The editorial in the latest Organiser titled “A Strange Minority Aggression” says: “The minority politics in the country is getting curious. The church is behaving as if it has a divine right to proselytise ... And an Archbishop ... It’s as if he is a special envoy of the Holy Roman Empire in the zenith of its glory. And for some representatives of the Muslim community, every act of the internal security apparatus is lawless, biased and designed to discriminate and condemn them. Look at the reactions of the vice chancellor of Jamia Millia, the residents of Jamia Nagar, Azamgarh and even actress Shabana Azmi. Do the minorities believe that they are super citizens? A hang-over of the past when they were the ruling class and the majority Hindus, the deprived second class citizens?”

It concludes: “India is the only country that has always protected the minorities. But the definition of minorities in India is strangely distorted. Here the minorities are better off than Hindus and were the ruling class for centuries... The Christians are in majority in four states, the Muslims in one. Is it not a fact that where minorities are dominant they don’t accommodate any other community? ...The BJP has walked an extra mile to reassure the minorities and take them into its fold. But the response has so far been limited. If pseudo-secular politicians and fanatics gang up in this fashion what will be the future shape of Indian polity?”

US crash and burn

In a column titled “India’s chance in the financial crisis of the West”, R Balashankar writes: “In the last three weeks the world of American finance came down crumbling marking perhaps the end of Wall Street as we know it. China and India have largely been insulated from the crisis...The big meltdown has forced the US Federal Reserve and the Treasury ‘nationalise the economy faster than Hugo Chavez.’ India and China will continue to thrive for various reasons, the most important being that they had no part in the big gains made by few in the freewheeling financial system that is now in a shamble.” He adds: “The US government had to rescue the American International Group (AIG) through an $85 billion loan at punitive interest rates though AIG was a safe, well-run insurer. But its financial products division, which accounted for just a fraction of its revenues, wrote enough derivatives contracts to destroy the firm and shake the world ...”

... contd.