In continuation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s declaration to fight terrorism and radicalization, he gave a call to de-radicalization and expressed his faith in the plural society in the Conference on “Islamic Heritage : Promoting Understanding and Moderation” on 1 March 2018 at Delhi. The King of Jordon, Abdullah II bin Al Hussein, graced the occasion. Prime Minister said: “Islamic culture is flourishing across India. The influence of Sufism spreads the message of love, peace and brotherhood. The Government of India is leaving no stone unturned in empowering the Muslim youth. We want them to have the Qur’an in one hand and a computer in the other.” He stressed on fighting terrorism and militancy. While saying India does not believe in campaigning against any religious belief, PM Modi called India a cradle of all major religions in the world.
When the King of Saudi Arabia, Salman bin Abdulapziz Al Saud, visited India in April 2016, PM Modi gifted him a gold-plated replica of the Cheraman Juma Masjid in Kerala situated in Thrissur district. The Cheraman Masjid is believed to be the first mosque built in India by Arab traders around 629 AD, and symbolic of active trade relations between India and Saudi Arabia since ancient times. According to oral tradition, Cheraman Perumal was the Chera King and a contemporary of the Holy Prophet who went to Arabia and embraced Islam after meeting the Holy Prophet at Mecca. Some years later, he sent letters to his relatives and the ruling chieftains of Malabar through his friends Malik bin Dinar and Malik bin Habib who, along with their companions, were then given permission by the local rulers to build the mosque at Kodungallur.
The Indian Prime Minister is trying to break the myth that Islam arrived in India with Holy Qur’an in one hand and sword in another. Right from an early era, even the Islamic scholars as well as Hindu scholars have made efforts to draw parallels in both the religions and the Holy books like Gita and Qur’an. In an ancient Sanskrit, the phrase like “Vasuddhaiv Kutumbkam”, meaning the whole world is a family, is commonly used and modern-day Hindu-Muslim cultural bond is called “Ganga- Jamuni Tahzeeb or Sanskriti”. The British historians tried to play down the role of their countrymen in subjugating the native kingdoms in India by all means. It was left to a few diligent historians to carry out painstaking research and unravel the facts. Pandit Sunderlal was one of such persons who vigorously exposed the British plan to enlarge their sphere of influence in India slowly and steadily through a number of dubious methods. In writing the foreward for Pandit Sunderlal’s book “How India Lost Her Freedom”(published by Popular Prakashan-Sage Publishing, 2018), originally published in 1929 and banned by the British, Rajen Habib Khwaja, IAS(Retd.), calls Pandit ji “the rarest of the rare combination of spiritual, intellectual and human quality” and adds: “Perhaps his most unique aspect was his unconditional and complete belief in humanism in its most complete sense, which he practiced like a true Karmayogi.” Apart from “How India Lost Her Freedom”, Pandit ji’s great contribution is in his original work titled “Bharat Mein Angrezi Raj” published before independence and was banned by the British. Gandhi ji called it most authentic historical work and after independence, the Publication Division of the Government of India published it. “Pandit ji has irrevocably exposed the deep, sinister and unfortunate prejudices of British historians who have distorted original sources through selective misquotations and false translations of some original texts. Their basic objective was the splitting of Hindus and Muslims, promoting hatred among them, dividing the Indian society and thereby establishing their colonial rule.”
Khwaja, presently the Director-General of Administrative Staff College of India at Hyderabad, was fortunate to interact with Pandit Sunderlal since his father A. M. Khwaja and Pandit ji shared many common values. Being a great scholar of Islam, Pandit ji gave a scholarly, powerful and compelling discourse which included recitation of the verses from the Holy Qur’an in Arabic and their translation in simple Hindustani. Originally, Pandit Sunderlal was a revolutionary and a member of the Ghadar Party. But after he came in contact with Mahatma Gandhi, he became a Gandhian and a true practitioner of non-violence or Ahimsa. He was jailed seven times for participating in the freedom movement. While being a Member of Parliament, he chaired the Hyderabad Police Action Atrocities Inquiry Committee of which the report was so explosive that the then PM Pandit Nehru and his Deputy PM Sardar Patel did not release it. Though till date the report is not released officially but it is leaked out by certain scholars which puts an estimate of killings between 25,000 to 40,000 people during the Operation Polo in September 1948! According to R. H. Khwaja, the three key life missions of Pandit ji included: promoting essential unity of all religions; promoting communal harmony between Hindus and Muslims; and practicing the composite culture of India. In 1944, he published his famous book “Gita Aur Qur’an” simultaneously in Hindi and Urdu. Later, the book was translated to Gujarati, Marathi, Bengali and Arabic. Its English version was published in 1957 and republished in 2016. “In today’s turbulent times, the need for reading “Gita Aur Qur’an” cannot be overemphasized.” One cannot understand the greatness of Indo-Vedic civilization unless one reads Pandit Sunderlal.
Pandit Sunderlal’s book “Gita Aur Qur’an” was rendered into English by Syed Asadullah and published from Varanasi in 2005. Bob Gibbons opines: “The Gita and the Qur’an” is an interesting example of a book, which examines the interrelationship of differing faiths. Written by Pandit Sunderlal and translated by Syed Asadullah, it offers us a side-by- side comparison of Hinduism and Islam. In all religion basic themes of humanity are to the fore, themes, which should unite the world’s people and not divide them.
In the seven chapters of the book of hardly 150 pages, Pandit Sunderlal ends with the gist of both the Holy books: “Even like the Gita, the Qur’an permits its followers, under certain conditions, to take up arms in the defence of their faith. Both ask them to desist from fighting, if the enemy seeks peace. There is no compulsion in religion. That is a basic principle of the Qur’an. In every field of activity, the clear Qur’anic direction is : ‘It is always good for man to forgive the wrongs inflicted on him by others and endure them with patience and return good for evil.’ For ‘God is gracious and forgives all.’ Verily, “God loves those only who do good to others.”
Next Column: Patri Sarkar against British in Maharashtra
(The writer is a Socio-political Historian. E-mail: [email protected] )
