ਡੇਰੇਦਾਰਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਹਿਬਾਨ ਜੀ ਦੀ ਕੀਤੀ ਜਾ ਰਹੀ ਬੇਅਦਬੀ ਦੀ ਕੋਈ ਚਿੰਤਾ ਨਹੀਂ, ਕਿਰਪਾਲ ਸਿੰਘ ਬਠਿੰਡਾ

ਡੇਰੇਦਾਰਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਆਪਣੇ ਸਾਧਾਂ ਦੀ ਨਿੰਦਾ ਤਾਂ ਬਹੁਤ ਹੀ ਚੁਭਦੀ ਹੈ, ਪਰ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਹਿਬਾਨ ਜੀ ਦੀ ਕੀਤੀ ਜਾ ਰਹੀ ਬੇਅਦਬੀ ਤੇ ਚਰਿਤਰਘਾਣ ਦੀ ਇਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਕੋਈ ਚਿੰਤਾ ਨਹੀਂ
- ਕਿਰਪਾਲ ਸਿੰਘ ਬਠਿੰਡਾਮੋਬ: 9855480797

ਦਸਮ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਦੇ ਮਹਾਂ ਵਿਦਵਾਨ ਸਮਝੇ ਜਾ ਰਹੇ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਅੰਬਾਲੇ ਵਾਲਾ ਨੇ ਗੁਰਦੁਆਰਾ ਬੰਗਲਾ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਵਿਖੇ ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੀ ਚੱਲ ਰਹੀ ਲੜੀਵਾਰ ਕਥਾ ਦੌਰਾਨ 17-18-19 ਮਾਰਚ ਨੂੰ ਤਿੰਨ ਦਿਨ ਕਥਾ ਕੀਤੀ, ਜਿਸ ਦਾ ਸਿੱਧਾ ਪ੍ਰਸਾਰਣ ਚੜ੍ਹਦੀ ਕਲਾ ਟਾਈਮ ਟੀਵੀ ਤੋਂ ਹੋ ਰਿਹਾ ਸੀ। 18 ਤਰੀਕ ਨੂੰ ਕੀਤੀ ਕਥਾ ਦੌਰਾਨ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੇ ਕਈ ਪ੍ਰਚਾਰਕਾਂ ਵੱਲੋਂ ਸੰਤਾਂ ਦੀ ਕੀਤੀ ਜਾ ਰਹੀ ਨਿੰਦਾ ਦੀ ਅਲੋਚਨਾ ਕਰਦਿਆਂ ਕਿਹਾ, ਗੁਰਬਾਣੀ ਤੋਂ ਅਣਜਾਣ ਇਹ ਪ੍ਰਚਾਰਕ ਕਹਿੰਦੇ ਹਨ ਕਿ ਕੋਈ ਮਨੁਖ ਸੰਤ ਹੋ ਹੀ ਨਹੀਂ ਸਕਦਾ ਤੇ ਗੁਰਬਾਣੀ ਵਿੱਚ ਵਰਤੇ ਗਏ ਸ਼ਬਦ ‘ਸੰਤ’ ਕੇਵਲ ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਲਈ ਹੀ ਹਨ। ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਸੁਖਮਨੀ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਵਿੱਚ ਪੰਜਵੇਂ ਪਾਤਸ਼ਾਹ ਗੁਰੂ ਅਰਜੁਨ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਵੱਲੋਂ ‘ਸੰਤ’ ਦੀ ਕੀਤੀ ਮਹਿਮਾਂ ਦਾ ਜ਼ਿਕਰ ਕਰਦਿਆਂ ਕਿਹਾ ਕਿ ਇਸ ਬਾਣੀ ਵਿੱਚ ਇਹ ਵੀ ਲਿਖਿਆ ਹੋਇਆ ਹੈ:

‘ਪੂਰਾ ਗੁਰੁ, ਅਖ੍ਹਓ ਜਾ ਕਾ ਮੰਤ੍ਰ ॥ ਅੰਮ੍ਰਿਤ ਦ੍ਰਿਸਟਿ ਪੇਖੈ ਹੋਇ ਸੰਤ ॥’ ਜਿਸ ਦਾ ਭਾਵ ਹੈ ਕਿ ਸਤਿਗੁਰੂ ਪੂਰਨ ਪੁਰਖ ਹੈ, ਉਸ ਦਾ ਉਪਦੇਸ਼ ਭੀ ਸਦਾ ਲਈ ਅਟੱਲ ਹੈ, (ਜਿਸ ਵਲ) ਅਮਰ ਕਰਨ ਵਾਲੀ ਨਜ਼ਰ ਨਾਲ ਤੱਕਦਾ ਹੈ ਓਹੀ ਸੰਤ ਹੋ ਜਾਂਦਾ ਹੈ।

ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਨੇ ਕਿਹਾ ‘‘ਕੀ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਕਿਸੇ ਸਿੱਖ ਨੂੰ ਅੰਮ੍ਰਿਤਮਈ ਦ੍ਰਿਸ਼ਟੀ ਨਾਲ ਤਕਦੇ ਹੀ ਨਹੀਂ? ਜੇ ਤਕਦੇ ਹਨ ਤਾਂ ਉਹ ਸੰਤ ਕਿਉਂ ਨਹੀਂ ਹੋ ਸਕਦੇ? ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਤਾਂ ਸਾਰੇ ਹੀ ਸਿੱਖਾਂ ’ਤੇ ਆਪਣੀ ਕ੍ਰਿਪਾ ਦ੍ਰਿਸ਼ਟੀ ਕਰਦੇ ਹਨ ਇਸ ਲਈ ਜੇ ਸਿੱਖ ‘ਸੰਤ’ ਨਹੀਂ ਬਣ ਸਕਦੇ ਤਾਂ ਹੋਰ ਕੌਣ ਬਣੇਗਾ? ਪਰ ਇਹ ਗੁਰੂ ਦੀ ਕ੍ਰਿਪਾ ਦ੍ਰਿਸ਼ਟੀ ਹੁੰਦੀ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ’ਤੇ ਹੀ ਹੈ ਜੋ ਗੁਰੂ ਦੀ ਸਿਖਿਆ ਅਨੁਸਾਰ ਹਮੇਸ਼ਾਂ ਨਾਮ ਨਾਲ ਜੁੜੇ ਰਹਿੰਦੇ ਹਨ। ਨਾਮ ਬਿਹੂਣੇ ਜਿਹੜੇ ਮਨੁੱਖ ਆਪਣੇ ਕਰਮਾਂ ਕਰਕੇ ਗੁਰੂ ਦੀ ਅੰਮ੍ਰਿਤਮਈ ਦ੍ਰਿਸ਼ਟੀ ਤੋਂ ਵਾਂਝੇ ਰਹਿ ਜਾਂਦੇ ਹਨ, ਉਹ ਈਰਖਾ ਵੱਸ ਸੰਤਾਂ ਦੀ ਨਿੰਦਾ ਕਰਦੇ ਹਨ।’’

ਦੂਸਰੀ ਕੱਚਘਰੜ ਗੱਲ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਕਹੀ ਕਿ ਜਿਸ ਸਮੇਂ ਗੁਰੂ ਹਰਿਗੋਬਿੰਦ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦਾ ਜੋਤੀ ਜੋਤ ਸਮਾਉਣ ਪਿਛੋਂ ਸਸਕਾਰ ਕੀਤਾ ਜਾ ਰਿਹਾ ਸੀ ਤਾਂ ਉਸ ਸਮੇਂ ਚਿਖਾ ਤਿਆਰ ਕਰਨ ਦੌਰਾਨ ਕੀਤੇ ਗਏ ਜਪੁਜੀ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੇ ਪਾਠ ਦਾ ਜਦੋਂ ਹੀ ਭੋਗ ਪਿਆ ਤੇ ਅੰਤਲੀ ਤੁਕ ਪੜ੍ਹੀ ਗਈ: ‘ਨਾਨਕ ਤੇ ਮੁਖ ਉਜਲੇ ਕੇਤੀ ਛੁਟੀ ਨਾਲਿ ॥’ ਉਸੇ ਸਮੇਂ ਰਾਜਾ ਰਾਮ ਪ੍ਰਸ਼ਾਦ ਨੇ ਆਪਣਾ ਸੀਸ ਗੁਰੂ ਹਰਿਗੋਬਿੰਦ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੇ ਚਰਨਾਂ ’ਤੇ ਟਿਕਾਇਆ ਤੇ ਆਪਣੇ ਆਪ ਨੂੰ ਬਲ਼ ਰਹੀ ਚਿਖਾ ਦੇ ਸਪੁਰਦ ਕਰ ਦਿੱਤਾ। ਵੇਖਦਿਆਂ ਹੀ ਵੇਖਦਿਆਂ ਰਾਜਾ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਨੇ ਵੀ ਚਿਖਾ ਵਿੱਚ ਛਾਲ ਮਾਰ ਕੇ ਪ੍ਰਾਣ ਤਿਆਗ ਦਿੱਤੇ। ਚਿਖਾ ਵਿੱਚ ਸੜ ਕੇ ਮਰਨ ਦਾ ਕਾਰਣ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਨੇ ਇਹ ਦੱਸਿਆ ਕਿ ਰਾਜਾ ਰਾਮ ਪ੍ਰਸ਼ਾਦ ਤੇ ਰਾਜਾ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਜਹਾਂਗੀਰ ਦੇ ਜੁਲਮਾਂ ਤੋਂ ਬਚਨ ਲਈ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੀ ਸ਼ਰਨ ਵਿੱਚ ਆਏ ਸਨ ਤੇ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਦੇ ਜੋਤੀ ਜੋਤ ਸਮਾਉਣ ਪਿੱਛੋਂ ਉਹ ਸਮਝਦੇ ਸਨ ਕਿ ਹੁਣ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਦੀ ਰੱਖਿਆ ਕਰਨ ਵਾਲਾ ਕੋਈ ਨਹੀਂ ਹੈ, ਇਸ ਲਈ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੀ ਚਿਖਾ ਵਿੱਚ ਸੜ ਜਾਣਾ ਹੀ ਬਿਹਤਰ ਸਮਝਿਆ।

18 ਮਾਰਚ ਦੀ ਕਥਾ ਉਪ੍ਰੰਤ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਨੂੰ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਦੇ ਮੋਬ: ਨੰ: 09466466987 ’ਤੇ ਫ਼ੋਨ ਮਿਲਾਇਆ ਤੇ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਬੇਨਤੀ ਕੀਤੀ, ਕਿ ਚੰਗਾ ਹੋਇਆ ਤੁਸੀਂ ਬਨਾਉਟੀ ਸੰਤਾਂ ਦੀ ਅਸਲੀਅਤ ਪ੍ਰਗਟ ਕਰਨ ਵਾਲੇ ਗੁਰਸ਼ਬਦਾਂ ਦੀ ਕੀਤੀ ਜਾ ਰਹੀ ਵਿਖਾਖਿਆ ਨੂੰ ਤਾਂ ਸੰਤਾਂ ਦੀ ਨਿੰਦਾ ਕਰਨਾ ਦੱਸ ਕੇ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਸ਼ਬਦਾਂ ਦੀ ਵਿਆਖਿਆ ਕਰਨ ਵਾਲੇ ਪ੍ਰਚਾਰਕਾਂ ਦੀ ਅਲੋਚਨਾ ਕਰ ਦਿੱਤੀ, ਪਰ ਜੋ ਸ਼੍ਰੋਮਣੀ ਕਮੇਟੀ ਵਲੋਂ ਛਪਵਾਈ ਗਈ ਪੁਸਤਕ ‘ਸਿੱਖ ਇਤਿਹਾਸ ਹਿੰਦੀ’ ਵਿੱਚ ਕੁਫ਼ਰ ਤੋਲਿਆ ਗਿਆ ਹੈ, ਜਿਸ ਦਾ ਖ਼ੁਲਾਸਾ ਭਾਈ ਬਲਦੇਵ ਸਿੰਘ ਸਿਰਸਾ ਨੇ ਡੇ ਐਂਡ ਨਾਈਟ ਟੀਵੀ ਚੈਨਲ ’ਤੇ 16 ਮਾਰਚ ਨੂੰ ਕੀਤਾ ਸੀ; ਉਸ ਸਬੰਧੀ ਵੀ ਚਾਨਣਾਂ ਪਾ ਦੇਣਾਂ ਸੀ ਕਿ ਪੁਸਤਕ ਲਿਖਣ ਤੇ ਛਪਵਾਉਣ ਵਾਲੇ ਗੁਰੂ ਨਿੰਦਕ ਹਨ।

ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਬੇਨਤੀ ਕੀਤੀ ਕਿ ਕੱਲ੍ਹ ਜਾਨੀ ਕਿ 19 ਮਾਰਚ ਨੂੰ ਹੋਣ ਵਾਲੀ ਕਥਾ ਦੌਰਾਨ, ਇਸ ਪੁਸਤਕ ਵਿੱਚ ਤੋਲੇ ਗਏ ਕੁਫ਼ਰ ਸਬੰਧੀ ਚਾਨਣਾਂ ਪਾ ਕੇ ਅਜੇਹੀਆਂ ਪੁਸਤਕਾਂ ਦੇ ਲਿਖਾਰੀਆਂ ਤੇ ਪ੍ਰਕਾਸ਼ਕਾਂ ਤੋਂ ਸੁਚੇਤ ਰਹਿਣ ਲਈ ਸੰਗਤਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਜਰੂਰ ਜਾਗਰੂਕ ਕਰ ਦੇਣਾਂ। ਮੇਰੇ ਵਾਰ ਵਾਰ ਬੇਨਤੀ ਕਰਨ ਤੇ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੇ ਵਾਅਦਾ ਕੀਤਾ ਕਿ ਜੇ ਗੁਰੂ ਨੇ ਬਖ਼ਸ਼ਿਸ਼ ਕੀਤੀ ਤਾਂ ਉਹ ਜਰੂਰ ਇਸ ਸਬੰਧੀ ਸੰਗਤਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਕੁਝ ਜਾਣਕਾਰੀ ਦੇਣਗੇ। ਪਰ ਮੈਨੂੰ ਹੈਰਾਨੀ ਹੋਈ ਜਦੋਂ 19 ਮਾਰਚ ਦੀ ਸਾਰੀ ਕਥਾ ਦੌਰਾਨ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਇਸ ਪੁਸਤਕ ਸਬੰਧੀ ਇਸ਼ਾਰੇ ਮਾਤਰ ਵੀ ਕੋਈ ਗੱਲ ਨਾ ਕੀਤੀ, ਜਦੋਂ ਕਿ ਗੁਰੂ ਹਰਿਗੋਬਿੰਦ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੀ ਚਿਖਾ ਵਿੱਚ ਸੜ ਕੇ ਪ੍ਰਾਣ ਤਿਆਗਣ ਵਾਲਿਆਂ ਦੀ ਕੱਚ ਘਰੜ ਕਹਾਣੀ ਦੂਸਰੇ ਦਿਨ ਵੀ ਦੁਹਰਾ ਦਿੱਤੀ।

ਇਸ ਲਈ ਕਥਾ ਉਪ੍ਰੰਤ ਅੱਜ ਦੂਸਰੇ ਦਿਨ ਫਿਰ ਫ਼ੋਨ ਮਿਲਾ ਕੇ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਚੇਤਾ ਕਰਵਾਇਆ ਕਿ ‘ਸਿੱਖ ਇਤਿਹਾਸ ਹਿੰਦੀ’ ਪੁਸਤਕ ਸਬੰਧੀ ਸੰਗਤਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਜਾਗਰੂਕ ਕਰਨ ਸਬੰਧੀ ਤੁਸੀਂ ਆਪਣਾ ਵਾਅਦਾ ਨਹੀਂ ਨਿਭਾਇਆ। ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਨੇ ਕਿਹਾ ਅੱਜ ਗੁਰੂ ਹਰਿਗੋਬਿੰਦ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦਾ ਸ਼ਹੀਦੀ ਦਿਵਸ ਹੋਣ ਕਰਕੇ, ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਦਾ ਇਤਿਹਾਸ ਦੱਸਣਾਂ ਜਰੂਰੀ ਸੀ ਇਸ ਲਈ ਸਮਾਂ ਨਹੀਂ ਮਿਲ ਸਕਿਆ। ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਚੇਤਾ ਕਰਵਾਇਆ ਗਿਆ ਕਿ ਇਹ ਕੱਚ ਘਰੜ ਇਤਿਹਾਸ ਤਾਂ ਤੁਸੀਂ ਕਲ੍ਹ ਵੀ ਸੁਣਾਂ ਦਿੱਤਾ ਸੀ। ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਤੋਂ ਪੁੱਛਿਆ ਗਿਆ ਕਿ ਤੀਜੇ ਪਾਤਸ਼ਾਹ ਗੁਰੂ ਅਮਰਦਾਸ ਜੀ ਨੇ ਸਤੀ ਰਸਮ ਦਾ ਭਾਰੀ ਵਿਰੋਧ ਕੀਤਾ ਤੇ ਅਕਬਰ ਬਾਦਸ਼ਾਹ ਨੂੰ ਕਹਿ ਕੇ ਇਹ ਨਿੰਦਣਯੋਗ ਰਸਮ ਕਨੂੰਨੀ ਤੌਰ ਤੇ ਬੰਦ ਕਰਵਾਈ ਸੀ, ਤਾਂ ਇਹ ਕਿਵੇਂ ਸੰਭਵ ਹੋ ਸਕਦਾ ਹੈ ਕਿ ਗੁਰੂ ਹਰਿਗੋਬਿੰਦ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੀ ਸ਼ਰਨ ਵਿੱਚ ਆਏ ਰਾਜਾ ਰਾਮ ਪ੍ਰਸ਼ਾਦ ਤੇ ਰਾਜਾ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਜਿਹੜੇ ਹਰ ਰੋਜ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੇ ਦੀਵਾਨਾਂ ਵਿੱਚ: ‘ਮਨਮੁਖਿ ਅੰਧੇ ਸੁਧਿ ਨ ਕਾਈ ॥ ਆਤਮ ਘਾਤੀ ਹੈ ਜਗਤ ਕਸਾਈ ॥’ (ਮਾਝ ਮ: 3, ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਾਹਿਬ - ਪੰਨਾ 118) ਦੀ ਕਥਾ ਵੀ ਸ੍ਰਵਨ ਕਰਦੇ ਹੋਣਗੇ, ਪਰ ਇਸ ਦੇ ਬਾਵਯੂਦ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੇ ਚਿੱਤਾ ਵਿੱਚ ਛਾਲਾਂ ਮਾਰ ਕੇ ਆਤਮਘਾਤ ਕੀਤਾ ਹੋਵੇਗਾ?

ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਨੇ ਕਿਹਾ ਫ਼ੋਨ ’ਤੇ ਸਾਰਾ ਗਿਆਨ ਨਹੀਂ ਦਿੱਤਾ ਜਾ ਸਕਦਾ, ਤੁਸੀਂ ਮੇਰੇ ਕੋਲ ਆ ਜਾਣਾ ਤੁਹਾਨੂੰ ਸਭ ਕੁਝ ਲਿਖਿਆ ਵਿਖਾ ਦੇਵਾਂਗਾ। ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਪੁੱਛਿਆ ਕਿ ਜੇ ਲਿਖਿਆ ਹੀ ਵਿਖਾਉਣ ਹੈ ਤਾਂ ਕੱਲ੍ਹ ਨੂੰ ਕੋਈ ਇਹ ਵੀ ਵਿਖਾ ਦੇਵੇਗਾ ਕਿ ਸ਼੍ਰੋਮਣੀ ਕਮੇਟੀ ਵੱਲੋਂ ਛਾਪੀ ਇਤਿਹਾਸ ਦੀ ਪੁਸਤਕ ਵਿੱਚ ਲਿਖਿਆ ਹੈ: ‘ਨਾਨਕ ਕਾ ਗੁਰੂ ਇਕ ਮੁਸਲਮਾਨ ਥਾ। ਨਾਨਕ ਮੁੱਗਲੋਂ ਕੋ ਹਿੰਦੁਸਤਾਨ ਲੇ ਕੇ ਆਇਆ। ਨਾਨਕ ਮਰ ਗਿਆ। ਅੰਗਦ ਆ ਗਿਆ। ਅਰਜੁਨ ਨੇ ਆਤਮ ਹੱਤਿਆ ਕਰੀ। ਅਰਜੁਨ ਕੇ ਮਰਨੇ ਕੇ ਬਾਅਦ ਹਰਗੋਬਿੰਦ ਕਾ ਦਿਮਾਗੀ ਸੰਤੁਲਨ ਖੋ ਗਿਆ। ਹਰਗੋਬਿੰਦ ਬਹੁਤ ਡਰਪੋਕ ਆਦਮੀ ਥਾ। ਹਰਗੋਬਿੰਦ ਜਬ ਸੋਤਾ ਥਾ ਤੋ ਸਾਥ ਬੰਦੂਕਦਾਰੀ ਪਹਿਰੇ ਪੇ ਖੜ੍ਹੇ ਰਹਿਤੇ ਥੇ। ਹਰਿਰਾਏ ਕੇ ਦੋ ਬੇਟੇ ਤੇ। ਜਬ ਹਰਿਰਾਏ ਮਰਾ ਤੋ ਬੜੇ ਬੇਟੇ ਰਾਮ ਰਾਇ ਕੀ ਉਮਰ 15 ਥੀ ਔਰ ਹਰਕ੍ਰਿਸ਼ਨ ਕੀ 6 ਬਰਸ ਦੀ। ਬੜੇ ਬੇਟੇ ਕੋ ਗੱਦੀ ਇਸ ਲੀਏ ਨਹੀਂ ਦੀ ਕੇ ਵੋ ਨੌਕਰਾਣੀ ਕਾ ਬੇਟਾ ਥਾ।’ ਉਸ ਸਮੇਂ ਇਸ ਦਾ ਜਵਾਬ ਕੌਣ ਦੇਵੇਗਾ ਕਿ ਜਿਸ ਗੁਰੂ ਅਰਜੁਨ ਨੇ ਜਹਾਂਗੀਰ ਦੇ ਤਸੀਹਿਆਂ ਤੋਂ ਡਰਦਿਆਂ ਆਤਮ ਹੱਤਿਆ ਕਰ ਲਈ। ਗੁਰੂ ਹਰਿਗੋਬਿੰਦ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਖ਼ੁਦ ਬਹੁਤ ਡਰਪੋਕ ਹੋਣ ਕਰਕੇ ਜਹਾਂਗੀਰ ਤੋਂ ਡਰਦਿਆਂ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਦਾ ਦਿਮਾਗੀ ਸੰਤੁਲਨ ਵਿਗੜ ਗਿਆ, ਸੌਣ ਸਮੇਂ ਬੰਦੂਕਧਾਰੀ ਪਹਿਰੇ ’ਤੇ ਖੜ੍ਹਦੇ ਸਨ ਤਾਂ ਹੀ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਨੀਂਦ ਆਉਂਦੀ ਸੀ, ਤਾਂ ਉਹ ਗੁਰੂ ਹਰਿਗੋਬਿੰਦ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਜਹਾਂਗੀਰ ਦੇ ਜੁਲਮਾਂ ਤੋਂ ਹੋਰ ਕਿਸੇ ਨੂੰ ਸੁਰੱਖਿਆ ਕਿਵੇਂ ਦੇ ਸਕਦੇ ਸਨ?

ਇਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਸਵਾਲਾਂ ਦਾ ਜਵਾਬ ਦੇਣ ਤੋਂ ਅਸਮਰਥ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ ਨੇ ਇਹ ਕਹਿ ਕੇ ਟੈਲੀਫ਼ੋਨ ਕੱਟ ਦਿੱਤਾ, ਕਿ ਤੁਹਾਡੀ ਅਵਾਜ਼ ਸਮਝ ਨਹੀਂ ਆ ਰਹੀ ਤੁਸੀਂ ਇੱਥੇ ਆ ਜਾਓ ਸਭ ਕੁਝ ਦੱਸ ਦਿੱਤਾ ਜਾਵੇਗਾ। ਦੋ ਤਿੰਨ ਵਾਰ ਦੁਬਾਰਾ ਦੁਬਾਰਾ ਫ਼ੋਨ ਮਿਲਾਇਆ ਤੇ ਪੁੱਛਿਆ ਕਿ ਤੁਹਾਨੂੰ ਮੇਰੀ ਅਵਾਜ਼ ਸੁਣਾਈ ਨਹੀਂ ਆਉਂਦੀ ਜਾਂ ਸਮਝ ਨਹੀਂ ਆਉਂਦੀ? ਜਾਂ ਤੁਸੀਂ ਇਹ ਅਣਸੁਖਾਵੇਂ ਸਵਾਲ ਸੁਣਨਾਂ/ਸਮਝਣਾਂ ਹੀ ਨਹੀਂ ਚਹੁੰਦੇ? ਜਵਾਬ ’ਚ ਉਹ ਇਹ ਕਹਿੰਦੇ ਸੁਣਾਈ ਦਿੰਦੇ ਕਿ ਸਾਰਾ ਗਿਆਨ ਟੈਲੀਫ਼ੋਨ ’ਤੇ ਨਹੀਂ ਸੁਣਾਇਆ ਜਾ ਸਕਦਾ, ਜੇ ਕੁਝ ਸਿੱਖਣਾਂ ਜਾਂ ਵੀਚਾਰ ਕਰਨੀ ਚਾਹੁੰਦੇ ਹੋ ਤਾਂ ਨਿਜੀ ਤੌਰ ’ਤੇ ਆ ਕੇ ਮਿਲੋ। ਹੋ ਸਕਦਾ ਹੈ ਕਿ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਸੱਚ ਹੀ ਕਹਿੰਦੇ ਹੋਣ ਤੇ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਟੈਲੀਫ਼ੋਨ ’ਤੇ ਮੇਰੀ ਗੱਲ ਨਾ ਸਮਝ ਆਉਂਦੀ ਹੋਵੇ। ਪਰ ਐਸਾ ਵੀ ਨਹੀਂ ਹੈ; ਕਿਉਂਕਿ ਪਿਛਲੇ ਦਿਨ ਜਦੋਂ (ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਵਲੋਂ ਮਿਥੇ ਗਏ) ਸੰਤ ਨਿੰਦਕਾਂ ਦੀ ਅਲੋਚਨਾ ਨੂੰ ਮੈਂ ਚੰਗਾ ਕਹਿ ਕੇ ਜਾਣਬੁੱਝ ਕੇ ਸਲਾਹ ਦਿੱਤਾ ਸੀ, ਤਾਂ ਉਸ ਦਿਨ ਮੇਰੀ ਹਰ ਗੱਲ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਬਹੁਤ ਚੰਗੀ ਤਰ੍ਹਾਂ ਸਮਝ ਆ ਰਹੀ ਸੀ। ਅੱਜ ਵੀ ਉਸ ਸਮੇਂ ਤੱਕ ਮੇਰੀ ਗੱਲ ਚੰਗੀ ਤਰ੍ਹਾਂ ਸੁਣਦੇ ਸਮਝਦੇ ਰਹੇ ਜਦ ਤੱਕ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਵੱਲੋਂ ਸੁਣਾਈ ਕੱਚ ਘਰੜ ਸਾਖੀ ਨੂੰ ਮੈਂ ਰੱਦ ਨਹੀਂ ਕੀਤਾ। ਪਰ ਇਸ ਕੱਚਘਰੜ ਸਾਖੀ ਰੱਦ ਕਰਦੇ ਸਾਰ ਹੀ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਮੇਰੀ ਗੱਲ ਸੁਣਨ ਤੇ ਸਮਝਣੀ ਬੰਦ ਹੋ ਗਈ। ਇਸ ਦੇ ਬਾਵਯੂਦ ਮੈਂ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ’ਤੇ ਸ਼ੱਕ ਨਹੀਂ ਕਰਦਾ, ਤੇ ਹੇਠ ਲਿਖੇ ਸਵਾਲ ਜਨਤਕ ਤੌਰ ’ਤੇ ਪੁੱਛ ਕੇ ਇਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਦੇ ਜਵਾਬ ਵੀ ਜਨਤਕ ਤੌਰ ’ਤੇ ਦੇਣ ਦੀ ਮੰਗ ਕਰਦਾ ਹਾਂ ਤਾਂ ਕਿ ਕਿਸੇ ਨੂੰ ਅਵਾਜ਼ ਦੇ ਗਲਤ ਸਮਝਣ ਦਾ ਭੁਲੇਖਾ ਨਾ ਰਹੇ।

1. ਗੁਰੂ ਨਾਨਕ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੇ ਸਮੇਂ ਤੋਂ ਲੈ ਕੇ 19ਵੀਂ ਸਦੀ ਦੇ ਅੱਧ ਤੱਕ ਦੇ ਸਿੱਖ ਇਤਿਹਾਸ ਵਿੱਚ ਕੋਈ ਇੱਕ ਵੀ ਸੰਤ ਪੈਦਾ ਨਹੀਂ ਹੋਇਆ। ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬਾਨ ਦੇ ਸਭ ਤੋਂ ਨਜ਼ਦੀਕ ਰਹਿਣ ਵਾਲੇ ਸਿੱਖਾਂ ਤੇ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਪਿੱਛੋਂ ਗੁਰੂ ਸ਼ਬਦ ਤੋਂ ਸੇਧ ਲੈ ਕੇ, ਪੰਥ ਲਈ ਭਾਰੀ ਕੁਰਬਾਨੀਆਂ ਕਰਨ ਵਾਲੇ ਸਾਰੇ ਸਿੱਖਾਂ ਦੇ ਨਾਮ ਨਾਲ ‘ਭਾਈ’ ਤੇ ‘ਬਾਬਾ’ ਸ਼ਬਦ ਹੀ ਲਗਦੇ ਰਹੇ। ਜਿਵੇਂ ਕਿ ਭਾਈ ਰਾਇ ਬੁਲਾਰ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਮਰਦਾਨਾ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਲਾਲੋ ਜੀ, ਬਾਬਾ ਬੁੱਢਾ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਗੁਰਦਾਸ ਜੀ, ਬਾਬਾ ਸੁੰਦਰ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਸੱਤਾ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਬਲਵੰਡ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਮੰਝ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਮਨਸੁਖ ਜੀ, ਸਾਂਈ ਮੀਆਂਮੀਰ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਮਤੀ ਦਾਸ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਸਤੀ ਦਾਸ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਦਿਆਲਾ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਜੈਤਾ ਜੀ, ਪੰਜ ਪਿਆਰੇ, ਚਾਰ ਸਾਹਿਬਜ਼ਾਦੇ, ਭਾਈ ਨੰਦ ਲਾਲ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ, ਪੀਰ ਬੁੱਧੂ ਸ਼ਾਹ, ਭਾਈ ਬਚਿੱਤਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਸੰਗਤ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਗ਼ਨੀ ਖਾਂ, ਭਾਈ ਨੱਬੀ ਖਾਂ, ਭਾਈ ਮਹਾਂ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਦਾਨ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਵੀਰ ਸਿੰਘ, ਭਾਈ ਧੀਰ ਸਿੰਘ, ਬਾਬਾ ਬੰਦਾ ਸਿੰਘ ਬਹਾਦਰ, ਭਾਈ ਮਨੀ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਤਾਰੂ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ, ਬਾਬਾ ਬੋਤਾ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ, ਬਾਬਾ ਗਰਜਾ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਸੁਬੇਗ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ, ਭਾਈ ਸ਼ਹਿਬਾਜ਼ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ, ਬਾਬਾ ਗੁਰਬਖ਼ਸ਼ ਸਿੰਘ ਜੀ ਅਤੇ ਅਨੇਕਾਂ ਹੋਰ ਸਿੰਘਾਂ ਵਿੱਚੋਂ ਕਿਸੇ ਇੱਕ ਦੇ ਨਾਮ ਨਾਲ ਵੀ ‘ਸੰਤ’ ਸ਼ਬਦ ਨਹੀਂ ਲੱਗਾ। ਕੀ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਕਿਸੇ ਇੱਕ ’ਤੇ ਵੀ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਦੀ ਕ੍ਰਿਪਾ ਦ੍ਰਿਸ਼ਟੀ ਨਹੀਂ ਹੋਈ? ਕੀ ਅੱਜ ਦੇ ਸੰਤ ਬ੍ਰਹਮਗਿਆਨੀਆਂ ਦਾ ਨਾਮ ਅਭਿਆਸ ਸਿੱਖ ਇਤਿਹਾਸ ਦੀ ਸਿਰਜਨਾ ਕਰਨ ਵਾਲੇ ਉਕਤ ਸਤਿਕਾਰਯੋਗ ਸਿੱਖਾਂ ਤੋਂ ਵੀ ਵੱਧ ਹੈ? ਜੇ ਨਹੀਂ ਤਾਂ 20ਵੀਂ ਸਦੀ ਦੇ ਖਤਮ ਹੋਣ ਤੱਕ ਇਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਸੰਤਾਂ ਦੀ ਗਿਣਤੀ ਇੱਕਦਮ ਇਤਨੀ ਕਿਵੇਂ ਵਧ ਗਈ ਕਿ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਦੀ ਗਿਣਤੀ ਪੰਜਾਬ ਦੇ ਪਿੰਡਾਂ ਨਾਲ ਵੀ ਬਹੁਤ ਜਿਆਦਾ ਵਧ ਗਈ ਹੈ।
2. ਸੁਖਮਨੀ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਦੀ 7ਵੀਂ ਅਸਟਪਦੀ ਵਿੱਚ ਸਾਧ ਦੀ ਬੇਅੰਤ ਸੋਭਾ ਦਾ ਬਿਆਨ ਕੀਤਾ ਗਿਆ ਹੈ, ਉਸ ਦੇ ਅਖੀਰਲੇ ਪਦੇ ’ਚ ਦੱਸਿਆ ਗਿਆ ਹੈ ਕਿ ਜਿਸ ਸਾਧ ਦੀ ਸੋਭਾ ਦਾ ਵਰਨਣ ਇਸ ਅਸਟਪਦੀ ਵਿੱਚ ਕੀਤਾ ਗਿਆ ਹੈ; ਉਸ ਦੇ ਗੁਣ ਇਹ ਹਨ: ‘‘ਸਾਧ ਕੀ ਸੋਭਾ ਸਾਧ ਬਨਿ ਆਈ ॥ ਨਾਨਕ ਸਾਧ ਪ੍ਰਭ ਭੇਦੁ ਨ ਭਾਈ ॥8॥7॥’’ ਭਾਵ ਸਾਧੂ ਦੀ ਸੋਭਾ ਸਾਧੂ ਨੂੰ ਹੀ ਫਬਦੀ ਹੈ (ਕਿਉਂਕਿ) ਸਾਧੂ ਤੇ ਪ੍ਰਭੂ ਵਿਚ (ਕੋਈ) ਫ਼ਰਕ ਨਹੀਂ ਹੈ ॥8॥7॥
3. ਸੁਖਮਨੀ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਦੀ 8ਵੀਂ ਅਸਟਪਦੀ ਵਿੱਚ ਬ੍ਰਹਮ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਦੀ ਸ਼ੋਭਾ ਕੀਤਾ ਗਈ ਹੈ ਉਸ ਦੇ ਅਖੀਰਲੇ ਪਦੇ ’ਚ ਦੱਸਿਆ ਗਿਆ ਹੈ, ਕਿ ਜਿਸ ਬ੍ਰਹਮਗਿਆਨੀ ਦੀ ਸੋਭਾ ਦਾ ਵਰਨਣ ਇਸ ਅਸਟਪਦੀ ਵਿੱਚ ਕੀਤਾ ਗਿਆ ਹੈ ਉਸ ਦੇ ਗੁਣ ਇਹ ਹਨ: ‘‘ਬ੍ਰਹਮ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸਭ ਸ੍ਰਿਸਟਿ ਕਾ ਕਰਤਾ ॥ ਬ੍ਰਹਮ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸਦ ਜੀਵੈ ਨਹੀ ਮਰਤਾ ॥ ਬ੍ਰਹਮ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਮੁਕਤਿ ਜੁਗਤਿ ਜੀਅ ਕਾ ਦਾਤਾ ॥ ਬ੍ਰਹਮ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਪੂਰਨ ਪੁਰਖੁ ਬਿਧਾਤਾ ॥ ਬ੍ਰਹਮ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਅਨਾਥ ਕਾ ਨਾਥੁ ॥ ਬ੍ਰਹਮ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਕਾ ਸਭ ਊਪਰਿ ਹਾਥੁ ॥ ਬ੍ਰਹਮ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਕਾ ਸਗਲ ਅਕਾਰੁ ॥ ਬ੍ਰਹਮ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਆਪਿ ਨਿਰੰਕਾਰੁ ॥ ਬ੍ਰਹਮ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਕੀ ਸੋਭਾ ਬ੍ਰਹਮ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਬਨੀ ॥ਨਾਨਕ ਬ੍ਰਹਮ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸਰਬ ਕਾ ਧਨੀ ॥8॥8॥’’ ਭਾਵ ਉਹ ਬ੍ਰਹਮਗਿਆਨੀ ਸਾਰੇ ਜਗਤ ਦਾ ਬਣਾਉਣ ਵਾਲਾ ਹੈ, ਸਦਾ ਹੀ ਜਿਊਂਦਾ ਹੈ, ਕਦੇ (ਜਨਮ) ਮਰਨ ਦੇ ਗੇੜ ਵਿਚ ਨਹੀਂ ਆਉਂਦਾ। ਬ੍ਰਹਮਗਿਆਨੀ ਮੁਕਤੀ ਦਾ ਰਾਹ (ਦੱਸਣ ਵਾਲਾ ਤੇ ਉਚੀ ਆਤਮਕ) ਜ਼ਿੰਦਗੀ ਦਾ ਦੇਣ ਵਾਲਾ ਹੈ, ਉਹੀ ਪੂਰਨ ਪੁਰਖ ਤੇ ਕਾਦਰ ਹੈ। ਬ੍ਰਹਮਗਿਆਨੀ ਨਿਖ਼ਸਮਿਆਂ ਦਾ ਖ਼ਸਮ ਹੈ, ਸਭ ਦੀ ਸਹਾਇਤਾ ਕਰਦਾ ਹੈ। ਸਾਰਾ ਦਿੱਸਦਾ ਜਗਤ ਬ੍ਰਹਮਗਿਆਨੀ ਦਾ (ਆਪਣਾ) ਹੈ, ਉਹ (ਤਾਂ ਪ੍ਰਤੱਖ) ਆਪ ਹੀ ਰੱਬ ਹੈ। ਬ੍ਰਹਮਗਿਆਨੀ ਦੀ ਮਹਿਮਾ (ਕੋਈ) ਬ੍ਰਹਮਗਿਆਨੀ ਹੀ ਕਰ ਸਕਦਾ ਹੈ; ਹੇ ਨਾਨਕ! ਬ੍ਰਹਮਗਿਆਨੀ ਸਭ ਜੀਵਾਂ ਦਾ ਮਾਲਕ ਹੈ ॥8॥8॥
4. ਸੁਖਮਨੀ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਦੀ 13ਵੀਂ ਅਸਟਪਦੀ ਦੇ ਸਲੋਕ ‘‘ਸੰਤ ਸਰਨਿ ਜੋ ਜਨੁ ਪਰੈ ਸੋ ਜਨੁ ਉਧਰਨਹਾਰ ॥ ਸੰਤ ਕੀ ਨਿੰਦਾ ਨਾਨਕਾ ਬਹੁਰਿ ਬਹੁਰਿ ਅਵਤਾਰ ॥1॥’’ ਨੂੰ ਇਹ ਅਖੌਤੀ ਸੰਤ ਸਭ ਤੋਂ ਵੱਧ ਲੈਅ ਵਿੱਚ ਗਾ ਕੇ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਦੀਆਂ ਕਰਤੂਤਾਂ ਦਾ ਪਾਜ ਖੋਲ੍ਹਣ ਵਾਲਿਆਂ ਨੂੰ ਨਿੰਦਕ ਦੱਸ ਕੇ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਹਮੇਸ਼ਾਂ ਜਨਮ ਮਰਨ ਦੇ ਚੱਕਰਾਂ ਵਿੱਚ ਫਸੇ ਰਹਿਣ ਵਾਲੇ ਦੱਸਦੇ ਹਨ, ਉਸ ਅਸਟਪਦੀ ਦੇ ਅਖੀਰਲੇ ਪਦੇ ਵਿੱਚ ਦੱਸਿਆ ਗਿਆ ਹੈ ਕਿ ਜਿਸ ਸੰਤ ਦੀ ਨਿੰਦਾ ਕਰਨੀ ਮਾੜੀ ਹੈ ਉਸ ਸੰਤ ਦੇ ਗੁਣ ਇਹ ਹਨ: ‘‘ਸਭ ਘਟ ਤਿਸ ਕੇ ਓਹੁ ਕਰਨੈਹਾਰੁ ॥ ਸਦਾ ਸਦਾ ਤਿਸ ਕਉ ਨਮਸਕਾਰੁ ॥ ਪ੍ਰਭ ਕੀ ਉਸਤਤਿ ਕਰਹੁ ਦਿਨੁ ਰਾਤਿ ॥ ਤਿਸਹਿ ਧਿਆਵਹੁ ਸਾਸਿ ਗਿਰਾਸਿ ॥ ਸਭੁ ਕਛੁ ਵਰਤੈ ਤਿਸ ਕਾ ਕੀਆ ॥ ਜੈਸਾ ਕਰੇ ਤੈਸਾ ਕੋ ਥੀਆ ॥ ਅਪਨਾ ਖੇਲੁ ਆਪਿ ਕਰਨੈਹਾਰੁ ॥ ਦੂਸਰ ਕਉਨੁ ਕਹੈ ਬੀਚਾਰੁ ॥ ਜਿਸ ਨੋ ਕ੍ਰਿਪਾ ਕਰੈ ਤਿਸੁ ਆਪਨ ਨਾਮੁ ਦੇਇ ॥ ਬਡਭਾਗੀ ਨਾਨਕ ਜਨ ਸੇਇ ॥8॥13॥’’ ਭਾਵ ਸਾਰੇ ਜੀਅ ਜੰਤ ਉਸੇ ਦੇ ਹੀ ਹਨ, ਉਹੀ ਸਭ ਕੁਝ ਕਰਨ ਦੇ ਸਮਰੱਥ ਹੈ, ਸਦਾ ਉਸ ਅੱਗੇ ਸਿਰ ਨਿਵਾਓ। ਦਿਨ ਰਾਤਿ ਉਸ ਪ੍ਰਭੂ ਦੇ ਗੁਣ ਗਾਓ, ਦਮ-ਬ-ਦਮ ਉਸੇ ਨੂੰ ਯਾਦ ਕਰੋ। (ਜਗਤ ਵਿਚ) ਹਰੇਕ ਖੇਡ ਉਸੇ ਦੀ ਵਰਤਾਈ ਵਰਤ ਰਹੀ ਹੈ, ਪ੍ਰਭੂ (ਜੀਵ ਨੂੰ) ਜਿਹੋ ਜਿਹਾ ਬਣਾਉਂਦਾ ਹੈ ਉਹੋ ਜਿਹਾ ਹਰੇਕ ਜੀਵ ਬਣ ਜਾਂਦਾ ਹੈ। (ਜਗਤ-ਰੂਪ) ਆਪਣੀ ਖੇਡ ਆਪ ਹੀ ਕਰਨ ਜੋਗਾ ਹੈ। ਕੌਣ ਕੋਈ ਦੂਜਾ ਸਲਾਹ ਦੱਸ ਸਕਦਾ ਹੈ? ਜਿਸ ਜਿਸ ਜੀਵ ਉਤੇ ਮੇਹਰ ਕਰਦਾ ਹੈ ਉਸ ਉਸ ਨੂੰ ਆਪਣਾ ਨਾਮ ਬਖ਼ਸ਼ਦਾ ਹੈ; (ਤੇ) ਹੇ ਨਾਨਕ! ਉਹ ਮਨੁੱਖ ਵੱਡੇ ਭਾਗਾਂ ਵਾਲੇ ਹੋ ਜਾਂਦੇ ਹਨ ॥8॥13॥
5. ਉਕਤ ਤਿੰਨਾਂ ਹੀ ਅਸਟਪਦੀਆਂ ਦੇ ਅਖੀਰ ’ਤੇ ਕੱਢੇ ਨਚੋੜ ਵਾਲੀਆਂ ਤੁਕਾਂ ਸਿਰਫ ਪ੍ਰਭੂ ਲਈ ਵਰਤੀਆਂ ਜਾ ਸਕਦੀਆਂ ਹਨ। ਇਸ ਲਈ ਇਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਅਸਟਪਦੀਆਂ ਵਿੱਚ ਵਰਤੇ ਗਏ ਸ਼ਬਦ ‘ਸੰਤ’ ‘ਸਾਧ’ ‘ਬ੍ਰਹਮਗਿਆਨੀ’ ਕੀ ਕਿਸੇ ਵਿਅਕਤੀ ਲਈ ਵਰਤਣੀਆ ਯੋਗ ਹਨ?
6. ‘‘ਭਾਗੁ ਹੋਆ ਗੁਰਿ ਸੰਤੁ ਮਿਲਾਇਆ ॥ ਪ੍ਰਭੁ ਅਬਿਨਾਸੀ ਘਰ ਮਹਿ ਪਾਇਆ ॥’’ (ਮਾਝ ਮ: 5, ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਾਹਿਬ - ਪੰਨਾ 97)। ਜੇ ਇਥੇ ਸੰਤ ਦਾ ਭਾਵ ਕਿਸੇ ਨਾਮ ਅਭਿਆਸੀ ਮਨੁੱਖ ਵਾਸਤੇ ਹੁੰਦੇ ਤਾਂ ਗੁਰੂ ਨੇ ਕਿਹੜੇ ਸੰਤ ਨੂੰ ਮਿਲਾਇਆ, ਕਿਉਂਕਿ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੇ ਸਮੇਂ ਤਾਂ ਕੋਈ ਸੰਤ ਹੈ ਹੀ ਨਹੀਂ ਸੀ। ਜਿਸ ’ਤੇ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੀ ਕ੍ਰਿਪਾ ਦ੍ਰਿਸ਼ਟੀ ਹੋ ਜਾਵੇ ਉਸ ਨੂੰ ਕਿਸੇ ਮਨੁਖ ਨਾਲ ਨਹੀ ਬਲਕਿ ਪ੍ਰਭ ਨਾਲ ਹੀ ਮਿਲਾਉਣਗੇ। ਇਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਤੁਕਾਂ ਦੇ ਇਹੋ ਅਰਥ ਨਿਕਲਦੇ ਹਨ ਕਿ ਮੇਰੇ ਭਾਗ ਜਾਗ ਪਏ ਹਨ, ਗੁਰੂ ਨੇ ਮੈਨੂੰ (ਸੰਤ) ਸ਼ਾਂਤੀ ਦਾ ਸੋਮਾ ਪਰਮਾਤਮਾ ਮਿਲਾ ਦਿੱਤਾ ਹੈ। (ਕਿਸ ਸੰਤ ਨੂੰ ਮਿਲਾਇਆ ਉਸ ਸਬੰਧੀ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਆਖ ਰਹੇ ਹਨ ਕਿ ਉਸ) ਅਬਿਨਾਸੀ ਪ੍ਰਭੂ ਨੂੰ ਮੈਂ ਆਪਣੇ ਹਿਰਦੇ ਵਿਚ ਹੀ ਲੱਭ ਲਿਆ ਹੈ। ਇਸ ਤੋਂ ਕੋਈ ਸ਼ੱਕ ਨਹੀਂ ਰਹਿ ਜਾਂਦਾ, ਕਿ ਉਪ੍ਰੋਕਤ ਸਾਰੀਆਂ ਤੁਕਾਂ ਵਿੱਚ ਸ਼ਬਦ ‘ਸਾਧ’ ‘ਬ੍ਰਹਮਗਿਆਨੀ’ ਅਤੇ ‘ਸੰਤ’ ਕੇਵਲ ਤੇ ਕੇਵਲ ਪ੍ਰਭੂ ਵਾਸਤੇ ਹੀ ਵਰਤੇ ਗਏ ਹਨ। ਕਿਉਂਕਿ ਗੁਰਬਾਣੀ ਵੀ ਨਿਰੰਕਾਰ ਦਾ ਹੀ ਰੂਪ ਹੈ: ‘‘ਵਾਹੁ ਵਾਹੁ ਬਾਣੀ ਨਿਰੰਕਾਰ ਹੈ ਤਿਸੁ ਜੇਵਡੁ ਅਵਰੁ ਨ ਕੋਇ ॥’’ (ਗੂਜਰੀ ਕੀ ਵਾਰ:1 (ਮ: 3) ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਾਹਿਬ -ਪੰਨਾ 516) ਇਸ ਲਈ ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਹੀ ਅਸਲੀ ਸੰਤ ਹਨ।
7. ਉਕਤ ਸਾਰੀਆਂ ਉਦਾਹਰਣਾਂ ਅਤੇ ਗੁਰਬਾਣੀ ਵਿੱਚ ਦਿੱਤੇ ਸੈਂਕੜੇ ਹੋਰ ਪ੍ਰਮਾਣਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਗਹੁ ਨਾਲ ਵਾਚਿਆਂ ਕੋਈ ਸ਼ੱਕ ਨਹੀਂ ਰਹਿ ਜਾਂਦਾ ਕਿ ਗੁਰਬਾਣੀ ਵਿੱਚ ਆਇਆ ਸ਼ਬਦ ‘ਸੰਤੁ’ ਜਿਥੇ ਇੱਕ ਬਚਨ ਹੈ ਤਾ ਹਮੇਸ਼ਾਂ ਕੇਵਲ ਤੇ ਕੇਵਲ ਪ੍ਰਭੂ ਜਾਂ ਗੁਰੂ ਲਈ ਹੀ ਵਰਤਿਆ ਗਿਆ ਹੈ। ਜਿਥੇ ਮੁਕਤਾ ਅੰਤ ਨਾਲ ਸ਼ਬਦ ‘ਸੰਤ’ ਆਇਆ ਹੈ ਉਥੇ ਬਹੁ ਬਚਨ ਦੇ ਅਰਥਾਂ ਵਿੱਚ ਹੈ ਤੇ ਇਹ ਗੁਰੂ ਦੀ ਹਜੂਰੀ ਵਿੱਚ ਇੱਕ ਮਨ ਇਕ ਚਿੱਤ ਹੋ ਕੇ ਜੁੜੀ ਸੰਗਤ ਲਈ ਹੈ ਜਿਸ ਨੂੰ ਗੁਰੂ ਰੂਪ ਖ਼ਾਲਸਾ ਜਾਂ ਗੁਰੂ 20 ਵਿਸਵੇ ਤੇ ਸੰਗਤ 21 ਵਿਸਵੇ ਦੀ ਸੰਗਿਆ ਵੀ ਦਿੱਤੀ ਜਾਂਦੀ ਹੈ। ਜਿਥੇ ਵੀ ‘ਸੰਤ’ ਸ਼ਬਦ ਭੇਖਧਾਰੀ ਪਾਖੰਡੀ ਸਾਧਾਂ ਲਈ ਵਰਤਿਆ ਗਿਆ ਹੈ ਉਥੇ ਬਾਬਾ ਕਬੀਰ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਨੇ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਸਬੰਧੀ ਇਸ ਤਰ੍ਹਾਂ ਦੇ ਖ਼ਿਆਲ ਪ੍ਰਗਟ ਕੀਤੇ ਹਨ: ‘‘ਆਸਾ ॥ ਗਜ ਸਾਢੇ ਤੈ ਤੈ ਧੋਤੀਆ ਤਿਹਰੇ ਪਾਇਨਿ ਤਗ ॥ ਗਲੀ ਜਿਨਾ ਜਪਮਾਲੀਆ ਲੋਟੇ ਹਥਿ ਨਿਬਗ ॥ ਓਇ ਹਰਿ ਕੇ ਸੰਤ ਨ ਆਖੀਅਹਿ ਬਾਨਾਰਸਿ ਕੇ ਠਗ ॥1॥ ਐਸੇ ਸੰਤ ਨ ਮੋ ਕਉ ਭਾਵਹਿ ॥ ਡਾਲਾ ਸਿਉ ਪੇਡਾ ਗਟਕਾਵਹਿ ॥1॥ ਰਹਾਉ ॥ ਬਾਸਨ ਮਾਂਜਿ ਚਰਾਵਹਿ ਊਪਰਿ ਕਾਠੀ ਧੋਇ ਜਲਾਵਹਿ ॥ ਬਸੁਧਾ ਖੋਦਿ ਕਰਹਿ ਦੁਇ ਚੂਲ੍‍ੇ ਸਾਰੇ ਮਾਣਸ ਖਾਵਹਿ ॥2॥ ਓਇ ਪਾਪੀ ਸਦਾ ਫਿਰਹਿ ਅਪਰਾਧੀ ਮੁਖਹੁ ਅਪਰਸ ਕਹਾਵਹਿ ॥ ਸਦਾ ਸਦਾ ਫਿਰਹਿ ਅਭਿਮਾਨੀ ਸਗਲ ਕੁਟੰਬ ਡੁਬਾਵਹਿ ॥3॥ ਜਿਤੁ ਕੋ ਲਾਇਆ ਤਿਤ ਹੀ ਲਾਗਾ ਤੈਸੇ ਕਰਮ ਕਮਾਵੈ ॥ ਕਹੁ ਕਬੀਰ ਜਿਸੁ ਸਤਿਗੁਰੁ ਭੇਟੈ ਪੁਨਰਪਿ ਜਨਮਿ ਨ ਆਵੈ ॥4॥2॥’’ (ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਾਹਿਬ - ਪੰਨਾ 476) ਅਤੇ ਭੱਟ ਸਾਹਿਬਾਨ ਨੇ ਲਿਖਿਆ ਹੈ: ‘‘ਰਹਿਓ ਸੰਤ ਹਉ ਟੋਲਿ ਸਾਧ ਬਹੁਤੇਰੇ ਡਿਠੇ ॥ ਸੰਨਿਆਸੀ ਤਪਸੀਅਹ ਮੁਖਹੁ ਏ ਪੰਡਿਤ ਮਿਠੇ ॥ ਬਰਸੁ ਏਕੁ ਹਉ ਫਿਰਿਓ ਕਿਨੈ ਨਹੁ ਪਰਚਉ ਲਾਯਉ ॥ ਕਹਤਿਅਹ ਕਹਤੀ ਸੁਣੀ ਰਹਤ ਕੋ ਖੁਸੀ ਨ ਆਯਉ ॥ ਹਰਿ ਨਾਮੁ ਛੋਡਿ ਦੂਜੈ ਲਗੇ ਤਿਨ੍‍ ਕੇ ਗੁਣ ਹਉ ਕਿਆ ਕਹਉ ॥ ਗੁਰੁ ਦਯਿ ਮਿਲਾਯਉ ਭਿਖਿਆ ਜਿਵ ਤੂ ਰਖਹਿ ਤਿਵ ਰਹਉ ॥2॥20॥’’ (ਸਵਈਏ ਮਹਲੇ ਤੀਜੇ ਕੇ (ਭਟ ਭਿਖਾ) ਗੁਰੂ ਗ੍ਰੰਥ ਸਾਹਿਬ - ਪੰਨਾ 1396)। ਬਾਣੀ ਵਿੱਚ ‘ਸੰਤ’ ਦੀ ਮਹਿਮਾ ਦੱਸਣ ਵਾਲੇ ਅਖੌਤੀ ਸੰਤ ਆਪਣੇ ਡੇਰਿਆਂ ਵਿੱਚ ਇਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਸ਼ਬਦਾਂ ਦਾ ਕੀਰਤਨ ਤੇ ਵਿਆਖਿਆ ਕਿਉਂ ਨਹੀਂ ਕਰਦੇ?

ਨੋਟ:

ਗੁਰਬਾਣੀ ਵਿੱਚ ਕਈ ਥਾਵਾਂ ਤੇ ਮੁਕਤਾ ਅੰਤ ਸ਼ਬਦ ‘ਸੰਤ’ ਸਬੋਧਨ ਜਾਂ ਸਬੰਧਕੀ ਕਾਰਕ ਦੇ ਰੂਪ ਵਿੱਚ ਆਇਆ ਹੈ ਜਾਂ ਇਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਪਿਛੇ ਸਬੰਧਕੀ ਸ਼ਬਦ ਕਾ, ਕੇ, ਕੀ ਜਾਂ ਦਾ, ਦੇ, ਦੀ ਆਦਿ ਆਉਣ ਕਰਕੇ ਕੱਟੀ ਜਾਂਦੀ ਹੈ। ਸੋ, ਇਹ ਸ਼ਬਦ ਬਹੁ ਬਚਨ ਵਾਸਤੇ ਨਹੀਂ ਇੱਕ ਬਚਨ ‘ਸੰਤੁ’ ਲਈ ਹੀ ਆਏ ਹਨ। ਔਕੜ ਕੱਟੀ ਜਾਣ ਕਰਕੇ ਇਸ ਤੋਂ ਭੁਲੇਖਾ ਨਹੀਂ ਖਾਣਾ।

ਉਕਤ ਸਾਰੀ ਵੀਚਾਰ ਤੋਂ ਸਿੱਟਾ ਇਹੀ ਨਿਕਲਦਾ ਹੈ ਕਿ ਸਾਰਾ ਸ਼ਬਦ ਜਾਂ ਸਮੁਚੀ ਬਾਣੀ ਦਾ ਭਾਵ ਅਰਥ ਸਮਝੇ ਬਿਨਾਂ ਇਹ ਪਾਖੰਡੀ ਚੋਣਵੀਆਂ ਤੁਕਾਂ ਸੁਣਾ ਕੇ ਭੋਲੀਆਂ ਸਿੱਖ ਸੰਗਤਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਗੁਮਰਾਹ ਕਰਦੀਆਂ ਹਨ।

ਸੰਤਾਂ ਦੀ ਨਿੰਦਾ ਸੁਣ ਕੇ ਤੜਫਨ ਵਾਲੇ ਪਰ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੀ ਬੇਅਦਬੀ ਤੇ ਚਰਿਤਰਘਾਣ ਕਰਨ ਵਾਲੀਆਂ ਪੁਸਤਕਾਂ ਛਾਪਣ ਵਾਲਿਆਂ ਵਿਰੁਧ ਮੂੰਹ ਨਾ ਖੋਲ੍ਹਣ ਵਾਲੇ, ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਵਰਗੇ ਭੁਲੇਖੇ ਪਾਉ ਪ੍ਰਚਾਰਕ ਜਿਥੇ ਵੀ ਕਥਾ ਕਰਨ ਜਾਣ; ਗੁਰੂ ਕੇ ਸਿੱਖ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਤੋਂ ਇਹ ਸਵਾਲ ਜਰੂਰ ਪੁੱਛਣ ਕਿ:

1. ਤੁਹਾਡੇ ਲਈ ਗੁਰੂ ਵੱਡਾ ਹੈ ਜਾਂ ਤੁਹਾਡੇ ਪਾਖੰਡੀ ਸਾਧ?
2. ਜਿਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੇ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੀ ਸਿਖਿਆ ਗ੍ਰਹਿਣ ਕੀਤੀ ਤੇ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੀ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ’ਤੇ ਮਿਹਰ ਦੀ ਨਜ਼ਰ ਹੋਈ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੂੰ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਨੇ ਸਿਰਫ ਸਰੀਰਕ ਤੌਰ ’ਤੇ ਸੁਰੱਖਿਆ ਹੀ ਨਹੀਂ ਦਿੱਤੀ, ਬਲਕਿ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਦੀ ਆਤਮਾ ਇਤਨੀ ਬਲਵਾਨ ਕਰ ਦਿੱਤੀ, ਕਿ ਗੁਰੂ ਤੇ ਧਰਮ ਲਈ ਉਹ ਆਰਿਆਂ ਨਾਲ ਚੀਰੇ ਗਏ, ਚਰਖੜੀਆਂ ’ਤੇ ਚੜ੍ਹੇ, ਉਬਲਦੇ ਕੜਾਹਿਆ ਵਿੱਚ ਉਬਾਲੇ ਗਏ, ਬੱਚਿਆਂ ਦੇ ਕਲੇਜੇ ਮੂੰਹ ’ਚ ਪਵਾਏ, ਜਮੂਰਾਂ ਨਾਲ ਮਾਸ ਤੁੜਵਾਇਆ, ਬੰਦ ਬੰਦ ਕਟਵਾਏ, ਖੋਪਰੀਆਂ ਲੁਹਾਈਆਂ, ਬੀਬੀਆਂ ਨੇ ਸਵਾ ਸਵਾ ਮਣ ਪੀਸਣ ਪੀਸੇ ਬੱਚਿਆਂ ਦੇ ਟੋਟੇ ਕਰਵਾ ਕੇ ਝੋਲੀ ਵਿੱਚ ਪਵਾਏ ਪਰ ਕਿਸੇ ਇੱਕ ਨੇ ਵੀ ਆਤਮ ਹੱਤਿਆ ਨਹੀਂ ਕੀਤੀ ਜਿਸ ਤਰ੍ਹਾਂ ਕਿ ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਵਰਗੇ; ਰਾਜਾ ਰਾਮ ਪ੍ਰਸ਼ਾਦ ਅਤੇ ਰਾਜਾ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਨੂੰ ਗੁਰੂ ਹਰਿਗੋਬਿੰਦ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦੀ ਚਿਖਾ ਵਿੱਚ ਸੜ ਕੇ ਆਤਮ ਹੱਤਿਆ ਕਰਦੇ ਵਿਖਾ ਰਹੇ ਹਨ।

ਗਿਆਨੀ ਸ਼ੇਰ ਸਿੰਘ ਅਨੁਸਾਰ ਜਿਨ੍ਹਾਂ ’ਤੇ ਗੁਰੂ ਦੀ ਕ੍ਰਿਪਾ ਦ੍ਰਿਸ਼ਟੀ ਹੋ ਜਾਂਦੀ ਹੈ ਉਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਵਿੱਚੋਂ ਸੰਤਾਂ ਦੇ ਵੱਗ ਤਾਂ ਬਹੁਤ ਬਣ ਗਏ ਪਰ (ਬਾਬਾ ਜਰਨੈਲ ਸਿੰਘ ਭਿੰਡਰਾਂ ਵਾਲੇ ਨੂੰ ਛੱਡ ਕੇ ਬਾਕੀ) ਸਾਰਿਆਂ ਦੀ ਜ਼ਮੀਰ ਇੰਨੀ ਮਰ ਚੁੱਕੀ ਹੈ, ਕਿ ਇਨ੍ਹਾਂ ਨੇ ਅੱਜ ਤੱਕ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦਾ ਚਰਿਤਰਘਾਣ ਕਰਨ ਵਾਲੀਆਂ ਪੁਸਤਕਾਂ ਬਚਿੱਤਰ ਨਾਟਕ, ਗੁਰਬਿਲਾਸ ਪਾਤਸ਼ਾਹੀ 6ਵੀਂ, ਅਤੇ ਸਿੱਖ ਇਤਿਹਾਸ (ਹਿੰਦੀ) ਵਰਗੀਆਂ ਪੁਸਤਕਾਂ ਲਿਖਣ ਵਾਲੀਆਂ ਲਿਖਣ ਵਾਲਿਆਂ ਵਿਰੁਧ ਯਾਦ ਕਰਵਾਉਣ ਦੇ ਬਾਵਯੂਦ ਵੀ ਇੱਕ ਸ਼ਬਦ ਵੀ ਬੋਲਣ ਲਈ ਤਿਆਰ ਨਹੀਂ।

ਇਸ ਤੋਂ ਇਹ ਸਿੱਧ ਤਾਂ ਨਹੀਂ ਹੁੰਦਾ, ਕਿ ਇਹ ਸਾਰੇ ਗੁਰੂ ਸਾਹਿਬ ਜੀ ਦਾ ਚਰਿੱਤਰਘਾਣ ਕਰਨ ਵਾਲਿਆਂ ਦੀ ਸਾਜਿਸ਼ ਵਿੱਚ ਸ਼ਾਮਲ ਹਨ?

Western Converts

Western Converts

Shiva's welcome

Installation of the god's Lingam is celebrated by San Diego worshippers

By Sandi Dolbee
UNION-TRIBUNE RELIGION & ETHICS EDITOR

July 21, 2005

The temple room nearly vibrated from the cacophony. The rhythmic chanting from devotees packed shoulder to shoulder on the floor and in chairs was joined by a clanging bell rung for so long a half-dozen men took turns pulling the cord.

The sounds, and the people, were for Lord Shiva, the powerful third deity of what is often referred to as the Hindu trinity. There is Brahma, the creator; and Vishnu, the preserver; and Shiva, the destroyer who can do away with everything from bad habits to evil.

Behind a red cloth curtain sat the focus of the congregation's anticipation: a Shiva Lingam, a newly arrived idol symbolizing Lord Shiva, which was being installed at the Shiva Vishnu Temple of San Diego.

And with its arrival came another symbol of how San Diego County's religious diversity continues to deepen. The Shiva Lingam is believed to be the first in the region, taking its place among other idols at the 5-year-old temple that is tucked into the back of a business park off Arjons Drive in Mira Mesa.

"It's very auspicious," said Usha Dilawri, a 49-year-old Rancho Peñasquitos resident, of the arrival of the Shiva Lingam.

Like many in the crowd, Dilawri was born in India, where Hinduism is believed to have been founded and is the predominant religion today. For her, Hinduism is like her second life. "It gives me peace and satisfaction. It takes away my worries and my difficulties and gives me the strength to live my life."

They cling to a faith that is not only part of their heritage but also gives them a code for conduct ... particularly the cause-and-effect teachings of karma. "I think if you think about it, you don't do wrong things," saidSudesh Kumar, a 58-year-old Carlsbad resident who also is from India. This lingam, which means form, is not the typical image of Shiva that Westerners are used to seeing ... a princely looking man holding a three-pronged trident or wearing a third eye or dancing about with four arms.

Indeed, the ancient idol form isn't meant to look like a being, at all.

Instead, when the curtain was raised, what was revealed was a black stone pedestal, a couple of feet high and shaped like a basin, with an elliptical, watermelon-sized brown stone atop it.

The Shiva Lingam is a powerful and sacred symbol in Hinduism, so much so that the Shiva Vishnu installation ceremonies took place over four days – beginning Thursday and continuing through Sunday.

The temple services were elaborate, each step a part of a colorful process to bring this manifestation to life. "When we pray to this one, we're actually praying to Shiva," explained Pandit Srihari Kadambi, chief priest, who was joined for the festivities by a visiting priest from a Livermore temple.

The stone itself is from the Narmada River in India. "It has to come from only that river," Kadambi said. Some Hindu writings describe the stone's shape as phallic to represent "the regenerative aspect of the material universe."

The Shiva Vishnu Temple of San Diego is one of at least three Hindu temples in San Diego County, joining a landscape that includes an increasing number of Jewish synagogues, Muslim mosques, Christian churches, Buddhist congregations and other houses of worship. The Hindu population also is growing – with some longtime members estimating that there are several thousand devotees living here.

On Saturday, the modest temple overflowed with about 250 men, women and children, dressed in a colorful mix of Indian clothing – along with some San Diego-like ensembles of jeans and T-shirts. At lunchtime, people gathered under the shade of canopies, the pavement cushioned by mats and rugs.

"If somebody told me I have to give up chocolate or religion, I'd probably give up chocolate," said Sharad Sundar, a 12-year-old University City student who came dressed in a Nehru-style suit. Sharad said that for young people, Hinduism gives us something to focus on when we're in some kind of predicament."

Not all Hindus are of Indian descent. As East met West, over the last half-century particularly, there have been converts from other faith backgrounds.

Gary Hofacker, a 55-year-old Descanso resident, became interested in Hinduism through the writings of Gandhi. Raised a Protestant, Hofacker said one of the attractions of this Eastern philosophy is that it accepts all religions.

"It's like every religion is right, just different paths to God," said Hofacker, who wore a red dot on his forehead to symbolize the third eye of Shiva.

Raised a Catholic, Erika Kalter came to Hinduism through practicing yoga and then learning chanting. She's been attending the Shiva Vishnu Temple for about a year. "I just really found that this really filled something in for me, where there was an emptiness," said the 51-year-old Hillcrest woman, dressed in a burgundy and gold sari.

Over lunch, there was much talk about the universality of religions. About how everyone breathes the same air and bleeds the same kind of blood. Headlines, however, often tell stories of violence and disagreement in the name of faith.

That's the fault of people, said Joe Kohli, a 64-year-old Carmel Valley resident. "From God's point of view, when he's looking at it, they're all the same," he said.

Hindu Marriage

Hindu Marriage

Child bride fights back

A young woman says "no" to rural India's child-marriage tradition.

By John Lancaster

THE WASHINGTON POST

Sunday, October 2, 2005

HIMATNAGAR, India -- Like many women in parts of India, Savita Chaudhry was a child bride, married at the age of 3 to a boy two years her senior, then sent home to grow up. In keeping with the customs of their agrarian caste, the two were expected to move in together after reaching adulthood.

But Chaudhry, 22, decided to challenge the system.

Last year, the willowy woman with the flashing dark eyes refused the entreaties of her husband and his family to join them in their village, several hundred miles from this small city in western India where she runs the family grocery shop. She is paying a steep price.

Not only does Chaudhry accuse her would-be in-laws of demanding money in exchange for her freedom, but the leaders of her caste -- a powerful informal council known as a "caste panchayat" -- have threatened Chaudhry and her family with the ultimate sanction of excommunication, or ejection from the caste. Such an outcome would rob the family of its social standing and damage the marriage prospects of Chaudhry's 18-year-old brother, among other things.

"If they can't honor the commitment, society will ostracize them," said Bhawar Lal, a member of the council, which claims jurisdiction in the case. "The penalty will be a heavy one. She has to understand that she hasn't even lived with him for one day, and she's complaining about him. It's definitely set a bad example."

Chaudhry's dilemma shows the enduring power of India's caste system -- the rigid social hierarchy that is integral to the Hindu faith in India -- even in the face of modernizing forces such as globalization and rapid economic growth. It also underscores the central role of the caste panchayats, which operate in much of rural India as a kind of parallel justice system, especially on family matters such as marriage and inheritance.

Typically composed of five men, these unelected councils have for centuries served as the main arbiters of life in villages across rural India. In the decades since independence from Britain in 1947, India's government has sought to replace them with a more representative system of elected village bodies called "gram panchayats." The elected system seeks to counter discrimination by reserving some seats for women and other vulnerable groups, such as the casteless Indians known as untouchables.

Combined with urbanization and improved education, such efforts have eroded the standing of traditional councils in some areas and help explain Chaudhry's willingness to challenge an edict that once would have been heeded without question.

Still, breaking the stranglehold of the traditional councils on rural life is no easy task. In part, some experts say, that is because many politicians have come to rely on the councils to deliver blocs of votes at election time. About two-thirds of India's billion-plus people still live in rural villages, where caste loyalties are supreme.

Because of their undemocratic nature, the caste councils tend to be dominated by powerful local interests, such as landlords, and are frequently implicated in incidents of persecution and violence. Penalties are often directed against those who break the rules on marriage, perhaps by eloping with someone from a lower caste. Indian newspapers regularly carry stories of star-crossed lovebirds who have been stripped, shorn of their hair and sometimes tortured to death on the orders of local caste leaders.

"Everything to do with household and family, all the intra-family disputes, is still very much controlled by the caste panchayats," said Ranjana Kumari, the head of the Center for Social Research in New Delhi, who asserts that women are usually the victims in such cases.

Savita Chaudhry grew up in Himatnagar, a sleepy industrial city of about 100,000 people in the western state of Gujarat, about 300 miles southwest of New Delhi. She studied through the ninth grade, then joined her father in the family's grocery shop, which occupies a front room of their small brick house. She took over the business after her father's death in March.

The Chaudhrys belong to a farming caste from the neighboring state of Rajasthan. Her parents were born in Rajasthan and moved to Himatnagar as a young couple. Like many Indians who migrate to urban areas, the Chaudhrys have retained their ties to their ancestral home as well as to their caste, which includes about 37 families in Himatnagar. By tradition, if not law, these families are answerable to caste councils in both Rajasthan and Himatnagar.

Savita Chaudhry said her predicament dates to her early childhood, when one of her grandfathers in Rajasthan approached a neighbor and proposed, "Let's get your grandson married to my granddaughter." Her grandfather then sealed the bargain by presenting the boy's family with a coconut.

Chaudhry and her parents then traveled to her father's village in Rajasthan, where she was married to 5-year-old Pap- pu, who uses just one name, in a ceremony performed by a Hindu priest. She was one of 26 children in the village who got married that day in 1985, which coincided with a Hindu festival considered auspicious for weddings. Child marriage is illegal in India but is still widely practiced in Rajasthan and several other states.

In symbolic consummation of the union, the bewildered 3-year-old spent the night at the groom's house, then returned with her parents to Himatnagar.

"I don't consider myself married," said Chaudhry, who has no memory of the ceremony. "I was 3 years old. It was more like a game than a marriage."

Nevertheless, the families remained in loose touch. Two years ago, Chaudhry decided that she wanted to get to know Pappu. For the first time in eight years, she said, the couple got together. But the reunion didn't go well.

For openers, she recalled, Pap- pu asked her to borrow $1,825 from her father on his behalf, then chided her for not covering her hair in his presence.

"It made a very bad impression on me," Chaudhry said.

Soon afterward, Chaudhry tore up Pappu's photograph and told her parents that she wouldn't go to live with him, a decision they supported. But he and his family insisted that she honor her commitment and move to their village in Rajasthan.

Hoping for a peaceful resolution, Chaudhry's parents traveled last December to Rajasthan and offered the family $2,280 to end the relationship, according to Savita Chaudhry's mother, Patashi.

"It's a custom within our caste," she explained. "If the girl doesn't want to marry the boy, the girl's family pays them off." But Patashi Chaudhry said the man's family refused the offer, insisting on four times the amount offered.

In a telephone interview from Rajasthan, Pappu's mother, Kelki Devi, denied that the family had asked for money. But she acknowledged that they had pressed Savita Chaudhry to join them in their village, and that they took the matter to the caste council when she refused.

"Finding wives for my three sons wasn't easy," she said. "We didn't want to involve the caste panchayat, but what are we to do?"

Pappu, now working in Bombay, couldn't be reached for comment.

The caste council in Rajasthan sided with Pappu's family and referred the matter to the caste council in Himatnagar, which last month summoned Chaudhry's mother to its meeting place at a Hindu temple and threatened her with excommunication.

"These things are not good for the community," explained Lal, 38, the member of the Himatnagar caste council. "They have to understand it's not so easy to break off a relationship."

But Savita Chaudhry said she was determined to do just that, having fallen in love with another man.

"It's very unfair," she said of the council's threats. "I'm not some cow or goat."

Hindu Bullshit

Hindu Bullshit

Fight to save sacred bull Shambo

British law says any bull suspected of having bovine tubercolosis must be slaughtered. The caretakers disagree.

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
July 13, 2007

LONDON - Those caring for him at a Hindu monastery in Wales say he symbolizes the sanctity of all life and is an inspiration to templegoers. Officials say he could have a contagious disease and should be put down.

Now the fate of Shambo, the sacred bull, is in the hands of Welsh justice.

The 6-year-old Friesian bull tested positive for bovine tuberculosis in April. Under British law, animals suspected of carrying the disease must be slaughtered. But Shambo's caretakers at Skanda Vale Hindu monastery near Carmarthen, in southwest Wales, backed by worldwide supporters, say Shambo is not sick and have been fighting to save him.

The temple brought its case before the Cardiff Civil Justice Center on Thursday, arguing that their religious rights were being violated. Judge Gary Hickinbottom said he would rule on Shambo's case on Monday.

After a notice in early May that regional authorities intended to have Shambo slaughtered, the bull was isolated in a hay-filled shrine in the monastery's main temple. An Internet petition was launched, and the temple created a blog listing Shambo's daily thoughts, paired with a live Web cam dubbed "Moo Tube."

Shambo is one of a herd of cows at a 115-acre estate belonging to the monastery, also known as the Community of the Many Names of God.

The monastery has fiercely defended the animal, arguing that the tuberculosis test was inconclusive and that, even if Shambo were sick, he could be treated rather than killed.

The Welsh rural development minister, Jane Davidson, argued that the tuberculosis tests were accurate in 99.9 percent of all cases and that even healthy looking cattle might be sick or even contagious.

"I have ... considered extremely carefully whether the rights of the community to manifest their religion should override the duty on me to protect animal and human health," she said in a letter to the Welsh Assembly last month. "In the light of the veterinary, medical and legal assessments, I am minded to conclude that they should not."

The monastery said in a Web statement that its members would be "willing to defend his life with our own."

Another Hindu leader urged understanding on both sides.

"If there is good evidence of a genuine case of tuberculosis, which is then a danger to others, ... then you have to let go," said Anil Bhanot, the general secretary of Hindu Council UK. "It is the body that is dying, not the atma (soul) - that is not perishable."

HINDU SOCIETY

HINDU SOCIETY

NAIPAUL’S INDIA: "That was a time when there was no intellectual life in India..."

In reacting to his Nobel Prize laudation, Naipaul averred: “I am utterly delighted, this is an unexpected accolade. It is a great tribute to both England, my home, and to India, home of my ancestors.” While England provided him with a place and a language to express his thoughts, the ethos of his writings is clearly his Indian ancestry. Never before has a writers work been so consumed by the complexities of his origin, compounded by the geographical displacement of his forefathers.

His writings about India, scathingly depreciating at times, have never gone down well with the Indian intelligentsia. His post Nobel Prize remark that he had contributed to India's intellectual development was greeted with profound scepticism and deep antipathy in India. However, a close reading of his works reveals that his three books about India (An Area of Darkness, A Wounded Civilisation and India-A Million Mutinies Now) are in essence, an accurate, objective picture of the changing scenario in post-independent India.

Naipaul, the son of Indian immigrants to Trinidad, first visited India in the 1960's. He carries in his mind a carefully cultivated image of India-the land of Nehru and Gandhi, the land of a great civilisation. His shock and disappointment at the land of his ancestors finds vent in a harsh and stinging tirade in An Area of Darkness, ostensibly to mask the deep hurt that he himself experiences. Jeffery Paine author of Father India rightly concludes: "Area is the narrative of a young man not finding the India he expected and not liking the India he finds." India does not live up to his dreams and the young Naipaul lacks the maturity to gauge the strength of an ancient civilisation.

Naipaul's disgust at what he sees is exemplified in sentences like this: "Indians defecate everywhere. They defecate mostly, besides the railway tracks. But they also defecate on the beaches; they defecate on the hills; they defecate on the river banks; they defecate on the streets; they never look for cover."

However his observations are not all gloom and doom. He appreciates the Indian attitude and deep down in his mind exists a glimmer of hope for the country of his forefathers: "Nowhere are people so heightened, rounded, and individualistic; nowhere did they offer themselves so fully and with such assurance. To know Indians was to take delight in people; every encounter was an adventure. I did not want India to sink; the mere thought was painful." (An Area of Darkness)

But does his book depict genuinely the India of the 1960's? The answer is, yes. Naipaul could not have come to India, at a more inappropriate time. It was a country in flux. The initial euphoria of Independence had evaporated, the Chinese war had deflated its confidence and crushed its philosophy of non-violence, the economy was non-existent and at the helm was an aging, crestfallen Prime Minister; certainly not an optimistic picture. So when Naipaul suggests, much to the dislike of some Indians, that there was little intellectual life in India 40 years ago, he is probably right. The guiding principles of India at that time had failed.

Ahimsa (Gandhian principle of non-violence) had fallen flat in the face of Chinese aggression, socialism had failed miserably and the image of India as a beggar with a begging bowl was gaining strength. Resistant and oblivious to the changing world, India’s aging leaders (both political as well as intellectual), proponents of this decaying ideology clung stubbornly to it ruthlessly suppressing any alternative thought process and allowing India to sink deeper and deeper into a quagmire. In the absence of a rejuvenating force, there, indeed existed an intellectual vacuum. Though rather harsh, Naipaul rightly concludes: "India has been a shock for me, because-you know, you think of India as a very old and civilised land. One took this idea of an antique civilisation for granted and thought it contained the seed of growth in this century.... India has nothing to contribute to the world, is contributing nothing."

On a personal note he ends: "It was a journey that ought not to have been made; it had broken my life in two" But return he did. Again and again until he had made peace with the civilisation of his origin.

Ten years later (A Wounded Civilisation, 1976) the shock, disgust and anger persist but in an attempt to assuage his own wounds he conducts a root cause analysis of India's plight. He concludes that the Hindu land is "a wounded civilisation", injured by the British Raj and the preceding Islamic invasion. Again his strong emotional links with India come to the fore: "India is for me a difficult country. It isn't my home and cannot be my home; and yet I cannot reject it or be indifferent to it; I cannot travel only for the sights. I am at once too close and too far."

Towards the end of the first millennium, India had become an inward looking society which arrogantly ignored the outside world and this attitude had brought with it, its inherent weaknesses and prepared the ground for its impending invasions: "No civilisation was so little equipped to cope with the outside world; no country was so easily raided and plundered, and learned so little from its disasters. Five hundred years after the Arab conquest of Sind, Moslem rule was established in Delhi as the rule of the foreigners, people apart; and foreign rule-Moslem for the first five hundred years, British for the last 150-ended in Delhi only in 1947."

The catastrophic effect that these repeated invasions had on the Hindu psyche are well delineated by Naipaul. Commenting on the decline of the Vijayanagar Kingdom, one of the last bastions of Hindu rule during the Islamic invasion, he astutely observes: "I wondered whether intellectually, for a thousand years India hadn't always retreated before its conquerors and whether in its periods of apparent revival, India hadn't only been making itself archaic again, intellectually smaller, always vulnerable."

This idea is repeatedly emphasized in the book:" Hinduism hasn't been good enough for the millions. It has exposed us to a thousand years of defeat and stagnation. Its philosophy of withdrawal has diminished men intellectually and not equipped them to respond to challenge; it has stifled growth. So that again and again in India, history has repeated itself: vulnerability, defeat and withdrawal."

And for a thousand years (1000 AD to 1947) foreign rule suppressed the native intellect and stymied any growth of the native civilisation. Free of the shackles of alien subjugation, one would have expected to see a positive assertion of ones identity in the post 1947 period. Tragically this was not to be. India's intellectual power fell into the hands of a myopic Indian intellectually community (largely comprised of Marxist oriented historians-sophisticated Pol Pots who desired to erase any reference to India's past) who failed to give a sense of direction to free India.

These armchair intellectuals propounded new fangled philosophies that only accelerated its sense of purposelessness. One such concept was secularism. This 'secularism' did not subscribe to the dictionary definition of the word. But took on a totally different meaning in India. It was a corruption. It led to showering on the non-Hindu communities a set of privileges that could not be justified morally, economically or legally. But more important it expected the Hindu to negate his own identity. Any attempt by the Hindu, however innocent, to assert his identity was dubbed as reactionary and divisive. This proved disastrous in terms of India's self- confidence. Naipaul was probably the first person to make this observation and express it in no uncertain terms: "The loss of the past meant the loss of that civilisation, the loss of a fundamental idea of India, and the loss therefore to a nationalist-minded man, of a motive for action. It was a part of the feeling of purposelessness of which many Indians spoke."

Even an attempt to accurately define India's historical past was frowned upon. Over the centuries India had shrunk physically. Its boundaries had receded from mountains of the Hindu Kush in the West to deserts of Rajasthan forsaking in the process even its traditional cradle of civilisation- the Indus Valley. Academics foolishly contended that the very fact that India existed now was enough to infer that the Islamic invasion was not detrimental to India. They went on to add that invasions had enriched India. Even if India had shrunk to a sliver of land near the southern tip of India-these intellectuals would seek satisfaction that India still existed, totally oblivious of its loss and incapable of appreciating the magnitude of damage. India not only suffered an intellectual depletion but also a crass intellectual perversion that failed to identify the true cause of its backwardness and thus hampered progress.

Therefore Naipaul correctly avers: "The crisis of India is not only political or economic. The larger crisis is of a wounded old civilisation that has at last become aware of its inadequacies and is without the intellectual means to move ahead." I am not certain whether India had 'become aware of its inadequacies' but certainly it lacked the intellectual means of progress during that period.

Finally when he returns to India in the 1990's (India-A Million Mutinies Now), Naipaul is more mature and discerning: "What I hadn't understood in 1962, or had taken too much for granted was the extent to which the country had been remade; and even the extent to which India had been restored to itself, after its own equivalent of the dark ages-after the Muslim invasions and the detailed, repeated vandalising of the North, the shifting empires, the wars, the 18th-century anarchy."

Naipaul now sees the benefits of independence, a crucial catalyst for human growth: "the idea of freedom had gone everywhere in India." And he observes Indians discovering their own identity (to some extent fuelled by the growth of the nationalist BJP): "People everywhere have ideas now of who they are and what they owe themselves"

Change is present everywhere, "India was now a country of million mutinies. A million mutinies, supported by twenty kinds of group excess, sectarian excess, religious excess, regional excess: the beginnings of self-awareness, it would seem the beginnings of an intellectual life, already negated by old anarchy and disorder. But there was in India now what didn't exist 200 years before: a central will, a central intellect, a national idea. .... What the mutinies were also helping to define was the strength of the general intellectual life, and the wholeness and humanism of the values to which all Indians now felt that they could appeal. They were a part of the beginning of a new way for many millions, part of India's growth, part of its restoration."

In summary, India had changed. India was now something to be proud of. Naipaul had something to be proud of. He is finally at peace with India, the very essence of his origin and his existence.

After winning the Nobel Prize, Naipaul arrogantly claimed he helped effect this change in India. What he overlooks is the fact that he is merely the chronicler of the change and not its instigator. However, one may also look at this remark from a different perspective. Does it reflect a deep empathy for India? Does he badly want to be a part of its success?

Note: The views expressed here are those of the writer and not necessarily those of Expressindia's.

2002 WORLD BOOK ENCYCLOPEDIA

2002 WORLD BOOK ENCYCLOPEDIA

Hinduism, the major religion of India, is one of the oldest living religions in the world. The roots of Hinduism date to prehistoric times in India. About 750 million people practice the religion. Although most Hindus live in India, Hindu literature and philosophy have influenced people throughout the world. 

Through the centuries, Hinduism has been the most important influence on the culture of India. For example, the caste system of India is a basic part of Hinduism. The caste system determines the way of life of most Hindus, including what occupations they enter.


Beliefs of Hinduism. Hinduism developed gradually over thousands of years, and many cultures and religions helped shape it. Many sects (groups) arose within Hinduism, and each developed its own philosophy and form of worship. Like most religions, Hinduism has basic beliefs about divinities, life after death, and personal conduct. 

Sacred writings. Hinduism has no single book that is the source of its doctrines. But it has many sacred writings, all of which have contributed to its fundamental beliefs. The most important include the Vedas, the Puranas, the Ramayana, the Mahabharata with its section called the Bhagavad-Gita, and the Manu Smriti. 

The Vedas are the oldest Hindu scriptures and are older than the sacred writings of any other major religion. The teachings of the Vedas existed for centuries before they were finally written down. There are four Vedas--the Rigveda, the Samaveda, the Yajurveda, and the Atharvaveda. Each has four parts--the Samhitas, the Brahmanas, the Aranyakas, and the Upanishads. The Samhitas contain prayers and hymns and are the oldest part. The Brahmanas deal with ritual and theology and include explanations of the Samhitas. The Aranyakas and the Upanishads are works of mysticism and philosophy written as dialogues. 

The Puranas are long verse stories that contain many important Hindu myths about Hindu gods and goddesses and the lives of great Hindu heroes. They also describe the Hindu beliefs about how the world began and how it periodically ends and is reborn. 

The Ramayana and the Mahabharata are long epics. The Ramayana tells of Prince Rama and his attempts to rescue Sita, who has been kidnapped by the demon king Ravana. The Mahabharata describes a conflict between the Pandavas and the Kauravas, two families who are cousins. Generally, the Pandavas are considered to be morally and ethically superior to the Kauravas. 

The Bhagavad-Gita, a philosophical work, forms part of the Mahabharata. In it, the god Krishna and the Pandava warrior Arjuna discuss the meaning and nature of existence. 

The Manu Smriti (Code of Manu) is a basic source of Hindu religious and social law. Part of the Manu Smriti sets forth the basis of the caste system. 

Divinities. Early Hindus worshiped gods that represented powers in nature, such as rain and the sun. Gradually, some Hindus came to believe that, though divinities appear in separate forms, these forms are part of one universal spirit called Brahman. These Hindus believe that many divinities make up Brahman. The most important ones are Brahma, the creator of the universe; Vishnu, its preserver; and Shiva, its destroyer. 

One of the most important Hindu divinities is Shiva's wife, who has several names. She is best known as Durga, Kali, Parvati, or Uma. As Parvati or Uma, she is the beloved goddess of motherhood. As Durga or Kali, she is the feared goddess of destruction. For many Hindus, these contrasting natures of the goddess represent the way in which time and matter constantly move from birth to death and from creation to destruction. Many Hindus find great religious truth in this symbolism and worship the goddess as their most important divinity. 

According to Hindu doctrine, animals as well as human beings have souls. Hindus worship some gods in the form of animals. Cows are sacred, but Hindus also revere monkeys, snakes, and other animals. 

The six schools of philosophy. Many schools of Hindu thought have developed through the centuries. Six of these schools have become especially prominent. In their traditional order, they are (1) nyaya, (2) vaisheska, (3) sankhya, (4) yoga, (5) purva-mimamsa, and (6) vedanta. 

Nyaya deals with logic. Vaisheska concerns the nature of the world. Sankhya examines the origin and evolution of the universe. Yoga is a set of mental and physical exercises designed to free the soul from reliance on the body so that the soul can unite with Brahman. Purva-mimamsa categorizes Vedic texts and rituals. Vedanta interprets especially the Upanishads, the Bhagavad-Gita, and the Brahma Sutra. 

Caste is India's strict system of social classes. The caste system may have existed in some form before Aryan invaders from central Asia attacked India about 1500 B.C. The Aryans or their descendants gradually gained control of most of India. They used the caste system at first to limit contact between themselves and the native Indian people. Later, the caste system became more elaborate and one of the teachings of Hinduism. The Hindu castes are grouped into four main categories, called varnas. In order of rank, these hereditary groups are (1) Brahmans, the priests and scholars; (2) Kshatriyas, the rulers and warriors; (3) Vaisyas, the merchants and professionals; and (4) Sudras, the laborers and servants. The caste system includes thousands of castes, each of which has its own rules of behavior. 

For centuries, one large group, the untouchables, has existed outside the four varnas and has ranked below the lowest Sudra caste. The untouchables traditionally have had such occupations as tanning, which Hindu law forbids for a member of any caste in the four varnas. The Indian constitution of 1950 outlawed untouchability and gave the group full citizenship. But discrimination against untouchables has not been eliminated. 

Through the years, the caste system has weakened somewhat, but continues to be a strong influence in Indian life. Some social distinctions have been abandoned, especially in the cities. Many educated Hindus of different castes intermix and work with one another. Formerly, they would have dined with and would have married only members of their own caste. 

Reincarnation and karma. Hinduism teaches that the soul never dies. When the body dies, the soul is reborn. This continuous process of rebirth is called reincarnation. The soul may be reborn in an animal or in a human being, but Hindu doctrine is not clear on this point. 

The law of karma states that every action influences how the soul will be born in the next reincarnation. If a person lives a good life, the soul will be born into a higher state, perhaps into the body of a brahman. If a person leads an evil life, the soul will be born into a lower state, perhaps into the body of a worm. A person's reincarnation continues until he or she achieves spiritual perfection. The soul then enters a new level of existence, called moksha, from which it never returns. 

 

Hindu worship 

 

Worship in temples. Hinduism considers temples as buildings dedicated to divinities. Its followers worship as individuals, not as congregations. Most Hindu temples have many shrines, each of which is devoted to a divinity. Each temple also has one principal shrine devoted to a single important god or goddess. 

The shrines portray the divinities in sculptured images. Hindus treat these images as living human beings. Every day, for example, priests wash and dress the images and bring them food. Hindus do not consider this custom idol worship. They believe the divinities are actually present in the images. 

Hindu temples hold annual festivals commemorating events in the lives of the divinities. Huge crowds gather for these festivals. They come to worship, to pray for assistance, and to enjoy the pageantry of the event. Millions of Hindus visit temples along the Ganges River, the most sacred river in India. 

Worship in the home. Many observances of Hinduism take place in the home. Most homes have a shrine devoted to a divinity chosen by the family. In most homes, the husband or wife conducts the daily family worship. A number of important ceremonies are performed at home, including the one in which boys officially become members of the Hindu community. Other religious ceremonies include marriage ceremonies and rituals that are connected with pregnancy and childbirth. 

Worship of saints. Hindus worship both living and dead men as saints. Some saints may be yogis (men who practice yoga), and others may be gurus (spiritual teachers). Hinduism has many local and regional saints, rather than official saints for all its followers. A Hindu village, tribe, or religious order may elevate its own heroes or protectors to sainthood. Many Hindu monks and nuns have joined together in religious orders under the leadership of a saint. 

Contributor: Charles S. J. White, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of Philosophy and Religion, The American University.

Additional resources 

Flood, Gavin. An Introduction to Hinduism. Cambridge, 1996. 
Klostermaier, Klaus K. A Survey of Hinduism. 2nd ed. State Univ. of N. Y. Pr., 1994. 
Powell, Barbara. Windows into the Infinite: A Guide to the Hindu Scriptures. Asian Humanities, 1996. 
Sharma, Arvind. Hinduism for Our Times. Oxford, 1996. 
Sullivan, Bruce M. Historical Dictionary of Hinduism. Scarecrow, 1997.
Viswanathan, Ed. Am I a Hindu? The Hinduism Primer. Halo Bks., 1992.

Hindu Incest Monster of incest is on the rampage

Hindu Incest Monster of incest is on the rampage

By Juggie Naran

Incest in the Indian community is a ticking time bomb ready to explode at any time, according to three top child support and anti-abuse groups.

This follows the release by the Advice Desk for the Abused of shocking statistics, showing it had handled 847 incest cases in the Durban, Chatsworth and Verulam areas in the past two years.

"Unfortunately, there has been a phenomenal change of late," said Advice Desk Executive Director, Fatima Bayat. "Cases relating to incest are now high on the agenda. They include child rape, sexual molestation and sodomy within the family structures. 

"The perpetrators include close members of the family. Fathers, uncles, brothers and other relatives sexually abusing or raping girls in the home is still not uncommon," said Bayat. 

"Human rights organisations and women's rights groups are still 
fighting what I call a losing battle. 

"We are faced with yet another monster to deal with. Incest has become the norm in certain homes. Siblings, who are in mutual agreement, are indulging in sexual activities," said Bayat.

Absence

"Parents are of the belief that fancy homes and cars, generous amounts of money and unlimited freedom make up for their absence in the child's life. Children are left to their own devices and this is one of the crucial factors that contribute to incest," said Bayat.

The Advice Desk for the Abused has, in the past two years, dealt with 30 075 cases in which women were victims of domestic violence, and 15 485 cases of domestic violence where men were the victims. Of the total 45 560 cases, 847 were reported as incest, said Bayat.

"There are many more families, who might not even be aware it is happening in their homes, or which are quite aware that it is taking place, but are too embarrassed to seek the necessary help," she said. 
"If the situation is not dealt with, children will continue with this behaviour," said Bayat.

"Unfortunately, (this behaviour) is very common within the Indian community. It is becoming more common within the Muslim and Hindu communities," said Bayat. 

"As a society, we tend to think that this problem does not exist within our homes or communities. We tend to take it for granted that it is a far-fetched idea that does not exist in our homes," said Bayat.

"This has been happening for a very long time. Parents would never know, unless they were faced with the unpleasant experience of walking into the situation," she said. "I can only commend those parents who have taken a stand - who have put aside the embarrassment and stigma they might experience and have approached the relevant organisations for assistance or intervention."

Linda Naidoo, Director of Childline KwaZulu-Natal, confirmed that incest - especially sibling incest - had become a cause for serious concern. Naidoo said this was a far more serious problem than adult incest, because it was hidden.

"There is a clear dividing line between sibling and adult incest. Adult incest is more reported than sibling incest," she said. "Parents are terrified of reporting sibling incest - not only because of the stigma attached, but because they also fear for the future of the siblings concerned. The parents feel they need to protect the child," said Naidoo.

"They believe the child will grow out of it. Even though they know it is inappropriate behaviour that they need to deal with, the only action they take is to discipline the child," said Naidoo. 

"Many forces also come into play as far as the girl victim is concerned. The girl child may feel guilty, believing that she may have touched her sibling accidentally, or said something to arouse his feelings," she said. "This leads to all forms of emotional trauma for the girl victim.

"She also requires counselling to help her overcome her emotional problems," she said.

Bobbi Bear Crisis Centre Director Jackie Branfield agreed that incest had become a serious problem that required urgent intervention. She said the centre had operated an HIV/Aids Abuse Prevention Programme throughout schools in KwaZulu-Natal for the past five years. 

She said many cases of incest had surfaced through the programme. 
"Incest does not know colour, language or culture. It runs across the colour line," she said.

However, she added, when the HIV/Aids prevention programme was taken to Chatsworth schools, the centre had found it was rife in the Indian community.

Branfield said they had come across numerous cases of incest during their visits to this South Durban area. 


Trauma

"The programme is conducted in such a way that it allows children who may have been abused, or who know of someone who has been abused, to come forward and talk about their trauma during private sessions. 

"We found incest was particularly rife among Muslim and Hindu children," said Branfield.

"However, the worrying factor about this is that these reports only surface a year or two later," she said. "Our concern is of the victims being affected by HIV/Aids. Because it takes such a long time to surface, there is not very much one can do if they are infected."

"The father or brother may be the perpetrator, but we have found that mothers also play an important role in covering up this abuse. Mothers need to be made aware they could also face criminal charges if it is found they knew about the abuse and assisted in covering up these crimes," said Branfield.


Real-life, shocking cases from the Advice Desk for the Abused in Durban

·  Case 1
The family of four - parents and two children, aged 16 and 14 - is not well-off. Both parents' jobs include working, at times, in shifts. Both children are at school. 

One week both parents end up working at night. The father, in the vicinity of his home, decides to check on the children. When he walks into the lounge he finds his son and daughter in a compromising position. In desperation he takes both his children to the local police station. They are not able to assist and refer him to the Advice Desk. The matter was referred to the Child Protection Unit.

The children were separated, the girl kept with the family and the boy sent to his uncle. 

The family members were sent to professionals for counselling.

·  Case 2
The father of the well-respected family was a priest at the local church. He had two sons and two daughters.

The father refused to send his daughters to school, instead insisting on educating them at his office attached to the church.

The two older sons were allowed to go to school, but their father instructed them to have sexual intercourse with the daughter every afternoon.

If they did not do so, he beat them and called them sissies. The father also sexually abused his youngest daughter in the park every day. 

The mother did not accept that her husband was capable of such behaviour. Charges were laid, but were withdrawn by the mother. 
The children were removed from the parents into foster care.

·  Case 3
The advice desk was approached for help by a 14-year-old girl who was adamant she was attracted to her father, whom she described as very handsome and sexy. She claimed to have sexual desires for him.

She was not able to accept that this was unacceptable. She developed a terrible attitude towards her mother, becoming extremely jealous and possessive and resorting to physical abuse. 

Her parents could not understand her behaviour. The daughter would take advantage of any conflict between the parents and often insisted on sharing a bed with her dad. 

He does not allow her to do so, or encourage her in any way.

She is currently receiving counselling twice a week from a psychologist, as well as seeing a psychiatrist.

·  Help can be found: 
Childline: 031 312 0904;

Bobby Bear: 031 904 2237;

Advice Desk for the Abused: 
031 262 5231. 

Published on the web by Sunday Tribune on December 9, 2005.

Hindu Hate

Hindu Hate

Father Raymond J. De Souza: The sad plight of India's flock

September 08, 2008

by Kelly McParland

Last Friday, Sept. 5, was the anniversary of Mother Teresa's death. Eleven years ago, Indians lined the streets to honour her state funeral procession. This year, her sisters, the Missionaries of Charity, encountered a rather different crowd on the anniversary.

Four sisters were attacked by about 20 Bajrang Dal (a Hindu nationalist youth movement) activists and forced off a train in Chhattisgarh, a province in central India. The small mob marched the sisters to the police station, chanting anti-Christian slogans, threatening to beat them up and accusing the sisters of kidnapping the children in their care.

A Hindu nationalist mob threatening violence against religious sisters who run orphanages? Sadly, that there were only threats must today be considered a blessing. In the neighbouring state of Orissa, the past fortnight has seen an outbreak of deadly anti-Christian violence - the latest episodes in an ominous trend spanning several years.

In India as a whole, and in Orissa as well, Christians represent slightly more than 2% of the population. Two weeks ago, a Hindu nationalist leader named Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati was killed in Orissa. Responsibility for the assassination was claimed by Maoists guerrillas. Despite that, the followers of Saraswati blamed Christians and went on a rampage.

At least a dozen people have been killed, including a young woman missionary burnt alive in an orphanage. (When the mob torched the building, she ran inside to try and rescue the children.) A priest at the same orphanage was locked in a room to suffer the same fate - though he escaped with grave injuries. In scenes of pure barbarism, a Catholic layman was hacked to pieces, a young nun was raped. Christian schools, churches and hospitals have been sacked.

"There is a climate of intolerance against Christians that is growing in the country, and it will have serious drastic long-term effects on Indian society," said Cardinal Oswald Gracias, Archbishop of Bombay, accusing Hindu nationalist leaders of "poisoning minds" with anti-Christian propaganda.

On Aug. 29, India's Catholic bishops closed all the Catholic schools in the country - many of which are sought out by India's non-Catholic elite for the quality of the education - in a one-day protest "against the atrocities on the Christian community and other innocent people."

Yesterday was observed throughout the Indian Catholic Church as a Gandhi-esque day of prayer and fasting for "the promotion of communal harmony and peace in India." But otherwise, anti-Christian violence in the country seems to have attracted little notice.

Ignoring this phenomenon would be mistake, both for India and Indian Christians.

The growth of Hindu nationalism in India, both in its democratic political form and in its mob-terrorist form, threatens to put the country on a path of sectarian conflict and religious violence. The more extreme Hindu nationalists want to overturn India's official secularity in favour of an explicit Hindu identity. In such an India, the public life and even presence of Muslims and Christians would be severely circumscribed.

Muslims in India, numbering some 150 million, are simply too numerous to be a plausible first target. Christians, on the other hand, are a tiny minority and, with the apparent global ignorance of their plight, can be subject to harassment and violence with relative impunity.

Yet if Hindu nationalist violence grows, it will one day turn against Muslims in large numbers - threatening to inflame religious tensions on the subcontinent, within India and with India's Muslim neighbours, Pakistan and Bangladesh. A religious conflagration could be massively destabilizing for global politics.

The Christian world ought to pay attention on Christian grounds, too. No flock is too small to be expendable; and in any case, India's Christians are not a small flock. There are 18 million Catholics in India - more than in Canada and England combined.

The Church in India is vibrant. In 2006, I was in Bombay for the installation of the new archbishop and was struck by the sheer vitality of the Indian Church. Cardinal Gracias told me then that Bombay, with "only" 500,000 Catholics, is actually comparable to cities such Chicago or Milan in terms of actual church-goers, with Mass attendance above 80%. Certainly, the Church in Bombay is more vital and important to the shape of global Catholicism than the Church in Toronto or Montreal - a sobering reality for Canadians to consider.

So in terms of India's future and the future of global Christianity, it is a pressing concern that anti-Christian violence be checked. But it cannot be checked if it is not at least noticed.

National Post

Crosses desecrated in Goa

by Nirmala Carvalho

21 July, 2005

Goa (AsiaNews) – Four crosses were desecrated in seven days in Ponda Parish, in the state of Goa, the former Portuguese colony on India West Coast.

“Desecrating the crosses conceals an ulterior motive, namely sowing the seeds of communal suspicion and unrest in Goa,” said Father Loiola, secretary to the Archbishop of Goa and Daman, Mgr Filipe Neri Ferrão, Patriarch of the East Indies.

“There have been sporadic cases of communal violence,” Father Loiola noted, “but Archbishop Ferrão has refused to view them as instances of anti-Christian violence. He left any action or official complaint with the State Administration to local parish priests.”

Two crosses were struck on the night of July 13-14. The cross near the Mount Carmel Chapel was completely destroyed; the other one, which is on private property, was damaged.

Another cross was found damaged at Farmagudi Ponda this week and it is worrisome that it should so close to the other to acts of vandalism.

Some weeks back, a cross at Opa was also found to be desecrated.

The small state of Goa is dotted with crosses rising along public roads and on private properties. Christians often meet at these sites in May to recite litanies when the feast of the Holy Cross is celebrated.

These acts have not however raised sectarian tensions among religious groups, which are united in their condemnation.

“The Church and the clergy are highly respected in Goa. Our educational institutions are most sought after by people of all faiths. They are considered prestigious, not only because of the level of academics, but because of the values that are transmitted to the students,” Father Loiola said.

Ponda has a Hindu majority and law enforcement is checking out whether the incidents are motivated by religious hatred or a feud between families.

For Father Loiola, it is too early to label what happened as a fundamentalist attack against the Catholic Church even if there have been cases of anti-Christian intolerance in the past.

Copyright © 2003 AsiaNews All rights reserved
 Institute Condemns Planned Distribution of Anti-Christian Booklets by Hindu Extremist Group in Orissa; Calls on Police to Monitor Activity of Dara Sena

To: National & International Desks

Contact: Ben Marsh of the Institute on Religion and Public Policy

WASHINGTON, July 21 /Christian Wire Service/ -- The Dara Sena, a Hindu extremist group dedicated to the promotion of convicted murderer Dara Singh, is planning to distribute anti-Christian booklets in Orissa, India. Dara Singh was convicted in 2003 and sentenced to life in prison for murdering missionary Graham Staines and his two sons by burning them alive.

"Dara Singh and the Dara Sena are violent thugs seeking to intimidate growing non-Hindu populations in Orissa," said Joseph K. Grieboski, President of the Institute on Religion and Public Policy. "Rather than protect Hinduism their stated objective - they have harmed and embarrassed the international Hindu community by promoting violence and intolerance."

Dara Singh has repeatedly stated that he wishes to run for public office in Orissa despite a law prohibiting convicted criminals from holding public office. His followers in the Dara Sena hold Singh as a godlike figure and a leader in the fight to protect Hinduism against "foreign" religions such as Christianity and Islam.

The Superintendent of Police in Mayurbhanj District, where Singh's prison is located, has publicly stated that the police will arrest anyone caught distributing anti-Christian publications.

"We encourage the government in Orissa to uphold role of law and fundamental rights, and to combat the atmosphere of intolerance and religious-based violence espoused by groups like the Dara Sena," continued Mr. Grieboski.

Hindu extremists slander the Church but send their children to Church-run schools

by Nirmala Carvalho

26 July, 2005

False charges of “forced conversions” are levelled at a Catholic priest. For the local bishop, this is a plot by Hindu extremists, backed by the state government that provides the legal instruments. Behind it, there is an attempt by extremists to get free access to high-status Catholic schools.

Jhabua (AsiaNews) – The growing anti-Christian campaign in states controlled by Hindu fundamentalist administrations has fallen upon another Catholic priest. For the bishop of his diocese who has come to the clergyman’s defence, this is another example of how the Madhya Pradesh’s Freedom of Religion Act can be used as a “legal instrument” for every kind of abuse.

The main character in the story is Fr Thomas P.T., a parish priest at St Michael’s Church in the diocese of Jhabua (Madhya Pradesh). He was arrested on July 21 on false charges of favouring the conversion of local Tribals. The facts are quite different.

The Father’s troubles go back to July 8, when Rusmal Charpota, an activist with the Hindu paramilitary group Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), and six other people pressed charges against the priest in the village of Jhaapadra for violating the state’s Freedom of Religion Act, which bans forced conversions.

On June 25, Mr Charpota had already publicly accused Father Thomas with raising fees at the mission school he runs in order to discriminate against Hindus.

On that occasion, the RSS activist warned the Catholic priest that his organisation would decide what steps to take against him at its next meeting and would inform the authorities.

Father Thomas was eventually charged with demanding very high tuition fees whilst offering parents who couldn’t pay them with the option of converting to Christianity in order to have the fees waved. The parents are said to have refused and so their children were not allowed to attend school.

In an interview with AsiaNews, Mgr Chaako Thottumarickal, Bishop of Jhabua, the diocese in which Father Thomas’s parish is located, rejects the charges as false, a plot by Hindu extremists.

“These accusations are completely false. Sister Pratima and the teachers are in charge of admissions. The priest is the overall administrator but he is not involved in the day-to-day affairs of the school,” Bishop Thottumarickal said.

According to the prelate, “Father Thomas’s arrest is part of a conspiracy by the Sangh Parivar (an umbrella group, a ‘family’ of organisations and parties to which the RSS belongs). In the RSS’s agenda, there is a campaign to foment anti-Christian hatred among Hindus and cause social unrest as a means to increase its popular appeal and slander the Church and its missionaries”.

What is more, for Bishop Thottumarickal “the attitude of Hindu extremists towards Christians is inconsistent. First, they attack us and then they want to send their children to our schools because of the high quality of education.”

The problem, he laments, is that often these families “demand their children pass the admission exams and be exempted from the fees”.

The situation is made worse by the tacit support of the state government for these anti-Christian acts.

“The Freedom of Religion Act is a legal instrument offered by the authorities to extremists to persecute missionaries whom they accuse of ‘forced conversions’,” he said.

“Being persecuted is the price the Church must pay to pursue its mission, but at the same time our voice must be heeded. We need justice and those responsible for these odious crimes should be punished to prevent future violence.”

Still, there is a silver lining in all of this, namely “solidarity among Christians in such a critical time.” 
None the less, ”everyone is angered by the false charges brought against Father Thomas and are determined to obtain justice,” Bishop Thottumarickal stressed.

After the priest’s arrest, Jhabua Catholics in fact submitted a memorandum to the local and district administrations demanding that” the charges against Father Thomas be dropped and that his accusers be charged with unjustly attacking Christians and their institutions, which provide a valued service to the population in the social, educational and health fields”.

The state of Madhya Pradesh is administered by the Bharatiya Janata Party, a Hindu fundamentalist party.

Copyright © 2003 AsiaNews All rights reserved

 

India: priest arrested under "anti-conversion" law

New Delhi, Jul. 25 (CWNews.com) - Church leaders in India have decried the arrest of a Catholic priest who now faces charges under a new state law restricting religious conversions.

Father P. T. Thomas was arrested on July 21, in the Madhya Pradesh state, and charged with promising admission to a local Catholic school, and waiver of fees, for Hindu families who embraced Christianity. Father Thomas has been released on bail pending trial.

The complaint against the priest, brought by local Hindu activists, cites a "Freedom of Religion" act that prohibits the use of force or allurement in an attempt to encourage religious conversions.

But Bishop Chacko Thottumarickal of the Jhabua diocese insists the charges against Father Thomas are false. "The accusers never come to the priest for admission," he said, "as admission is done by the headmistress." He added that "the priest never had any role in the day to day running of the school."

The central Jhabua region has seen clashes between Christians and Hindu groups who charge that Christians are offering inducements to poor Hindu families to convert. A controversial report issued by the government recently said that acts of violence against Christians were triggered by the "massive" conversion campaigns.

Praying and fasting to counter anti-Christian violence

by Nirmala Carvalho

4 August, 2005

Praying is the best weapon against rising persecution in Madhya Pradesh and Chattisgarh, says the Archbishop of Bhopal. Catholic Tribals attend the prayer meeting in great numbers.

Bhopal (AsiaNews) – People gathered for a prayer meeting to counter “the deliberate and rising tide of anti-Christian violence” in Madhya Pradesh and Chattisgarh, Indian states ruled by the Hindu fundamentalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). In both places, local legislatures have adopted anti-conversion laws.

In an interview with AsiaNews, Mgr Pascal Topno, Archbishop of Bhopal, where the day of prayer was held two days ago, said that “all Christians from the two states came together to fast and pray as a result of the atrocities inflicted on our community by the anti-conversion law”.

“The Council of Bishops of Madhya Pradesh and Chattisgarh chose a day of prayer and fasting as the best means to counter the increasing persecution we are now facing,” he noted.

As one of the promoters of the event, Archbishop Topno explained that Christians from all denominations arrived in Bhopal from both states, including Protestant ministers and Catholic bishops following Eastern rites.

“We prayed for those who persecute us and for the enemies of Christianity, whose lives have not been enlightened by the ‘Light of Truth’,” he said. “Many of the participants have been themselves victims of anti-Christian violence perpetrated by Hindu fundamentalists. As spiritual guides we called on the faithful to forgive their attackers, explaining that prayer and forgiveness are the response to injustice.”

“The plight of [Christian] Tribals is pathetic,” the prelate lamented. They are poor, unemployed and “at the mercy of rightwing extremists who try to reconvert them to Hinduism using intimidation and threats”. The presence of many Catholic Tribals at the event is good though, “a sign, an indication that is encouraging and makes us more confident”.

Tribals from Jhabua—where a catholic priest was charged and arrested for alleged forced conversions—were among those who came.

Local police provided security but were unprepared for the lack of fiery speeches or inflammatory remarks. “They were surprised,” Archbishop Topno said, “by the atmosphere of serenity and spirituality of the day”.

For him, August 2 was a “marvellous ecumenical experience”. He noted that “despite the monsoon rains, people came [. . .] from far and wide to express their solidarity and voice their concern over the escalating anti-Christian violence”.

Archbishop Topno said that he prepared a memorandum for Madhya Pradesh’s Chief Minister, Babulal Gaur, in which it is made plain and clear that Christians are guilty only of bearing witness of Christ, not of forcing anyone to convert to their religion.

The document also denounces the conditions of discrimination and threat in which Christian Tribals live.

Indian filmmaker fans the flames

Sidney Morning Herald

March 28, 2006

Deepa Mehta's work provokes violent reactions, writes Garry Maddox.

The word controversial hardly does justice to director Deepa Mehta's trilogy on Indian life.

The acclaimed first instalment, Fire, prompted fundamentalist Hindus to violently attack cinemas in 1998.

Seeing it as an example of corrupting Western influences, they broke windows, tore down posters, threatened Mehta and forced the Government to send the film back to the censors. It took a Supreme Court challenge before Fire, which dealt with a lesbian relationship, could be re-released. But that was nothing compared with the responses when the third film, Water, started shooting in the holy city of Varanasi two years later.

A day into filming, an angry mob of 2000 Hindu protesters burnt sets, threw others in the Ganges and made death threats against the director and the then lead actresses, Shabana Azmi and Nandita Das. Mehta, who was rehearsing, was not on set.

For two weeks, protesters burnt effigies of her in cities across the country. With the Government denouncing the riot and the army providing protection, authorities shut down the production after a protester attempted suicide by jumping in the Ganges tied to a rock. He was in intensive care and there were reports the inflamed protesters planned more violence.

"It was insane," says Mehta, who is in Sydney for previews of Water. "It was like something out of Kafka."

Set as Gandhi is coming to power in 1938, the drama follows an eight-year-old girl who becomes a social outcast when her husband from an arranged marriage dies. Like other widows, she is dispatched to an ashram for a life, according to Hindu tradition, of poverty and prayer.

Even though the script had been approved by the Government, the protesters believed Water was anti-Hindu.

While they were clearly unhappy about the interpretation of sacred texts on the treatment of women, Mehta believes the "self-proclaimed protectors of the religion" really wanted publicity.

"I was hurt and angry and dismayed," she says of the fury directed at the production. "But mostly I was really angry. It had a lot to do with the increasing climate in the world and in India at that point of intolerance in the name of religion."

Mehta, who grew up in India but is based in Canada, cites the murder of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh and the fatwa on writer Salman Rushdie as other instances of religious extremism affecting art. "When Clint Eastwood makes something like Million Dollar Baby and Christian fundamentalists are up in arms, it's happening all over the world," she says.

It took five years to get Water back into production, eventually shooting in Sri Lanka amid tight security under the anonymous title Full Moon. The film has opened in Canada, running for 25 weeks, and is headed for India soon after an encouraging response at a recent film festival.

Mehta believes Water will face a better reception as India continues to modernise. The theme of the trilogy, which emerged with Fire and continued with Earth in 1999, is "the tug of war between modernity and tradition". The final instalment has the support of Rushdie, who has called Water a magnificent film that has "serious, challenging things to say about the crushing of women by atrophied religious and social dogmas".

Extremists Threaten Lovers In India With Violence on Valentine's Day

February 13, 2007
by Playfuls Team

Lovers who kiss in public on Valentine's Day in India must live in fear, if an unusual alliance of extremist groups has its way, reports said Tuesday. 

The alliance was formed to protest declining Indian values and the Westernization of society. 

Fanatical Hindu and Maoist rebels and Muslim groups have warned couples not to show each other physical affection on Valentine's Day, to be celebrated on Wednesday. 

An influential, radical Hindu group said they would blacken the couples' faces, if they caught them. 

Every year, fanatical groups in India protest against celebrating Valentine's Day which is gaining popularity. In the past years, businesses selling Valentine's Day cards were demolished and couples were attacked in the streets. 

The extremists claim that showing emotion in public contravenes Indian cultural customs.