Religion and Civilization                                                                         Mushirul Hasan

Mushirul Hasan is historian, thinker and an Islamic scholar.  He was awarded Padma Shri in 2007. His works included “Legacy of a Divided Nation”, India partitioned-The Other Side of Freedom etc.

 Mushirul Hasan says that India is a land of three religions – Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism. In the 7^th and 5^th centuries various heterodox movements emerged in India. Among them, Buddhism was the greatest. Its founder Gautama Buddha introduced the Four Noble Truths. They are: Life is full of sorrow, Desire is the root cause of sorrow.  Thirdly sorrow can be stopped only by the removal of desire and finally good conduct in life and meditation will destroy desire for ever.

 The simplicity of this message appealed to thousands of people and were converted to Buddhism. Jainism, just like Buddhism is an offshoot of Hinduism. Buddhism spread to various parts of Asia, while Jainism limited to the boundary of India. Then came Islam from a distant land. Although aggressive, this monotheistic religion soon adapted itself to local social culture and began to spread. The Arab traders brought this religion to India. It was followed by the Turks and Mughals who had come to India for wealth, power and glory, made India their home. The Mughal Empire declined in 17^th century because of the enmity of the local Rajputs and the Marathas.

 There is no clash of civilization theory in India,  but a process of acculturation occurred due to the spread of various religions and the confrontation of Hinduism in India. Many factors helped this acculturation process. They are the amorphous character of Hinduism, the rise of heterodox movements with their emphasis on bhakti or devotion, the appeal of Sufi ideas which adopted many Hindu beliefs and ideas and local tradition and the inter community alliances made by the Muslim rulers like Akbar all helped this acculturation process. As a result, when years passed by, all different religious sites such as Muslim, Christian churches and Hindu, Buddhist and Jain religious places of worship are situated near by in peaceful co-existence show the secular, composite culture of India. The sounds of Muslim shehnai is heard in the rituals of the most sacred Hindu temple in Benares and in some villages near Ajmer in the shrine of Muslim saint. Similarly Muslims celebrate the Hindu festival Deepavali with the worship of the goddess of wealth.

 Now Mushirul Hasan speaks about the two major difficulties that the nationalist leaders of India faced during the freedom struggle in their effort to evolve an inclusive ideology. The first problem was that the British government followed a divisive policy which encouraged the religious identities and as a result difference between Hindus and Muslim have been fostered which finally led to the partition of India. The second problem was that there was difference of opinion among the nationalist leaders over the strategies in achieving freedom for India.

                                                           

  Now the author explains the two fold challenges Hinduism confronted in its encounter with the West. The social and administrative reforms made by the British government and the spread of Christianity brought two fold challenges to Hinduism. The leaders of Hindu religion tried to make many social and religious reforms in order to equip the people to confront the cultural and religious attack of the West. Secondly they wanted to give birth to a resurgent Hinduism by bringing many social and religious reforms. But these reforms did not reach out to all sections of society. The backward castes or Dalits  wanted to free themselves from poverty, humiliation and slavery of the upper caste Hindus.

As a minority community, Muslims demanded two things. As a political minority, they wanted political safeguards in a representative government, secondly as a religious minority they asked for cultural autonomy. Both these demands were ignored by Congress. As a result, Muhammad Ali Jinnah asked for a separate Muslim nation and thus India was partitioned as India and Pakistan.

Kjt/15-03-2015

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