The Doll’s House

1) ``Now may I ask on what basis do a number of Hindus have any business to suspect this? ``
- No one in India expects any Indian Muslim to express contrition for a suicide bombing in Israel. However, there is a legitimate expectation that the moderate muslims will distance themselves from an Akshar-dham attack or a Raghunath temple attack or an attack on the Parliament. This is legitimate because these terrorists justify their deeds on the basis of Islam. So, you the moderate muslim, should condemn these co-religionists of yours. You should listen to the Friday sermons in the mosques. There is all the pretentious talk about Iran, Iraq and Palestine. When you take up the cudgels on behalf of Muslim causes the world over, you should also take time to discriminate between the legitimate and terrorist approaches they take to achieve their goals.

2) ``If I am supposed to feel ashamed for what someone does in another part of the world, whose language I cannot understand, whose food habits and clothes are different from mine, who even looks different, then I have every right to find terrorists in my backyard from the majority community.``

If so, how come you find it necessary to support the causes of people in other parts of the world ``whose language I cannot understand, whose food habits and clothes are different from mine, who even looks different.`` You do so on the basis of the concept of Muslim brotherhood. The concept of ``Umma.`` When the people who you support behave barbarically, you turn around and say how am I connected to all this. Take it on your chin... You can`t have it both ways.

The Ottoman Caliphate is defeated in WWI and you find it necessary to protest here in distant India. Salman Rushdie, a British citizen, writes a book, and you riot in Mumbai. A newspaper publishes an article with references to Dante`s Inferno and thousands gather in the streets of Bangalore and we have a law and order situation.

Who are we fooling? If everything is hunky-dory with the muslim society, why are we having this discussion at all?

PS to #508

http://meaindia.nic.in/humanright/2003/0415hr01.htm
`` We are all aware that there is no single universally applicable definition of minorities. This becomes even more difficult for a diverse country like India. My delegation would, therefore, in the context of minorities, refer to the religious minorities in India. ``

http://www.sundayobserver.lk/2004/09/05/fea25.html

``The discussion on the issues of minorities and their rights in the present form has been going on for almost a century. After the First World War, the concern of the minorities particularly in the context of Europe was on the agenda of the League of Nations.

The discussion on the minority issues continues, but no formal attempt was made to define a `minority`. In 1945, the United Nations put more emphasis on the human rights rather than minority rights. It is in 1977, that a UN study on the `Rights of Persons belonging to Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities offered a definition of a minority group.

It defined the minority as ``a group numerically inferior to the rest of the population of a State, on a non-dominant position, ethnic, religious or linguistic characteristics differing from those of the rest of the population and show if only implicity, a sense of solidarity, directed towards preserving their culture, tradition, religion or language.``

A revised version of the definition was submitted to a Sub-Commission of the United Nations in 1985. Accordingly, it defined the minority as ``a group of citizens of a State, constituting a numerical minority and in a non-dominant position in that State, endowed with ethnic, religious or linguistic characteristic which differ from those of the majority of the population, having a sense of solidarity with one another, motivated, if only implicitly, by a collective will to survive and whose aim is to achieve equality with the majority in fact and in law.``

--

Agreed that there is ambiguity in definition of `minorities`, but don`t know how far the Indian constitution has lent itself to innovative definitions other than the broadest religious and linguistic(mother tongue) definitions.

In other words, I doubt for instance Shias are recognised as having minority status wrt Sunnis, rather they are given minority status as Muslims wrt Hindus. Suppose a uniform Muslim code was imminent, could Shias claim minority status wrt Sunnis and opt out of it? And then on to smaller and smaller sect definitions possibly...? Lingayats in Karnataka have tried this wrt Hindus, certainly.

Another issue - how large is the geographical area where minorities are counted and declared minorities? Say the unit is district not state(as it currently seems to be). Do Hindus have minority rights in Muslim-majority North Kerala districts(running their own educational institutions, for instance) which they do not have in Hindu-majority South Kerala districts? Can Lingayats really claim minority status in Karnataka districts where they are in majority? Many Indian states are as big as independent countries, is it meaningful in terms of protecting minorities to fix state-wide ennumeration as the definition of majority-minority?

[And each Hindu caste group is itself a minority if viewed on national scale - but unlike religious self-awareness which is statutory, statutory caste self-awareness is illegal. Does this disadvantage some Hindu groups wrt the sharing of spoils - resulting in politics of scrambling to get into the statutory OBC definitions to claim their share?]

It seems to me that where the contradictions are, is where the tensions accumulate.

And those Muslims who don`t think Shariat is mandatory, can they be a recognised ``religious minority`` and the state intervene to keep them safe from fatwas and boycotts from the majority on that count?

I doubt it can be done until the general tone of politics and public discourse changes from protection of group rights to protection of individual rights. IMO, for UCC purposes, the broadest group definition applies currently - of Muslim minority rights in Hindu-majority population.

AlephNull #507


You asked:
``Is there in fact such a constitutional right (to autonomy/non-interferene)? And if so, how explicitly is it demarcated?``

For instance, how are ‘minorities’ (or ‘communities’, more generally) defined? Are the recognized minorities explicitly enumerated, or are they to be identified in an ad hoc fashion? Are ‘minorities’ granted any rights above and beyond those that voluntary associations of people inherit from their constituent individuals? ``


My answer(pl. feel free to contradict and demolish, and sorry in advance for my amateurish lack of exactitude)

Re religious minorities-

Article 26 of the Indian Constitution:
http://164.100.10.12/cgi/nph-bwcgi/BASIS/coiweb/all/secretr/DDW?W=actid
=`1ONS00`&M=30&K=960&U=1

26. Freedom to manage religious affairs.- Subject to public order, morality and health, every religious denomination or any section thereof shall have the right-

(a) to establish and maintain institutions for religious and
charitable purposes;

(b) to manage its own affairs in matters of religion;

(c) to own and acquire movable and immovable property; and

(d) to administer such property in accordance with law.

--
There is no mention of `minorities`.

However in the previous article, Article 25, it sets Hindus, Sikhs, Jains and Buddhists apart from others for state interference, in other words:


``Right to Freedom of Religion

25. Freedom of conscience and free profession, practice and propagation of religion.-(1) Subject to public order, morality and health and to the other provisions of this Part, all persons are equally entitled to freedom of conscience and the right freely to profess, practise and propagate religion.


(2) Nothing in this article shall affect the operation of any existing law or prevent the State from making any law-

(a) regulating or restricting any economic, financial, political or other secular activity which may be associated with religious practice;

(b) providing for social welfare and reform or the throwing open of Hindu religious institutions of a public character to all classes and sections of Hindus.

Explanation I.- The wearing and carrying of kirpans shall be deemed to
be included in the profession of the Sikh religion.

Explanation II.- In sub-clause (b) of clause (2), the reference to Hindus shall be construed as including a reference to persons professing the Sikh, Jaina or Buddhist religion, and the reference to Hindu religious institutions shall be construed accordingly.``

--
My comment:
How about 25 (a) - does the right to be governed by Shariat qualify as `religious freedom` or is it a fit subject in which the state can invoke 25 (a)? I don`t know.

There IS mention of religious and linguistic minorities in Article 30 wrt educational institutions:
30. Right of minorities to establish and administer educational institutions.- (1) All minorities, whether based on religion or language, shall have the right to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice.

--

Hindus can be minorities too but this has taken time to get accepted. Correct me if I am wrong, that it took decades to get Hindus officially declared minorities in some NE states where they have been in minority.



Re noninterference and Muslim Law:

The Shariat Act 1937 adopted by independent India
http://www.helplinelaw.com/bareact/index.php?dsp=mus-per-law

Which gives a Muslim the right to be governed by Shariat Law. This implies non-interference by the state unless a Muslim explicitly approaches the state.

``2. Application of Personal Law to Muslims. —Notwithstanding any customs or usage to the contrary, in all questions (save questions relating to agricultural land) regarding intestate succession, special property of females, including personal property inherited or obtained under contract or gift or any other provision of Personal Law, marriage, dissolution of marriage, including talaq, ila, zihar, lian, khula and mubaraat, maintenance, dower, guardianship, gifts, trusts and trust properties, and wakfs (other than charities and charitable institutions and charitable and religious endowments) the rule of decision in cases where the parties are Muslims shall be theMuslim Personal Law (Shariat).``

--

You asked:

``And most important, how should the state decide between the rights of individuals and the alleged rights of minorities when they are in conflict (as they very often are, and as they most certainly were in, e.g., the Shah Bano case)? ``


My answer:
There are plenty of contradications all over the place. In the Constitution, the directive principle calling for UCC contradicts the provisions of the Shariat Act 1937. `Shariat` as it is interpreted could contradict a Muslim woman`s Consitutional right to `equality of status and opportunity` (as could various other religious communities` personal laws)


Re interpreting what is Muslim law, there are contradictions there too. There are parallel judicial systems, 1) the local bodies/qazis/justice traditions of various sects of Muslims as well 3) the Indian judiciary (with Muslim and nonMuslim judges) both of which can issue legally binding judgements under Shariat Act 1937.

The problems regarding this according to me
1. The Indian judiciary`s building up of cases/precedents under Shariat binds only Indian judiciary`s future judgements under Shariat, not judgements from the multiplicity of local community boards/ Jamaats where the state can still not interfere.

2. An economically and socially vulnerable Muslim woman is mostly forced to remain within her local community`s judgement system and the state can do nothing about it(Shariat Act)

3. There is a limit to how much the effect of Shariat Act 1937 system can be influenced from outside- given a longstanding Muslim tradition of preference for Shariat, given politics, and the given right of minorities to run their own religious institutions without state interference(for instance if the state decreed a quota for women`s seats in mosque committees as a way to improve Muslim women`s status and opportunity. If I am correct, payscale revisions or terms of employment of teachers are other instances where state dictums have been challenged by minority educational institutions managements on the noninterference ground).


If I may repeat the conclusions I drew from the references in my past posts(in case you missed), it appears that (#473)
1. A Qazi/Jamaat/mosque committee`s judgement is legally binding on a Muslim woman unless she explicitly opts out and approaches the state judicial system
2. In the situation she does not opt out, state can not intervene on any grounds
3. Muslim law is not codified, in the sense that any body can deliver any judgement as long as he/the body is an accepted authority within the community.
4. The Indian judicial system does interpret what is Shariat but there are limits to its powers (as evidenced by the Shah Bano case).


How to go about resolving the contradictions in ways acceptable to large numbers of Muslim Indians is what I was talking of, not of purely the legalities.

IMO, the way to go about it is via codification and fundamental rights. It is better to project the positive aspect of holding a Muslim woman`s fundamental rights to be above her current exigencies under the current/local/regional interpretation/administration of Shariat vs the negative one of attacking the right of neighbourhood religious stiffs to decide on her personal affairs.

Sadna #406

{{In contrast, in the Muslim woman`s case the state appears to be forcing a curtailment of her rights by implicitly endorsing mosque committees as fit adjudicators under Muslim law- due to consitutional right of minorities to noninterference in religious affairs.}}

and #505

{{And without rationalizing it with the constitutional right to religious autonomy and without consensus on the religious question of whether Sharia is mandatory or not, imposing UCC does not make sense.}}

Is there in fact such a constitutional right (to autonomy/non-interferene)? And if so, how explicitly is it demarcated?

For instance, how are ‘minorities’ (or ‘communities’, more generally) defined? Are the recognized minorities explicitly enumerated, or are they to be identified in an ad hoc fashion? Are ‘minorities’ granted any rights above and beyond those that voluntary associations of people inherit from their constituent individuals?

And most important, how should the state decide between the rights of individuals and the alleged rights of minorities when they are in conflict (as they very often are, and as they most certainly were in, e.g., the Shah Bano case)?

harimau #502
It is not just the clergy who will react. Mosque committees are grassroots organisations functioning all over the country. If UCC is `imposed` and their power to run their communities` affairs is forcibly taken away, you can expect widespread grassroots reaction. And without rationalizing it with the constitutional right to religious autonomy and without consensus on the religious question of whether Sharia is mandatory or not, imposing UCC does not make sense. UCC can only make sense with broad Muslim consent.

IMO, the way to get that consent is to emphasize an Indian citizen`s individual rights/right to gender equality as primary reason for reform of all personal law, including Muslim personal law.

And how evil to talk of UCC, the ultimate culmination of Muslim mainstreaming, when the above FV article was all about how we Hindus are pure evil for ganging up with Zee TV and forcibly mainstreaming a Muslim woman (not by reforming her personal law, but simply by putting her on TV) ?

Dost-mittar #491

My assessment of Urstruly probably coincides with yours. My impression is that he would stay strictly within the boundaries of what he think Islam permits, but would strive for utmost lenience within those rigidly demarcated boundaries. It’s interesting though to see him trot out notions of ‘social contract’ between groups of human beings (genders, religious communities) to justify legally sanctioned unequal treatment of individuals. I pity those whom childhood brainwashing has programmed to find convoluted rationalizations for such a worldview.

My take on Asif Naqshbandi is somewhat similar. He wants a rigid dispensation of justice under shariat but regards the required standards for admissible evidence as being exceptionally high.

I ‘d probably be stoned to death within a week if suddenly transplanted into the Islamic society that these gentlemen pine for. I don’t doubt their core sincerity, though.

Quoting the following from another debate on the same subject...

`` Was the point of contention between the North and South largely about slavery? Yes, of course. No one is even really disputing that. Was the war that resulted from this disagreement about slavery? No. And it`s very important to understand the distinction, subtle though it may be.

Let`s try another example. Child pornography is a problem. You`ll find very few people who are in favor of it, just as you`ll find few in favor of slavery. But now let`s say the Government wanted to stop child pornography and they decide that since a lot of child pornography is on the internet, they need to shut the internet down. Now if you decide the oppose the government in shutting the internet down, does that mean you`re in favor of child pornography? Of course not. While that was what caused the dispute, it`s not what the dispute itself is about.

The North and South were opposed on the issue of slavery and it drove them apart. The secession of the Southern states was basically about slavery and their Constitutional rights to continue it, and thereby protect their economic livlihood. In response, the North went to war for the purpose of stopping that secession, not to stop slavery. He didn`t even try to stop slavery until two years into the war.

I say it`s important to note the difference because if you think the war was about slavery, then it becomes all too easy to just pass it off as a good vs. evil struggle where the righteous Union marched into the evil Confederacy and forced them to stop their slavin` ways, end of story. But if that`s what you think, you completely miss the real history of what happened. You miss how we went as a country from a collection of states, to a an entity driven by a central power. You miss the precedent and curcumstance by which the federal government came into ascendance and you`re more likely to believe that it`s simply always been that way and that`s how the Founding Fathers intended it. But that`s not the case. This is not the government they had in mind, at least not entirely. One of the major sources of checks and balances is gone. The states no longer have the ability to oppose the federal government and so the federal government has turned into something monstrous in size and no longer entirely clear in its purpose and intent. And this all goes back to Lincoln and the Civil War. But if you want to continue thinking it was about slavery and nothing more, then all this is lost on you. ``

#490 by AlephNull

``I live and have lived only in countries aspiring to be civilized, ``

Spoken like a true a-hole!!

Read this A-hole- from the “aspiring to be civilized country”.
All from the “Final” solution?” board. Running on the front page.
Some more narratives from where ``you have lived`` a-hole!

So were you celebrating when they were roasting children alive? Barbarian!


“No human can celebrate children being roasted alive. Only barbarians
can.
This is because they believe neither in religion nor in humanity. That
is
why, each day, Modi reminds us of Idi Amin and Pinochet. And Goebbels.

-- Amit Sengupta, in his article ‘A poem for Asif’, in The Hindustan
Times,
March 23, 2002.

The carnage was made possible by the city’s Hindu police force, which
merely
watched yesterday as gangs rampaged through Muslim areas.

-- The Guardian, London, quoted in The Statesman, March 3, 2002

`I`d worship Hitler, not Gandhi`

TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 06, 2004 06:37:18 PM ]

AHMEDABAD/VADODARA: When asked about his perception of Gandhi, a mass communication student, Vishal Desai, says that he would rather worship Hitler than him. This was just one of the many grossly irreverent views of the youth who have all but forgotten about the man they were told was the Father of the Nation.

#42 by hindvi on October 6, 2004 9:35am PT
Urstruly

you have no idea of the kind of humiliation women underwent in gujrat. in some villlages they were strippped naked and made to run through the main street (infront of other hindu women) then they were made to pe, and finally raped. in other places they were stripped and raped sometimes infront of their children and male members of their families including fathers and brothers. in large numebrs of cases they were simply burnt. the mutilation of their bodies while alive and then later when dead attested to the extreme hate and urge to humilate on the part of their assailants. They also meant to terrorise the victims in running away and leaving their land/property. The economic boycott of those that remained continues till today more than 2 years later.

In some cases they continue to live in the same villages though in most cases the muslims just dissapeared leaving behind their gutted property and land. few rape victims have come forward mostly they are those who lost their children, husbands or were horrificly burnt , those who had a chance of getting married or whose families survived have not reported, if you have the time read this.

Link:http://www.geocities.com/shrawan_k_s/Communalism/Gujrat/TheSurvivorsSpeakX.html.htm
http://www.sacw.net/DC/CommunalismCollection/ArticlesArchive/TanikaSarkarJUL02.html

``Women have been killed in very large numbers. At the mass grave that was dug on March 6 to provide burial to 96 bodies from Naroda Patiya, 46 women were buried. Bilkees Beghum from the Godhra relief camp told a tale that seemed to confirm a recurrent pattern in most places, according to survivors` accounts. She was stripped, gang-raped, her baby was killed before her, she was then beaten up, then burnt and left for dead. For variety`s sake, other women also had acid thrown upon them, and then burnt in fires. A womens` fact-finding report sums up the usual procedure: ``..rape, gang rape, mass rape, stripping, insertion of objects into their body, molestationÖ a majority of rape victims were burnt alive.`` Before they were finally killed, some were beaten up with rods and pipes for almost an hour. Before or after the killing, their vagina would be sliced, or would have iron rods pushed inside. Similarly, their bellies would be cut open or would have hard objects inserted into them. A 13-year old girl, Farzana, had a rod pushed into her stomach, and was then burnt. A mother reported that her three-year old baby girl was raped and killed in front of her, while elsewhere daughters reported on the rapes of their mothers, now dead. Kausar Bano, a young girl from Naroda Patiya, was several months pregnant. Several eyewitnesses testified that she was raped, tortured, her womb was slit open with a sword to disgorge the foetus which was then hacked to pieces and roasted alive with the mother.

At Fatehpura, young girls were paraded naked. After they were rescued by a Muslim ambulance service, they travelled to the camp without a stitch on them. Other victims arrived naked at camps, too, after acid had been poured upon their clothes, which they tore off in agony from their burning and peeling bodies.

Medina Mustafa Ismail Shaikh reported from Kalol camp: ``My daughter was like a flower, still to experience lifeÖThe monsters tore my beloved daughter to piecesÖthe mob was saying, cut them to pieces, leave no evidenceÖI saw fires being lit. After some time, the mob started leaving. And it became quiet.``

It had become very quiet, for the voices of children could not be heard. A very large number of parents, especially mothers, had to see their children die in excruciating agony before they, too, were tortured and burnt. At the mass grave for 96 people, they buried a six month old baby. Fatimabibi, who came to Delhi to testify to the violence, kept repeating dementedly: ``Innocent (masoom) tender babies were crying for water, they filled them up with petrol and then lit them up.`` At Randhikapur village, a young pregnant woman first saw her baby cut to pieces. Then she was raped and her foetus was ripped out and killed. They beat her up and left her for dead. Four year old Asif died of 90 per cent burns after several days` of agony. Before he died, The Hindu took a photograph of his bandaged face, out of which his large, beautiful, fully aware eyes were blazing out.``

Ref sadna #501

[An exercise in standardization might only set off power struggles and sectarian rivalries and end in mutual declarations of apostasy just like in Pakistan (or it might not). Hm. So it might not be reasonable or rational to expect the clergy to sit together and deliver a uniform Muslim Personal Law, such a thing might be conceptually impossible (or it might not). So what should other Indians and Indian Muslim women DO ?]

Screw the mullahs. Forget about a Uniform Muslim Personal Law. Just bring out a Uniform Civil Law for all including Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Jains, Buddists, Jews, Agnostics, Movie Actress Worshippers like Soysauce, etc. Those who don`t like it can lump it.

sadna #various
Of course a push for a uniform codified Muslim Personal Law might bring to attention a huge elephant in the room, which is that various leaders of various Islamic sects in various regions of India(perhaps even in the next town) cannot, infact agree on a single Muslim code.

Even if our traditions of justice are currently ambiguous and justice delivered uneven, we coexist and we each agree to disagree, because we have our share of Jamaats/mosques/communities which we preside over and so we do not need to be at each others throats to prove that our sect has the monopoly on the absolute truth(which it does of course, otherwise why would I, a learned member of the clergy, belong to mine?). A uniform code will put other sects on a equal basis to mine, how can I accept that?

An exercise in standardization might only set off power struggles and sectarian rivalries and end in mutual declarations of apostasy just like in Pakistan (or it might not). Hm. So it might not be reasonable or rational to expect the clergy to sit together and deliver a uniform Muslim Personal Law, such a thing might be conceptually impossible (or it might not). So what should other Indians and Indian Muslim women DO ?
(talking to myself)

498 #HP,

This from somebody whose country has effectively wiped out all minorities.

HP

Post#498

If you feel I have just picked a sentence from your post and going by that only, say so and/or feel free not to react/respond to it.

Quote:

`` Not a month passes in this “aspiring to be civilized” country when members of the minority community are not killed only because they belong to a religious minority.``

Assuming reference is to India. If that is the case, then it would be very, very hard to even show (note, I am not saying prove) that it is the case. Rumours/perceptions is a different matter. Things are not that bad at all in India.

#490 by AlephNull

Here this a-hole goes again!

“You’ve gotten hold of the wrong end of the stick as far as I’m concerned. I live and have lived only in countries aspiring to be civilized, where silly primitive notions such as ‘blasphemy’ and ‘hate-mongering’ do not carry excessive weight.”

This “aspiring to be civilized country” takes pride in killing people by thousands and the word “Muslim” in that “aspiring to be civilized country” has more heinous meaning than the word kafr can ever be.
This “aspiring to be civilized country” still boasts of a chief minister who is directly and indirectly involved in mass murders.
Two posters form this same “aspiring to be civilized country” are debating the merits of “RAT worship” on another thread.

And this self-proclaimed civilized person on another board implied that Sikhs in Golden Temple and in Delhi in 1984 were killed because they sought martyrdom.

This A-hole also believes that Muslims in Gujarat asked for the treatment they got. This A-hole is proud of the killing of unborn babies when babies were plucked out of mother’s womb and placed on sharp objects. This person from the so-called civilized country probably appreciated his fellow citizens’ gang raping and murdering 70 years old woman and similar incidences were repeated for days. This A-hole most likely applauded those ``civilized`` murders.
Not a month passes in this “aspiring to be civilized” country when members of the minority community are not killed only because they belong to a religious minority.

Here is a person so full of hate for one community in his own country that he cannot miss an opportunity to show his hatred on various threads and despite being this vile and hateful he thinks he is civilized because he does not worship “Rats”.

Any person with such ingrained hate cannot be civil! A-hole!
Any person who can blame the victims of the 1984 Sikh murders on Sikhs themselves can be only an A-hole!
Civilized! My foot!

Hindvi

Here is another resolution, directly from the Congress/House itself...and no where this too mentions anything about abolition of slavery ....

It can not be copy/pasted so self typing.

37th Congress, 1st Session

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES.

JULY 25, 1861

Mr Clark asked, and by unanimous consent obtained, leave to bring in the following Joint Resolution; which was read the first and second time, ordered to lie on the table, and be printed.

.... JOINT RESOLUTION

Declaratory of the determination of the Congress to maintain supermacy of the government and integrity of the Union.

Be it resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

That we, as representatives of the people and States, respectively, do hereby declare our fixed determination to maintain the supermacy of the government and the integrity of the Union of all these United States; and to this end, as far as we may do so, we pledge the entire resources of the government and people, until all rebels shall submit to the one, and cease their efforts to destroy the other.

tahmed #410

{{Interestingly, I have never heard a peep from anyone out of you in all these years on what BJP did to mess up the indian school curriculum.}}

There have been repeated discussions on Chowk of the Indian school curriculum, and of moves to modify it. A vigorous discussion can be found, for instance, following one of Angana Chatterbox’s articles from last year. Did you not read it or did it simply not register?

Here is a good post from that thread. Prominent among those who debated it, are many of those with whom you regularly clash. Their specific take on matters is unlikely to satisfy you; but since you inhabit a world of your own, that would hardly be surprising.

{{On the point about `k` kafir being in urdu qaidas}}

Oh dear. Let me clue you in. I often permit myself a twist of the knife in the last couple of sentences in a post. ‘K for kafir’ is a chowk catchphrase made famous by Jay (a penetrating intellect indeed, sorely missed), together with ‘J for Jalim’ (sic). It may or may not occur in contemporary Urdu qaedas – I’m inclined to believe it does, along with a lot of other material in Pakistani textbooks that inculcates aspirations to militancy, jihad, shahadat etc. I thought it just right for a post on the observed uses of the word ‘kafir’. Having to explain it all spoils the fun. As to the rest of your post (1500s on the SATs as proof of ‘world-class’ education, etc.) the less said the better.

Hindvi

Post #480

Quote:

``and you accuse dost mittar of making up stuff? is their a difference between preserving unity and making a strong center or they are the same thing in your eyes? Lincoln was avoiding conflict at all costs this is the concensus among all US historians, he waged war only when they seceded. ``

Where has this come from? Issue was slavery, and whether civil war was fought for the abolition of slavery or not. And I have been presenting case by giving facts that it was not about slavery when the civil war started. Slavery is an after thought. If you want to discuss other aspects, sure, you are welcome. However, let us stick to this issue of slavery first as this is already being discussed.

Quote:

`` and then ``Southern states or states which went ahead with secession, had done that peacefully`` have you heard of Fort Sumter sir? ``

I have heard of that, Sir. Now, please familiarise yourself with the sequence of events. And this is a historical data, not made by me or someone else. Look at the dates...


**********

Dec 20, 1860 - South Carolina secedes from the Union. Followed within two months by Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas.

Feb 9, 1861 - The Confederate States of America is formed with Jefferson Davis, a West Point graduate and former U.S. Army officer, as president.

March 4, 1861 - Abraham Lincoln is sworn in as 16th President of the United States of America.

April 12, 1861 - At 4:30 a.m. Confederates under Gen. Pierre Beauregard open fire with 50 cannons upon Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina. The Civil War begins.

***********

Civil war begins, almost 4 months after some of the states had seceded peacefully.

Quote:

`` And do you believe Slavery was only abolished in the South and continued to exist in the north? ``

What is there to believe or not believe. It is in black and white. I think, I took that link from US Congressional records which says, ratification of abolition on slavery took place in December 1865.