[Reader-list] Fwd :François Gautier does it again

[Jeebesh Bagchi]

How do you know that Hussian is not a Hindu? :-)

On 14-Jun-07, at 2:50 PM, Aishwarya Iyer wrote:

> On the other hand, I totally stand by François Gautier's view of  
> Hussain's hypocrisy. Would he have represented his own religion in  
> this manner? Freedom is not an absolute entity. Freedom must  
> recognise its sister, responsibilty. Look at what Rushdie did for  
> instance, and invited the fatwa upon himself. He was conscious of  
> his own transgression, but Hussain did it for cheap thrills.   It  
> is interesting how one can unwittingly fall in a trap.   Aishwarya
>
> On 6/12/07, inder salim <indersalim at gmail.com> wrote: It is very  
> interesting to see how one can unwittinlgly fall in a trap...
>
> You begin to criticize the politicians for all the ills in India...
> and also highlight the fact that they are terrible manipulators...
> fine.... but suddenly you criticize the aritsts choice for being
> creative.... and forget the the fact that the politicians are ther
> real culprits...( if they only are )
>
> for Hussain ( whether he is a genius or not ) i can quote Salman  
> Rushdie for you
>
> There is no Freedom of Expression if it does not provoke, it is  
> meaningless...
>
> with love
> indersalim
>
>
>
> Democracy Hijacked
>
> François Gautier
>
> Practitioners of cynical politics who are driven by
> the lust for power are destroying all that is good and
> true and valuable in India . Hindus are mocked at and
> persecuted while Government is busy devising ways and
> means of dividing the nation along caste and communal
> lines
>
> India prides itself as the greatest democracy in the
> world. But actually, there are very few places where
> democracy has been so hijacked and perverted. Nothing
> demonstrates this better than the manoeuvring going on
> at the moment to find India 's next President.
>
> President APJ Abdul Kalam must be the most popular
> President in the history of India . Yet he will not be
> re-elected, because he was the people's President and
> not a stooge of political parties.
>
> Congress president Sonia Gandhi will never forgive
> him, as he was the one who stopped her from becoming
> Prime Minister when he told her in the privacy of his
> chambers that it was unconstitutional to hold two
> passports - Indian and Italian - as she did for many
> years (she is not the only foreigner who did so after
> obtaining Indian citizenship).
>
> Quite a few Muslims regard him suspiciously because,
> although he is a true Muslim, he respects other
> religions and is known to keep the Bhagvad Gita and
> Sri Aurobindo's Savitri in his study. Thus Mayawati,
> partly elected by Muslims votes, will keep away from
> him. And the BJP is wary of Kalam because he did not
> always do its bidding.
>
> How else is democracy perverted in India ?
>
> Well, here you have a party, the Congress, which has
> been going from bad to worse in the last 15 years,
> came a miserable last in the recent Uttar Pradesh
> Assembly election, and sprung to power at the Centre
> by a freak accident because the TDP lost in Andhra
> Pradesh and the Marxists did well in West Bengal .
>
> Yet, the Congress is all powerful at the moment and is
> dividing India more and more along caste and religion
> lines, thanks to a cynical reservation policy -
> witness the recent strife in Rajasthan.
>
> You have a foreigner who, whatever her qualities
> -honesty, hard work, family values - is just an
> elected MP, like hundreds of others, and yet rules as
> the supreme leader of this country, one whose word can
> make or unmake anybody. Do you think it would be
> possible for an Indian to become a de facto President
> or Prime Minister in the US , France or Germany ?
> Absolutely not!
>
> Even India 's Prime Minister, a decent but weak man,
> is not elected: He was defeated the last time he
> contested an election and is now a Rajya Sabha MP from
> Assam , where he has no roots at all.
>
> Democracy in India has also been hijacked by cynical
> mathematics: How to get elected with the votes of the
> Muslims; who remain the most backward community in
> India, in spite of having brought to power umpteen
> Congress Governments since Independence; and how to
> manipulate the Dalits, who have had a fair share of
> benefits and have had one of them as President and
> many of whom are politicians in power.
>
> Ms Mayawati has become a master of cynical
> mathematics: Muslims + Dalits + Brahmin votes =
> Absolute majority. Yet, will she do more for the
> Muslims and the poor of Uttar Pradesh than she did in
> her three previous stints as Chief Minister?
>
> It seems doubtful, the way she has started, wasting
> hundreds of crores by scrapping all previous projects,
> including the Special Economic Zones and transferring
> hundreds of officials.
>
> In the name of freedom of expression, Indian
> intellectuals defend people like MF Husain, who
> denigrates Durga , India 's most holy goddess. Would
> he dare depict Mohammed's wife in this manner?
> Certainly not!
>
> When the Prophet is caricatured by a Danish newspaper
> - harmless lampooning compared to Husain's derogatory
> portrayal of Durga - the entire Muslim world erupts in
> flames. Had Husain defiled Islam's icons, he would
> have been dead today.
>
> Did India 's 'free' Press ever care to show on TV or
> publish in magazines and newspapers Husain's
> derogatory paintings? Yet, they are freely available
> and have been reproduced in a coffee table book
> sponsored by Tata Steel with a foreword by Russi Modi.
>
>
> India's judiciary is stretched to the limits by clever
> lawyers getting their rich clients off the hook,
> thanks to judges who go by the book without adapting
> their judgements to the Indian context, or by bribing
> witnesses as has been allegedly done in the BMW case.
> But poor people go to jail and it takes seven years to
> get a case cleared.
>
> India's socialist system, which is still enforced,
> pretends to tax the rich to subsidise the poor. But in
> reality, the rich have smart chartered accountants who
> twist the law, while the less fortunate have to pay
> taxes on small savings and salaries. And, of course,
> most of this money never reaches the destitute.
>
> Finally, here you have a country of 850 million
> Hindus, a billion worldwide, one of the most tolerant,
> law-abiding communities in the world. Yet, Hindus in
> India are made fun of and their beliefs riled at. They
> are persecuted, as the four lakh Kashmiri Pandits have
> been, without raising finger in defence - their men
> hanged, women raped, children disembowelled. They have
> become refugees in their own country and the media is
> mostly silent.
>
> Yes democracy is needed, and a free and democratic
> India definitely has (in the long run) an advantage on
> an undemocratic China . But the way things are going
> now, India seems on the verge of losing all that is
> good and true and valuable within the nation, thanks
> to cynical and self-serving politicians.
>
> Cry O my Beloved India . Look at what Thy children are
> doing to Thee.
>
>
>
> --
>
> http://indersalim.livejournal.com
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