It is true that intellectuals who take pains to study every subject from its sources, are few and far between in this country. But it is also true th… - Sita Ram Goel

Islam was getting raised from the status of an imperialist ideology to that of a religion. The residues of Islamic imperialism were now being rehabilitated as the representatives of a religious community which was in a ‘minority’ and which was trying to ‘save’ itself from the ‘domination of a majority’. The frantic efforts of a foreign fraternity to retain its unequal rights and privileges, earned during the days of its military domination, were now being described as ‘a minority’s struggle for self-identity’.

Secularism per se is a doctrine which arose in the modem West as a revolt against the closed creed of Christianity. Its battle-cry was that the State should be freed from the stranglehold of the Church, and the citizen should be left to his own individual choice in matters of belief. And it met with great success in every Western democracy. Had India borrowed this doctrine from the modem West, it would have meant a rejection of the closed creeds of Islam and Christianity, and a promotion of the Sanatana Dharma family of faiths which have been naturally secularist in the modern Western sense. But what happened actually was that Secularism in India became the greatest protector of closed creeds which had come here in the company of foreign invaders, and kept tormenting the national society for several centuries. We should not, therefore, confuse India's Secularism with its namesake in the modern West. The Secularism which Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru propounded and which has prospered in post-independence India, is a new concoction and should be recognized as such. We need not bother about its various definitions as put forward by its pandits. We shall do better if we have a close look at its concrete achievements. Going by those achievements, one can conclude quite safely that Nehruvian Secularism is a magic formula for transmitting base metals into twenty-four carat gold. How else do we explain the fact of Islam becoming a religion, and that too a religion of tolerance, social equality, and human brotherhood; or the fact of Muslim rule in medieval India becoming an indigenous dispensation; or the fact of Muhammad bin Qasim becoming a liberator of the toiling masses in Sindh; or the fact of Mahmud Ghaznavi becoming the defreezer of productive wealth hoarded in Hindu temples; or the fact of Muhammad Ghuri becoming the harbinger of an urban revolution; or the fact of Muinuddin Chishti becoming the great Indian saint; or the fact of Amir Khusru becoming the pioneer of communal amity; or the fact of Alauddin Khilji becoming the first socialist in the annals of this country; or the fact of Akbar becoming the father of Indian nationalism; or the fact of Aurangzeb becoming the benefactor of Hindu temples; or the fact of Sirajuddaula, Mir Qasim, Hyder Ali, Tipu Sultan, and Bahadur Shah Zafar becoming the heroes of India's freedom struggle against British imperialism or the fact of the Faraizis, the Wahabis, and the Moplahs becoming peasant revolutionaries and foremost freedom fighters? One has only to go to the original sources in order to understand the true character of Islam and its above-mentioned luminaries. And one can see immediately that their true character has nothing to do with that with which they have been invested in our school and college text-books. No deeper probe is needed for unraveling the mysteries of Nehruvian Secularism.

Meanwhile, the Stalinist "historians" led by Romila Thapar and S. Gopal (son of the late President of India, Dr. Radhakrishanan) had jumped into the fray. A letter written by this gang had been published in The Times of India, New Delhi, on 2 October 1986 accusing the daily of "giving a communal twist to news items and even editorial comments". The "provocation" for their outburst had been provided by two photos which had been front-paged by the newspapers in August and September, 1986. The first photo was of two stones from the Kutub Minar at Delhi depicting defaced carvings of Hindu deities. The editorial comment had said that the stones were found with their faces turned inwards during repairs of a wall of the Minar. The second photo was that of Aurangzeb's Idgah on the Katra Mound at Mathura standing on the site and built with the rubble of a pre-existing Kesavadeva Temple. The editorial comment was that a Committee had been formed at Mathura for the liberation of Srikrishnajanmabhumi. I was told that the photos had been displayed by Arun Shoruie who had joined The Times of India a few month earlier to take over as Chief Editor from Girilal lain who had decided to retire soon. His appointment had been -approved by Girilal lain as lain himself told me.