Towards reconciliation

Hindu-Muslim reconciliation possible’, says the headline of an article written by O.P. Batra. Reconciliation has not happened and Muslims are not in the Indian mainstream because of their own fault, he argues. “The solution of Muslim poverty and backwardness lies in their own hands, and not in the hands of so-called secular parties, leaders and concocted reports, like the Sachar report, which only offers false promises to win their votes. In case, true, sound and impartial confidence is built among the Muslims, it shall break the shackles of bigotism, cobweb spun around them by their fundamentalists, clerics and short-sighted leaders, and to a greater extent, by the crooked politicians, who have forced the community to live in isolation and become a mere tool and pawn in their hands, to be used only at the time of voting, to win elections, and to forget them after the victory, for a period of another five years.”

Hill conspiracy

Columnist Sandhya Jain explains the link between Nepal abolishing monarchy under pressure from Maoists and a recent visit of former US president Jimmy Carter to the hill country as part of a Christian proselytising conspiracy. Carter, she says, is pushing evangelism, Maoists are converted Christians doing his bidding, and the UPA government controlled by Sonia Gandhi is encouraging it all. “The formal abolition of the Nepal monarch will help America delink the nation’s Hindu civilisation and ethos from its political culture, and evangelise more aggressively in the region,” she says.

... contd.