Dhokha and Being a Muslim in India

P3,

it is all done very begrudgingly and dispassionately with no pride involved.

Well, at least better than being completely overlooked.

Regards

Re: # 316

Majumdar,

You must be kidding me! I don't remember any positive references to our so called Hindu past in our curriculum. Harappa, Moenjodaro an Taxila are mentioned but when I look at it in retrospect, it is all done very begrudgingly and dispassionately with no pride involved.

Tahmed sahib,

Re: 313

Does Pakistan school/college history books cover pre- 712 history or as the Indian detractors say completely avoids all mention of pre- 712.

Regards

#312 not only have the brits accepted the US definition - i read an article by a brit where he commented on how fortunate the brits were to know english, now that it has become the virtual lingua franca.

DM sahib,

My first English dictionary a 1950s vintage OED defined 1 billion as 1,000,000,000,000.

Regards

#309 DM: You are merely repeating the standard Indian line when you say "Indo-Pak Muslims are allergic to any talk of their ancestors' achievements before they converted to Islam". This may be true of indian muslims you have met, but it is certainly not true of Pakistan.

What have I been saying in my posts below, e.g.? And dont say I am in a minority - Pakistanis take pride in being heirs to the indus valley civilization, to the gandhara civilization, as well as their muslim heritage.

Granted that they dont see kautlya and panini in the same warm light as they see the harrapan civilization or taxila, but that is the same short-sightedness that indians take when they disown their muslim heritage.

majumdar, tahmed:

Interesting tidbit re. billion. When I was in high school, a billion was equal to a million-millions; when I came to the US, it was a thousand-millions. Now, it is universally a thousand-million. I guess, the British, whose measure I learnt in high school, too have accepted the american definition.

#307 i had understood "bharat" to be a tribe, and my point was that this was just one of gazillions of tribes in india. So what's the big deal about what stretch of land one tribe thinks it owns.

You say it is a king. That makes my point even better. Instead of being ispired by land-grabbing dreams of some long dead individual, I was suggesting to nkg/guru to broaden their vision a bit.

DM sahib,

For example, is there a more popular book for Hindus in North India than Tulsidas's Ramayan? And this Ramayan was written during the Mughal period. Kabir, Surdas, Meera were all writing during the Mughal rule.

I have actually pointed this out to Nkg moshai but in his opinion all that was written in this period- is basically small stuff compared to Kalidas, Tagore et al.

Regards

nkg#303,304:

Indo-Pak Muslims are allergic to any talk of their ancestors' achievements before they converted to Islam and reflexively try to "balance" any such talk with human achievement elsewhere. But Hindus too seem to do something similar when they equate Muslims to barbarians. There is ample evidence to suggest that when Muslim rulers were tolerant, such as Abbasids in Baghdad, Berber/Arabs in Spain, Ottomans in Europe or Mughals in India, there was progress under their rule as well. For example, is there a more popular book for Hindus in North India than Tulsidas's Ramayan? And this Ramayan was written during the Mughal period. Kabir, Surdas, Meera were all writing during the Mughal rule. The revenue system in North India, with their patwaris, that the British adopted was also developed in Akbar's time and that too by a Hindu Minister, Raja Todar Mal.

majumdar: thanks, and i just realized that. I was getting ready to post this "correction to last part of #305: 400 crore is 4 billion (i left out two zeroes). you are right. the rest of what i say still stands." when I saw your post.

Tahmed sahib,

For once, Guruji is right -400 crores is 4 billion. 40 million is 400 lakhs.

I assume you are familiar with the origins of the term "bharat".

I believe it is named after King Bharat, son of Dushyant and Shakuntala. Do you have a different explanation?

Regards

#297/303 nkg: You are basically saying that you have nothing against people in areas constituting Pakistan, but consider this part of "BharatVarsha" (by which i assume you mean the Bharat Heritage) and consider Islam to have been a destroyed rather than contributed to this.

Like I am saying below to guru - you need to replace "bharatvarsha" with "lok virsa" (i.e. step beyond hindu nationalism and embrace all of humanity). You will then see things in a very different light than the one above, rest assured.

PS: btw, I assume you are familiar with the origins of the term "bharat".

guru #291: "carbon dating is not very accurate, it approximates date by 1K years."

I did not mention carbon dating as a means to determine the age of the earth. In fact, carbon dating is an effective method only until less than 100,000 years, and so not useful in determining the age of fossils or rocks prior to that.

The "minerals" I referred to are zircon, which were used to establish the now generally accepted age of earth, this age being cross-checked with other means.

But I can see you have bigger problems to address when you write "why do tell me about christian stuff.". Facts are not "christian" or "hindu" or "muslim". That is what I am trying to get through to you when I say you need to rise above petty-minded hindu nationalism.

In the rest of your post, you repeat the same pseudo-science mumbo jumbo of some hindu "sage". You can try making 2 + 2 = 6.87 by pointing to the position of Saturn and the phase of the moon and the angle of the sun with reference to the Chapter III of Mahabharata. And you can repeat this magical manter over and over again. But 2 + 2 is still 4.

guru #295 By all means take pride in the achievements of the subcontinent. But dont forget my suggestion of stepping beyond petty hindu nationalism and seeing yourself as heir to all of mankind's scientific and cultural achievements. I suggest you visit Taxila sometime (you will need to come to Pakistan to that!) - you will see how that city has layers of civilzations reflected in it. Including a buddhist monastery adjacent to building foundations with greek carvings. A museum built in british days, now tended to by muslim guardians. That is what I am talking about.

#296 guru: you write "400 crores is 4 Billion years."

No, it is not. 400 crores is 400,00,000 (or 40 million years). 4 billion is 4,000,000,000. Please write more carefully. The rest of you post is the same mumbo-jumbo pseudo-science that hindu pandits have "educated" you with. Please try to shake out of it.

Re: # 251
GT...
Mughals survived in India due to internal problem between Rajputs. Mughals were not civilised people (unlike British). They had to depend upon Indians on everything. When their barbarism crossed limit - Sivaji/Marathas, united Rajputs and Sikhs kicked them thoroughly...
And unfortunately Ranjit Singh have not killed moslems....His stupidity caused the present problem in India...


Indians are very patient in nature- they do not react, unless and until it becomes extreamly necessary. The way Siv Sena kicked out Islamic thugs from Mumbai- is nice proof of it. When Dawood,Shakeel, Tiger Memon etc... were going out of control (with help of Congress), Siv Sena thrashed them. Now, moslems in Maharashtra crying foul and Congress also not paying much heed to it....
Today there was serial blast in different places of Bangalore. Kannadigas are good people. Couple of more such islamic barbarism may force them to take some reasonable action....

Re: # 247
Tahmed....
contd...
As a place the present day Pakistan had produced one of the greatest lumiaries of computing science - Panini ( Language Theory, which Backus Naur re-invented later). I have no doubt about that. But, I am talking about negative turn around after post islamic invastion of this area.

Muslems (under infleunce of Islam) had brought large scale destruction of civilisational structure. Education was the greatest casualty. In my previous posts, I have provided some of the famous works from India, and historical timeline proves, how that dried up with islamic invastion.
Regarding administration, Indian administration matured very well, post vedic period (1000 BC onwards). There was absolute no value addition from moslems side....
Like Indians were master in metallurgy, science, literature and mathematics, Chinks were master in Silk, textile, pottery, explosive etc... which rest of the world borrowed from them.....