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The Hindu
14-06-2025
- Politics
- The Hindu
Baby calls for detoxification of society from fascist ideals propagated by RSS
Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI(M)] general secretary M.A. Baby has observed that while politically defeating the fascist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)-controlled Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is important, even more important is defeating their fake cultural nationalism project through which they are invading people's minds. He was speaking after releasing the Malayalam translation of the book, Being Muslim in Hindu India written by Ziya Us Salam, Associate Editor of The Hindu, here on Saturday (June 14, 2025). 'What is needed parallel to a political fight is a cultural fight by democratic and secular forces to detoxify people's minds of fascist ideals. Otherwise, even if the BJP is electorally defeated in the future, the RSS will continue to work in Indian society,' Mr. Baby said. 'The electoral setback suffered by the BJP in last year's general elections is a lesson that attempts by the Modi-led neo-fascist, majoritarian forces to set up a Hindu State with the backing of the corporate and the neo-rich can be effectively resisted by democratic and secular forces, if they so desire. However, whether the political parties, which are supposed to learn lessons from that, are acting accordingly remains a question,' he said. Mr. Baby said that Modi, whose party lost its majority in the last general elections and now relies on two crutches — the Janata Dal (United) and the Telugu Desam Party — is trying to win back popular support by politically exploiting the post-Pahalgam scenario, just as he did before the 2019 general elections. He bemoaned the 'othering' based on religion and caste in the country, citing the denial of passage to Mr. Salam over a mere misspelling in his air ticket as an example. Mr. Salam was unable to attend the function. Senior journalist Siddharth Varadarajan and poet P.N. Gopikrishnan spoke at the seminar on 'In Defence of Secularism.' Trade union activist C.B. Venugopal translated the book, which was published by Samooh Books. Greater Cochin Development Authority Chairman K. Chandran Pillai presided. Critic M.K. Sanoo was present. Samooh president Joby John welcomed the gathering, and R. Minipriya, vice-president, delivered vote of thanks.
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First Post
06-06-2025
- Politics
- First Post
How Pakistani military has metastasised like cancer inside society
The public plays along as the military intensifies its anti-India narrative and false propaganda and the Generals prosper at the expense of the economy read more 'Of all the countries I've dealt with, I consider Pakistan to be the most dangerous because of the radicalisation of its society and the availability of nuclear weapons.' —Jim Mattis, former US defence secretary and four-star Marine Corps General, Call Sign Chaos: Learning to Lead, 2019 General Mattis, who commanded forces in the Persian Gulf War, Afghanistan War and Iraq War, realised three things: First, the Pakistani society is 'radicalised'. Second, Pakistan's political culture has 'an active self-destructive streak'. Third, US military interactions with Pakistan 'could only be transactional' as its military can't be trusted. The three factors are interwoven and describe the current state of Pakistan's mess. A nation born out of hatred and animosity, ruled directly or indirectly by its military, which sponsors terrorism and has radicalised its society, will keep on sinking into the abyss of self-destruction. Decades of hatred and enmity towards India—especially the dream of occupying J&K—systematically nurtured and propagated by the Pakistani military, have turned into a metastatic cancer which has spread deep inside its society. External affairs minister S Jaishankar rightly compared Pakistan to a cancer that has started affecting its society. 'Pakistan is an exception in our neighbourhood in view of its support for cross-border terrorism. That cancer is now consuming its body politic,' he said at the 19th Nani A Palkhivala Memorial Lecture in Mumbai in January. Military supremacy and hatred for India Hatred for India and the Pakistani military's creation of the mirage of a Hindu nation being an existential threat unite its society. Despite orchestrating four coups, ruling directly and indirectly, meddling in politics, robbing the nation of development, wasting funds and foreign loans on weapons and suppressing dissent and protests, the Pakistani military is respected by the population. The military has cemented its image as the saviour of Pakistan's borders and its people, 'threatened by a Hindu India' since its independence. In his book Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military, Husain Haqqani, a Pakistani journalist and former ambassador to the US, writes: 'Very soon after independence, 'Islamic Pakistan' was defining itself through the prism of resistance to 'Hindu India'.' The belief that India 'represented an existential threat to Pakistan led to maintaining a large military, which in turn helped the military assert its dominance in the life of the country'. Within weeks of independence, Haqqani writes, 'Editorials in the Muslim League newspaper, Dawn, called for 'guns rather than butter', urging a bigger and better-equipped army to defend 'the sacred soil' of Pakistan.' The national security apparatus was accorded a special status as protecting nationhood by military means 'took priority over all else'. 'It also meant that political ideas and actions that could be interpreted as diluting Pakistani nationhood were subversive. Demanding ethnic rights or provincial autonomy, seeking friendly ties with India, and advocating a secular Constitution fell under that category of subversion.' Haqqani explains how the military gained prominence. 'The Kashmir dispute as well as the ideological project fuelled rivalry with India, which in turn increased the new country's need for a strong military. The military and the bureaucracy, therefore, became even more crucial players in Pakistan's life than they would have been had the circumstances of the country's birth been different.' Historian Ayesha Jalal, in her book The State of Martial Rule, explains how internal threats to the government were conflated with a defence against India. Thus, the difference between internal and external threats was blurred to the military's advantage. 'So in Pakistan's case, defence against India was in part a defence against internal threats to central authority. This is why a preoccupation with affording the defence establishment—not unusual for a newly created state— assumed obsessive dimensions in the first few years of Pakistan's existence,' she writes. The Pakistani leadership found it 'convenient to perceive all internal political opposition as a threat to the security of the state'. Gradually, the Pakistani society also started perceiving India as a threat and the military as the protector from this imaginary danger. A February Gallup & Gilani Pakistan opinion poll found that only 41 per cent of Pakistanis think that Pakistan should maintain any relationship with India at any level before the Kashmir issue is resolved—35 per cent are against it. Military cons, coerces Pakistanis at the same time Operation Sindoor exposed Pakistani society's fickle-mindedness, the military's hero-worshipping and how the Generals con and coerce the public at the same time. The Pakistani military changed the Black Day in May 2023 to the Day of Righteous Battle in the same month this year in merely four days. The tactics were the same. Pakistani and local terrorists attack J&K, Indian retaliation portrayed as an attack on Pakistan's sovereignty and the military retaliates as the nation's saviour. The scene in Pakistan changed from the massive protests against Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chief Imran Khan's arrest, which engulfed major cities, public and private properties and military installations, to celebration and triumph around two years later. In May 2023, the public challenged the military's dominance and power. In May 2025, the public celebrated the military's fake propaganda of supremacy and winning against India as the Generals took advantage of Operation Sindoor and the decades-old Kashmir issue to boost their decreasing popularity. A May 7 Gallup Pakistan survey found 77 per cent of Pakistanis rejecting India's allegation that Pakistan was behind the Pahalgam attack with 55 per cent believing that India's intelligence or government may have orchestrated it. Despite India's no-first-use nuclear policy, 45 per cent of Pakistanis fear that India might launch a first nuclear strike. For Pakistanis, the country's foreign policy with India takes precedence over deep-rooted corruption, serious economic problems and the incapability of successive governments with 64 per cent of the public satisfied with the political leadership's unified stance on tensions with India. Sixty-five per cent express overall satisfaction with the Shehbaz Sharif government's India foreign policy. Another Gallup Pakistan survey, conducted on May 21, found how the military's lies, disinformation and fake propaganda had boosted its image with 96 per cent of the public believing that India was defeated and 97 per cent rating the performance of its armed forces as good or very good. An overwhelming 87 per cent held India responsible for initiating the conflict. Public opinion of the Army improved to 93 per cent compared to 73 per cent of the civilian government. Sharif's party, PML-N, received the highest positive performance rating (65 per cent), followed by PTI (60 per cent) and Pakistan Peoples Party (58 per cent). Around 30 per cent opposed normalisation of ties with India. Not even 50 per cent supported normalising relations with India with trade cooperation receiving the highest support (49 per cent), followed closely by sports (48 per cent), education (44 per cent) and cultural exchanges (40 per cent). Two incidents show how the military cons Pakistanis, who are willing to be conned, in the name of the non-existent Indian threat and increases its iron grip at the same time. First, the government revoked the ban on X, imposed in February 2024, a few hours after India targeted terrorist bases in Pakistan and PoK on May 7. The social media platform was banned on February 17, 2024, without notification on the pretext of threats to national security and Elon Musk's company's refusal to accede to requests and comply with the Removal and Blocking of Unlawful Online Content (Procedure, Oversight and Safeguards) Rules 2021. The actual reason for the ban was the accounts of candidates and parties, especially PTI and the National Democratic Movement, posting about election irregularities. The government admitted after one month that X was banned. Internet and cybersecurity watchdog NetBlocks said that X was banned after 'it was used to draw attention to instances of alleged election fraud'. According to Access Now, a nonprofit that focuses on digital civil rights and reports on global Internet censorship, Pakistan imposed 21 shutdowns in 2024. Once the ban on X was revoked, a deluge of disinformation, like Pakistan shooting down a Su-30MKI and a MiG-29, from Pakistani handles flooded the platform. Pakistanis were part of the disinformation campaign without realising that the ban was removed to whip up anti-India feelings and restore the military's image. The military managed to reunite the nation with hatred against India and false claims of victory as Pakistanis forgot how their economic woes increased, ethnic and political dissent was crushed, dissenters went missing and all these years. Even Khan, who had held Army chief General Syed Asim Munir responsible for his arrest, tweeted: 'The recent escalation between Pakistan and India has once again proven that Pakistanis are a brave, proud, and dignified nation.' Second, as Pakistanis celebrated the military's lies, the spineless Supreme Court, in a 5-2 verdict by the Constitutional Bench, allowed 105 civilians accused in the May 9, 2023, protests to be tried in military courts. The civilians had been convicted under the Pakistan Army Act (PAA), 1952, and the Official Secrets Act, 1923, for espionage, 'interfering with officers of the police or members of the armed forces' and unauthorised use of uniforms. The apex court overturned an earlier ruling against military trials of civilians. Section 2 of PAA permits trials of civilians before military courts when they are accused of 'seducing or attempting to seduce any person subject to this Act from his duty or allegiance to government' or having committed 'in relation to any work of defence…in relation to the military of Pakistan'. Section 59(4) provides for the trial of such civilians under the PAA. In a May report by the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), 'Military Justice in Pakistan: A Glaring Surrender of Human Rights', found that trials of the 105 civilians violated Pakistan's legal obligations under international human rights. 'The ICJ recalls that the use of military courts to try civilians usurps the functions of the ordinary courts and is inconsistent with the principle of independence of the judiciary.' According to Principle 5 of the UN Human Rights Sub-Commission, 'military courts should, in principle, have no jurisdiction to try civilians… The jurisdiction of military courts should be limited to offences of a strictly military nature committed by military personnel. Military courts may try persons treated as military personnel for infractions strictly related to their military status'. Pakistani military's grip on economy The state of Pakistan's economy is as open as the military and the political leadership's sponsorship of terrorism. Since joining the IMF in 1950, Pakistan has been bailed out more than 20 times by the Fund to address fiscal deficits, balance of payments crises and structural reforms. One of the arrangements under which the IMF has bailed out Pakistan is the Extended Fund Facility (EFF), a longer-term arrangement involving reforms to address the economy's structural weaknesses. On May 9, a day before the ceasefire, the IMF granted $1 billion to Pakistan as part of its $7-billion EFF and another $1.3 billion under the Resilience and Sustainability Facility. The amount was a carrot dangled by the US-led IMF before Pakistan to end hostilities, and was vociferously opposed by India. Pakistan's economy was in negative territory twice in the last five years—2020, -0.9 per cent; 2021, 5.8 per cent; 2022, 6.2 per cent; 2023, -0.2 per cent; and 2024, 2.5 per cent In April, the IMF revised Pakistan's GDP growth in 2025 downward to 2.6 per cent from 3 per cent in January and 3.6 per cent in 2026 from 4 per cent citing the 29 per cent tariffs imposed by the Donald Trump administration. Inflation has been a constant problem with higher prices of fruits, vegetables, flour, rice, meat and chicken. According to IMF data, inflation has been in double digits in the last five years except once—2020 (10.7 per cent), 2021 (8.2 per cent), 2022 (12.2 per cent), 2023 (29.2 per cent) and 2024 (23.4 per cent). Per IMF projections, inflation in 2025 will be 5.1 per cent and 7.7 per cent in 2026. The unemployment rate in the last five years was 6.6 per cent in 2020, 6.3 per cent in 2021, 6.2 per cent in 2022, 8.5 per cent in 2023 and 8.3 per cent in 20204. According to the IMF, the unemployment rate in 2025 is projected at 8 per cent and in 2026 at 7.5 per cent. Pakistan's forex reserves are abysmally low compared to India's. In December 2020, it was $20.5 million; December 2021, $23.9 million; December 2022, $10.8 million; December 2023, $12.7 million; and December 2024, $15.9 million. Forex reserves in May were $16.6 million, according to data released by the State Bank of Pakistan. The Pakistani currency has been severely hit by economic mismanagement, ineffective fiscal policies, a massive trade deficit, the lack of structural reforms and investment, low growth rates, high inflation, rising unemployment and political instability. The PKR tanked to an all-time low of 307.10 against the dollar in the first week of September 2023. The currency has been trading above 280. According to a Fitch Ratings projection in April, Pakistan will gradually devalue its currency to avoid likely pressure on the current account. Bloomberg, quoting Krisjanis Krustins, director, Asia Pacific Sovereign Ratings, Fitch, reported, 'The ratings company sees the rupee falling to 285 against the dollar by the end of June and weakening further to 295 by the end of the next fiscal year in 2026.' Pakistan's poverty rate is estimated at 42.4 per cent in the 2025 fiscal year, higher than 40.5 per cent in 2024, according to the World Bank. With a two per cent annual population growth, 1.9 million more people will fall into poverty this year. Even in 2026 and 2027, the rate will be around 40 per cent and 40.8 per cent, respectively. Amid the economic disaster and financial ruin with a national debt of $130 billion, $7.64 billion was allocated for defence in the 2024-25 defence budget. The Generals have been thriving for decades at the expense of Pakistanis by controlling industry, agriculture and the private sector. Under the Defence Housing Authority, the Army owns 12 per cent of the country's land at nominal rates, including urban and agricultural. The military has a massive stake in the government's industrial and commercial policies due to its immense influence on industry, commerce and business. In her book Military Inc. – Inside Pakistan's Military Economy, Pakistani political scientist Ayesha Siddiqa terms the military's 'internal economy' Milbus, military capital used for the personal benefit of its personnel, especially officers. 'Pakistan's military runs a huge commercial empire with an estimated value of billions of dollars.' This capital is 'neither recorded nor a part of the defence budget. Its most significant component is entrepreneurial activities that are not subject to state accountability procedures'. The military is the sole driver of Milbus— and is 'an example of the type of Milbus that intensifies military interest in remaining in power or direct/indirect control of governance'. According to her, Milbus involves: the varied business ventures of four welfare foundations (small businesses such as farms, schools and private security firms and corporate enterprises such as commercial banks and insurance companies, radio and television channels and manufacturing plants) direct institutional military involvement in enterprises such as toll collecting, shopping centres and petrol stations and benefits given to retired personnel, such as state land or business openings. Siddiqa explains how Milbus hurts Pakistan economically, politically and socially. The system 'nurtures' the military's political ambitions by creating deep-rooted vested interests in military dominance. 'The military has nourished the religious right to consolidate military control over the State and society.' Socially, it 'increases inter-ethnic tensions (due to skewed military recruitment policies), reduces the acceptability of the military as an arbiter among political interests and increases the alienation of the underprivileged'. Moreover, building and sustaining the military's influence in power politics come at a cost. 'Evidence shows that military businesses are not run more efficiently than others. Some of the military's larger businesses and subsidiaries have required financial bailout from the government.' Meanwhile, the Army continues with its anti-India narrative despite losing four wars to India—and the public plays along. Anti-India rhetoric, sponsorship of terrorism in J&K and the portrayal of India as an existential threat to Pakistan sustain the military while development has come to a standstill. According to Noam Chomsky, professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the father of modern linguistics, 'Pakistan just cannot survive' if it continues the confrontation with India. In an interview with the Dawn in May 2013, he said, 'Pakistan will never be able to match the Indian militarily and the effort to do so is taking an immense toll on society.' The writer is a freelance journalist with more than two decades of experience and comments primarily on foreign affairs. He tweets as @FightTheBigots. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the writer. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost's views.
The Print
02-06-2025
- Politics
- The Print
Pakistan has no natural tendency to be democratic. Rule of Islam is the priority
So let us see whether these beliefs about Pakistan are true, or merely our own confirmation biases in action, where we evaluate others by our own standards and historical experience. It is my belief that you cannot judge an Islamic state by any standard except the one set by Islam's history. Three other statements made about Pakistan are equally worth questioning. One, Pakistan is a failed state. No state is a failed state unless it is totally incapable of using power to achieve its basic aims. This is far from being the case in Pakistan. Another half-truth is that the country has no self-definition beyond hatred for 'Hindu India'. And yet another assumption, which we have now begun to question, is that religion cannot be a basis for statehood. We started saying this after we helped create Bangladesh, but now we are back to square one, for the post-Hasina Bangladesh government is Islamist and effectively anti-India. We now have two Pakistans to confront, not just one. One of the enduring myths Indians are told about Pakistan is that the real hurdle to peace is its army, which is a state above the state. It is the Pakistani Army that needs to use terror as state policy against a stronger India, and this, in turn, enables the army to retain extraordinary power. That the Pakistani Army chief was recently elevated to the rank of Field Marshal after an indifferent performance in the short, near-war with India seems to reinforce this statement. Victory or defeat, the army will rule. Let's start with the frequently made statement—partially in jest—that other countries have an army, but in Pakistan, the army has a country. There is surely some truth to this, but we must consider other explanations too. Ask yourself, was the Pakistani state any different at the time of Partition, when its army, then run by British Generals, decided to use tribal forces to overrun and take over Jammu & Kashmir? Did a democratically elected Zulfikar Ali Bhutto have any different notions about India than its rapidly Islamising army under Zia ul-Haq? An alternate hypothesis would be that Muslim majority states have no natural tendency to remain democratic or secular, because Islam puts religion above the state, umma (a global community of Muslims) above the nation-state. In the imagined existence of an umma, the existence or non-existence of a state like Pakistan is immaterial. What matters is whether the state, or states, are under the rule of Islam. So, when secular historians point out that Islam does not provide a template for national unity, they are partly wrong. In Islam, a legitimate state must merely follow the sharia; so whether we have one Islamic state or 100, the umma remains one in theory. And this situation does not change whether it is an army that rules or a theocracy (with some notable exceptions). Neither of them is willing to accept the normal checks and balances that apply to any functioning democracy. This is why, despite having lost almost all wars with India and behaving brutally with its own insurgencies in Balochistan, the army is still the most popular institution in Pakistan, with 74 per cent approval ratings. The most important aspect of Islam (as with the Communists) is the acquisition of power, and hence it does not matter whether the person wielding the power is a mullah or a soldier, or someone who combines both functions. So when Field Marshal Asim Munir declares himself to be a believer in the two-nation theory, he is only validating his right to rule over all Muslims in Pakistan. Also read: Pakistan cyber attacked India right after Pahalgam. How govt acted against it Who rules an Islamic country? The ideological underpinnings of Islam start with the Prophet, who combined the roles of political, religious and military head of the community in Medina. His successor Caliphs followed the same policy. Unlike Christianity, which, after repeated clashes between church and state, accepted a bifurcation of sovereignty based on whether something belonged to the temporal sphere or the religious, in Islam, there is no such separation. In both Pakistan and Bangladesh, the military has often dumped the elected government, and the military uses religious authority to remain in power. Among Muslim-majority countries that have had short or long spells of military rule—Egypt, Syria, Sudan, Yemen and Turkey (before Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Islamist party came to power). Even the most benign of Muslim states, Indonesia, had a general, Suharto, as its president for nearly three decades. The rest are either theocratic (Iran, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan) or ruled by Muslim monarchs. And Nigeria, which is evenly divided between Muslims and Christians, has seen military dictatorships. Boko Haram, one of the most brutal terrorist organisations in the world, wants to turn it into a full-blown Islamic state. Some rulers may be liberal and some conservative, but the idea that the head of the state must represent religious authority is key in Muslim majority states (no doubt, with some honourable exceptions). Malaysia is somewhere in between. Islam is the official religion, but it gives guaranteed political spaces to its minorities as long as they don't threaten Islamic supremacy. The second part of the statement is vital, for it does not imply equal treatment for all religions. A Pew Research survey on Muslim attitudes to Sharia law in 39 countries (India was not surveyed, for some strange reason) found an overwhelming majority of Muslims favouring Sharia. By implication, one can conclude that—since Sharia needs to be imposed from above, by a ruler who has to be Muslim and proclaims Islam as the state religion and sets up laws to align with Sharia—the people who want Islamic law may not object to any ruler who promises them the same. Whether they wear the robes of clerics or military uniforms does not matter. In India's neighbourhood, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan have 82-99 per cent of the population supporting Sharia. In Bangladesh, support was 82 per cent, which explains why even with a friendly Sheikh Hasina in place (before last August's student-led coup), the de-Hinduisation of Bangladesh continued. It is the nature of society that determines democracy and inclusion, not whether it is an army running the show or clerics or some more secular dictator. Nothing else can explain the steady decline of Hindus in Bangladesh from 22 per cent after Partition to under eight per cent now. Even when the ruler may be mildly secular, its polity is definitely not on the same page. Also read: India-Pakistan conflict exposed the real danger — China Pakistan will always be a problem The second point, that Pakistan is a country without a positive self-definition, is equally unimportant. Reason: Hatred is a strong binding force for nationhood. It gives the rulers and the population enormous ability to withstand economic deprivation. This is the main reason why Bhutto said that he would eat grass in order to fund the country's efforts to build a nuclear bomb. Hatred for the 'other' is one of the most powerful motivators. In our own Mahabharata, we can note how Ashwatthama's hatred for the Pandavas—for using subterfuge to kill his father Dronacharya in the Kurukshetra war—motivated him to kill almost the entire Pandava clan in the stealth of night. This happened even after the war had formally ended with the killing of Duryodhana. This is why Aman ki Aasha can never trump Pakistani hatred of India. The third point relates to Pakistan's status as an Islamic state, created as a redoubt to strengthen Islam against 'Hindu India'. This idea, too, has its roots in Islamic history, where the Prophet, when he was weak, chose to establish a regime in Medina, where he fused religion with military and political power. Once he gained in strength, he could take over Mecca without a fight, after abrogating the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah, a 10-year peace treaty he had signed with the Meccans. Peace is useful only when you are weak. Pakistan, to note a scholarly work by Venkat Dhulipala, was about 'Creating a New Medina' for undivided India's minority Muslims. A Medina is always temporary, and meant to provide a sanctuary to build your strength till you are ready to take on your enemy. Two Medinas or three do not make this template irrelevant to understand what Pakistan is all about. The mere creation of Bangladesh did not enable the country to embrace secularism or pluralism, as it is now becoming apparent. For the future, it also implies that Balochistan may also become another Islamist country once it achieves freedom from Punjabi-ruled Pakistan. We must, of course, support the freedom movement to weaken Pakistan, but we should not be naive enough to believe that it implies a win for secularism in the end. As far as Pakistan is concerned, India has to reckon with the possibility that even if, at some point, its army were to be cut down to size, that country's enmity to 'Hindu India' will not cease. Terrorism could remain a way of life in Pakistan, either as one country or in truncated form, especially since terrorists are integrated into the army and civil society. A smaller Pakistan will become even more prone to foisting terror, since its army can no longer defeat India. What a truncated Pakistan will give us is a brief reprieve. Pakistan, as one unit or many mini-Pakistans, will continue to remain a problem for India, and possibly the world, under army rule or civilian rule. Also read: Asim Munir just stole his 5th star & has nothing to show for it. It'll make him desperate, dangerous Open up for reinterpretation So, what hope is there for peace in the future? The answer lies with thinking and questioning Muslims, who have been intimidated into silence by jihadi elements. It is only when ordinary Muslims start openly questioning the basic tenets of Islam and modifying or reinterpreting them for the modern era that jihadism will start shrinking. It is worth noting that global Islam closed the doors to ijtihad—the use of reason to interpret sacred texts—nearly 10 centuries ago, after briefly trying to begin the process during the 10th and 11th centuries CE. The age of Ibn Sina and Ibn Rushd (Avicenna and Averroes to western writers), which dawned when Islamic armies ruled parts of Europe and came in touch with Greek philosophy, died by the end of the 11th century, when Al-Ghazali and the Asherite movement closed the gates to ijtihad and declared the Quran as not subject to revisionist and reason-based interpretations. These trends and the victory of non-reason are brilliantly captured in Robert R Reilly's book, The Closing of the Muslim Mind: How Intellectual Suicide Created the Modern Islamist Crisis. The revival of reason and tolerance needs the wider Muslim polity to end this continuing intellectual suicide. Things will change when Muslims reopen ijtihad. The starting point will be reached when they openly disown the idea of the umma as a brotherhood only of Muslims, or that the kafir is undeserving of equal rights. In India, Muslims must see other Indians, especially non-Muslims, as part of their core umma. The word kafir must be outlawed, for it is does not just mean non-believer, but someone worth dehumanising, and made actionable under the law as a put-down. Till then, we must judge Pakistan or any Islamist nation only in the context of Islamic history and experience. And be ready to defend ourselves. R Jagannathan is former Editorial Director, Swarajya. He tweets at @TheJaggi. Views are personal. (Edited by Theres Sudeep)
1News
07-05-2025
- Politics
- 1News
India and Pakistan face a new crisis. Here's a look at their history of conflict
India struck multiple sites inside Pakistani-controlled territory early Wednesday, two weeks after a deadly attack on tourists in the disputed Kashmir plunged relations between the neighbours to new lows. India accused Pakistan of backing the massacre, in which 26 men, mostly Indian Hindus, were killed, a charge Pakistan denies. Soldiers on each side have exchanged fire along their de facto border since the killings, with each blaming the other for shooting first. Both countries expelled diplomats and citizens, ordered the border shut and closed their airspace to each other. Here's a look at multiple conflicts between the two countries since their bloody partition in 1947: 1947 — Months after British India is partitioned into a predominantly Hindu India and a Muslim-majority Pakistan, the two young nations fight their first war over control of Muslim-majority Kashmir, then a kingdom ruled by a Hindu monarch. The war killed thousands before ending in 1948. 1949 — A UN-brokered ceasefire line leaves Kashmir divided between India and Pakistan, with the promise of a UN-sponsored vote that would enable the region's people to decide whether to be part Pakistan or India. That vote has never been held. 1965 — The rivals fight their second war over Kashmir. Thousands are killed in inconclusive fighting before a ceasefire is brokered by the Soviet Union and the United States. Negotiations in Tashkent run until January 1966, ending in both sides giving back territories they seized during the war and withdrawing their armies. 1971 — India intervenes in a war over the independence of East Pakistan, which ends with the territory breaking away as the new country of Bangladesh. An estimated 3 million people are killed in the conflict. 1972 — India and Pakistan sign a peace accord, renaming the ceasefire line in Kashmir as the Line of Contro. Both sides deploy more troops along the frontier, turning it into a heavily fortified stretch of military outposts. 1989 — Kashmiri dissidents, with support from Pakistan, launch a bloody rebellion against Indian rule. Indian troops respond with brutal measures, intensifying diplomatic and military skirmishes between New Delhi and Islamabad. 1999 — Pakistani soldiers and Kashmiri fighters seize several Himalayan peaks on the Indian side. India responds with aerial bombardments and artillery. At least 1000 combatants are killed over 10 weeks, and a worried world fears the fighting could escalate to nuclear conflict. The US eventually steps in to mediate, ending the fighting. 2016 — Militants sneak into an army base in Indian-controlled Kashmir, killing at least 18 soldiers. India responds by sending special forces inside Pakistani-held territory, later claiming to have killed multiple suspected rebels in 'surgical strikes". Pakistan denies that the strikes took place, but it leads to days of major border skirmishes. Combatants and civilians on both sides are killed. 2019 — The two sides again come close to war after a Kashmiri insurgent rams an explosive-laden car into a bus carrying Indian soldiers, killing 40. India carries out airstrikes in Pakistani territory and claims to have struck a militant training facility. Pakistan later shoots down an Indian warplane and captures a pilot. He is later released, de-escalating tensions. 2025 — Militants attack Indian tourists in the region's resort town of Pahalgam and kill 26 men, most of them Hindus. India blames Pakistan, which denies it. India vows revenge on the attackers as tensions rise to their highest point since 2019. Both countries cancel visas for each other's citizens, recall diplomats, shut their only land border crossing and close their airspaces to each other. New Delhi also suspended a crucial water-sharing treaty.
The Independent
01-05-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
Timeline: Key moments in the history of armed conflict between India and Pakistan
A deadly attack on tourists in Kashmir last week has plunged relations between India and Pakistan to new lows, with both sides hinting at imminent military action. India accuses Pakistan of backing the massacre, in which 26 men, mostly Indian Hindus, were killed, a charge Pakistan denies. Both countries have since expelled diplomats and citizens, ordered the border shut and closed their airspace for each other. Soldiers on each side have exchanged fire along their de facto border, with each blaming the other for shooting first. Here's a look at multiple conflicts between the two countries since their bloody partition in 1947: 1947 — Months after British India is partitioned into a predominantly Hindu India and a Muslim -majority Pakistan, the two young nations fight their first war over control of Muslim-majority Kashmir, then a kingdom ruled by a Hindu monarch. The war killed thousands before ending in 1948. 1949 — A UN-brokered ceasefire line leaves Kashmir divided between India and Pakistan, with the promise of a U.N.-sponsored vote that would enable the region's people to decide whether to be part Pakistan or India. That vote has never been held. 1965 — The rivals fight their second war over Kashmir. Thousands are killed in inconclusive fighting before a ceasefire is brokered by the Soviet Union and the United States. Negotiations in Tashkent run until January 1966, ending in both sides giving back territories they seized during the war and withdrawing their armies. 1971 — India intervenes in a war over the independence of East Pakistan, which ends with the territory breaking away as the new country of Bangladesh. An estimated 3 million people are killed in the conflict. 1972 — India and Pakistan sign a peace accord, renaming the ceasefire line in Kashmir as the Line of Control, a heavily fortified stretch of military outposts that divide the region between them. Both sides deploy more troops along the frontier, turning it into a heavily fortified stretch of military outposts. 1989 — Kashmiri dissidents, with support from Pakistan, launch a bloody rebellion against Indian rule. Indian troops respond with brutal measures, intensifying diplomatic and military skirmishes between New Delhi and Islamabad. 1999 — Pakistani soldiers and Kashmiri fighters seize several Himalayan peaks on the Indian side of the territory. India responds with aerial bombardments and artillery. At least 1,000 combatants are killed over 10 weeks and a worried world fears the fighting could escalate to nuclear conflict. The U.S. eventually steps in to mediate, ending the fighting. 2016 — Militants sneak into an army base in Indian-controlled Kashmir, killing at least 18 soldiers. India responds by sending special forces inside Pakistani-held territory, later claiming to have killed multiple suspected rebels in 'surgical strikes.' Pakistan denies that the strikes take place, but it leads to days of major border skirmishes. Combatants and civilians on both sides are killed. 2019 — The two sides again come close to war after a Kashmiri insurgent rams an explosive-laden car into a bus carrying Indian soldiers, killing 40. India sends carries out air strikes in Pakistani territory, claiming to have struck a militant training facility. Pakistan later shoot down an Indian warplane and captures a pilot. He was later released, deescalating tensions. 2025 — Militants attack Indian tourists in region's Pahalgam resort town and kill 26 men, most of them Hindus. India blames Pakistan for the attack, something Islamabad denies, and vows revenge on the attackers, sending tensions to their highest point since 2019. Both sides cancel visas of each other's citizens, recall diplomats, shut their only land border crossing and close their airspace to each other. New Delhi also suspends a crucial water-sharing treaty with Islamabad.
