Since end July 25 and after August 1, when the ECI published the draft first list excluding a staggering 65 lakh voters, the VFD team of experts and legal analysts have scrutinised the ECI’s own data and come up with startlingly inconsistent hike periods of deletions.

VFD released this data today through a Facebook live event. The entire report and power point presentation may be viewed here.

Vote for Democracy: Key findings from the analysis of ECI data

1. Legally unsanctioned process: The term Special Intensive Revision (SIR) has no legal or statutory basis under existing electoral laws. The Registration of Electors Rules, 1960 only permits summary, intensive, or partial revisions. The ECI not only devised a new nomenclature but also violated Rule 8 by introducing non-standard enumeration forms and failing to provide receipts or duplicate copies to electors, compromising basic procedural safeguards.
2. Statistical irregularities and data “jugglery”: Between July 14 and July 25, deletion categories such as “deceased,” “permanently shifted,” and “untraceable” showed sudden, exponential jumps that defy logical or statistical explanation:

• Unprecedented one-day spike in “deceased” voters: A staggering 2, 11, 462 electors (18,66,869 – 16,55,407) are claimed to have been found dead over just one day, between July 21 and July 22, 2025.
• Mass constituency-level removals in over one day: Worse, 870 electors on an average per constituency have been removed over one day, between July 21 and July 22. This makes the electors removed per constituency in that period at 2,11,462. Is this part of a genuine clean-up process or a pre-determined mass deletion?
• Five-day surge in “deceased” category: During the last five days of the SIR process, July 21 to July 25, the ECI has magically raised the number of dead electors from 16,55,407 on July 21, 2025 to a significant 22 lakh dead voters, four days later, on July 25. Thus, we see a hike of deletions in this category at 5,44,593 in 243 constituencies (which is a figure that is 2,241 dead electors per constituency).
• Sharp three-day escalation in “permanently shifted” voters: The hike in the mass deletions under the head “permanently shifted” is too high to be digested and the same in the last three days is 15,24,769 for all the 243 constituencies, and this turns out to be 6,275 per constituency on an average. Thus, the last three days have been the most marked deletion days (!!!) for the ECI’s Bihar SIR process where 8,516 electors have been removed from each of the state’s 243 constituencies.
• Deletions exceeding forms processed: All this already points to what amounts to a jugglery in data science. Why? Because the huge surge in the number of “dead” and “permanently shifted” voters is almost double the number of the electors’ forms digitalised in those very hours! Between July 23 and July 25, the number of digitised electors increased from 7.17 crore to 7.23 crore. Concurrently, the total count of deceased and permanently shifted voters rose from 48 lakh to 57 lakh, an increase of approximately 9 lakh!
• Disappearance of “multiple registration” category: Another ECI-driven miracle is that in this same period i.e., July 23 to 25, there was not even a single such elector who exists in the “registered at more than one place” category! Observation: The ECI appeared to be in a hurry over the last days of the SIR exercise to complete the first phase of pre-determined and desired number of deletions.

Such anomalies, where deletions exceed even the number of forms received, suggest possible manipulation of data to meet a pre-decided quota of deletions.

3. Opacity and aggregation of deletion data: On July 23, the ECI replaced category-wise reporting with “Merged Data”, collapsing separate categories (e.g., deceased, shifted, untraceable) into one opaque classification: “Electors not found at their addresses.” This intentional data obfuscation came just as deletion figures accelerated, reaching 65 lakh by July 27.
4. Disproportionate impact in key districts: Deletion rates vary wildly across districts, with Gopalganj (15.10%), Purnia (12.08%), Kishanganj (11.82%), and Madhubani (10.44%) among the worst affected—well above the state average of 8.31%. These districts are known for marginalised populations, migrant workers, and minority communities, raising fears of targeted disenfranchisement.
5. Democratic and legal concerns:
   • The Supreme Court, in its July 29 hearing, refused to stay the publication of the draft rolls but cautioned that it would intervene if “mass exclusion” was proven.
   • Petitioners, including ADR, have pointed out that the ECI has failed to publish names of those marked for deletion, denying voters the opportunity to file claims or objections.
   • The burden of proof has effectively been shifted onto voters to defend their inclusion, a reversal of the ECI’s constitutional obligation to ensure due process.

Broader implications for electoral democracy
The ECI claims that no deletion occurs without a prior notice and hearing. However, with 65 lakh deletions across 243 constituencies, this would mean conducting an average of 26,748 hearings per constituency within a month—a logistical impossibility that casts serious doubt on procedural compliance.

Further, many of the categories used for deletions, such as “untraceable” or “permanently shifted”, are highly vulnerable to subjective assessment, especially given the scale and speed of the deletions. The introduction of new deletion categories mid-way, rapid statistical jumps, and the disappearance of disaggregated data suggest a process driven by pre-determined numerical targets, not genuine verification.

Call for transparency and legal scrutiny
Vote for Democracy (VFD) and allied experts and researchers are calling for the ECI to immediately release:

• The complete list of deleted voters with reasons for deletion.
• Documentary proof backing each deletion, as required by law.
• A clear breakdown of deletion categories per constituency.

With Supreme Court hearings set for August 12 and 13, the credibility of Bihar’s electoral process now hinges on whether these deletions withstand judicial scrutiny and public transparency. Anything less risks undermining the very foundation of the right to vote in India.

The experts involved with the VFD are Dr Pyara Lal Garg, Former Dean, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Panjab University, Chandigarh, MG Devasahayam, IAS (Retd), Convenor, Forum for Electoral Integrity & Coordinator, Citizens Commission on Elections,  Madhav Deshpande, Computer Science Expert over four decades and a former consultant to the Obama administration. Teesta Setalvad & Dolphy D’Souza are Co-Convenors of Vote for Democracy[1]

The Power Point presentation may also be viewed here:

[1] Vote for Democracy (VFD) is a Maharashtra-level citizens’ platform of individuals and organisations formed in 2023 to ensure Voter registration, Voter Awareness, and a Hate-Free Poll where Accountability & Transparency is key. Teesta Setalvad and Dolphy D’Souza are Co-Convenors and for this report a slew of legal researchers and activists contributed to the final product, this Report.

Related:

Bihar SIR: 65 Lakh electors flagged for deletion, SC said “if there is mass exclusion, we will immediately step in”

ECI to SC: Voter ID insufficient for Bihar roll, defends citizenship verification power

Punjab University’s former dean writes to CJI: Bihar SIR threatens democracy, alleges ECI overreach & voter disenfranchisement

Non-Electors Within Electors: ECI reports over 61 lakh potential exclusions

The post Vote for Democracy: Statistical, legal and procedural irregularities dot Bihar’s controversial SIR process appeared first on SabrangIndia.

In a passionate defense of Urdu’s rich heritage and its rightful place as a language of India’s heart, in an article shared on his Facebook wall, former Supreme Court Justice Markandey Katju delves into its origins, evolution, and cultural significance, describing it as a uniquely Indian language with a dual character—both aristocratic and rooted in the common man’s experience. Titled “What is Urdu,” the piece challenges the notion that Urdu is a foreign language, asserting its indigenous roots and its deep connection to the Indian populace.

Urging its revival and recognition as a unifying cultural force, Justice Katju explains that Urdu emerged from the superimposition of Persian vocabulary and features onto a Hindustani (Khariboli) foundation, making it a hybrid language, once called Rekhta. “Urdu is a language created by the combination of two languages, Persian and Hindustani,” he writes, emphasizing that its verbs, derived from Hindustani, classify it as a special kind of Hindustani rather than Persian. “The fact that it is a special kind of Hindustani shows that it is a desi or indigenous language,” Katju asserts, countering claims that Urdu is foreign.

Tracing the historical context, Katju notes that Hindustani, the foundation of Urdu, developed as the common language of urban markets in North India, facilitating trade across diverse regions. “A trader traveling from Bihar or Madhya Pradesh could easily sell his goods in a city in Uttar Pradesh or Rajasthan or Punjab because there was a common language, Hindustani,” he explains. Urdu, built on this base, incorporated Persian sophistication due to the latter’s status as the court language during the Mughal era, particularly from Emperor Akbar’s time.

Katju highlights the transformation during the decline of the Mughal Empire after 1707, when the later Mughals, reduced to nominal rulers, adopted Urdu as the court language. “Urdu is thus the language of aristocrats who had become pauperized, but who retained their dignity, pride and respect,” he writes, citing the example of poet Ghalib, who, despite financial struggles, maintained his aristocratic pride. Katju quotes Urdu poet Josh to encapsulate this dignity: “Hashr mein bhi khusrawana shaan se jaayenge hum / Aur agar purshish na hogi, to palat aayenge hum” (Even on judgment day I will go in style / And if not given respect, will turn back).

The article underscores Urdu’s dual nature: “It is both an aristocratic language as well as the commoner’s language.” While its content reflects the struggles and aspirations of the common man, its polished, sophisticated style draws from Persian influences, making it a powerful medium for expressing human emotions. Katju praises Urdu poetry’s elegance, stating, “In no language does the voice of the human heart emerge with such power and elegance (andaz-e-bayan) as it does in Urdu.”

However, Katju laments the damage inflicted on Urdu post-1947 Partition, when it was branded as a “foreign” or “Muslim” language in India. He criticizes the systematic replacement of commonly used Persian words with obscure Sanskrit ones, such as replacing zila (district) with janapad. “This policy of hatefully removing Persian words… resulted in almost genocide for Urdu in India,” he writes. Despite this, he remains optimistic, pointing to the enduring popularity of Urdu in mushairas, Hindi film songs, and the sale of Urdu poetry books at railway bookstalls as evidence of its vitality.

To revive Urdu, Katju suggests making it compulsory in schools for five years, alongside Sanskrit, to connect it to livelihoods and ensure its cultural preservation. He also advocates for publishing Urdu works in both Persian and Devanagari scripts to make them accessible to a wider audience. Quoting Urdu critic Shamshur Rahmaan Farooqui, who called Urdu a “dead and buried” language, Katju disagrees, asserting, “The language which speaks the voice of the heart can never be stamped out as long as people have hearts.”

Katju concludes by urging Urdu and Hindi writers to use simpler language to address contemporary issues like poverty and unemployment, making literature a tool for the masses. He celebrates Urdu poetry’s ability to capture historical transitions, citing Firaq’s couplet: “Har zarre par ek kaifiyat-e-neemshabi hai / Ai saaqi-e-dauran yeh gunahon ki ghadi hai,” which he interprets as a profound depiction of India’s ongoing transition from feudalism to modernity, marked by societal upheaval and clashing values.

The post ‘Heartbeat of India’s soul’: Urdu is an indigenous language with a dual nature, insists Markandey Katju appeared first on SabrangIndia.

I write this to you with a heavy heart: shocked and saddened; upset and angry. This letter to you, is perhaps to ease the angst in me; I really don’t know what to say and how to say it! But I am sure that what I write, is also the sentiments, the emotions of many, from all over: Jesuit companions, colleagues, collaborators, alumni well-wishers and friends who knew you so well and particularly, the Adivasis and other sub-alterns,whom you loved so much and gave your life for. This letter comes from the bottom of my heart (and our hearts) to say “Sorry, Stan!”

On August 9, St Xavier’s College(SXC) Mumbai, (through their Department of Inter-Religious Studies) was scheduled to hold ‘The Annual Stan Swamy Memorial Lecture’. The topic was ‘Migration for Livelihood: Hope Amidst Untold Miseries’.It was to be delivered virtually by Jesuit Fr. Prem Xalxo, currently Associate Professor of Moral Theology at the Gregorian University, Rome. The speaker was a renowned personality and the topic timely and relevant. On August 4, representatives of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad(ABVP) met the SXC authorities, and in a written letter ‘strongly condemned’ the organising of the lecture and demanded its cancellation. Very sadly, the Jesuit management and other officials caved in to this pressure and cancelled the lecture. For this, “Sorry, Stan!”

In their letter ( which they have put on their facebook page)the ABVP said “organising a lecture in memory of a person who was a key accused in serious crimes, like UAPA, including contact with the banned CPI (Maoist), financing and recruiting armed Naxalite groups, and seizure of documents containing a conspiracy to overthrow the constitutional government through armed uprising, is glorifying the Naxalites…“it is extremely sad that prestigious colleges like St. Xavier’s are trying to encourage Naxalist ideas by glorifying a person accused of committing anti-national conspiracies. We demand that the principal cancel this lecture immediately.” All this is patently false and it has been proved that even the so-called ‘incriminating documents’ were planted in your computer. Besides for an ‘alleged’ crime, the law stipulates that one is innocent, till proved guilty. That you are innocent is without doubt.  Judge after judge have rescuedthemselves from your case, for the simple reason, is that theywill have to declare you innocent! For the falsehood and slander you are still subject to, “Sorry, Stan!”

Stan, you are aware that SXC is my Alma Mater. I spent cherished years as a Xavierite from 1968 – 1972 (1969 was our Centenary year). At that time, we had Jesuits who were stalwarts, Staff who were excellent and a great student body! It was a joy to be a Xavierite. It was at that time I first met youin a Social Analysis Programme – and ever since, you have been to me a hero, mentor and guide. In 1974, (and later), after entering the Society, together with my companions, wereadily accepted the faith – justice mandate under the leadership of Fr Pedro Arrupe. Over the years, I learnt that you heroes were Dom Helder Camara, Paolo Friere, Ivan Illich and Arrupe. Your knowledge on their writings and works, rubbed off on many. As a good friend of yours, as an SXC alumnus and as Jesuit, feel duty bound to say, “Sorry, Stan!”

Ever since the news broke out of the cancellation of the Memorial lecture, I have been literally besieged with calls and comments; in the many groups, I belong to, on social media, there are innumerable comments against the Jesuits, and particularly against SXC (some of the comments are even offensive) From across the board, people (including several alumni and Jesuits) are feeling angry and let down. They say that SXC has failed to see the big picture: cancelling the lecture means giving in to the anti-national and anti-Constitutional fascist forces.; acquiescing with these forces means that they are emboldened and will continue to call the shots.

 It means negating the academic freedom which is the essence of every institution of higher learning; it means that the Constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech and expression is not important. In the past, when there were such threats, we are aware that, SXC called in the police and continued with their programme.

Today’s (10 August) Mid-day reports, “We are surprised that the college has shown cowardice and yielded to pressure tactics. We teach our students about the values of justice, democracy, and peace, but when it comes to taking a stand, we bow down to the pressure, even when Stan has not been proven guilty. This has been the general pulse of the St Xavier’s alumni and the community,” said a source from the St Xavier’s College Society. “Sorry, Stan!”

On July 1, our Superior General Fr Arturo Sosa, delivered a path-breaking inaugural address to the Assembly of International Association of Jesuit Universities (IAJU) gathered in Colombia. Among the many other things, he said, “At the 2018 IAJU Assembly in Bilbao, I also recalled how Ignacio Ellacuría, S.J., one of the martyrs of the UCA-El Salvador, strongly insisted on understanding the university as a project of social transformation. Trying to explain the meaning of those words, I said: “It is a university that moves toward the margins of human history where it encounters those who are discarded by the dominant structures and powers. It is a university that opens its doors and windows to the margins of society. With them comes a new breath of life that makes efforts for social transformation a source of life and fulfilment.””. That the Jesuits of SXC have not understood this fundamental of Jesuit education, we say “Sorry, Stan!”

Today on Facebook I came across a powerful picture and quote posted by ‘Earth. We Are One’.( ewao.com) we are one. The picture shows birds in a cage criticising the bird who dares fly. The quote said, “The image of caged birds criticising a rebel who has chosen to fly free is a powerful metaphor for the way society often views those who dare to challenge the status quo. The caged birds represent the fear and conformity of those who prefer to remain inside their safe boundaries, while the free bird embodies the courage to break away from societal norms. What is it that makes us fear the rebel—the one who chooses to question the rules? Perhaps it’s because they see a different path, one that holds the potential for growth and freedom. This cartoon asks us: Is it better to stay in the cage, or should we follow our own path toward true liberation?”  That reminded me of you Stan, someone who had the courage to fly and even when you were caged in prison, you dared to tell us that even caged birds sing. Of course you meant the song of truth and justice. For not having the courage to fly and even to sing whilst being caged, we say with humility “Sorry, Stan!”

I can see you Stan, smiling at us here below, telling us in your own inimitable and no-nonsense way of how we have lost the plot! You tell us that instead of accompanying the Adivasis and the Dalits, the excluded and exploited, the minorities and marginalised, the poor and vulnerable, we focus on constructing buildings and on institutionalisation. You question us about ‘forming men and women for others’ when some of those who take away the jal-jungle-jameen other natural resources, identity and dignity fromthe Adivasis, are those ‘educated’ by us. You remind us of the film ‘Mission’ and of the Jesuit Martyrs of El Salvador; you challenge us to live our faith-justice mandate and to realise the Universal Apostolic Preferences (UAPs) in all our initiatives. Above all, you tell us that mere ‘tokenism’ and ‘cosmetic activities’ will in no way help us truly walk the talk! Yes, Stan, we have betrayed you, your vision and mission. Perhaps, this act by SXC, may evenhopefully help us all to ‘examen’ ourselves much more and honestly! Till then “Sorry, Stan!”

Forgive us, dear Stan, and intercede for us from your eternal abode,

Your brother,

Cedric

The author is a human rights, reconciliation & peace activist /writer

Related:

Fr. Stan Swamy SJ: Person, Pilgrim, Prophet

Fr. Stan Swamy’s legacy lives forever!

Jailed Father Stan Swamy dies ahead of his bail hearing

Fr Stan Swamy’s institutional murder

The post Sorry, Stan! appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The notification issued by the Union Territory’s Home Department on August 5, 2025 was unprecedented and sweeping in more ways than one. It included scholarly and rigorously  researched books by a range of academics and writers from across the globe, including the noted  constitutional scholar, the late A G Noorani, the writer Arundhati Roy, academics Sumantra Bose, Christopher Snedden and Victoria Schofield and journalist and editor Anuradha Bhasin. Books edited by researchers, activists and intellectuals of calibre such as Essar Batool, Tariq Ali, Sugata Bose, Ayesha Jalal,  Angana Chatterjee, etc, have also been prohibited.

The books have been in circulation for several years. For instance, “Kashmir Politics and Plebiscite” by Dr Abdul Jabbar Gockhami was published in 2011, “The Kashmir Dispute 1947-2012” by A G Noorani in 2014, while “A Dismantled State: The Untold Story of Kashmir After Article 370” by Anuradha Bhasin was published in 2022 and “Colonizing Kashmir: State-building under Indian Occupation” by Hafza Kanjwal was published in 2023.

The religious-political text ‘Al Jihad Fil Islam’, by the Islamic scholar and founder of the Jamaat-e-Islami, Maulana Maududi, on the concept of jihad in Islam was published in 1927, while “Mujahid Ki Azan”, another Urdu book by Hasan Al Banna Shaheed, was published in 2006 and is out of stock.

But whether or not the books are out of stock is immaterial, as mere possession is outlawed. A day after the notification,  the Anantnag police scoured stationery shops for the books but there is no information as to whether any of the offending publications were located and seized. In February 2025, six years after the ban on the Jamaat-e-Islami Jammu and Kashmir, police had raided bookstores and seized around 600 books, mostly Islamic literature, though there was no official notification on their forfeiture.

The recent notification, issued  under Section 98 of the Bhartiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), 2023, grants powers to the State Government to declare certain publications forfeited and to issue search-warrants for them, if they violate Section 152 (acts endangering the sovereignty, unity and integrity of India), Section 196 (promoting enmity between different groups), Section 197 (imputations and   assertions prejudicial to national integration and harming national unity), Section 294 and Section 295 (obscenity), Section 299 (acts outraging religious feelings) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023.

The notification itself provides little evidence of the precise violations of Section 98 of the BNSS or of the multiple sections of the BNS by which books can be banned or forfeited. Instead, the notification is replete with terms that find no place in actual law. For instances, the notification says the banned literature propagates false narratives, giving no instances or examples of these narratives and why they are considered false.

The letter and spirit of the law (however flawed its application) is practically drowned in a discourse of the most fantastical language of condemnation, the more wild, unreasonable and irrational, the better.

By what stretch of imagination are books by such scholars like Noorani or Anuradha Bhasin or Arundhati Roy or Essar Batool or any others named in the notification even remotely obscene? How are these books, primarily words that convey ideas, historical facts and analysis “acts” that endanger the sovereignty and unity of India? How do they promote enmity between communities or endanger national harmony? There are no clues in the notification.

For the authors or the publishers of the books, the only recourse would be under Section 99 of the BNSS, which gives them two months to apply to the High Court to set aside the declaration of forfeiture. A special three-judge bench of the High Court will be convened to consider the applications.  Till then, the sale and possession of the books will be considered a crime.

Misplaced “concern” for youth

Betraying a staunchly paternalistic tone towards youth of the former state, the notification goes on to say that a significant driver behind youth participation in violence and terrorism is “the systematic dissemination of false narratives and secessionist literature by its persistent internal circulation disguised as historical and political commentary”. Why is it internal, when most of the more popular books are freely available, online and offline and what is disguised about the commentary – the notification doesn’t bother to say.

Reiterating the state government’s “concern” for the youth of Kashmir, the notification further says that  the books are responsible for “misguiding youth, glorifying terrorism and inciting violence against the Indian State”. The last is a serious charge but, again, there is scant detail on any of these 25 books.

Notwithstanding its avowed concern for youth, the notification also slams them, stating that these 25 books promote a “culture of grievance, victimhood and terrorist heroism.”

Ironically, it is also perhaps the first official acknowledgment of the “alienation” of the youth of Jammu and Kashmir, who are today bearing the brunt of decades of conflict and a history passed down, not only through books, but by shared accounts of  successive generations of more than 75 years of living in an area of militarized strife.

Far from book bans, what really ought to concern the government of Jammu and Kashmir is unemployment, poor healthcare (including for mental health) and education. In all these spheres, the undisputed data itself starkly tells the true story of the youth in Kashmir.

Official data on Kashmiri youth pegs unemployment at 17.4 per cent, far above the national average of 10.2%. According to the Baseline Survey Report 2024-25 under Mission YUVA (Yuva Udyami Vikas Abhiyan), which cited the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) 2023-24, the overall unemployment rate in J & K is 6.7%, nearly double the national average of 3.5%. According to the report, released by Chief Minister Omar Abdullah in June this year, women face even steeper barriers, with urban female unemployment recorded at 28.6%.

Studies on the condition of mental health in the population, given the prolonged conflict, are also cause for alarm. An epidemiological study, conducted in 2024, of psychiatric disorders in Kashmir, observed that 11.3% of the adult population suffered from mental illness in the valley. As compared to males (8.4%), there was a higher prevalence among females(12.9%). Depressive disorders (8.4%) were the most common psychiatric disorders, followed by anxiety disorders (5.1%).

What would be the effect of such arbitrary and repressive acts on an already beleaguered population?

 

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Erasure of history and the fear of recollection

 The ban on books comes a day after the 6th anniversary of the abrogation of Article 370 of the Indian Constitution in August  2019. Scrapping the special status of Jammu and Kashmir, the Union Government has aggressively pushed for its “naya Kashmir “project and multiple erasures of lived histories and experiences have marked the last six years.

While newspapers mirrored the government-led normalcy, a deafening silence has prevailed, first due to the unprecedented communications blockade that lasted till 2021 and then due to the crackdown on journalists, lawyers, human rights activists, academics and political party members. There have been police summons and detentions, disembarking of journalists flying out of the country for legitimate professional work, suspension and withdrawal of passports and no-fly lists.

While the invisibilising of everyday accounts has become the norm, the digital erasure of archives of published accounts of multiple journalists has been a chilling feature of the toolkit for the new Kashmir. Heavily dependent on government advertising, the media in Kashmir put up little resistance to the mass deletion of their own archives. Independent journalists found that their social media accounts were also vulnerable, as content was taken down and accounts were blocked with impunity.

The censoring of universities and academic spaces is, of course, an all-India project. Conferences, talks, discussions and even film screenings on sensitive issues need prior permission, chapters in text books have been changed, historical accounts are dropped from the curriculum and teachers are under watch both in the classroom and for posts on their private social media accounts, as the experience of Prof. Tejaswini Desai of the Kolhapur Institute of Technology’s College of Engineering or of Prof.  Ali Khan Mahmudabad of Ashoka University reveal.

But the ‘K’ word occupies a special place as the recent development over the revised syllabus for MA in Political Science reveals. According to this report in Maktoob Media, the paper “DSE 17: Politics and Ethnic Conflicts in J&K,” including debates on state autonomy, self-determination, secessionist politics and factors of terrorism, was flagged by the Standing Committee (of the University) for its discourse on the Indian national identity, Hindu nationalism and Politics of anxiety. It had earlier been approved by the Academic Council and the Executive Council of the University.

In the face of all these official attempts to wipe our plural viewpoints, however reasoned and well-researched, the J & K government’s book ban is the most objectionable effort. The ban seeks to arbitrarily criminalise 25 books, casting them as the prime accused and convicting them before a fair trial. Though words have a way of escaping the bars of forfeiture and prohibition, unlike the prolonged jailing of academics, human rights activists, journalists, lawyers and students, the notification must go.

First Published on freespeechcollective.in

The post J & K Govt. Book Ban: What do the Thought Police Fear? appeared first on SabrangIndia.

A bench comprising Justices Rajesh Bindal and Manmohan described such pre-publication restraints as “super injunctions”, stressing that they are permissible only in extremely rare circumstances in a democratic, free country.

The petition was filed by Harshendra Kumar D., Secretary of the Dharmasthala Temple management body, who alleged that defamatory content targeting the temple’s managing family was being widely circulated online, particularly on YouTube. According to his submission, around 8,000 YouTube channels were carrying material that defamed the hereditary head of the temple, Veerendra Heggade, and other members of the managing trust.

While refusing to pass any immediate restraining orders, the Supreme Court directed the Karnataka trial court to reconsider Kumar’s plea afresh, with all supporting evidence placed on record. The bench clarified that it was not expressing any opinion on the merits of the defamation claim, as per a report of Hindustan Times.

Karnataka High Court’s Intervention: August 1, 2025

This Supreme Court development came just a week after the Karnataka High Court bench comprising Justice M. Nagaprasanna set aside a sweeping gag order issued on July 18, 2025 by a Bengaluru civil court in Kumar’s earlier defamation suit.

That order had restrained reportage on the Dharmasthala burial allegations and directed 390 media houses to remove nearly 9,000 online links, including news articles, videos, and posts, related to the case. The gag order was granted ex parte, without hearing the affected media outlets, and despite there being no FIR naming Kumar or temple officials in connection with the allegations.

The High Court criticised the indiscriminate nature of such injunctions, noting that restrictions on reportage in matters of significant public interest should be exceptional, narrowly tailored, and supported by strong prima facie grounds.

Origins of the Current Case: Whistle blower’s complaint of July 3, 2025

The present controversy began more than a month earlier, when on July 3, 2025, a former sanitation worker of the Shri Dharmasthala Manjunatheshwara Temple lodged a six-page complaint with the Superintendent of Police, Dakshina Kannada district.

The whistle-blower, a Dalit man who worked for the temple between 1995 and 2014, alleged that during his employment, he was forced to bury hundreds of murder victims on temple premises and surrounding lands. He claimed that many of the victims were minor girls who had been sexually assaulted before being killed.

The worker stated that he had been threatened with death if he ever spoke about these events. He fled Dharmasthala in 2014, remaining silent for 11 years, before deciding to come forward out of guilt, as per a report in Frontline Magazine.

Historical Context: Dharmasthala’s unsolved cases

The allegations immediately gained national and international attention, in part because they appeared to connect to a long-standing history of unsolved murders and disappearances in Dharmasthala.

• 1987 – Padmalatha case: Rape and murder of a 17-year-old girl; no arrests made.
• 2012 – Soujanya case: Rape and murder of another 17-year-old girl; case remained unresolved for over a decade and was officially closed in 2023.

Families of several victims and activists have repeatedly alleged that these crimes were linked to Veerendra Heggade, the hereditary head of the temple and a Rajya Sabha MP since 2022. Past investigative reporting pointed to poor police investigations allegedly influenced by powerful individuals.

Mounting public pressure and SIT formation

Following the whistle-blower’s testimony and growing public anger, the Karnataka government, on July 19, 2025, announced the formation of a Special Investigation Team (SIT) headed by Director General of Police Pranab Mohanty.

Acting swiftly, the SIT identified 13 suspected burial sites. According to Indian Express, exhumations began on July 29, 2025, in challenging conditions — heavy monsoon rains, forested terrain, and proximity to the Netravathi River.

By August 4, 2025:

• Site No. 6: Partial human skeleton recovered.
• Site No. 11-A: Skeletal fragments recovered; unclear if they form complete skeletons.
• One location: PAN card found belonging to a man reportedly deceased in 2025.

Families and witnesses come forward

The SIT’s work encouraged families of past victims to step forward:

• Soujanya’s parents expressed hope that the case will finally lead to justice.
• Mother of Ananya Bhat (medical student missing since 2003) filed a fresh complaint in hopes her daughter’s remains might be identified.
• Additional witnesses provided accounts of other secret burials in and around Dharmasthala.

According to Frontline Magazine, some families and activists have called for the case to be handed over to a national agency such as the NIA, citing the gravity of the allegations and potential local influence over the investigation.

Threats, attacks, and evidence destruction concerns

Despite the High Court’s lifting of the gag order, independent journalists and YouTubers reporting on the case have faced threats and physical violence. According to Hindustan Times, on August 6, 2025, two YouTubers were attacked while filming in Dharmasthala.

In a major revelation was also present in the report raising concerns of evidence destruction, the Belthangady police station admitted in early August to having deleted records of unidentified deaths from 2000–2015 — a period covering many of the alleged crimes.

Political and institutional responses

Political reactions have largely been muted, with many leaders avoiding direct comment on the allegations against Heggade:

• G. Parameshwara (Home Minister, Karnataka): Said a “thorough investigation” must precede any conclusions and confirmed SIT’s mandate.
• R. Ashok (BJP Leader of Opposition): Dismissed the allegations as a conspiracy; falsely claimed the whistle blower was Muslim.
• B.S. Yediyurappa (former CM, BJP): Called the charges baseless but welcomed the SIT’s formation.

Heggade has made no public statement. A temple spokesperson has said the administration supports the SIT’s investigation.

Forensic challenges

Forensic experts warn that identifying the skeletal remains will be complex due to:

• Advanced decomposition.
• Possible disturbance of burial sites.
• Requirement for DNA matching with living relatives.

Despite this, victim families remain hopeful that the investigation will deliver closure after decades of unanswered grief.

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The post Supreme Court rejects gag order plea in Dharmasthala mass burial case, orders fresh Trial Court review appeared first on SabrangIndia.

On July 28, 2025, Kavin Selva Ganesh, a 27-year-old Dalit software engineer from Arumugamangalam near Eral in Thoothukudi district, was hacked to death in broad daylight in KTC Nagar, Tirunelveli. The accused, S. Surjith (21), allegedly attacked Kavin with a sickle over his relationship with Surjith’s sister, Subashini, a Siddha practitioner. Kavin and Subashini had been in a long-term inter-caste relationship, which Surjith and his family, belonging to the dominant Maravar community (MBC), vehemently opposed.

Surjith is not just an ordinary civilian — he is the son of two serving Sub-Inspectors in the Tamil Nadu Armed Police, Saravanan and Krishnakumari, both of whom were also named as co-accused in the FIR. Despite this, the couple was only suspended and has not been arrested, triggering public outrage. The FIR has been filed under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 2015, and relevant sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).

According to Kavin’s mother, S. Tamizhselvi, who filed the police complaint, her son had received repeated threats from the accused’s family. On the day of the incident, Surjith reportedly lured Kavin under the pretext of their parents wanting to meet him and then brutally attacked him with a sickle, chasing him down and killing him less than 200 metres from the hospital where Subashini worked. Eyewitnesses, CCTV footage, and multiple media reports corroborate these details.

Petition filed with the National Commission for Scheduled Castes (NCSC)

On July 30, 2025, a citizen petition was submitted at the National Commission for Scheduled Castes (NCSC) headquarters in New Delhi by Shailendar Karthikeyan, law student seeking urgent intervention in the caste-based killing of Kavin Selva Ganesh. He met the Personal Secretary to the Chairperson and submitted detailed documentation, including press clippings. During the interaction, the petitioner was informed that the Commission had already taken suo moto cognizance of the case.

While a formal number was not assigned to the newly submitted petition, the representation was accepted and acknowledged by the Commission. The petitioner urged the Commission to treat the matter with utmost urgency and to include the following demands in its proceedings:

1. Immediate arrest of the accused’s parents — Sub-Inspectors Saravanan and Krishnakumari — who are named in the FIR.
2. Constitution of a fact-finding committee to investigate the role of caste bias and police complicity.
3. NCSC’s ongoing monitoring of investigation and prosecution, including regular status reports from the State Government.
4. Provision of witness protection to the victim’s family, who continue to fear retaliation.

The petition can be accessed here 

Arrest, CB-CID transfer, and body acceptance

In a significant turn of events, Saravanan, a serving Sub-Inspector and father of the main accused Surjith, was arrested by Tamil Nadu police in connection with the caste-based killing of Kavin Selva Ganesh. The arrest came soon after a petition was filed with the National Commission for Scheduled Castes (NCSC), though it is unclear if the two are directly connected. The case has since been transferred to the CB-CID, reflecting its seriousness and the growing demand for an impartial investigation. Following Saravanan’s arrest, Kavin’s family ended their five-day protest and accepted his body from the Tirunelveli Government Medical College Hospital, where Minister K.N. Nehru and Collector R. Sukumar paid their respects. Notably, the family had earlier rejected the state’s ₹6 lakh compensation, insisting that they sought justice and not money by demanding the immediate arrest of both police officers named in the FIR.

Deafening Silence from Political Leaders

The response from Tamil Nadu’s mainstream political parties has been largely muted, drawing criticism from activists. Only leaders of VCK (Thol Thirumavalavan), NTK (Seeman), and Puthiya Tamilagam (K. Krishnasamy) have issued strong public statements demanding separate legislation to curb honour killings. The silence of ruling and opposition parties has left Dalit voices further isolated.

A Broader Pattern

This is not an isolated incident. Tamil Nadu has seen a disturbing pattern of caste-based honour killings from the 2016 murder of Sankar in Udumalpet to the more recent cases in Cuddalore and Krishnagiri. In most cases, justice has been delayed, and police bias is often evident.

The murder of Kavin Selva Ganesh is a stark reminder that caste continues to determine who gets to love, who gets to live, and who gets away with murder in this country.

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Director of the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT), D. P. Saklani unveiled the Class 8 Social Science textbook with several fundamental changes on July 17, 2025. This revised version of texts will be utilised in schools from the academic session, 2025-26. Wide-ranging changes have been made in this new edition. Media reports have singled out how existing lessons on Mughal and Muslim rulers had been replaced with details of the religious persecution and other atrocities under ‘Muslim rule’ in India. And on this pretext, the Hindutva-captive media and ‘WhatsApp university’ have started another war against Islam and the country’s Muslims. Before this move, some radical changes had been made in the textbooks of classes 6-12.

The expert who has been given the responsibility to complete this work by NCERT, under the complete control of RSS, is Michel Danino, an Indian writer of French origin. He secured Indian citizenship only in 2003. The Modi government has conferred the Padma Shri, India’s fourth-highest civilian award on him, in 2017.  He is currently the chairman of the social science curriculum of the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT). He is a supporter of Hindutva and has been criticised for indulging in historical negationism (denying the truths of the past).

Let us first understand which crucial developments have been omitted from the school syllabus.

Emergency of 1975

The chapter on Emergency in the Class 12 political science textbook ‘Politics in India after Independence’ has been reduced by five pages. Parts relating to the harsh impact of the Emergency on people and institutions have been deleted.  Another reference to the ban imposed on all trade union activities during the Emergency has been removed from chapter 8 (‘Social Movements’) of the class 12 sociology textbook.

Material on protests and social movements dropped

Nearly three chapters detailing protests that turned into social movements in contemporary India have been removed from political science textbooks for classes 6 to 12. A chapter on “Rise of Popular Movements” has been removed from the class 12 textbook ‘Politics in India after Independence’. The Chipko movement, the growth of the Dalit Panthers in Maharashtra in the 1970s, the agrarian struggles of the 1980s, especially those led by the Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU), the anti-alcohol movement of Andhra Pradesh, details on the famous Narmada Bachao Andolan [Save Narmada River Movement] opposing the construction of the Sardar Sarovar Project on the Narmada River and its tributaries in Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Maharashtra and the Right to Information movement were removed in one go.

The chapter ‘Struggle for Equality’ also removed

NCERT has also removed the chapter ‘Struggle for Equality’ from the Class 7 Political Science textbook, which states how ‘Tawa Matsya Sangh’ fought for the rights of displaced forest dwellers of Satpura forests of Madhya Pradesh.

Chapter on struggles of indigenous people removed

The third chapter on mass struggles has been removed from the Class 10 political science textbook ‘Democratic Politics-II’. It dealt with indirect ways of influencing politics through pressure groups and movements. Besides the movement for democracy in Nepal and the protests against water privatization in Bolivia, South America. This chapter also covered the Narmada Bachao Andolan, the non-violent ‘Kittiko-Hachiko Movement’ (‘Kittiko-Hachiko Movement’, also known as the “Kittiko Hachiko” movement, was a non-violent protest in Karnataka, India, in 1987 which opposed eucalyptus plantations on grazing land. The movement involved people plucking eucalyptus saplings and planting alternative, useful plants instead) in Karnataka in 1987, the BAMCEF (All India Backwards SC/ST/OBC and Minorities Communities Employees’ Federation) founded by Kanshiram in 1971, and the National Alliance of People’s Movements, whose founders included Medha Patkar.

Scissors on study of social movements

The only chapter on social movements in the sociology syllabus of classes 11 and 12 has been significantly reduced. In the chapter titled ‘Social Movements’ in the class 12 textbook ‘Social Change and Development in India’ one of the several changes made is the removal of the exercise box in which students were asked to discuss the recent farmers’ protests against the three farm laws passed by Parliament.

Shredding of Indian democracy

Four chapters dealing with Democracy and the Making of Indian Democracy have been removed on the ground that similar topics are covered in Political Science textbooks of other classes. For example, a chapter titled ‘Key Elements of Democratic Government’ has been removed from the Class 6 political science book. This was the first detailed introduction to the concept of democracy in middle school and discussed some of the key elements that affect the functioning of a democratic government, including chapters like ‘Democracy and Diversity’ and ‘Challenges to Democracy’ that have been removed from the Class 10 political science textbook.

Both these chapters were first removed from the CBSE syllabus in April and have now been permanently removed from the NCERT textbook.

Jawaharlal Nehru cut short

The following comment of Nehru on Bhakra Nangal Dam has been removed from Class 12 Sociology textbook, ‘Social Change and Development in India’:

“Our engineers tell us that probably nowhere else in the world is there a dam as high as this. The work bristles with difficulties and complications. As I walked around the site I thought that these days the biggest temple and mosques and gurdwara is the place where man works for the good of mankind. Which place can be greater than this, this Bhakra Nangal, where thousands and lakhs of men have worked, have shed their blood and sweat and laid down their lives as well?”

Discussion on sedition deleted

A section describing the arbitrariness of colonial sedition law through the example of sedition and how Indian nationalists, specially, revolutionaries played a role in challenging it is no longer part of a chapter ‘Understanding Laws’ in the class 8 political science book. This deleted section also carried the following exercise for students: “State one reason why you think the Sedition Act of 1870 was arbitrary? In what ways does the Sedition Act of 1870 contradict the rule of law?”

Constitution making and creation of linguistic states left out

The chapter ‘India after Independence’, which talks about constitution making and creation of linguistic states, has been removed from the Class 8 history textbook ‘Our Pasts III’.

Description of demolition of Babri Masjid, Gujarat and Manipur violence removed

References to the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya (1992), targeted killing of Muslims in the Gujarat communal violence (2002), and to the Manipur violence have been removed from Class 11 and 12 textbooks.

Pioneers of Anti-British struggle, Hyder Ali and Tipu Sultan dropped

NCERT’s new Class 8 social science textbook does not mention Hyder Ali and Tipu Sultan, or the four Anglo-Mysore Wars of the 1700s, in its chapter on India’s colonial period. Remember, Tipu Sultan, known as the “Tiger of Mysore”, led a glorious military resistance to British colonialism. He was the pioneer of rocket artillery which had great success against the British. The economy of Mysore reached its peak during his reign.

He was martyred on 4 May 1799 while fighting the combined forces of British-Maratha-Nizam at the Srirangapatna front. At the time of Tipu’s martyrdom, he was wearing a heavy gold ring on which ‘Ram’ was inscribed in Devanagari script.

How much British dreaded Tipu would be clear by the letter which A. Campbell, wrote to the Court of Directors of the East India Company in 1788, “the most active powerful, ambitious Prince of Hindustan, whose troops are in high order and whose powerful antipathy to the English is beyond what the Directors are yet well aware of.” When he died there were jubilant celebrations in Britain with declaration of public holiday in Britain.

Shockingly, Danino defending the removal of Haider Ali and Tipu Sultan’s contribution to anti-colonial wars while confirming that Tipu Sultan and related events will likely remain absent in Part 2 of the series as well, stated: “If we include every war, we go back to cramming.”

The ‘Muslim’ rule not removed but toxified

The supplicant majoritarian regime-captive media and experts have been arguing that the period of rule of Muslim rulers in India has been removed, attributing this reason to the ire within the secular and progressive camp. The truth is different: Muslim rule has been related but re-configurated and now narrated with a vigorous anti-Islam and anti-Muslim rhetoric in tune with the current communal politics of RSS-BJP rulers (regime).

The history section of the new book, begins with the Delhi Sultanate and goes up to the colonial period (the British Raj), deliberating in a note on ‘Dark Periods of History’, when war, abuse, fanaticism and bloodshed prevailed. The description of ‘dark periods of history’ includes the oppressive policies of Mahmud of Ghazni and the Mughal rulers as we will know in the following.

1. Reference to Mahmud Ghazni of Afghanistan, who invaded the subcontinent and raided the Somnath temple, has been tweaked. First, the title “Sultan” has been dropped from his name. Second, the sentence “he raided the subcontinent almost every year” has been revised to “he raided the subcontinent 17 times (1000-1025 CE) with a religious motive”.
2. On Babur, the first Mughal emperor, the book notes that his autobiography points to him as being cultured and intellectually curious. “But he was also a brutal and ruthless conqueror, slaughtering entire populations of cities, enslaving women and children, and taking pride in erecting ‘towers of skulls’ made from the slaughtered people of plundered cities.”
3. Akbar’s reign is described as a blend of “brutality and tolerance”, and that during the seizure of the Chittor fort, Akbar, then 25 years old, ordered the massacre of 30,000 civilians, and the enslavement of women and children, the new textbook states. Akbar’s message is also quoted in the textbook: “We have succeeded in occupying a number of forts and towns belonging to infidels and have established Islam there. With the help of our bloodthirsty sword, we have erased signs of infidelity from their minds and have destroyed temples in those places and also all over Hindustan.”
4. On Aurangzeb, the book points out that some scholars argue that his motives were primarily political, and they give examples of his grants and assurances of protection to temples. While politics played a part in his decisions, his farmans (edicts) “make his personal religious motive clear too.” He ordered governors of provinces to demolish schools and temples, and destroyed temples at Banaras, Mathura, Somnath, and Jain temples and Sikh gurdwaras.

This detailed account of the atrocities committed by the ‘Muslim’ rulers on their Hindu subjects has been accompanied by a commentary which underlines that it is important to study the dark events objectively, without blaming anyone of the present-day people (i.e. the Muslims of the country). If we want to identify the criminals of the ‘Muslim Raj’, then the historical facts of that period, as recorded by the ‘Hindu’ sources themselves, will clearly reveal that the upper caste Hindus were fully complicit in the atrocities committed by the Muslim rulers.

Majoritarian narrative of incidents in history when privileged caste Hindus helped ‘Muslim’ rulers

No sane person can deny that Somnath Temple in Gujarat was desecrated, looted and razed by Mahmud Ghazi (Mahmud Ghaznavi) in 1026. But a fact remains buried that it was done with the active help and participation of local Hindu chieftains. The most prominent ideologue of RSS, MS Golwalkar while referring to the desecration and destruction of Somnath Temple by Mahmud Ghazi added:

“He crossed the Khyber Pass and set foot in Bharat to plunder the wealth of Somnath. He had to cross the great desert of Rajasthan. There was a time when he had no food, and no water for his army, and even for himself left to his fate, he would have perished…But no, Mahmud Ghazi made the local chieftains to believe that Saurashtra had expansionist designs against them. In their folly and pettiness, they believed him. And they joined him. When Mahmud Ghazi launched his assault on the great temple, it was the Hindu, blood of our blood, flesh of our flesh, soul of our soul-who stood in the vanguard of his army. Somnath was desecrated with the active help of the Hindus. These are facts of history.”

[RSS English organ, Organizer, January 4, 1950.]

These were not ‘Muslim’ rulers only who were defiling Hindu temples. Swami Vivekananda shared the fact that,

“The temple of Jagannath is an old Buddhistic temple. We took this and others over and re-Hinduised them. We shall have to do many things like that yet”. [The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, vol. 3, 264.]

It has been corroborated by another darling of the Hindutva camp, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee. According to him the rath yatra, an integral part of Jagganath Temple was a Buddhist ritual. Bankim wrote:

“It is a fact…that the images of Jagannath, Balaram, and Subhadra, which now figure in the Rath, are near copies of the representations of Buddha, Dharmma, and Sangha, and appear to have been modelled upon them.”

[Chatterjee, Bankim Chandra, ‘On the origin of Hindu festivals’ in Essays & Letters, Rupa, Delhi, 2010, pp. 8-9.]

It was not an isolated takeover. Swami Dayanand Saraswati who is regarded as a Prophet of Hindutva and revered by RSS while dealing with the contribution of Shankaracharya (8th century) in his tome, Satyarth Prakash wrote:

“For ten years he toured all over the country, refuted Jainism and advocated the Vedic religion. All the broken images that are now-a-days dug out of the earth were broken in the time of Shankar, whilst those that are found whole here and there under the ground had been buried by the Jainis for fear of their being broken.” [Sarswati, Dayanand, Satyarth Praksh, chapter xi, p. 347.]

According to the Buddhist narrative of ancient Indian history the last of Maurya dynasty’s Buddhist king (Ashoka being one), Brihadratha was assassinated by Pushyamitra Shunga, a Brahmin in 184 BCE thus ending the rule of a renowned Buddhist dynasty and establishing the rule of Shunga dynasty. DN Jha an authority on ancient Indian history referred to Divyavadana, a Buddhist Sanskrit work from the early centuries which described how Buddhist and Jain religious places were destroyed by Pushyamitra Shunga, a great persecutor of Buddhists.

“He is said to have marched out with a large army, destroying stupas, burning monasteries and killing monks as far as Sakala, now known as Sialkot, where he announced a prize of one hundred dinars for every head of a Shramana (opposed to Vedas).”

Jha also presented evidence from the grammarian Patanjali, a contemporary of the Shungas, who famously stated in his Mahabhashya that Brahmins and Shramanas were eternal enemies, like the snake and the mongoose.[1]

Did Hindus join persecution of Sikhs by Mughals?

In the Hindutva narrative the persecution of Sikh Gurus and their followers by Mughal rulers is used to spread hatred against present day Indian Muslims. The Mughal rulers especially Aurangzeb’s armies committed the most heinous and unspeakable crimes against Sikhs. Was the conflict really Muslims versus Sikhs? The contemporary Sikh records reject such an interpretation. According to a Sikh site during the last and the most brutal siege of Anandpur Sahib in 1704, “The Muslims and the Hindu hill rajas completely surrounded the city and cut it off from outside supplies.” While trying to escape the Mughal invaders,

“The younger sons of Guru Gobind Singh, Baba Zorawar Singh age 9 and Baba Fateh Singh age 7, were separated from the group in the confusion. They walked through the rugged jungle with their holy grandmother, Mata Gujri ji (mother of Guru Gobind Singh) until they came to small village where they took shelter. An old servant of the Guru’s household, Gangu, heard they were there and came to Mataji. With sweet words he requested that they go with him to his village. He expressed care and concern, but his heart was dark with betrayal. Cold, wet and alone, Mata Gujri gratefully went with Gangu to his house. For a few gold coins, Gangu betrayed their whereabouts to the Moghul army. At dawn, a loud banging came on the door, and the soldiers of the evil governor Wazir Khan came to escort the holy family to Sarhind. As they travelled through the city, people thronged to see them pass offering words of encouragement. They shouted curses at the Brahmin and were shocked at the depravity of the Moghul governor”. [2]

Maratha Rule glorified overlooking what it did to Hindus

The class 8 social science book now has a separate chapter on the Marathas; it refers to the Anglo-Maratha wars between 1775 and 1818 and states that “the British took India from the Marathas more than from the Mughals or any other power”. Marathas in general are seen as having “contributed substantially to India’s cultural developments.”

Let us compare these claims with the horrendous experience of the contemporary Hindus. Sir Jadunath Sarkar (1870-1958), a renowned historian, held no brief for Islam or Muslim rulers in India. In fact, he is regarded as a true ‘Bhartiye’ historian by RSS and a truthful narrator of the Hindu history during the Mughal rule. However, his description of the Maratha invasion of Bengal in 1742, too, makes it clear that this army of ‘Hindu nation’ cared least about honour and property of Hindus of Bengal. According to Sarkar, “the roving Maratha bands committed wanton destruction and unspeakable outrage”.

[Jadunath Sarkar (ed.), The History of Bengal-Volume II Muslim Period 1200 A.D.–1757 A.D. (Delhi: BR Publishing, 2003), (first edition 1948), 457.]

Sarkar, in his monumental work on the history of Bengal, reproduced eyewitness accounts of the sufferings of Bengali Hindus at the hands of Marathas. According to one such eyewitness, Gangaram,

“The Marathas snatched away gold and silver, rejecting everything else. Of some people they cut off the hands, of some the nose and ear; some they killed outright. They dragged away the beautiful women and freed them only after raping them”.

[Jadunath Sarkar (ed.), The History of Bengal-Volume II Muslim Period 1200 A.D.–1757 A.D. (Delhi: BR Publishing, 2003), (first edition 1948), 457.]

Another eyewitness, Vaneshwar Vidyalankar, the court Pandit of the Maharaja of Bardwan, narrated the horrifying tales of atrocities committed by the Marathas against Hindus in the following words:

“Shahu Raja’s troops are niggard of pity, slayers of pregnant women and infants, of Brahmans and the poor, fierce of spirit, expert in robbing the property of everyone and committing every kind of sinful act.” [Ibid., 458.]

Babur’s atrocitiesNCERT does not tell the truth that Babur captured northern India by defeating and killing the Muslim Ibrahim Lodhi. It is also not mentioned that the chief commander of the Hindu king Rana Sanga who challenged Mughal army led by Babur was Hasan Mewati who was martyred while fighting Babur’s army in the Battle of Khanwa [near Bharatpur] on March 15, 1527. Atrocities of Aurangzeb

It cannot be argued that Aurangzeb [1618-1707] did commit heinous crimes against his Hindustani subjects. It is important, however, to remember that his cruelty was not confined to non-Muslims.
His own father (Mughal emperor Shah Jahan), brothers (Dara Shikoh, Murad Bakhsh and Shah Shuja), the Shia community, Muslims who did not follow his brand of Islam and the Muslim ruling dynasties in the eastern, central and western parts of India suffered his terrible cruelty and repression. They were destroyed. The word barbaric would be too mild a word to describe his treatment of the Sikh Gurus, their families and followers.

It was Aurangzeb who murdered the famous Sufi saint, Sarmad, in the premises of Delhi’s Jama Masjid [there is a mausoleum on his grave at the eastern gate of the Jama Masjid where the stairs begin, which is still revered by many people]. It is also true that there were numerous cases when Hindus and their religious places were violently targeted during the autocratic rule of Aurangzeb. He crushed the rebellions of the ‘Satnamis’ in Gujarat.

However, there are also contemporary records of his patronage of Hindu and Jain religious sites. Two surviving examples are the magnificent Gauri Shankar Temple, a short distance from the Lahori-Gate of the Red Fort, which was built during Shah Jahan’s reign which continued to function during Aurangzeb’s reign and the famous Jain Lal Mandir right opposite the Red Fort. [Trushke, Audrey, Aurangzeb: The Man and the Myth, Penguin, Gurgaon, 2017, pp. 99-106.] Both these temples continue to function even today. It is important to remember that limiting all the crimes of Aurangzeb only to the suppression of Hindus would be tantamount to trivializing his grave crimes against humanity.

Mughal rule evolved and sustained by the support of the Hindu privileged castes

How naive is NCERT (or it is under the total influence of RSS) that it is unaware of the fact that Aurangzeb or Mughal ‘Islamic’ rule used Hindu upper castes in droves to establish and run their empire which was inhabited predominately by Hindus. How deep and strong this unity can be gauged from the fact that after Akbar, no Mughal emperor was born to a Muslim mother. The Hindu upper castes showed immense loyalty to the ‘Muslim’ rulers and served them well with both their brains and strength.

Aurobindo Ghosh, who played a major role in providing a Hindu dimension to Indian nationalism, acknowledged that Mughal rule survived due to the fact that the Mughal emperors gave Hindus “positions of power and responsibility, they used their brains and brawn to preserve their kingdoms”. [Chand, Tara, History of the Freedom Movement in India, vol. 3, Publication Division, Government of India, Delhi, 1992, p. 162.]

The renowned historian Tara Chand, relying on primary source material of the medieval period, concluded that from the end of the 16th century to the middle of the 19th century, “it can be reasonably concluded that the entire Punjab, except western Punjab, in whole of India, the ownership of land had come into the hands of the Hindus”, most of whom were Rajputs. [Chand, Tara, History of the Freedom Movement in India, vol. 1, Publication Division, Government of India, Delhi, 1961, p. 124.]

What do the contemporary official records show?

Maasir-ul-Umara [Biographies of Commanders] A biographical dictionary of officials the Mughal Empire from 1556 to 1780 [from Akbar to Shah Alam] in Persian language is the most authentic record of high-ranking officials employed by the Mughal rulers. This work was compiled by Shahnawaz Khan and his son Abdul Hai between 1741 and 1780. The details contained in it were based on the official records of the Mughal rulers. According to this compilation, during this period the Mughal rulers had about 100 Hindus (out of 365) were appointed to the high-ranking positions of Mughal empire, most of whom were from “Rajput Rajputana, Central-India, Bundelkhand, Maharashtra”. As far as numbers are concerned, Brahmins followed Rajputs in handling the Mughal administration.

[Khan, Shah Nawaz, Abdul Hai, Maasir al-Umara [translated by H Beveridge as Mathir-ul-Umra], volumes 1 & 2, Janaki Prakashan, Patna, 1979.]

Interestingly, the Kashi Nagari Pracharini Sabha, founded in 1893 which was “committed to the establishment of Hindi as the official language”, published part of this book in Hindi which contained ‘Biographies of Hindu Chieftains of the Mughal Court’ in 1931. [व्रज रत्न दास (अनुवाद), माआसिरुल–उमरा, काशी नागरी प्रचारिणी सभा, काशी, 1931]

Aurangzeb’s Hindu Generals & Advisors

Aurangzeb never faced Shivaji on the battlefield. It was his general, Jai Singh I (1611-1667), a Rajput ruler of Amer (Rajasthan), who was sent to subjugate Shivaji (1603-1680). Jai Singh II (1681-1743), (nephew of Jai Singh I) was another prominent Rajput general of the Mughal army who served Aurangzeb loyally against Shivaji. He was given the title of ‘Sawai’ by Aurangzeb in 1699. He was awarded the title of [one fourth time superior to his contemporaries] and thus he came to be known as Maharaja Sawai Jai Singh. He was also given the title of Mirza Raja [a Persian title for a royal prince] by Aurangzeb. Other titles given to him by other Mughal rulers were ‘Sarmad-i-Rajah-i-Hind’ [Eternal Ruler of India], ‘Raja Rajeshwar’ [Lord of Kings] and ‘Shri Shantanu Ji’ [Benevolent King]. These titles are even today displayed by his descendants today.

Akbar vs. Maharana Pratap

According to the prevalent Hindutva narrative, Pratap Singh I, popularly known as Maharana Pratap (1540-1597), fought for Hindus and Hindu nation against the Mughal emperor Akbar who wanted to subjugate the Hindus of India under Islamic rule. Interestingly, Akbar never faced the Maharana in any battle; it was Akbar’s most trusted Rajput military commander, Man Singh I (1550–1614), also his wife’s real brother, who fought against the Maharana on behalf of the Akbar.

The most important battle of Haldighati (June 18, 1576) was fought between the army led by Maharana and Mughal army led by Man Singh I. He was one of the Navratnas (favourite courtiers of Akbar). Akbar called him his Farzand (son), and he ruled several provinces of Akbar’s empire.

It also must be noted that chief of artillery of the army of Maharana Pratap was Hakim Khan Suri. He played a great role in confronting the Mughal army led by Man Singh in the Battle of Haldighati. Hakim Khan Suri fought alongside Maharana Pratap and was killed in the same battle while defending Maharana.

A Kayastha Prime Minister of Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb

Contemporary documents carry first-hand accounts of Raja Raghunath Bahadur, a Kayastha, who served as the Diwan Aala (Prime Minister) of both Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb. According to a biography written by one of his descendants, Raja Maharaj Lal,

“Raja Raghunath Bahadur was not oblivious to the interests of his co-castes [Kayasthas], having risen to the highest post of Dewan Aala (Prime Minister). Raja appointed each of them to positions of honour and emoluments according to their individual merits, while many of them were granted honours and valuable estates for their services. Not a single Kayastha remained unemployed or in needy circumstances.”

[Lal, Lala Maharaj, Short Account of the Life and Family of Rai Jeewan Lal Bahadur Late Honrary Magistrate Delhi, With Extracts from His Diary Relating to the Times of Mutiny 1857, 1902.]

This account reveals that in the Sultanate of Aurangzeb, who was a ‘fanatic Muslim’ and an unbridled tyrant, the Kayastha prime minister was free to patronize people of his caste, all of whom were Hindus. Aurangzeb was so fond of this Hindu Prime Minister that after his death he instructई one of his Wazirs (ministers) Asad Khan in a letter to follow the ‘saintly guidance’ of Raja Raghunath. [Trushke, Audrey, pp. 74-75.]

Investigating only the “Muslim period’ (500 years) in a 5000-year-old Indian civilization

Linking the crimes committed by Aurangzeb or other ‘Muslim’ rulers in pre-modern India to their religion is going to have serious consequences even for the ‘Hindu’ history as told by the RSS. For instance, take Ravana, the king of Lanka, who as per the ‘Hindu’ legend, committed unspeakable crimes against Sita, her husband Lord Rama and their companions during their 14-year long exile [exiled by Hindus only]. This Ravana, according to the same legend, was a learned Brahmin and one of the greatest worshippers of Lord Shiva.

Instances of Violence when in the earlier periods, when Hindus inhabited India

Mahabharata

The epic Mahabharata is not the story of a fierce war between Hindus and Muslims but between two ‘Hindu’ armies (Pandavas and Kauravas, both Kshatriyas). In this War, according to the ‘Hindu’ account, 120 crore people (all Hindus) were killed. Draupadi, the joint wife of the Pandavas, was disrobed by the Kauravas (all Hindus).

If the crimes of Ravana, Kauravas, Jai Singh I and II etc. are linked to their religion like Aurangzeb and other ‘Muslim’ rulers, then the country be represented as one that is perennially on the war path. If revenge then needs to be taken on the present co-religionists of the rulers/criminals of the past, then it must begin from the beginning of Indian civilization; the turn of Indian Muslims will come much later!

‘Muslims’ ruled India for centuries, but Muslim population remained a minority

Another crucial fact which is consciously kept under wrap is that despite more than five hundred hundreds of effective ‘Muslim’ rule which according to Hindutva historians was nothing but a project of annihilating Hindus or forcibly converting the latter to Islam, India remained a nation with an absolute Hindu majority. The British rulers held first census in 1871-72. It was the time when even ceremonial ‘Muslim’ rule was over. According to the Census report:

“The population of British India is, in round numbers, divided into 140½ millions [sic] of Hindus (including Sikhs), or 73½ per cent., 40¾ millions of Mahomedans, or 21½ per cent. And 9¼ millions of others, or barely 5 per cent., including under this title Buddhists and Jains, Christians, Jews, Parsees, Brahmoes…”

[Memorandum on the Census of British India of 1871-72: Presented to both Houses of Parliament by Command of Her Majesty London, George Edward Eyre and William Spottiswoode, Her Majesty’s Stationary Office 1875, 16.]

These figures make it clear that persecution and cleansing of Hindus was not even a secondary project of the ‘Muslim’ rule. If it had been so Hindus would have disappeared from India. At the end of ‘Muslim’ rule Hindus were 73.5%. India seems to be the only country in world history where despite ‘Muslim’ rule of more than half of a millennium the populace did not convert to the religion of the rulers. Hindu High Castes remained in control of the national wealth during the ‘Muslim’ rule and continue to be in control whereas common Muslims remained paupers during the ‘Muslim’ rule and continue to be so!

In the latest NCERT rewrite spree on Muslim period, a mysterious note has been added which generously states that the dark events i.e., Muslim period should be studied impartially without blaming any present-day people (i.e. Muslims of the country). If we really want to identify the criminals of ‘Muslim Raj’ then it is very important to also settle the account with the privileged caste Hindus of the country and not Indian Muslims. There are historical reasons behind the huge amount of wealth that the upper castes of the country have today.

They Hindu privileged castes did not bear enmity towards either Muslim or Christian rulers but rather served them with utmost loyalty; they even developed bread-daughter [roti-beti] relationship with the Muslim rulers. It is not that the upper Caste Hindus did not fight these cruel rulers, but nobody of their lineage survived. The tragedy of the country is that children of those who betrayed common Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains of this country, served most loyally under both the ‘Muslim Raj’ and the British.

[1] https://caravanmagazine.in/reviews-and-essays/dn-jha-destruction-buddhist-sites

[2] https://www.sikhdharma.org/4-sons-of-guru-gobind-singh/

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The post Rewriting NCERT school textbooks: ‘Muslim Raj’ is a mere excuse, the project is to conceal historical facts appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The entire text of the letter may be read here:

To

Shri Gyanesh Kumar

Chief Election Commissioner

Dr Sukhbir Singh Sandhu

Election Commissioner

Dr Vivek Joshi

Election Commissioner

Dear S/Shri Gyanesh Kumar, Sandhu and Joshi,

Many TV channels have just now aired a press conference held by the leader of a national political party today (https://youtu.be/fi9Y0yWsPkg), in which he alleged irregularities in the preparation of electoral rolls in Karnataka and a few other States. His allegations revolving around factual information, seemed to be based on an audit of hard copies of electoral rolls available in the public domain. 

If I were to be in your place in the Election Commission, I would have ordered a thorough verification of the factual information released in the press conference to satisfy myself of the veracity of the basis for the allegations, as those allegations, if they were to be factually correct, would have serious implications for the integrity of electoral rolls in general. 

In my view, each one of you, responsible under Article 324 of the Constitution to enhance the overall credibility of the electoral process, should readily take cognizance of each and every complaint of that kind and suo moto get such a complaint verified, as feedback of that kind would help the Commission to identify the shortcomings in every segment of the electoral process and take corrective measures.  

What surprised me was that the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) of Karnataka lost no time in issuing a notice to the concerned political leader calling upon him to “substantiate his claims of electoral fraud with a signed declaration under oath, as per Rule 20(3)(b) of the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960”.

I am sure that the CEO would not have responded so promptly without keeping the Commission informed. The impression I get from this that the Commission and its officers treat every complainant as an adversary and, instead of taking advantage of the contents of the complaint as a means to scrutinise the integrity of preparation of electoral rolls at the ground level, call upon the complainant to swear that the complaint is based on facts, whereas all those facts could be readily cross-verified with the help of the enormous resources they have at their command. It appears to me that the Commission and its machinery are more anxious to prove that the complainant is wrong than welcoming such a complaint as a part of a readily available feedback system that helps the Commission in constantly improving its internal procedures and practices. The effectiveness of the Commission  depends crucially on its ability to respond to public complaints in a meaningful manner and its ability to elicit public trust. If it closes its doors to public complaints and complaints from political parties, it loses the advantage of using such complaints as a means to correct its own internal procedures in a transparent manner. I am afraid that the Commission, in recent times, let go of such excellent opportunities, as it has resorted to treating complainants as adversaries.

In this connection, I refer to a letter I addressed you some time ago in which I had expressed my concerns about several issues that remained unaddressed, that would erode the credibility of the electoral process. While the Commission may not care to respond to a letter from a senior citizen like me, the least that the Commission could have done was to ponder over the concerns expressed by me and take appropriate corrective measures. To the best of my understanding, the Commission has chosen to ignore those concerns, perhaps adopting its usual stance of treating all such complaints as irritants.

Once again, let me caution you that the Commission’s effectiveness as an apolitical Constitutional authority would critically depend on its ability to respond to public complaints in a constructive manner, rather than treating them as vexatious.

All the best,

Yours sincerely,

E A S Sarma

Former Secretary to the Government of India

Visakhapatnam 

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The post Election Commission must take the Indian people into confidence, correct its procedures & practices appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Bernard Lewis, the influential British-American historian and Middle East scholar, played a pivotal role in shaping Western imperial attitudes toward Islam. His influence stretched far beyond academia, into the very heart of U.S. foreign policy. His counsel underpinned the American strategy of weaponising radicalised Islam for geopolitical ends, beginning with the Afghan-Soviet war.

Under this policy, the U.S. directly funded extremist literature and helped establish madrassas across Pakistan and Afghanistan to indoctrinate young Muslim men—drawn from over 35 countries—with a weaponised theology. Once trained, these fighters joined the CIA-backed jihad against the Soviets. When the war ended, they returned home, not to peace, but to disseminate their radicalised ideology further afield.

Yet even as Lewis helped construct the “radical Muslim” archetype, he also shaped its foil: the “good Muslim.” This ideal Muslim, according to Lewis, is a pacifist, apolitical, and docile figure—more cultural than religious, more mystical than legalistic. In this dual construction, Muslims were split into two essentialised camps: one to fight imperial battles, the other to legitimise imperial presence.

The Conference That Said It All

In a 2003 conference hosted by the Nixon Centre titled “Understanding Sufism and Its Potential Role in U.S. Policy,” Lewis openly championed Sufism—not for its theology or ethics, but because, in his words, it “reflects something more than tolerance” and holds that “all religions are basically the same.” In other words, it can be co-opted.

Sufi scholar Hesham Kabbani joined Lewis at the event, enthusiastically presenting Sufism as a depoliticised, non-threatening “social force.” He assured the audience—made up of Homeland Security officials and neoconservative hawks—that Sufis “never seek leadership” but serve as “social workers.” It was a performance for the empire, tailored to reassure Washington that there exists an Islam that does not resist.

But this was a gross erasure. Figures like Salahuddin Ayyubi, Umar Futi Tal, Abdul Qādir al-Jaza’iri, and Idris as-Senussi were Sufis—and they led political revolts, commanded armies, ruled states. Even within Kabbani’s own Naqshbandi lineage, the Jaysh Rijāl al-Ṭarīqa al-Naqshbandiyya was formed in Baghdad to fight the American invasion of Iraq. To erase these legacies is to rewrite history at the feet of power.

The Liberal-Orientalist Love Affair with Sufism

The romanticisation of Sufism by Western scholars is not innocent. Nineteenth and twentieth-century Orientalists and Islamicists—such as Wilfred Cantwell Smith, Fazlur Rahman, Seyyed Hossein Nasr, H.A.R. Gibb, and Annemarie Schimmel—created a scholarly framework that equated mysticism with moderation.

Schimmel herself admitted the absurdity of this selective love. “A good Sufi,” she once remarked, “should follow the shariah and all that it entails.” But the Western fascination with Rumi, Ibn Arabi, and the “whirling dervishes” consistently detaches their mysticism from their Islamic orthodoxy. This detachment implies that Sufism flourished in spite of Islam’s rigidity, rather than as an organic expression of it.

Tomoko Masuzawa warns that this portrayal is racialised: Islam becomes Arab, rigid, Semitic; Sufism becomes Aryan, gentle, European. Otto Pfleiderer, a German Orientalist, typified this racial dichotomy by treating Islam as tribal and inferior while elevating Sufism as universal and transcendent. This project—consciously or not—fed into a sanitised, de-Islamised, “Islam Lite” acceptable to the empire.

Manufacturing Consent for Genocide

In Good Muslim, Bad Muslim, Mahmood Mamdani critiques this binary construction. “Good Muslims” are cast as secular, apolitical, spiritual-but-not-religious liberals. They advocate gender equality, nonviolence, and Western-style democracy. They vote Democrat. “Bad Muslims” are political, militant, and resistant to imperialism.

This binary fuels military invasions, drone strikes, black sites, surveillance states, and genocides. It is not a cultural misunderstanding—it is a colonial strategy.

The primary architect of the “Islamic terrorism” narrative is none other than Benjamin Netanyahu, who has long sought to manufacture global consent for the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Lebanon, and Palestine bear the bloody consequences of this myth.

In this context, the imperial co-optation of Sufism is not about spirituality. It is about subjugation. It is the creation of a religious subclass willing to bless bombs and normalisation deals in exchange for visas, conferences, funding, and think-tank prestige. Today’s polished collaborators—Abdullah Bin Bayyah, Hamza Yusuf, and others backed by the UAE or U.S. State Department—have become handpicked enablers of a compliant Islam, weaponised against its more resistant, justice-oriented forms.

The Two-Faced Strategy: Wahhabis and Sufis

The imperial project thrives on contradiction. It is no surprise that both “Sufi Islam” and “Wahhabi Islam” are weaponised in tandem. These two projected as opposite poles—spiritual and severe—are manipulated to serve the same master. One is used to fight wars; the other to suppress dissent.

A legion of intellectually colonised Muslims makes this task easier by parroting imperial talking points in the name of peace, tradition, or “saving Islam.” They forget that it was the U.S., in alliance with Saudi Arabia, that funded Wahhabi madrasas to radicalise Muslim youth for its Cold War proxy battles. And yet, in the same breath, the U.S. hails Saudi Arabia—a hub of Wahhabism—as a key ally, while demonising Iran, a country with deep Sufi intellectual traditions.

Iran = evil. Saudi = friend. The absurdity is the point.

This is not a war of ideologies. It is a war of obedience. It’s not theology that divides “good” from “bad” Muslims—it’s loyalty.

Collaboration is Not Neutral

The “good Muslim” trope does not merely flatter collaborators—it provides ideological cover for genocide. Whether the branding is “Sufi Islam,” “plain vanilla Islam,” or “civilised Islam,” the core objective is control. The desire to pacify Islam, to regulate it, to make it safe for the empire, is what drives the violence, not Islam itself.

The Abraham Accords, CVE programs, Patriot Act, and Muslim Ban—across Republican and Democrat administrations—prove one thing: both sides weaponise “good Islam” to suppress resistance. Under Trump’s renewed presidency, expect more glossy initiatives promoting “peaceful Islam,” “Sufi moderation,” and “Muslim societies for progress.” These are not spiritual efforts. They are tools of colonial management.

Even the most well-meaning Sufi today must ask: have we been used? Has our spiritual tradition become a fig leaf for empire? Does our silence—or selective condemnation—manufacture consent for war?

Conclusion: The Real Struggle

Whether post-9/11 or post-October 7th, the game remains the same: pit Muslims against one another. Regulate the religion. Exalt one version. Exterminate the other.

But the consequences are not theoretical. In Gaza today, the “bad Muslims” being exterminated include poets, doctors, mothers, fathers, and children.

The tragedy is not just in bombs or policies. It is in the Muslim collaborators who, eager for Western approval, have chosen seats at imperial tables over solidarity with the oppressed. This is not just moral failure—it is complicity in genocide.

It is time to repent. To cease performing “good Islam” for the empire. To reclaim Islam—not as a set of talking points for think tanks—but as a living tradition of justice, resistance, and truth.

—–

مسلمانوں کو مسخر کرنے کے لیے تصوف اور وہابیت کو ہتھیار بنانا

مصنف: نصیر احمد

(مندرجہذیلتحریر،فرحالشریفکےمضمون: “اسلاملائٹکیتیاری: صوفیازمبطور ‘اچھااسلام’: ‘اچھےمسلمان’ بمقابلہ ‘برےمسلمان’ کیسیاستکسطرحنسلکشیکےلیےرضامندیپیداکرتیہے” کاخلاصہاورترمیمشدہورژنہے۔اصلمضمونیہاںپڑھاجاسکتاہے۔)

“اچھےاسلام” کیپیدائش

برنارڈلیوس،برطانوی-امریکیمؤرخاورمشرقوسطیٰکےاسکالر،نےمغربیسامراجیسوچمیںاسلامکےبارےمیںگہرااثرڈالا۔انکیآراءصرفعلمیمیدانتکمحدودنہرہیں،بلکہامریکیخارجہپالیسیپربھیاثراندازہوئیں۔انکیرہنمائیمیںامریکہنے “ریڈیکلاسلام” کوجیوپولیٹیکلمقاصدکےلیےایکہتھیاربنایا،جسکیشروعاتافغان-سوویتجنگسےہوئی۔

اسپالیسیکےتحتامریکہنےشدتپسنداسلامیلٹریچرکیمالیمعاونتکیاورپاکستانوافغانستانمیںمدارسقائمکیےجہاں 35 سےزائدممالکسےآئےنوجوانوںکوعسکرینظریاتسکھائےگئے۔تربیتکےبعد،یہمجاہدین CIA کےزیراثرسوویتوںکےخلافجہادمیںشاملہوگئے۔جنگختمہونےکےبعد،یہلوگامنکےساتھواپسنہیںلوٹےبلکہشدتپسندنظریاتکومزیدپھیلایا۔

برنارڈلیوسنےجہاں “شدتپسندمسلمان” کاخاکہبنایا،وہیں “اچھےمسلمان” کاتصوربھیانہینےپیشکیا۔انکےمطابق،مثالیمسلمانایکپرامن،غیرسیاسی،اورمطیعشخصیتہے—جسکیشناختمذہبسےزیادہثقافت،اورقانونسےزیادہروحانیتپرمبنیہے۔اسطرحمسلمانوںکودوخانوںمیںبانٹدیاگیا: ایکوہجوسامراجیجنگیںلڑے،دوسراوہجوسامراجیتسلطکوجائزقراردے۔

وہکانفرنسجسنےسبکچھواضحکردیا

2003 میںنِکسنسینٹرمیںمنعقدہ “صوفیازماورامریکیپالیسیمیںاسکاممکنہکردار” کےعنوانسےایککانفرنسمیں،لیوسنےصوفیازمکیحمایتکی—نہکہاسکیروحانیتیااخلاقیاتکیوجہسے،بلکہاسلیےکہاسمیں “برداشتسےزیادہ” کیعکاسیہےاوریہکہ “تماممذاہببنیادیطورپرایکجیسےہیں۔” یعنیاسےسامراجیمقاصدکےلیےاستعمالکیاجاسکتاہے۔

اسموقعپرصوفیاسکالر،شیخہشامقبانینےبھیصوفیازمکوغیرسیاسی،بےضرر “سوشلفورس” کےطورپرپیشکیا۔انہوںنےحاضرین—جنمیںہوملینڈسیکیورٹیکےاہلکاراورنیو-کنزرویٹونظریہدانشاملتھے—کویقیندلایاکہصوفی “کبھیقیادتکےطلبگارنہیںہوتے” بلکہ “سوشلورکرز” کاکرداراداکرتےہیں۔یہسامراجکےلیےایکپرفارمنستھی—ایکایسااسلامپیشکرناجومزاحمتنہکرے۔

لیکنیہتاریخکومسخکرناہے۔صلاحالدینایوبی،عمرفوتیتال،عبدالقادرالجزائری،ادریسالسنوسی—all صوفیتھے—اوروہسیاسیرہنما،سپہسالار،اورحکمرانبھیتھے۔یہاںتککہقبانیکےاپنےنقشبندیسلسلےمیںبھی،بغدادمیں “جیشرجالالطریقةالنقشبندیہ” کاقیامامریکیحملےکےخلافہواتھا۔انتاریخیحقائقکومٹاناطاقتکےسامنےجھکنےکےمترادفہے۔

لبرل-مستشرقینکاصوفیازمسےرومانیتعلق

صوفیازمکومغربیاسکالرزکیجانبسےرومانویتکالبادہپہنانامحضاتفاقنہیں۔انیسویںاوربیسویںصدیکےمستشرقیناوراسلامیاسکالرز—جیسےولفرڈکینٹویلاسمتھ،فضلالرحمٰن،سیدحسیننصر،گیب،اورانیمیریشمل—نےایکایساعلمیڈھانچہقائمکیاجسمیںتصوفکواعتدالپسندیسےجوڑاگیا۔

شملنےخوداستضادکوتسلیمکیا: “ایکاچھاصوفیوہہوتاہےجوشریعتکیمکملپیرویکرتاہے۔” لیکنمغربمیںرومی،ابنعربی،اوردرویشوںکیچکرداررقصکوانکیاسلامیسختیسےالگکرکےپیشکیاجاتاہے۔جیسےیہصوفیازماسلامکیسختیکےباوجودپنپا،حالانکہیہاسلامکےاندرہیایکروحانیاظہارہے۔

ٹوموکوماسوزاواخبردارکرتیہیںکہیہپیشکشنسلپرستانہہے: اسلامکوعربی،سخت،سامیقراردیاجاتاہے؛جبکہصوفیازمکوآریائی،نرم،یورپیسمجھاجاتاہے۔جرمنمستشرقاوٹوفلیڈررنےاسلامکوقبائلیاورکمتر،اورصوفیازمکوآفاقیواعلیٰبناکرپیشکیا۔یہمنصوبہ،شعورییاغیرشعوریطورپر،ایکایسا “اسلاملائٹ” تیارکرتاہےجوسامراجکوقابلقبولہو۔

نسلکشیکےلیےرضامندیکیتیاری

“گڈمسلم،بیڈمسلم” میںمحمودمامدانیاستقسیمپرتنقیدکرتےہیں۔ “اچھےمسلمان” کوسیکولر،غیرسیاسی،روحانیمگرغیرمذہبی،اورلبرلدکھایاجاتاہے—جوصنفیمساوات،عدمتشدد،اورمغربیجمہوریتکیحمایتکرتاہے۔ “برےمسلمان” سیاسی،مزاحمتیاورعسکریہوتےہیں۔

یہتصورہیفوجیجارحیت،ڈرونحملوں،بلیکسائٹس،نگرانی،اورنسلکشیکوجوازفراہمکرتاہے۔یہثقافتیغلطفہمینہیں—بلکہایکسامراجیحکمتعملیہے۔

“اسلامیدہشتگردی” کابیانیہبنانےوالےبڑےمعمار،بنیامیننیتنیاہوہیں،جنہوںنےفلسطینیوںکینسلیصفائیکےلیےعالمیحمایتحاصلکرنےکیکوششکی۔عراق،افغانستان،شام،یمن،سوڈان،لبنان،اورفلسطین—سباسجھوٹکیقیمتاداکررہےہیں۔

ایسےمیںصوفیازمکواپناناروحانیتنہیں،غلامیہے—ایکایساطبقہپیداکرناجوبموںاورنارملائزیشنڈیلزپربرکتدے،بدلےمیںویزے،فنڈنگ،اوراسٹیٹڈپارٹمنٹکیتعریفحاصلکرے۔آجکے “پالششدہ” معاونین—عبداللہبنبیہ،حمزہیوسفاوردیگر—سامراجکےلیےمنتخبکردہاسلامکےپرچارکبنچکےہیں،جومزاحمتیاسلامکودبانےکاذریعہہیں۔

دوہراہتھیار: وہابیاورصوفیاسلام

سامراجیمنصوبہتضاداتپرپلتاہے۔اسیلیےایکہیوقتمیں “صوفیاسلام” اور “وہابیاسلام” کوہتھیاربنایاجاتاہے۔ایکروحانی،دوسراسختگیر—لیکندونوںسامراجکیخدمتمیںہیں۔ایکجنگیںلڑتاہے،دوسرامزاحمتکودباتاہے۔

ایکپورینسل،جوذہنیطورپرغلامبنچکیہے،سامراجیبیانیےکو “امن”، “روایت” یا “اسلامکوبچانے” کےنامپردہراتیہے۔وہبھولجاتےہیںکہوہابیمدارسکوسبسےپہلےامریکہاورسعودیعربنےملکرفنڈکیاتھاتاکہسردجنگکیپراکسیجنگوںکےلیےنوجوانوںکوانتہاپسندبنایاجاسکے۔

اورپھروہیامریکہسعودیعربکودوست،اورایران—جسکاصوفیروایتمیںگہرامقامہے—کودشمنقراردیتاہے۔

ایران = بُرا۔سعودی = اچھا۔
یہتضادہیاصلکھیلہے۔

یہنظریاتکیجنگنہیں،فرمانبرداریکیجنگہے۔ “اچھے” اور “برے” مسلمانوںکیتقسیمکادارومدارعقیدےپرنہیں،وفاداریپرہے۔

“تعاون” غیرجانبدارنہیں

“اچھےمسلمان” کابیانیہصرفخوشامدنہیں،بلکہنسلکشیکونظریاتیکورمہیاکرتاہے۔چاہےنامہو “صوفیاسلام”، “سادہاسلام” یا “مہذباسلام”—اصلمقصدکنٹرولہے۔اسلامکوتابع،قابلِانتظام،اورسامراجکےلیےمحفوظبناناہیاصلہدفہے۔

ابراہیمیمعاہدے، CVE پروگرامز،پیٹریاٹایکٹ،اورمسلمبین—ریپبلکنیاڈیموکریٹ،دونوں “اچھےاسلام” کومزاحمتکچلنےکےلیےاستعمالکرتےہیں۔ٹرمپکیواپسیکےساتھ، “پرامناسلام” یا “صوفیاعتدال” جیسےمنصوبےدوبارہسامنےآئیںگے—یہروحانینہیں،نوآبادیاتیاوزارہیں۔

آجکاہرسچاصوفیخودسےپوچھے:
کیاہمیںاستعمالکیاجارہاہے؟
کیاہماریروحانیروایتسامراجکےلیےپردہبنچکیہے؟
کیاہماریخاموشی—یاچُنکرکیگئیمذمت—جنگوںکےلیےرضامندیپیداکررہیہے؟

نتیجہ: اصلجدوجہد

چاہے 9/11 کےبعدہویا 7 اکتوبرکےبعد،کھیلوہیہے: مسلمانوںکوآپسمیںلڑاؤ،مذہبکوکنٹرولکرو،ایکشکلکوعظیمبناؤ،دوسریکومٹادو۔

مگرنتائجصرفنظریاتینہیں—آجغزہمیںجو “برےمسلمان” مارےجارہےہیں،وہشاعر،ڈاکٹر،مائیں،باپ،اوربچےہیں۔

سانحہصرفبموںیاپالیسیوںمیںنہیں—بلکہانمسلمانوںمیںہےجومغربیخوشنودیکےلیےسامراجیمیزوںپربیٹھنےکوترجیحدیتےہیں۔یہصرفاخلاقیناکامینہیں—بلکہنسلکشیمیںشراکتداریہے۔

ابوقتہےتوبہکا۔
ابوقتہے “اچھااسلام” پیشکرنےکیاداکاریبندکرنےکا۔
اسلامکودوبارہاپنالو—بطورایکزندہروایت،جوعدل،مزاحمت،اورسچائیکاعلمبردارہو۔

—–

A frequent contributor to NewAgeIslam.com, Naseer Ahmed is an independent researcher and Quran-centric thinker whose work bridges faith, reason, and contemporary knowledge systems. Through a method rooted in intra-Quranic analysis and scientific coherence, the author has offered ground-breaking interpretations that challenge traditional dogma while staying firmly within the Quran’s framework.

His work represents a bold, reasoned, and deeply reverent attempt to revive the Quran’s message in a language the modern world can test and trust.

The following is a summarised and edited version of: “Manufacturing ‘Islam Lite’: Sufism as ‘Good Islam’: How the politics of ‘Good Muslim’ vs. ‘Bad Muslim’ manufactures consent for genocide” by Farah El-Sharif. Read the original here.

First Published on newageislam.com

The post Weaponising Sufism and Wahhabism to Subjugate Muslims appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Gandhi, in a detailed press conference held at the AICC headquarters in New Delhi, described the alleged irregularities as a systemic subversion of Indian democracy, claiming “massive-scale electoral fraud” or vote chori (vote theft) had taken place. He called this an “institutional crime against the Constitution.”

Key allegations and claims

The ‘Atom Bomb’ evidence

• Gandhi declared that the Congress has unearthed hard evidence of voter list manipulation after a six-month internal investigation.
• He asserted that 1 lakh fraudulent votes were cast in the Mahadevapura assembly segment of the Bengaluru Central Lok Sabha constituency of Karnataka alone.

Maharashtra Election: An alarming spike

• Congress began suspecting vote rigging after the 2023 Chhattisgarh elections, but their fears were confirmed in Maharashtra (2024).
• Over one crore new voters were added to Maharashtra’s electoral rolls in just five months—more than the total added in the preceding five years.
• Gandhi highlighted a suspicious surge in voter turnout after 5:30 PM, and the ECI’s refusal to release CCTV footage from polling booths, by unexpectedly changing rules to block access. (December 2024)
• “Why destroy evidence if nothing went wrong?” Gandhi asked, implying deliberate alteration of age old transparency driven laws/rules to prevent scrutiny.

Bangalore Central: A Case Study in ‘Vote Chori’

Focusing on the Bangalore Central Lok Sabha constituency, Gandhi said the Congress had anticipated a win based on internal surveys, but lost narrowly:

Margin: 32,707 votes

INC led in 6 out of 7 assembly segments, except Mahadevapura, where it lost by a staggering 1,15,586 votes.

Findings from Mahadevapura:

Congress’s detailed audit revealed:

Gandhi alleged that voters were registered multiple times—in the same constituency, across different states, and even using non-existent or zeroed addresses.

Example:

• 68 voters registered at a brewery (“Biere Club”).
• One voter, Shakun Rani, was registered twice in two months with slightly altered details and both entries cast votes. Ironically this woman voter (a mid-70 year old) was registered in the Form 6 batch of voters that are the ‘new voter’ category in ages 18-25 years!

Exit Polls vs Final Results: The growing mismatch

Rahul Gandhi further questioned:

• Why does anti-incumbency seem to affect every party except the BJP?
• Why are exit and opinion polls consistently off the mark in BJP’s favour?
• He noted similar suspicious swings in Haryana and Madhya Pradesh.

In Haryana:

• Congress lost 8 seats by a combined margin of only 22,779 votes—out of over 2 crore votes cast.

Nationally:

• BJP won 25 Lok Sabha seats with margins under 33,000 votes.
• “That’s all Modi needed to stay in power—just 25 seats,” Gandhi said.

Denial of Digital Voter Rolls: A deliberate barrier

Gandhi revealed that the ECI refused to share machine-readable voter rolls, instead providing physical documents that:

• Were over 7 feet tall when stacked.
• Could not be scanned using OCR (optical character recognition).
• Made manual verification virtually impossible.

“This is by design,” Gandhi alleged. “If the EC gave us electronically readable (searchable) digital data, we’d analyse it in 30 seconds. But they gave us deliberately un-scannable formats to stall scrutiny.”

Call for judicial oversight and constitutional accountability

• Gandhi called the EC’s actions a violation of its constitutional duty to safeguard elections.
• He urged the judiciary to intervene, declaring: “This is no longer just about one party’s loss. It’s a threat to the very foundation of Indian democracy—where every citizen gets one vote.”

He warned that the entire electoral process is being choreographed, facilitated by media hype, multi-phase polls, and an opaque EC.

Conclusion: A crisis at the heart of Indian democracy

Rahul Gandhi’s allegations go beyond partisan politics—they strike at the core of India’s democratic framework. If even a fraction of what he claims is true, it suggests that the electoral process, the one institution that legitimises political power, is compromised through a mix of bureaucratic opacity, voter list manipulation, and denial of digital transparency.

The Congress’s evidence-heavy exposé raises urgent questions:

• Why are electoral rolls being altered on such a massive scale without scrutiny?
• Why is the Election Commission refusing to provide machine-readable data, as required for transparency?
• Why were CCTV records from sensitive polling periods destroyed or withheld?

These are not just technical lapses—they are constitutional red flags. The principle of “one person, one vote” is not merely an administrative guideline; it is the very foundation of the Republic. If institutions tasked with protecting democracy instead facilitate its erosion, the implications are grave—not just for one election cycle, but for the future of electoral legitimacy in India.

The presentation given by Rahul Gandhi may be viewed here.

Related:

SC to ECI: Explain alleged irregularities in deletion of 65 lakh voters from Bihar’s draft electoral rolls

Bihar’s SIR process reveals an exercise of illegitimate powers, ECI forcing district machinery to resort to unethical practices: CCG’s Open Letter

Non-Electors Within Electors: ECI reports over 61 lakh potential exclusions

Principles of secret ballot, free will compromised, electronic surveillance a possibility with Voting APP introduced by the ECI: Expert

Memo to ECI: Make Voter’s Form 17Cs list accessible on Commission website, clean up existing, technologically messy EVS structure, say citizens

The post Rahul Gandhi alleges ‘Vote Chori’ in 2024 polls, accuses BJP-ECI nexus of systematic electoral fraud appeared first on SabrangIndia.