitopadesha!
Originally published January 29, 2016 on Yuga Parivartan.
Editorial illustration for “Shabrimala to Shani temple- tale of anti-Hindu feminists”.
Feminism is a good concept in theory but in practice it is just another Marxist tool to destroy cultures around the world. Since the Mohammedans will not listen to banning females from praying alongside men, or clad them in burqa, or giving divorce by saying triple talaq — nor will the Christians declare a female as the next Pope — the next best target for beloved feminists are Hindus. Since they are a fragmented lot and do not organize nationwide protests, they form an easy target.
For all its ills that modern feminism poses, the recent outrage is one more addition to the attempts where they are using state and mob power to push reforms down the throat of commoners. Whether forceful entry into a specific temple can be disguised as a Hindu reform is another important point to ponder. These outrages are nothing but part of a global agenda to destroy native customs and cultures under the guise of modernity and liberalism. The Jallikattu ban also falls under this category and is well analysed by us here. Let’s go into the details of why this recent outrage by a few women has been over the top and unjustified.
The most pertinent point is that a temple is not public property where people can party or drink alcohol (except in the Bhairav temple!). A random stranger cannot barge into your house because it is private property. People are allowed to form organizations and restrict their membership as well as determine the use of their premises. Similarly a temple, like any such organization or society, is formed by its local devotees who have the sole right to decide entry criteria.
Hinduism is not a religion driven by canon like Islam or Christianity and does not prescribe do’s and don’ts to everyone. All regions have their local customs which need to be respected and if needed reformed by the locals — and cannot be imposed by the champagne-sipping elites in Delhi circles. Women not only enter temples but engage in various religious activities in Hinduism, and so specific traditions guided by local mythology (like in the case of Sabarimala or Shani temple) should not be over-emphasized or blown out of proportion. In this particular case, women are allowed to enter the temple but cannot touch the main deity stone because Lord Shani is a celibate Brahmachari. Logic follows that if you are a believer you would follow and respect this tradition — otherwise why would you want to enter a specific temple where you are not invited, since you can always choose another one? The vandalism by these activists only proves that this was an organised protest to gain political mileage.
Given points 1 and 2 above, it is no longer difficult to understand why entry restrictions by these temples are not similar to discrimination against Dalits in pre-independence India — a point frequently raised by self-proclaimed reformists who like to equate these issues. While Dalits were systematically discriminated against in many of their village temples, it is not the case with women. Just as some temples or rituals are open to men, there are many other temples and rituals which only allow women — like Attukal temple or Navratri Puja, where only girls are worshipped. So there is no reason for Indians to blindly ape the fake equality notions from the west and kill their traditions.
Given the flexibility provided by Hinduism, these women who are opposing this particular temple tradition could have proved their case much more easily by building their own temple and worshipping Lord Shani. It would have been the most natural and Dharmic way to take this debate forward, but instead they created a ruckus to generate cheap publicity. Since reform was not part of the agenda, they have achieved what they wanted — another controversy.
The fact of the matter is that most of these self-proclaimed liberals and feminists engaged in such protests are the most illiberal kind and treat everyone else who does not toe their line as primates. They are just trying to fulfil a “brown men’s agenda” like the famous “white men’s agenda” of the past. Unfortunately, most Hindus do not understand the designs of the international cabal that is working to deconstruct each and every Hindu tradition and alienate them from their roots under the garb of modernity, feminism, or other famous cultural memes. Since most western social disciplines draw heavily from Judeo-Christian theology, like their cousin monotheistic cults, they want to force everyone to follow the same norms around the world. All these issues — from Jallikattu to the Shani temple — should be seen under this light and recognized as an assault on freedom of religion. Whether Hindus will be able to thwart these attempts against cultural genocide is something that will depend on how they perform in this war of memes.
Editorial illustration for “What Net Neutrality Ayatollahs won’t tell you about FreeBasics”.
Net neutrality has been a hot topic for debate in India since Mark Zuckerberg decided to launch Free Basics in India. In case you were sleeping and just woke up, this debate is about saving the internet from the whims and fancies of big corporate players like Facebook, which plans to offer free but limited internet in India through Free Basics. Without going too much back and forth, let’s look at the arguments put forth by the main protagonists against Free Basics and see how weak they are. The list of arguments below is taken from the blog savetheinternet.in.
Claim 1
There are other successful models for providing free Internet access to people, without giving a competitive advantage to Facebook. Free Basics is the worst of our options.
Rebuttal
No one has stopped other firms from offering these models. If they are really better than FB, let the consumers decide. If one type of banana is bad and rotten, does it need government intervention to restrict people from eating it? Wouldn’t the free market ensure that if Free Basics is really the worst product, it will be thrown out of the market?
Claim 2
Facebook doesn’t pay for Free Basics, telecom operators do. By encouraging people to choose Free Basics, Facebook reduces the propensity to bring down data costs for paid Internet access.
Rebuttal
This is a one-sided argument. When buying a new product, people often choose limited services so they can try and make up their mind — like a limited cable TV subscription that can be later upgraded. Similarly, new users who get hooked to the internet will not be satisfied with a limited package of Free Basics, thus demanding the full internet package in the future.
Claim 3
Free Basics isn’t about bringing people online. It’s about keeping Facebook and its partners free, while everything else remains paid. Free Basics is a violation of Net Neutrality.
Rebuttal
It is proof by redundancy. First, define net neutrality as an inviolable concept and then by default anything that violates it becomes non-halal.
Claim 4
Internet access is growing rapidly in India. We’ve added 100 million users in 2015. Almost all the connections added in India the last 1 year are NOT because of Free Basics.
Rebuttal
How is this even relevant to the debate? Just because India added 100 million users in 2015 does not mean there are no other users to be added any more. The subscription base cannot be used to determine whether a new product should be launched or not.
Claim 5
Free Basics is not an open platform. Facebook defines the technical guidelines for Free Basics and reserves the right to change them.
Rebuttal
Facebook is offering a limited service for free and should be free to choose the technical guidelines. Android is free but Google still enforces technical guidelines for future developers. This is just one way to harmonize the products offered under Free Basics.
Claim 6
The only source of info on Facebook’s Free Basics is Facebook, and it misleads people.
Rebuttal
This is another bizarre argument. Since when did Amul start advertising for Mother Dairy’s milk products? The above fact is not even true, given that so much info about Free Basics is provided on the savetheinternet.in website itself. Review columns on newspapers and websites exist for the precise reason that they help in dissecting the noise from real value.
Claim 7
Facebook gets access to all the usage data of all sites on Free Basics and gives data to the NSA. This is a security issue for India.
Rebuttal
This is a worthwhile issue to debate — and Facebook can be asked to have its servers in India. But how is this argument related to the holy grail of “net neutrality”? Even without Facebook offering Free Basics, the current servers of Facebook are located in the US and open for abuse by the NSA.
Claim 8
Research has shown that people prefer to use the open web for a shorter duration over a limited set of sites for a longer duration.
Rebuttal
Well, if that is what people prefer to do rather than pay, why do the Gods of net neutrality find it indigestible? Eating hamburgers is bad for health and is proved beyond doubt, but should we have campaigns to outright ban them?
Claim 9
Facebook says that Free Basics doesn’t have ads, but does not say that it will never have ads.
Rebuttal
So if Facebook agrees to never put ads on Free Basics, will it somehow become kosher? Even currently, the entire internet is littered with ads — does that make it less useful? People who do not prefer ads either opt out or reduce consumption of internet sites which have too many ads. This would be true even for Free Basics.
Claim 10
Facebook has shown people as saying they support Free Basics when they haven’t.
Rebuttal
This can be challenged in the court of law if savetheinternet.in really thinks it is a criminal offence. But again, this argument has nothing to do with the net neutrality debate. How Facebook got those signatures is immaterial to allowing Facebook to offer another internet service in the market.
As can be seen from above, none of the arguments put forth by the opponents of Free Basics can withstand basic logical reasoning. But it is no wonder that years of socialist brainwashing in India has created deep distrust for the market economy while giving a free pass for indiscriminate government intervention that has time and again failed the common citizen. The only thing that interventions like this can achieve is setting bad precedents that would allow the hounding of any new customer service in the future by online petitioning. It will also open the possibility for incumbent firms to hire specialist agencies to create a stir against new rival firms, killing the creative destruction mechanism which forms the bedrock of any well-functioning market economy.
Another important argument that is completely missed in the whole debate is that the biggest threat to free speech and the open internet is from governments around the world — not from big corporations. Frequent banning of websites in different countries is a testament to this abuse of power. Using government to kill Free Basics, the net neutrality activists are only playing into the hands of government which will use this precedent in the future to censor negative opinion by passing ad-hoc laws. The only thing that net neutrality activists should defend is freedom of choice as well as freedom to innovate. As long as these basic principles are followed, the best product will win over the consumer market without the need to endorse the bigger evil — unchecked state power.
Editorial illustration for “From fall of Olympics to Jallikattu ban”.
The Abrahamic war on Paganism has been perfected over the centuries and the recent ban on Jallikattu is a direct consequence of this old and perfected missionary tactic. One of the essential stages during the spread of Abrahamic religions over the world has been the destruction of paganism from Europe to Latin America to Africa. And the best way to kill paganism is to strike at its root by disconnecting the natives from their roots — turning sons against father, society and native religion. The cookbook of turning people against their forefathers has been refined over the centuries by these imperialistic religions. But how do you disconnect people from their roots?
The best way to achieve this objective is to chop down on native social traditions ranging from festivals, feasts, sacrifice and every social activity which defines the local society. Sometimes this objective was achieved in an overt fashion as exemplified by Mohammed destroying the idols of Arabic pagan Gods on his return to Mecca. With this single masterstroke, Mohammed completely disconnected the Mecca residents from their traditional culture which revolved around their pagan deities. Without common identity, customs and rituals to bind them, the old pagan society crumbled under Islamic barbarity in Arabia. If the sword was not powerful enough to censor ritualism, other machinations were deployed to achieve this objective.
But Islam only picked up these techniques later, much after Christianity had used them for several hundred years and was already a prominent religion. So it is important to look at the methods used by early Christians to destroy pagan societies and see whether the Jallikattu ban follows the old Church template. The only difference being that now western governments use secular institutions like NGOs and think-tanks to denounce native practices and de-link people from their traditions. Such societies then become easy fodder for proselytization attempts by the Church.
The suppression of Olympic games by the Church
The ancient Olympic games were the most important part of Greek identity but in 380 AD, when Emperor Theodosius I announced Christianity to be the official state religion of the Roman Empire, the Olympic games became the first victim of zealous Christian clergy. In 391 AD and 392 AD, Theodosius I further issued edicts to outlaw the pagan practices of sacrifice, libations, garlands, and divination throughout his territory. This would prove to be the final nail for the Olympics — celebrated in honour of Greek God Zeus — and other sports in their outwardly pagan forms. Finally in 426 AD, Emperor Theodosius II finished the work started by his grandfather and burned down the Temple of Zeus and other Olympia buildings including the great stadium of Olympia.
The burning down of the Temple of Zeus was the last step in establishing the supremacy of the monotheistic Christian God. But as mentioned above, the work to discredit pagan beliefs began much earlier as the Church actively used state power to ban different pagan practices. In 392 AD, Theodosius prohibited circus games on Sunday so that people would not be distracted from Sunday mass. The gradual decline of Gladiatorial fights under Constantine I, Constantine II, and complete closure under Honorius in 404 AD also happened under the influence of the Christian council as Roman kings restricted their soldiers from participating in these events and decreased the frequency of these events.
All these actions paved the way for removal of the statue of Zeus from Olympia. This statue was one of the primary attractions of the city and the Olympic games were discontinued soon after these events. No surprise that Olympia became a Christian town by the 5th century with its buildings falling into ruin or taken over by the Church.
The accommodations for the athletes and guests were at this point no longer used for their original purpose. Blocks from the gymnasium gate and perhaps from the palaestra too, and statue bases from the nymphaion were reused in the church.
— Sofie Remijsen, The End of Greek Athletics in Late Antiquity
The template thus used by the Church was very simple — look down upon all native traditions and either ridicule them to stop them covertly, or use the power of the state and mob and suppress them overtly. A gripping account of the destruction of ancient pagan culture and along with it the scientific temper was the subject of the movie “Agora” released in 2009:
[Embedded: Agora (2009) — trailer or clip on destruction of pagan culture] — contextual restoration.
But it was not all easy for the Church as the pagans did fight back for some time. There was a brief period between Constantine II and Valentinian where Julian the Apostate did his best to revive paganism by reviving games and festivals — but the poor fellow failed because the Church had become deeply entrenched in the Roman power structure and society by then. Paganism lost hold on Greek minds as they became victims of rational philosophy, escapist mystery cults and the reforming zeal of Christians who stamped out the pagan sacrifices, idolatry and rituals.
The suppression of sports and rituals in India
The targeting of Akali Nihangs and decline of Sikh martial traditions under the British Raj also followed the same template. Gatka, which was predominantly a battle art, was turned into performance art as the British hanged and imprisoned the Ustads and hunted down the Nihangs out of Punjab. This was done with such clinical precision that not only Sikhs forgot and gave up their traditional practices but also became one of the most loyal servants of the British.
The British made other similar attempts and banned Ayudh Puja as well as most other martial arts traditions like Silambam and Kalaripayat. Although these decisions had the objective to protect British colonialism in India, one should not miss the cultural aspect — the British had a deep desire to “civilise” the local Satan worshippers.
The recent fashion to rid Hinduism of its original pagan form while absorbing Hindu spirituality in the name of secularising Yoga, Advaita etc. should also be seen under this light. Once these philosophies are de-linked from their Hindu roots by banning the outward pagan rituals, the task of luring people into monotheistic creeds or hedonistic consumerism becomes much simpler.
The forces behind these bans
The current attempts to ban Jallikattu should be seen as a continuation of past attempts to suppress local traditions in pagan societies. The only thing that has changed is the players in the game. Instead of overt participation of the Church, now we have NGOs and other pressure groups who want to subvert local traditions. No surprise that in almost all cases, the customs and rituals under the scanner have an association with Hinduism — the last citadel of global paganism.
Most Hindu traditions are local in nature and closely related with local social life. This makes them easy targets as it is difficult to rally support from other Hindus in case of suppression by the state. Given the past success of proselytization attempts post destruction and vilification of native pagan traditions, one should expect that these attempts will only increase in the future in India — sometimes under the garb of animal protection and other times to promote equality, gender or otherwise. The recent judgements against temple elephants, Dahi Handi during Mumbai Gokulashtami celebrations, or the Sabarimala and Shani Shingnapur worship traditions are the disjointed pieces of this puzzle that one needs to put together to understand the big picture.
In this whole drama, the most worrying aspect is the fact that most of these decisions have come from the Supreme Court which has no mandate to interfere selectively and pass judgements against some local traditions while closing their eyes on other more reprehensible social practices. This probably gives a sense of infiltration of the deep state or current liberal memes in Indian judiciary. Also, the hurry shown by the SC to entertain such PILs, when many other important cases are pending, only leads to further distrust in the institution.
To counter this propaganda — and given the hold of Marxist thought in popular parlance in India — there is an active need on the part of Hindus to thwart any such attempts against local traditions. Given the presence of social media, it is much easier to identify and target the hypocrisy of individuals who want to ban Jallikattu while enjoying a piece of steak for dinner. But it is not enough, as Hindus usually try to brush off the strength of the enemy by citing that they have survived this onslaught for more than 2000 years. A cursory look at the epitaphs of various pagan societies from around the world should be enough to ring an alarm bell that they are not special and many other civilizations have been destroyed using similar techniques. So every attempt to ban and ridicule local rituals and traditions, no matter how small, should be thwarted at every level of society.
References:
Christianity and the Roman Games — Richard F. Devoe
The End of Greek Athletics in Late Antiquity — Sofie Remijsen
The Fall of the Ancient Olympics: The Theodosian Code
Editorial illustration for “Third battle of Panipat- Did Abdali win or Marathas lose?”.
Today is the 255th anniversary of the third battle of Panipat, which was fought between the Afghans and the Marathas in 1761. There is a plethora of information available on the third battle of Panipat, down to the exact dispositions of the men and officers. This has been the most analysed battle in the ancient to medieval era in India. Thus this story can be recounted in exact detail.
The roots of the expedition lay in Afghan king Ahmad Shah Abdali’s repeated invasions of India. In 1757, he invaded again at the invitation of Najib Khan Rohilla, the leader of the Afghans who had settled in the Katehr region of UP. Because these Afghans had come from Roh in Afghanistan, Katehr’s name was changed to Rohilkhand — needless to say that the name has not yet been changed by the ‘secular’ governments that regularly trample upon the rights of Hindus.
The 1757 invasion of Abdali was a particularly brutal invasion. Not only was Delhi looted, but the Mughal princesses were forced into the bed of Abdali and his son. Mathura was sacked and the Yamuna was turned red for several miles with the bodies of dead people. Eventually the pile of dead corpses became infected and diseases broke out in Abdali’s army, which finally prompted him to retreat back to Afghanistan.
How it started
The Wazir of Delhi, Imad-ul-Mulk had kept a force of Marathas in his pay under Antaji Mankeshwar. They had been borrowed from the Peshwa. These gave a good account of themselves as they killed two thousand Afghan soldiers, but had to retreat as they were numbering only four thousand and were outnumbered.
The Indian Afghans under Najib Khan Rohilla now dominated not only Delhi, Haryana and the region between the Ganga and Yamuna, but also Rohilkhand. The Wazir Imad-ul-Mulk realised that only the Marathas could deliver Delhi from this menace and invited them to Delhi with a powerful force.
Marathas conquer Delhi and Punjab
The Peshwa sent his brother Raghunathrao (popularly called Raghoba) with a powerful force into North India. Raghoba immediately captured Delhi and Najib Khan became a prisoner in his hands. This was the right moment to kill Najib as he was one who was inviting Abdali and could invite again. Besides, he had the blood of innocent people of Mathura on his hands.
But Najib paid Malhar Rao Holkar, the Maratha ruler of Malwa, huge bribes to save his life. Malhar Rao prevailed upon Raghoba to spare Najib and thus Najib was set free! This was the greatest mistake of Raghoba as the treacherous Najib was to invite Abdali again.
Now Raghoba made a surprising decision and invaded Punjab, which was Abdali’s territory. His forces conquered Lahore and then advanced on to Attock on the Indus, which was considered by Hindus to be the boundary of India. Abdali’s son Taimur, the Afghan governor of Punjab, was defeated and fled. According to the historian Grant Duff:
The Deccan horse had slaked their thirst in the waters of the Indus!
— Grant Duff, History of Mahrattas
In the Maratha capital Pune, there was wild jubilation and the Peshwa talked about capturing Kabul and Kandahar, and ambassadors were sent by Iran on hearing this news. But this actually made Abdali the deadly enemy of Marathas, for Punjab was the breadbasket of his empire, which was otherwise made of arid regions like Afghanistan and Baluchistan.
Having captured Punjab, Raghoba however could not face the biting cold of Lahore as winter came and decamped back to the Deccan with the majority of his army, leaving only 15,000 troops behind. Sabaji Scindia was sent as governor, who went even further and captured Peshawar and garrisoned it with 10,000 men. But the total troops that remained in the province numbered only 32,000 — hardly enough to face Abdali in full force. The Marathas had created enemies in India without destroying them — like the Nizam of Hyderabad, Najib Khan, Hyder Ali of Mysore and others — so troops were needed to garrison other parts of the empire. In hindsight Raghoba’s expedition to capture Punjab must be called a mad expedition.
Abdali was ready for a policy of live and let live — his ambassadors made it clear that he was ready to accept Maratha domination over Delhi, Haryana and western UP, if they gave up Punjab. But the Maratha ambition was boundless and they rejected it. Marathas also made the mistake of not properly taking the help of the Sikhs, who were natural allies for them.
Abdali invades India again — Battle of Barari Ghat
Najib Khan Rohilla had already been making calls to Abdali that Islam in India was in danger. Abdali assembled a force of 60,000 storm troopers — one of the finest cavalry in all Asia, all battle-hardened troops and especially cruel, ferocious and merciless. With this force he advanced from Kandahar along the Indus to Peshawar. Looking at the size and ferocity of his force, the Maratha garrison had to flee.
As Abdali advanced to Sirhind, the news reached Dattaji Scindia, the Maratha Governor of Delhi. Dattaji had been besieging Najib at Shukartal but with Abdali invading India, he was now faced with a superior force of Afghans and Rohillas — more than 1 lakh men. He had about 50,000 men with him, clearly insufficient. The only choice was to retreat, but Dattaji was a proud man.
As Abdali and Najib linked up on the eastern side of the Yamuna, Dattaji prepared on the west bank to fight. It was at Barari Ghat that the battle took place. Dattaji was right in the forefront — a serious mistake, as ideally a general should be at the back to guide his troops. He was shot by Rohilla troops who had muskets, and killed. Immediately panic seized his army and they began to flee.
The Afghans found the body of Dattaji. Najib’s minister Qutub Shah cut his head and took it away as a trophy — and the Marathas had to cremate his headless body. Later the Marathas would take revenge on Qutub Shah for this perfidy.
Maratha expedition to Panipat
The news of Dattaji’s death fell like a thunderbolt on the Marathas when it reached Pune. Great preparations were made for war. The Peshwa’s cousin Sadashivraobhau was selected as commander, for he had recently won a splendid victory over the Nizam at Udgir. He was a great believer in the European style of warfare using long-range muskets handled by well-drilled infantry troops.
The core of the army was 9,000 Gardis with 200 heavy cannon. But this style of warfare went completely against the Maratha style of mobile warfare on horses. The Peshwa added to this army a vast retinue of servants, dancing girls, wives of soldiers and camp-followers totalling more than 200,000 people — totally changing the Maratha style of making war with only light cavalry. This was to have disastrous results.
The fighting men totalled 85,000. Scindias of Gwalior, Holkars of Indore and Gaikwads of Baroda all added lustre to the galaxy of generals. Considering the vast numbers, the army moved slowly and by the time it reached across the Chambal river, the rainy season was at hand.
Arrogance of the Bhau — the friendless Marathas in north India
Once the Marathas had crossed the Chambal, Bhau sent ambassadors to all princes in north India to join him. Only the Jat Raja of Bharatpur joined him temporarily. The ruler of Awadh, Nawab Shuja-ud-Daula joined Abdali. So did the Pathans of Farrukabad. No Hindu was willing to join the Marathas.
The reason was not far to seek. Everyone knew that if the Marathas won at Panipat, they would become the rulers of India — meaning the destruction of everyone, Muslim or Hindu. On the other hand, if Abdali won, not only would they be free of the Maratha menace but Abdali himself would go back. The Afghans did not have the staying power of the Marathas and were not about to create an empire in India. So everyone would survive in the event of an Afghan win. The Maratha behaviour of looting even Hindus had not endeared them to the Hindus.
At Delhi, a war council was held in which both Malhar Rao Holkar and Jat Raja Suraj Mal gave sound advice to Bhau. They asked that the heavy baggage, women and camp-followers should be sent southwards, as it would prove a major impediment. In the event of defeat they could run away on light horses and escape to fight another day.
But Bhau rejected this advice! He insulted Malhar Rao by calling him a shepherd and insulted Jat Raja Suraj Mal by calling him a mere Zamindar. Thus Bhau resolved to take the women and camp followers into the zone of battle. Suraj Mal was so incensed that he abandoned the Marathas and went back to his domains. Malhar Rao secretly began talks with Najib Khan to save his own skin — and Najib agreed not to fight Malhar if he also did not attack Najib.
Afghans deliver the masterstroke of the war
From Delhi, Bhau moved northwards. He captured Kunjpura — a base of Abdali’s communications with Afghanistan — by bombardment, putting the entire Afghan garrison to death and finding Qutub Shah, who had cut off Dattaji’s head, and torturing him to death.
Abdali was stunned by the capture of Kunjpura but could not cross the flooded Yamuna. The Marathas enjoyed the huge foodstuffs found there and celebrated Dussehra — forgetting their main task and wasting time in praying.
Bhau made a serious mistake in not keeping strong patrols on the Yamuna. After desperate searching, a shallow crossing was found and the Afghan army crossed. They lost some 500 men to drowning but were finally across. This was truly the masterstroke of the war — Abdali was now south of the Marathas and in a position to cut off their way to the south. The Marathas were now trapped. Their supply line was cut. The Afghans were supplied food and provisions by Najib and allies. On the other hand the Marathas began to starve.
As they moved south, they found their way blocked by the Afghan hordes south of a super-unlucky place which had already seen the defeat of Indian armies twice before. This was Panipat — and this was going to be the third battle fought there.
The rival armies at Panipat
The two armies encamped at Panipat. The Marathas built ditches around their camp and ramparts with cannon at regular intervals. The first few weeks were dominated by the Marathas — their artillery kept firing cannon shells which fell onto the Afghans. Abdali had to move his camp farther south and out of range. The Marathas launched raids onto the Afghan camp.
In the dead of night, 5,000 Rohillas slipped through a weak point into the Maratha camp and started slaughtering them. The Gardi musketeers opened fire and killed more than 3,000 Rohillas — the rest fled. But Bhau’s personal friend Balwant Rao Mehendale was killed, filling Bhau with gloom.
From this point the Afghans dominated the plains between the two armies. All supplies to the Marathas were stopped and starvation began. A large force carrying treasure for the Bhau accidentally went into the Afghan camp in the dark and was annihilated. The vast retinue of servants, women and camp-followers quickly finished the remaining food at Panipat. Animals began to die for want of forage.
At last all men felt so weak that they gathered around Bhau’s tent clamouring for a fight to save their honour. Bhau agreed. Next morning the Marathas marched out with their faces pasted with saffron, as defenders of Hinduism. The date was 14 January 1761.
The battle of Panipat — phases I, II and III
The Marathas opened the action by firing their cannons, but the rapid movement of the Afghans meant that by the time the cannon were elevated and fired, the Afghans were ahead of the position on which they were aimed. The cannonballs fell harmlessly behind the Afghan troops. The cannons, which had proven decisive against static targets at Delhi and Kunjpura, proved useless on the fluid battlefield.
Bhau’s Gardi musketeers on his left then opened fire on the Rohillas and Afghans in front of them. The Gardis worked with clock-like precision — one line fired while the next reloaded. The Afghans on the right began to be decimated; between 8,000 to 9,000 of them lost their lives. The Afghan right seemed to be collapsing. Ibrahim Khan Gardi, their brilliant commander — a Pathan who had earlier rejected Afghan bribes and appeals to common religion, saying “my loyalty lies to the land which I have made my home, not from which I come” — led them magnificently.
However, jealousy grew among the cavalry of Damaji Gaikwad and Vitthal Shivdev posted to the Gardis’ right. They saw the battle being won by the Gardis while traditional Maratha cavalry did nothing. So they charged the Afghan lines before the Afghans had been fully decimated — bringing them within range of the short-range Afghan muskets. The entire charging force was cut to pieces at point-blank range. And since the horse-borne Marathas were now between the Afghans and the Gardis, the Gardis had to stop firing so as not to hit their own comrades.
Meanwhile, in the center the famed Huzrat cavalry scattered the Afghans and charged them, scattering thousands. For the Marathas, this was their golden opportunity. The Afghan right was turned and the center had melted. Considerable gaps had opened in the Afghan lines through which they could safely pass to the south, to safety and food!
But how could they! If they escaped to the south, they would have to leave behind the multitude of women, old and infirm people and servants — those who depended on them for safety. Could a Maratha soldier show his face in Maharashtra if he came back leaving these people to the tender mercies of the rapist Afghans? No. The Marathas after this charge had to return back to their original positions.
Abdali immediately sent his reserves and military police — numbering 10,000 — behind the fleeing Afghans with orders to browbeat them back. The situation was explained to them: they were in a far-off country and if defeated had nowhere to run. Finally they were brought back and re-divided into two groups, one to the centre and one to the right.
The Afghan troops back in position saw that the Gardi troops were now alone without cavalry escort — their protectors having been slaughtered by their own foolish assault. The Gardis were charged in full force. They fought as best as they could but were slaughtered to every single man. Ibrahim Khan Gardi himself was captured. But they and their gallant commander had honoured themselves on the battlefield by taking on a numerically superior force and nearly decimating it.
On the Maratha right, Malhar Rao Holkar had deliberately taken position opposite Najib Khan Rohilla — his secret friend. At a pre-arranged signal, Malhar Rao left his position and escaped from the battlefield. Najib did not attack him. This suddenly exposed the flank of the Scindia troops to his immediate left, who were attacked from the side and cut to pieces. Jankoji Scindia had to run to safety. The Maratha right wing was turned toward the center.
Abdali ordered his Zamburaks — swivel-cannons fitted on camels, more mobile than the static Maratha cannons — to attack. Then he ordered his Iranian troops with distinctive red headgear to attack the Maratha flank. A titanic battle developed. Both sides fought with swords, spears, battle axes and even daggers for more than two hours.
The Peshwa’s son Vishwasrao, the 17-year-old nominal commander, fought like a true warrior by the side of his uncle. When he mounted an elephant to bolster his forces, he was shot dead by an Afghan musket — exactly as Dattaji Scindia had been killed.
At this point, Bhau lost his head and forgot his duty as a general. He knew he could not show his face in Pune to Vishwasrao’s mother. He ordered his bodyguards, numbering hundreds, to accompany him as he plunged into the Afghan lines. Word spread among the Marathas that he had died. Many began to flee. The Afghans hounded them mercilessly. As they fled into the town of Panipat, they were chased and savagely massacred.
Some 75,000 of the 85,000 fighting men lost their lives — in all 2 lakh Marathas lost their lives. In Maharashtra not a single home was left which did not have to mourn the loss of a member. It was verily the doomsday of the Maratha people.
The news reached Shrimant Peshwa Nanasaheb, son of Bajirao, when he was at Sironj. An enigmatic letter came saying:
Two pearls have been lost, so have been 27 gold mohurs and the count of the copper lost is beyond count!
Needless to say, the gold were the sardars and the pearls were Bhau and Vishwasrao. Shocked by the news, the Peshwa breathed his last.
Abdali was not able to hold on to Punjab for which he had fought such an epic battle. The Sikhs took advantage of his weakened condition due to the losses at Panipat and wrested it from him in the coming years. But in Bengal, the race of white men were raising a Union Jack and were smiling at their good fortune.
References:
1. Advanced study in the history of modern India — J.L. Mehta
2. Fall of the Mughal Empire, Volume 2 — Jadunath Sarkar
Editorial illustration for “Why dalits should stay away from suicidal leftist politics”.
The recent suicide of Rohit Vemula, a student at Hyderabad University, has taken the country by storm. The popular narration peddled by the media is that the poor student was pushed to commit suicide due to discriminatory action by the university administration in response to political vandalism exhibited by Vemula and his peers associated with Ambedkar Students Association (ASA). To summarize, Vemula and five other students were expelled from the university after beating up another fellow student and later the punishment was reduced to expulsion from hostel. Since then, these students were protesting against university action and probably under stress. Post suicide, the ASA, media and other political parties are trying to bring in a Dalit angle to this incident by complaining that students were given harsh punishment due to their Dalit identity — a fact which is debatable.
In the following paragraphs, we will not be dissecting this particular incident but talk specifically about how Ambedkar would have been pained by his name being used by anti-national and anti-Dalit organizations like ASA and Ambedkar Periyar Study Circle (APSC). More importantly, we will throw some light on how Dalit politics is hijacked by anti-national leftists and Marxists in India and why Dalits and specifically SC/ST and OBC students should stay away from the politics of such organizations. Under the garb of Dalit identity, these organizations headed by upper caste Hindus (check yourself that top leaders of left parties like CPI(M) etc. are almost always Brahmins or upper castes) want to exploit the fault lines present in Hindu society to further their own agenda and trap poor Dalit students in ugly college level politics.
First, let me ask a few questions about history to get started. Who was the prominent Hindu leader in favour of partition of India before Congress succumbed under Jinnah’s pressure? Who was the prominent leader who wanted proper population exchange at the time of partition and thought without total population exchange Hindus will get a bad deal? Who was the leader who recognised the true destructive nature of Islam that we fail to acknowledge even today after seeing events like Malda and Muzzafarnagar? The answer to all the above questions is Ambedkar. Among the idealists and other crazy national leaders, Ambedkar was one of the few rational thinkers and realists in 1947.
Post-independence, Ambedkar has been digested by the left and his legacy has been reduced to a Dalit thinker. This has been done because Ambedkar’s views were vehemently against Abrahamics (both Islam and Christianity) and state control of the economy. These other identities of Ambedkar have been carefully suppressed by the leftist intelligentsia — and this is one of the reasons that most celebrated Dalit intellectuals today, who are promoted by the media and universities like JNU, demand government control of the economy and side with Abrahamics wherever possible.
Ambedkar’s opinion about Islam is as hard-hitting today as it was 70 years ago. In his book on partition of India, he wrote:
According to Muslim Canon Law the world is divided into two camps, Dar-ul-Islam (abode of Islam) and Dar-ul-Harb (abode of war). A country is Dar-ul-Islam when it is ruled by Muslims. A country is Dar-ul-Harb when Muslims only reside in it but are not rulers of it. That being the Canon Law of the Muslims, India cannot be the common motherland of the Hindus and the Musalmans. It can be the land of the Musalmans — but it cannot be the land of the Hindus and the Musalmans living as equals…
— B.R. Ambedkar, The Partition of India
No surprise that in the last few years of his life, when Ambedkar lost hope of reforming Hindus, he chose to convert to Buddhism — another Dharmic religion — instead of joining the fold of Abrahamics. Ambedkar had written and clearly presented evidence that caste and other evil Hindu practices were equally present in Islam and Christian converts, and so conversion to these cults served no purpose. On top of that, these religions separate the individual from his roots by carefully planting the seeds of extra-territorial allegiance towards Mecca and Rome. So Ambedkar perfectly envisaged that conversion to Abrahamic cults would lead to destruction of Indic civilization.
Looking at the above views of Ambedkar, it is no surprise that the Marxist cabal reduced Ambedkar to a mere Dalit icon. Ambedkar’s image has been used to fuel anti-caste sentiment and promote hatred towards Hinduism rather than reduce casteism from Indian society. Rather than promoting native Dalit intellectual and Dalit entrepreneurship associations like DICCI, Dalits are sold the narrative of victimhood by anti-national rabble-rousers like ASA and APSC and their parent organizations which often follow Marxist ideology.
These parent organizations are usually headed by upper caste elites who want to exploit the fault lines in Hinduism and align with Muslims and Christians to maintain their hegemony. They do not have the best interest of Dalits but use them as mere pawns and cannon fodder in this political game. Does it come as a surprise that in 40 years that CPI ruled Bengal, the CPI Politburo had no Dalit members? Does it come as a surprise that for every Kancha Ilaiah, there are hundreds of Rajdeep Sardesai-style upper caste anti-nationals? When the shit hits the fan, Dalits will always be the first victims and at the receiving end of Muslim atrocities as evidenced from daily events in West Bengal. Given this scenario, Dalits should reject this poison sold by snake oil salesmen in the media and intelligentsia.
Given the analysis above, we can now analyse the current suicide as part of a bigger narrative being built in different parts of India to exploit Dalit identity. This suicide can be traced back to the protest held by these Dalit students against the hanging of Yakub Menon, a proven terrorist. It should not come as a surprise that these Dalits had been brainwashed to such an extent that their protest reflected the anti-territorial affinities usually shown only by hardcore Abrahamics or anti-national apologists.
So, what is the way forward for Dalits? Dalit students should try to stay away from politics and focus on their education, as the free market is their best bet to fight caste discrimination and reform Hindu society. For the politically motivated ones who want to enter student politics, they should realise that leftist jholachaps have little to offer them except false victimhood. They need to realise that a stronger and united India is more in the interest of Dalits than the current generation of upper caste rulers and intelligentsia, who want to consolidate power by playing divide and rule. Only when Dalits realise and neutralise this nefarious design can they claim the legacy of Ambedkar and fulfil his dream of creating a strong and just India.
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