Again a tragedy in Hyderabad but a column on popular website Rediff demonstrates the insensitivity of the writer and the site.
It was heart-rending to see elderly parents, both Hindus and Muslims, searching for their sons and daughters among the dead. It was a human tragedy and even ordinary people on the street said that nothing could divide them on religious lines, as it was an attack on humanity.
But this morning as I read the column, I felt utterly frustrated. I am reproducing the piece here. B Raman writes...
'...during a visit to Hyderabad..I was told that the influence of LeT and HuJI was so pervasive in local Muslim community that many kept in their houses pictures of Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf......what an ambigous word 'many' (it can 10, 10 thousand or a lakh, nice way to dub the Muslim community as traiters).
I felt sick. The writer hasn't seen. He just heard it. Ok. From whom? His sources! For sixty years Indian Muslims have been targeted by the extreme right wing as 'pro-Pakistani' and labelled the fifth columnists.
When people are picking up their dead in the morning and lakhs of Muslims and Hindus in the City still retain sanity after this dastardly attack, there is such an article based on just hearsay.
Firstly those who understand Muslim psyche clearly know that this is the wildest theory which probably just a hardline Bajrang Dal activist could float but not even intelligence officials will take seriously.....Muslims in India don't have any love for Pervez Musharraf, at all. There is no reason for them.
I don't know who is going to be benefited by such write-up. Do I need to give a proof of my patriotism to any body. And how long will Indian Muslims have to bear such insults. It hurts terribly ... What about the site's credibility...the message board remain notorious...now columns can also be based on anybody's vague ideas and hearsay....good going....
Yes we all all terribly shaken by terrorist attacks in India. If some Muslims have been misguided and indoctrinated then why IB and intelligence agencies don't recruit Muslims so that they can penetrate into these cells.
Why IB, RAW don't have Muslim officers? And what these high ranking officers like the writer were doing in govt then and do they still have any solution except this sort of Muslim-bashing? What good will the article serves.
Spreading canards about Muslims being pro-Pakistanis, will not serve any purpose. It will provoke Muslims, who will feel frustrated and angry. The non-Muslims who may not have thought about it, have again been told that these Muslims are not loyal. Keep repeating such things and people feel that there must be some truth in that. And what good it is for the nation?
Link to the column on Rediff is here.