Nobel Prize Laureate V S Naipaul said, “Islam is, in its origins, an Arab religion. Everyone, not an Arab, who is a Muslim, is a convert……A convert’s worldview alters. His holy places are in Arab lands; his sacred language is Arabic. His idea of history alters. He rejects his own; he becomes, whether he likes it or not, a part of the Arab story.
The convert has to turn away from everything that is his. The disturbance for societies is immense, and even after a thousand years can remain unresolved; the turning away has to be done again and again. People develop fantasies about who and what they are; and in the Islam of the converted countries there is an element of neurosis and nihilism. These countries can be easily set on the boil.”
This particular quote of Naipaul is very well-known. In the above-mentioned few lines, Naipaul had aptly described the core psycho-social problem of non-Arab converted Muslims. These converted Muslims want to assert their Muslim-ness more than Arab Muslims. In this process, they show their peculiar attributes of ‘fantasy’, ‘neurosis’, ‘nihilism’, (dressing like Arabs) and ‘boiling’ etc., spelt by Naipaul above. Such pictures can be particularly seen in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Again, among the converts, neo-converts are the most radical. In the Indian subcontinent, we saw this in Allama Iqbal and Muhammad Ali Jinnah during last century. Murshid Quli Khan of early eighteenth-century Bengal was another example.
The Holy Quran repeatedly commands that it is for Arabic speaking people, particularly of Mecca and surrounding places. Such Quranic commandments make non-Arab converted Muslims to be outside the realm of Quran and by extension the ‘real Islam’. At least four verses of the Quran command so. These are Quran 12:2, 41:3, 42:7 and 43:3.
Quran 12:2 reveals “Verily, We have sent it down as an Arabic Quran in order that you may understand”.
Quran 41:3 reveals “A Book whose verses have been detailed, an Arabic Qur’an for a people who know”.
Quran 42:7 reveals “And thus did We reveal this Arabic Qur’an to you that you may warn the people of the Mother of Cities (to wit, Makkah) and those who dwell around it; and warn them of the Day of Gathering concerning which there is no doubt: whereon some will be in Paradise, and some in the Blazing Fire”.
And Quran 43:3 reveals “Indeed, We have made it an Arabic Qur’an that you might understand”.
So, it is made clear from the Allah that, Quran is not for the people who do not know Arabic. Thus, time and again the Quran specifies that it is only for the people who know Arabic. So, Muslims of the Indian subcontinent has nothing to do with the Quran. It is a known fact that in the Quran, important commandments come more or less similarly in a number of verses, as it has happened here.
In the Indian subcontinent, Hindu forefathers of today’s Muslims in Pakistan and India were mostly forced to convert to increase the size of the cohort with allegiance towards the foreign Muslim rulers. Conversion was also done by foreign Muslim rulers and invaders to subjugate and humiliate the local Hindu Kafir. Some Hindus also spontaneously got converted to avoid Islamic oppression. Forefather of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto converted to Islam from Hindu Rajput of Rajasthan in the time of Aurangzeb to avoid religious persecution.
Indian Hindus were never impressed by Islam and fought through centuries and against all odds to preserve their Dharma. So, India is still a Hindu-majority country even after eight hundred years of Muslim onslaught. Unlike Persia, Egypt and Afghanistan etc, Islam failed in India to over-run Hinduism. And conversion of Hindus of the Indian subcontinent to Islam was always disgraceful and shameful.
The story of conversion by Sufis is fraudulent, as Sufis were hard-core Jihadis. Mass conversion in Bengal, among low-caste and out-caste Hindus, was done by Sufi warrior Shah Jalal and many Ghazis (Muslim fighters against non-Muslims) between the thirteenth and mid-eighteenth century, when foreign Muslims ruled Bengal. The foreign Muslim rulers and ruling class did not come to Indian subcontinent with their women. They married Indian Hindu women, mostly by force. The life of Pandit dacoit Benimadhab Ray, during Akbar’s time in Bengal, is a testimony of abduction of Hindu women by Muslims. Siraj ud-Daulah, a Turkic descendant and the last Nawab of Bengal in mid-eighteenth century, was a debauch and notorious for abducting Hindu girls/women for his sexual pleasure and later conversion.
The local converted Muslims, in the Indian subcontinent, gradually became the pole bearers of Islam. They steadily started cultivating contempt and hatred for their Hindu brethren for being Kafir. It was not for nothing Vivekananda said, “And then every man going out of the Hindu pale is not only a man less, but an enemy more”. This explains what harm Indian converts have been doing on their Hindu brethren since a thousand years. Even today, one can see the hatred of converted Muslims of Kashmir valley towards fellow Hindus. But despite this, local converted Muslims of the Indian subcontinent were always looked down upon by the foreign Muslim ruling and invading class.
If Turkic, Afghan, Persian and Mongol Muslims in Indian subcontinent were second class Muslims vis-à-vis Arab Muslims, then converted Muslims of Indian subcontinent were/are third class Muslims. The high-caste Hindu converts, over the time, aligned with Indian Muslims of foreign stock to make an elite but small Ashraf class in the subcontinent and the remaining vast majority of converts became Pasmanda or backward Muslims. Pasmanda Muslims later became foot-soldiers of elite Ashraf Muslims in their fight for Pakistan.
Even today, Pasmanda Muslims, in India, very easily get involved in riots, stone pelting, road blockage, arson, and violent mass protests in the name of saving Islam. They are the ones who offer mass Friday prayer on the road, in railway stations and in any odd public place for showing the strength of Islam. They mostly go to Madrasa to get brainwashed and construct so-called Mazars in all inconceivable places as a stump of Islam. But Pasmanda Muslims don’t know that Allah has disowned them in Asmani Kitab and Ashraf class is using them as pawns.
Allah has really deceived the converted Muslims of the Indian subcontinent. Just imagine the level of anger and frustration that Mullahs and Islamists from the Indian subcontinent will show on being exposed of their futile connection with the Quran. They may explode in anger when they will be reminded that theirs being the Quran-following Muslims is like Begaani Shaadi Mey Abdullah Diwana. In that case, Bangladesh will see the worst scenario, followed by Pakistan and India in that order.
Stories have come to light in recent years that Indian Muslims who joined ISIS have ended up cleaning toilets. To add to their misery, they are tricked into becoming suicide bombers as Indian Muslims are considered not good enough to fight. Al Qaida and ISIS even call Muslims of the subcontinent as Hindi Miskeen, meaning poor Indians. So, it is not only Allah, but Arab Muslims also consider Muslims of the subcontinent as inferior Muslims.
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About the author: Jadabeswar Bhattacharjee served in the Government of India and retired as Higher Administrative Grade Officer after 35 years of service. After retirement from the service, he developed interest in writing on contentious issues and topics. His published books are (1) Politically incorrect Point of View, (2) Politics, Bong and Faith, (3) The Alternative Narrative, (4) The West Bengal Saga and (5) Political Islam and India.