Arun Shourie Quotes

Is an institution the Indian history course of which covers only the period from the raids of Mahmud Ghaznavi to 1947, the geography course of which focuses on the Arabian peninsula, an institution of and for India?

The example we would do well to keep in front of us is that of the Dalai Lama. He was giving a discourse on a Tibetan text about meditation. He read out a sentence, laughed and remarked, ‘Buddhist theories of creation, a disgrace! Must throw them out!’ He advises that we should keep a wastepaper basket nearby – whatever doesn’t accord with what we know now, we should cast into that basket. ‘Buddhism must face facts,’ that is what he teaches. Accordingly, he has opened Buddhist texts to minute examination. (...) That reflects confidence in one’s tradition. That is true service to the tradition. That is the way to preserve for the future ‘the pearl of great price’ in it.

The Dalai Lama is in India at India’s invitation. Panditji meets him on 26 and 28 November 1956. The Dalai Lama is distraught. Panditji jots down the points of their exchange. The Dalai Lama puts the figure of Chinese troops in Tibet at 120,000, the very figure for which Panditji had come down on Apa Pant. The foreign secretary inserts a paragraph in Panditji’s notings about the talks: ‘The Dalai Lama appealed to India for help. PM’s reply was that, apart from other considerations, India was not in a position to give any effective help to Tibet; nor were other countries in a position to do so. Dalai Lama should not resist land reforms.’ Instead of help, Panditji gives advice. He records the advice he gives: ‘D.L. should become the leader of the reform. Best way we can help is by maintaining friendly relations with China, otherwise China would fear our designs in Tibet.’ An excuse, and a presumptuous one—‘otherwise China would fear our designs in Tibet.’

The first major criticism of the ‘left-liberal’ or ‘progressive’ historians was made by Arun Shourie with special reference to the state of the ICHR in their control.”

Then we have our seedy Leftists busy abusing each other. And finally we have the liberals - busy rearranging furniture on the deck of theTitanic, nay busy holding seminars about rearranging furniture on the deck of the Titanic.

For all these reasons one would expect a host of studies on fatwas. But then one would reckon without our intellectuals. It is yet more proof of the fact that our intellectuals have seceded from our country; that there is hardly a study in either English or Urdu on the fatwas.

We comfort ourselves: at least, the virus of reservations has not got into judicial appointments; at least, reservations have not been extended to Muslims and Christians. Both notions are just make-believe.

And so on – among the highest piles of rubble in the world of the sacred temples of another religion, among the highest piles of corpses of those venerated by another religion. Yet, in the reckoning of our eminent historians a policy of ‘Broad Toleration’! A policy of toleration guided by purely secular motivations!

First, our scholars have not spared time for this vital material for the same reason on account of which they have not spared time for other things vital to our existence as a country. Most of the intellectual work in India consists in writing footnotes to work being done in the West—this has been so in the case of Marxist intellectuals even more than it is in the case of the others. And when our intellectuals are not engaged in writing these footnotes, they are busy following the fashion of the day in Western circles, busy ‘applying’, as the phrase goes, to Indian material the notion or ‘thesis’ which has become fashionable in the West. In a word, our scholarly work is derivative. So the first reason there has been no substantial study of the fatwas in India is that they have not yet caught the eye of the West.

The Catholic Bishops Conference of India is the hightest body engaged in attempts to coordinate the work of different Catholic churches in India and to engage in dialogue with other religions. ... To celebrate the 50th anniversary... the CBCI convened a meeting in January 1994.... And it was an important gathering: it was only the second time in fifty years and the first time in twenty five years that such a comprehensive review was being undertaken... The organizers were so kind as to ask me to give the Hindu perception of the work of Christian missionaries in India.

The first derailment was caused by plucking the words ‘of their choice’ out of context, by tearing them away from the object for which Articles 29 and 30 gave minorities the right to set up and administer institutions. A normal engineering college or a college of dentistry can by no stretch be taken to be an institution that has been set up to help conserve the language, script or culture of the minority. Yet, provided the engineering or dentistry college has been set up by members of a minority, it was presumed to enjoy the protection of Articles 29 and 30, and thereby be beyond the reach of the state.

They rely on intimidation, It is exactly by tactics of this kind that an earlier book of Mr. Swarup - Understanding Islam Through Hadis - was put out of circulation... November 27, 1990, under the influence of the same intimidation the Delhi Administration declared that, contrary to what it had itself twice decreed, the book was not only objectionable, was deliberately and malicious so!....
Our response should be three fold. First, whenever an attempt such as this from quarters such as Mr. Shahabuddin is made to stifle free speech, to kill even scholarly inquiry, we must go out of our way and immediately obtain the book....
Secondly, whenever the intimidators prevail and such a book actually comes to be banned large numbers should take to reprinting it, photocopying it, to circulating it, and discussing its contents.
The third thing is more necessary, and in the long run will be the complete answer to the intimidators. As long as scholars like Mr. Swarup are few, intimidators can bully weak governments into shutting them one by one. But what will they do if 1,000, scholars are to do work of the same order? This is the way to deal with intimidators. Let 1,000 scholars carry on work Mr. Swarup has pioneered.

And another thing: if an RSS publication publishes even an interview with me, that is further proof of my being communal; but so tough are the hymen of these progressives that, even when they contribute signed articles to publications of the Communist Party, their virginity remains intact!

The Jharkhand government, in turn, has announced that members of thirty-two tribes that are the most backward – literacy level among nine of them is said to be just 10 per cent – shall be directly recruited into government service; those among them who pass the graduation examination shall not have to take the qualifying examination which all others who enter government service have to take.

The volumes of fatwas devote pages and pages to an even more exotic subject—namely, what the believer should do with an animal which has been used for intercourse. ‘What is the hukum about the animal with which a man has had sexual intercourse—what is the hukum about the animal and the man?’, asks the querist, and after due deliberation the ulema of this great ‘centre of Islamic learning’ issue a fatwa. The other matters which call forth fatwas are just as earth-shaking. ‘Is a pregnant goat which has been used for intercourse halal or haram? Has one to wait for her to deliver or should she be killed and buried without waiting?’ ‘Zaid has had intercourse with a goat. What is the law in respect of her? Can we eat her flesh or drink her milk? And what is the law for him who has had the intercourse?’ ‘What is the punishment for having intercourse with a minor child or a goat?’ ‘Zaid decided to have intercourse with an animal which is halal such as a cow or a goat. He approached the animal and inserted his male member into its vagina. But there was no ejaculation. Should Zaid or other Muslims regard as halal the meat or milk of that animal? Has Zaid to do penance for this offence?’ ‘Zaid had intercourse with a cow, and then sold it. How should that money be spent? Can it be used for sadqah? And what is the punishment fo Zaid?’ ‘What is the punishment for one who has intercourse with a mare? What should be done with that mare?’ A fatwa on one and each of these matters. And the answers are not always predictable, often they turn on subtle differences. It is enough for the believer who has had intercourse with an animal to do taubah, decree these men of learning, but in the usual case the animal must be killed and burnt. In the usual case, that is, its meat should not be eaten. However, to take one instance, ‘If there is no ejaculation (inside the animal) its meat and milk are halal, without question,’ rule the ulema of Dar al-Ulum, Deoband. ‘But if there is ejaculation, it is better to kill the animal and bury its flesh. No one should eat it, though it is not haram to eat it.’ [...] Finally, while others may be a bit squeamish in discussing such questions, and a little surprised at encountering them in ‘religious’ books, the ulema have no qualms about discussing such matters and laying down the law on them as much as on any other matter. They regard it as one of their functions to do so. The point is set at rest by Maulana Mufti Abdur Rahim Qadri. It transpires that a maulvi, styling himself as Hazrat Shaykh al-Islam Maulana Maulvi, published two pamphlets attacking the Hanafite jurists for holding that intercourse with an animal does not vitiate a fast, even if ejaculation takes place. He cited the great authorities of Hanafite law—Shami and the Durr-ul-Mukhtar—as having decreed this. He also chided the learned ulema for filling religious books with discussions of such topics. The writings of the maulvi were referred to Mufti Abdur Rahim Qadri for opinion. The Mufti’s elucidation takes up ten printed pages of the Fatawa-i-Rahimiyyah. On the substance of the question, the decision turns on whether the ejaculation took place upon intromission into the animal—in which case the fast is rendered void—or it took place by the man merely touching the animal’s genitals with his hands or kissing it, without using his sexual organ—in which case the fast is not vitiated. The Mufti cites authorities to nail the distinction, and he argues that the maulvi who had made the charge against the Hanafite jurists had misrepresented their rulings on the matter.