* * *Hindus in Pakistan * *" If Muslims in India constantly crib to have no say and no power, they should come to Pakistan to see the plight of minority Hindus with their own eyes. They'll never complain and learn to live peacefully with their Hindu brethren in India."
-Asma Jahangir, Human rights activist, Pakistan * Asma's right. When pitted against the oppressed Hindus in Pakistan, the Muslims of India are indeed far better. A few days back there was a news that Hindus in Balochistan region are abducted and converted to Islam. The family members of those who've been abducted often avoid lodging complaints for fear of dire consequences. Many Hindus in Pakistan's Balochistan, Sindh and NWFP regions, embraced Islam for survival. Has any Muslim in India ever been forced to accept Hinduism in order to live in this country? The Marathas, who fought against Ahmadshah Abdali in 1761 and couldn't return, are now languishing in Pakistan doing menial jobs. Most of them are sweepers and Pakistan Military Academy, Kakul has the descendants of those Marathas working as toilet-cleaners. June, 2000, *Time *carried an article (later banned and deleted from the net) written by Craig Gaverns. He interviewed a few Hindu-Marathas (most of those Marathas are now forced Muslims) working as cleaners and attendants at PMA. One of them told him that once a Pakistani captain continuously slapped him and made him eat human excreta for not polishing his shoes properly. He fearlessly told Gaverns to disclose his name (Nanji Ubale) despite Gaverns had grave doubts about that man's safety. His name was carried and within a couple of days, he was hacked to pieces. Even those Hindus who got converted to Islam are treated very badly. They're always reminded of their humble and infidel roots. One such Hindu doctor Ratan Chitkara, who later embraced Islam and became Saeed Khan, was always denied promotion to become the C M H O (Chief Medical & Health Officer) at a hospital in Pakistan's Chitral province. The reason was that he willy-nilly accepted Islam. *'Dil se nahin liya'* (not accepted from the core of his heart) observed his *born Muslim* friend. My point is: Did the ancestors of the sub-continental Muslims ever accept Islam *DIL SE *? Were they not converted to Islam by coercion? BBC, London's Roger Amlett's big essay ' Conversions on the sub-continent ' (1998) puts it bluntly " Why do all the 'converted Muslims' of the sub-continent behave in a manner as if their Allah directly dropped them as Muslims from an imaginary heaven? Why do they (or their forefathers) forget that they were cajoled, coaxed and coerced into embracing Islam? " The Hindus in Pakistan constitute 2.67 % of its population, which is now close to 18 crores. According to Pakistan-born Ibn Warraq, an ex-Muslim, " By 2015 this ratio will drop down to almost one percent as very many existing Hindus will have accepted Islam to save their skins, precisely necks." Here in India, Muslims cry foul that they're discriminated against. This happens indeed. But don't they also get their rights and rightful positions in India? In India, Muslims have become the heads of the state. There've been so many top brass in the Armed Forces of India, who're Muslims. Can one show a single really big and influential Hindu in Pakistan? Why wasn't Pakistan's second Chief Justice Bhagwan Das, A Sindhi-Hindu from Shikarpur, Sindh, made the CJP (Chief Justice of Pakistan)? Why was Neeraj Chawla (actress Juhi Chawla's uncle, who chose to stay back in Pakistan following partition) abducted in spite of being a high official on Pakistan's Film Censor Board? Despite his seniority, he was not made the chief of the Censor Board of Pakistan. Has any Muslim been deprived of his rank in the sensitive army because of his religion? Didn't India have Idris Hasan Latif as the Air Chief Marshal? It's very easy to condemn sitting on the fence and when you're getting everything without much efforts. Look from a broader and deeper perspective and you'll realise that you're much better and well-ensconced here than the poor Hindus in Pakistan, who get no representation at any level. They cannot even register their marriage in Pakistan. Karachi and Islamabad universities abolished their Hindi departments and even certificate courses in Hindi because it's the language of the *Kafirs* (infidels). Except for Danish Kaneria, no Hindu ever played Test cricket in Pakistan, though Anil Dalpat came closest to playing and getting included in the final eleven. Why was Nirmal Mukherjee, a Bengali Hindu of PIA, never selected for the Pakistan national hockey team? He was PIA's vice captain in the early seventies. Veerbhadra Seksaria, the only Hindu industrialist from Pakistan, never got an opportunity to set up a cement factory in Pakistan's lone industrial city, Faislabad (erstwhile Layalpur). Indian media and some so-called secularists like Teesta Seetalvad (her husband's a Muslim), Arundhati Roy (a Syrian Christian) and Mallika Sarabhai (a Gujrati Hindu) scream from their rooftops when something 'wrong' happens to the Muslims in India. Why can't these influential secularists raise their voice in unison against the treatment meted out to the Hindus in Pakistan who live there as gentiles and lepers?
