Shalom or Salaam

dostmittar #60 `` Almost all the hindus and sikhs and mainly Panjabi Muslims are like the Palestinians (and the jews from Arab countries) who were kicked out of their homes. ``

The Palestinians fought tooth and nail to prevent the division of their motherland while Punjabi Hindus fought tooth and nail to create the division of their motherland. The Palestinians were innocent victims, the Punjabi Hindus were the cause of their own (and other`s) misery.

``[...] The last time I checked, there are millions of Mohajirs who are proud that they went to the new promised land for which they had fought [...]``

All very true, and all very irrelevant. Where do Muhajirs come into this?? Tell me about the fate of East Punjabi Muslims.


``And the last time I checked, the percentage of Muslims in India was greater than at the time of the partition. What about the percentage of the Hindus and Sikhs in Pakistan? ``

More to the point, what is the percentage of Muslims in East Punjab?

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hey arjun_m:

your problems are not going to be solved even if you come to downtown karachi riding an israeli tank. although i do fear for the plight of poor karachi taxi drivers then. otoh, paki newspaper journalist key tau eid ho jai gee.

Dost-Mittar:

I believe that you need to challenge your concerns on Pakistan`s treatment of its minorities on the following accounts:

1. On what statistical base figure are you assuming that minorities have reduced in numbers compared to Muslims in Pakistan? There are three statistically proven reasons for that to have happened: (1) If you are taking the base percentages of 1947, then you should understand that the minority population was larger in East Pakistan than in West Pakistan. With the separation of East Pakistan, the overall percentage deteriorated. (2) The birth rate amongst Muslims of Pakistan is higher just like it is amongst Indian Muslims or Palestinian Muslims due to stupid `religious` reasons of the stupid paunchy brainless Mullas. The greater the hold of Mullas in any region of Pakistan, the higher the birth rate. In our Pakhtoon belt for example, it is still common to have 6-9 children. People of my generation and with my educational qualifications would have at least four. (3) Muslims from neighboring countries have been migrating to Pakistan and illegally getting Nationalities. Afghans, Indian Muslims and Iranians (mainly Bahai`s) have settled in Pakistan in huge numbers from 1979 onwards.

2. Without any emotional bearings, in Pakistan it can be seen that it is not the oppression of minorities, but the oppression of working class masses (call them Kammis or workers) by the so called landed aristocrats. Therefore, the Hindu landlords of Tharparker of Sindh keep their Hindu masses under same kind of subjugation and humiliation as do the Muslim landlords of Sindh, Punjab and Balochistan their Muslim peasants. This is not present in the NWFP, but we have our other social ills. For example, whereas you may read often that a Muslim peasant woman was paraded naked in some bazaar of a backward Punjabi or Sindhi town, you will rarely find a news of blatant discrimination against a minority women.

3. Instead of targeting the minorities, the majority itself has begun to battle out on who is right. Hence, our extremist sectarian parties and Sunni-Shia feuds. But even here you need to understand that this feud has no roots amongst the people. This is purely terrorism oriented with extremists settling for easy targeted killings. For example, no mob attacks have happened on each other in Pakistan.

4. Even the narrow-minded, thick headed political Mullas have not incited people against each other to get votes. Instead, the Mullas from all sects have joined together under Mesozoic MMA to get a bigger share of the pie.

Now compare the above with India with its founding agenda based on secularism and pluralism.

``This may sound strange to some, but is a simple fact:- the people of India, the man on the street, have welcomed over the past decade with similar enthusiasm a variety of leaders . . . Bill Clinton, Queen Elizabeth, Pervez Musharaf, Ariel Sharon, Jigme Wanchuk, Sultan of Brunei, President of Iran, President of China, assorted Arab leaders, Swiss President, Russian Dadas, Central Asian lords, Afghan leaders of a variety of hues ....``(Veeresh)

....Idi Amin ...Pol Pot....now the Butcher....welcome .....welcome .....to the great land of nondiscriminating Hindutva Morons --

What a timing!...... mr. vege pie......what a timing!!.......indeed a masterly stroke of diplomacy to get a genocidal maniac from Israel meet a Desi one from Gujrat ...bravo

I dont know why people bring in their biases, religious doctrines, and their hangups just to let someone down...It is very well-written article and should be treated on its merit and not by the religion of its author...FV has the courage to say what she feels in an extremely morbid environment where things are getting worse every day...

``And that`s just one example, Farzana, of how showing needless concern for others who do not in the least concern themselves about us, comes in the way of solving our own problems.``(ANURADHA)

my dear Anuradha -- there was a time for India when the ``needless concerns`` about others made us the leader of the third world --

well of course that was the Nehru era of world vision idealism and third world community spirit and camaraderie -- that according to the NEW Father of the Nation -- Mahatma Bal Thackarey -- we should all SHUN now be aSHamed of --

but please do show some `needful concern` -- albeit for purely selfish economic reasons -- about our million Indian citizens who are working as Camel Drivers -- for the Bedouins -- from Libya to Saudi Arabia, to Yemen, Oman, Dubai Kuwait etc........thanks

Re FV 133

Well, your sharpness is matched wonderfully with your apt humor (may I add that the normal vending machine tea in offices here isn`t that great either!)

Please understand that while I disagree with just about every premise and conclusion you draw, I certainly appreciate the passion and good intent that go into the writing. I am sorry that at times some of the interactors (perhaps including myself) have crossed the line between political and personal.

This is strange. Despite my categorical assertion that I do not go along with the Muslim protest against Sharon’s visit, there are some who are hell-bent on trying to score brownie points by living in their precious little cocoons. Go ahead…add up your tally.

Meanwhile, what causes one takes up is entirely one’s prerogative. When I talk about what is happening in my backyard as a part of a community, I am accused of playing the ‘victim’ card. As regards other communities not protesting…remember when the Bamiyan statues where destroyed? When India decides to cootchie-coo with China? When there was killing of foreign missionaries? The prime minister of our country had to pacify the Pope, a religious leader. Where was our concept of ‘politics and religion should be separate’ then?

[this is a hindu-muslim-jewish issue. Muslims hate sharons guts because he has killed muslim palestenians.]

1. This is a Palestinian-Israeli issue. And where do Hindus come in here…unless it is being suggested that India, the host, is now a Hindu nation. Has that happened? On paper?
2. Did not know that sheep grazing on one pasture were supposed to hate the guts of the “butcher” in the slaughterhouse…

[Would the leftists and the raza academy be out in the streets if the saudi princes were invited? the saudis, as you know, funded the al-queda to the tune of half a billion $, gave pakiland 500million$ of oil and year and persecute non-muslims in the kingdom.]

No, they would not. And neither would the saffron brigade. And I do not have to repeat what is common knowledge – who gave fillip to Al Qaeda to begin with?

[The hindu nuts have a point when they say the left(of which you are a card carrying member) never says anything about the persecution of hindus in bangladesh.. ]

1. Why have the Hindus not protested against the persecution of those Hindus? Is it because BD came into being due to no small measure the contribution of our government, where we promptly labeled the PM ‘Durga’?
2. Am I a card carrying member of the Left? Great news…now may I have that card, please?

[This ISN`T about palestenian refugees..Why did you meet a palestenian student for sharons visit? why didn`t you meet an Indian soldier whose life was saved by weapons sold by Israel(sharon being the democratically elected PM of Israel)?]

1. What about the Indian soldiers that die? Should I blame the quality of Israeli weapons then? Or should I rue the fact that the Saudi weapons were better?
2. I did not meet the Palestinian student for this visit. I said I have spent hours with them. This is not the first time I have written on the subject; this is also not the first time anyone has written on this subject.

[Farzana Versey said: ``Indians have a history of being nice to thugs…``
Well atleast we don`t call em ``prophets``. Yeah, one man`s meat is another man`s ... ]

Has anyone called Arafat, Saddam, Osama ‘prophets’? They have been deified, yes…their pictures are carried around and pasted on walls…they become poster boys. Not prophets. But, there was one pandal where Narendra Modi was rubbing shoulders with the Ganesh idol on the same tableau.

Mirror mirror on the wall…

PS: Some have referred to the “bitter tea” I shared with the Palestinian students. I am glad that now besides reading between the lines, the lines too are being read. However, this time there was no metaphor. The tea was really bitter – overbrewed canteen tea with little milk and, considering the seriousness of the ‘cause’, I could not even ask for more sugar…how some of us suffer for those in alien lands!

PPS: Did not know there were so many closet Thackeray fans. He is the only one who relishes only with cleaning up (even if that means getting rid of human beings) his little island -- Mumbai.

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Ref pakfin #106

[You tend to forget that Sindh was probably the only province in India and Pakistan where migration was not forced and the Sindhi Hindus who choose to leave did so of their own will. There was almost no rioting against Hindus and the few incidents that did take place were caused by the migrants from India and were quickly quelled.]

Thank you very much for this information.

The lady from South India who left Karachi with two small children and who awaited her husband for the next two years must be mistaken. They, who were asked to turn their pockets inside out to show they were carrying nothing out of Karachi, why, they must have just had a nightmare because of the vicious propaganda of the RSS.

Thank you kindly for the Pak view of history.

Re: #95

Farzana Versey said: ``Indians have a history of being nice to thugs…"

Well atleast we don`t call em ``prophets``. Yeah, one man`s meat is another man`s ...


Farzana Versey said : ``[A religious muslim leader has no business to take a political stand.] Absolutely! Something we in India must remember at ALL times regarding ALL religious leaders… ``


Well, well, if he can`t stand, I guess he will have a political seat then. A religious person (whatever he/she may be) has every right to have a political stand (or seat for that matter). But once he`s a politician he shouldn`t have a religious stand. That`s what secularism is all about, people looking beyond their religion.

You are right the Palestenian issue isn`t a Jihad (well, lets hope Hamas and Islamic Jihad understand that as well), it`s religious politics. But the Jews aren`t solely to blame for the quagmire. Nor are they the major faulters. Yeah, they got 57% of the land (despite being 40%) of the people by the UN mandate. Well, not all countries were formed/created/divided equally/perfectly. The palestenians didn`t accept, fought and lost more. Well their loss. If they want their ``fair`` share back they better learn to ask nicely.

Being the neutral party and Indian that I am, I`d like to buy sophisticated missiles, electronic sensors, and early warning radars from the Palestenians (or Egyptians for that matter) as well. But, I guess the Egyptians didn`t use their aid (nor space: Sinai) as smartly as the Israelis.

Now why should we have qualms about Sharon when we don`t have any about Arafat? As you rightly said, we need to have the same standards for all religions, I think it applies to both of them as well. But I guess we should be allowed our own opinions ... or be allowed to welcome whomever we wish.