In Search of Political Will: Fight Against Militants in Swat

Bhatti, you need to slow down a bit.

Haste and sufi-ism does you injustice.

The Sultans tried their damndest to turn things around. But the culture and civilisation was strong and it survived the onslaught.

here is one side of it

"n 1193, the Nalanda University was sacked by Bakhtiyar Khilji;[21] this event is seen by scholars as a late milestone in the decline of Buddhism in India. Khilji is said to have asked if there was a copy of the Koran at Nalanda before he sacked it. The Persian historian Minhaz, in his chronicle the Tabaquat-I-Nasiri, reported that thousands of monks were burned alive and thousands beheaded as Khilji tried his best to uproot Buddhism and plant Islam by the sword,[22] and the burning of the library contin­ued for several months and "smoke from the burning manuscripts hung for days like a dark pall over the low hills.".[23] When the Tibetan translator Chag Lotsawa (Chag Lo-tsa-ba, 1197–1264) visited the site in 1235, he found it damaged and looted, with a 90-year-old teacher, Rahula Shribhadra, instructing a class of about 70 students.[24].[25]

Ahir considers the destruction of the temples, monasteries, centers of learning at Nalanda and northern India to be responsible for the demise of ancient Indian scientific thought in mathematics, astronomy, alchemy, and anatomy.[26] Many institutions off the main route such as the Jagaddala Monastery in northern Bengal were untouched and flourishing.[citation needed]
[edit] "

The state is yet to recover from this - the region is yet to recover. In Pakistan you Taxila itself. Destroyed by the islamic hordes.

Maybe your case would be stronger if you did try to sentimentalise historical facts,. as some else here said, no point going back into history for all you do is dig stuff you would not want repeated or something to this effect.

#68 Posted by krbhatti on
Bhatti Mian,

The question of values and culture is not so simple. You still don't understand that in the beginning and till those guys started learning things in 1000AD or later from India (again those, like Omar Khayyam, Ibn Sina, Al Kindi, Al Beiruni who were considered kafir by pure muslims), arab/muslim inavders were much less civilized (compared to those cultures, like Persia or India, which they were invading).

In the beginning the Ghazis/invaders of Islam were almost same as Taliban of today compared to rest of us. All of them were fanatic, carried a team of imams and were committed to convert people to Islam and Islamic culture (and loot slaves and wealth). Neither Indians nor Chinese, not even mongols ever inavaded people with religious committment. Mongols when turned into Mughals got this disease (earlier they were looters, killers but not in the name of religion, that was not norm for them). You are wrong if you say initially Islamists didn't do this- there and there. That is not because Islamists didn't try, but because it was not possible. Ghauri didn't win his first battles, not because he wanted to lose, but he couldn't. Akbar couldn't convert Birbal and todermal to Islam, not because he didn't want or didn't try, but because he couldn't. Birbal and Todermnal were smart and important enough to keep him away (but not everybody was so fortunate), initially and later his zeal somewhat faded.

Again, i don't mind if you convince your mind that all this is randi rona, because till people will do this randi-rona in front of your eyes you will keep on painting taliban of yesteryears in your arbitrary ways. If taliban of today win over pakistan and India, there will be people who will say exactly what you are saying now. The problem is that even omar khayyam and other intellectuals if born now as muslim will not be able to say what they said then, because now it is a huge group ego, at that time it was still a young group ego.


[[

BTW, akbar wanted to convert birbal and others not to Islam but his deen e Ilahi, which was the his attempt to unify the principals of all religions, and which people rejected exactly for the same reasons

]]

It is documented that initially Akbar wanted them to be converted to Islam, but in later days he became less interested in Islam and created his own Din-i-ilahi, and it was again a middle path. Tansen converted to Islam and not to din-i-ilahi.


Lastly about copts: You shuold read your sources again, the whole reason of conquest of Egypt was to spread Islam? Do you know that? And if you are going to convert people into Islam, what is the local culture you are trying to preserve. You think Islam is one of the most refined and advanced religion of 50,500 AD, where culture is completely detached from religion. And you can think that about Islam???

The reason why people do not get converted is the treaties, the way those people helped invaders initially and such tactics used by invading rulers and the second reason is that things were volatile and people were fighting all the time so winning on war fronts or maintaining empire was becoming more important than converting everyone under rule to Islam at one go. Christian and muslims were fighting in egypt, middle east and europe, In india almost every body was interested, that included mongols, theire descendants mughals, persians, greeks, turks and whatever you can think of.





Lastly, if you can not think of past properly when you have chance, don't assume you can think about future properly.

Re: # 64

Pinku Mian,

Yes, it was norm of the day throughout the world and that spilled into India from which Indian people could not defend themselves. We can do as much RR about it but yes, indians could not defend themselves.

On your second question of keeping values, there are two set of approaches. The first one which was adopted by the initial Islamic invaders was not to harm the local values. Hence copts in Egypt are still there, jews till the first world war had more confidence and sense of security in islamic lands than anywhere else in the world. And yes agree with it or not, but yes the huge mass of people i.e. India (including north india) did carry on their values. If the ghanavis and ghouris killed many, so did mongols. But it is part of the game that is empire buildings...

BTW, akbar wanted to convert birbal and others not to Islam but his deen e Ilahi, which was the his attempt to unify the principals of all religions, and which people rejected exactly for the same reasons.....

Ok, my fault... u did that already....

I took the cue from #65....

Yaar Pinku badshah,

Next time, can you please refer to what r u replying to and what post you are commenting on.....

Re: # 64
Pinku - this was one of the most lucid and dispassionate summary of events that you mentioned. This is where Islamist
wars stand out even amongst the barbarity of the years gone by.

Congratulations.

Bhatti ji could only come up with an arguement that this was all 'randi-rona'.
Congratulations to him too :)

#59 Posted by krbhatti on

[[
Suffice is to say that this invasion pattern was the norm of empires in those days.
]]

Bhatti, your answer is illogical. "norm" of the day doesn't tell you what is appropriate. Taliban style ruling may become "norm" of the day and things will be god then?? Right?

So invaders killing and converting people was norm of the day for ISlamic tribes but not for Indians. And who cares what is "norm of the day" for them. They invaded persia and turned it into their "norm of the day" style people. They invaded India, tried to convert it to their "norms" by all means, couldn't because here they dealt with too many people, half of them in the south they couldn't rule most of the time.

Again, it is stupid to claim that

[[
Keep in mind that whereever Islam went, it allowed the locals to keep their values intact.
]]
Only fools will see history like that. The question again is what Islam didn't do to kill local values. Start from invasion of persia and roam around the world and you should get the answer. Despite the fact that every body else had much better culture than your so called norm of the day invaders, local civilization and culture was hurt badly because of strong tribal influence.



[[
You and a billion hindus is a good example of that. You would not have been here if there was no tolerance in Islam.]
]]

What is it that muslim rulers didn't do to force them to convert. The credit that you still see so many hindus go to the Indian population which was beyond Arab counting all the time and the fact that they could rule south most of the time. North they corrupted merrily, even Akbar tried to convert Birbal, converted Tansen and forced todermal but failed to convert him. From killing, to snatching land, to giving high position every thing was used to convert people.

LeT = Sarkari funded Jehadi,

Talibanis = non-sarkari funded Jehadi


Now there is going to be an automatic merger of the two.

Paki Elites thought that their sarkari funded jehadis are going to follow their diktats.

Now this illusion is breaking and soon the monster is going to go after them .including the sarkari ones they once trained and funded!!!

General Hamid Gul Zindabad!!

Hamid Gul for the first PM of Taliban Republic of Pakistan!!

Bhatti.....oopps apologies KB!

BHati (for a moment forget the RR thing...and lets get back to your topic)

So its okay for people to be called Kafirs, kafr, kanjars etc. But okay to be called a dirty islamic terrorist, or whatever!

If you feel offended by the terminology used by the literalist Islamists, and their choice of words/phrases and anecdotes to describe you this article is for you

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/feb/11/freedom-of-speech-rac e



(a)regularly uncover new "outrage" over Muslim extremists referring to dirty kaffirs as less than pigs, etc.

(b)Modern civilisation depends on these shared norms and values.



But it point (b) which the literalists do not seem to enjoy much.

For Ambassador Holbrooke



Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Amina Masood Janjua

Dear ambassador: I am writing to you on behalf of the aggrieved people of Pakistan who have suffered tremendously in the last eight years. They have deep wounds and scars upon their hearts, incurred by their country's participation in America's war on terror which has caused many grave human rights violations within Pakistan.

//////from jang of today/////////////

My dear Amina,

When millions were slaughtered in east pakistan none of the pakis cared, even the amdur rahman report is not published and you did nothing about it.

When samia sarwar was murdered you di nothing.

Take it from me amina, the human right violations that you tak about today is built into teh pak ideology. That si why there was ethnic cleansing in pakistan, in 1947 there were 15 percent hindus and none remains.

When ahmadias were tattacked you did nothing. When hoodood was passed you did nothing.

Now you have the stupidity to write to hol;brook and say that paki human rights violations are due to teh yanks.

Amina, read what is TNt and you will find that is the source of human rights violatons.

Re: # 52

BJ Kumar,

Half way reading your post, I realized that it was all Randi Rona (thanks stuka). Suffice is to say that this invasion pattern was the norm of empires in those days. And the invasion from north was bound to happen, with only difference that invadors from north would have been non muslim, if not muslims... Just like many invasions of pre islamic era...

Re: # 56

NKG,

I know my history. I know why Ghaznavi came and why Ghori came and why Muhammad bin Qassim came. It was an imperial expansion and nothing else... But remember, this was the norm of empires in those days...

Re: # 51

Urstruly,

Your logic is flawed. When the constitution says that people of pakistan have the land, then how will of people is exercised? Apart from private properties, which state cannot take, the state possession is the possession of the land by people. Or you want to say that on state land whoever wants and whenever wants can construct anything that he/she likes?

And I do have the logical reasons to invoke the Lal Masjid and swati Mulla's incidences. They are/were agents of anarchy. They reject the accepted way Dawa to convince people for their cause, and instead take out lathis and Ak-47 to make people subordinate, which the kharijis did. So, they have no sympathy from me. and I say this loud and clear...

Re: # 30
Krb...
That is what Islamic version of history says...You need to study the spread of buddhism...
Persian or Indians never invited muslas (arabs or central asians) though Pakis are made to believe that muhammed bin kasem was invited by Sindhis....
The benchmark of a social system, is what it contributes to society and how it reacts to difficult situations...
the pattern accross the musla world does make people believe that, Islam/muslaism has brought anything but social indiscipline and destruction of civilian institutions...(yester years Taxila university is todays centre of spreading hatred...)

religious ga.dugiri is inhumane because who am I to to tell the aborigines of Australia, natives of Amazon what is the best for their spiritual growth. If they find solace at the feet of local kalubais, Yellama Devis, mother Amezona or Pacefica, who am I to tell them that some moon good of desert land is "real" god. The real problem is I have not found myself and I am trying to search myself in distant, alien and long dead era, culture and verbiage.

Let bakiland be an example of good governance, material prosperity and equality first and then preach others. All religions need to be first judged by the behaviors of its adherent.