Back to Our Origins
Last night I attended a “mehndi ceremony” of a friend’s daughter. Everybody there was wearing colorful dresses in a mixed gathering and soon after the dinner, young boys and girls presented beautiful dances on stage. The expertise with which they performed on different songs showed that a lot of practice had gone into it. There was lot of celebration and joy.
This was true sub-continental culture!
We, the people of the sub-continent love to celebrate on festive occasions. We are peaceful and humane people. We enjoy dance, music and other forms of art. Our diverse climatic conditions, different seasons and geography, lot of greenery, colorful fields, water channels and scenic beauty inspire us to not only appreciate nature but also to enjoy it to the fullest and celebrate it too.
This was true sub-continental culture!
We never systematically inculcated hatred against those who were different from us. We seldom taught our children to consider others inferior and bad. We never promoted jingoism and we never glorified villains as heroes. We believed in peaceful co-existence and never glorified war.
This was true sub-continental culture!
Never in the history of the sub-continent we assembled an army and carried out invasions of foreign lands. On the other hand we lived happily side by side, regardless of color and ethnicity. We are tolerant people. We believed in mutual co-existence though there were classes in the society and some discrimination, we never thought that the “other” should be exterminated.
This was true sub-continental culture!
But then religion replaced humanity. Identical humans became Hindus and Muslims, Shias and Sunnis, Deobandis and Barelvis. Looters and rapists became heroes. Hatred and contempt was to be systematically promoted and threat perception to be created. War and conflict was glorified and mutual co-existence to be rejected. Powerful stake-holders fished in troubled waters and began exploiting diversity to to their advantage. Somebody was more patriotic and somebody’s creed was superior.
This was never the sub-continental culture!
Therefore, today, it is the responsibility of every single soul living in the sub-continent to make every effort possible to revert back to the original sub-continental culture and summarily reject and condemn all those elements which propagate hatred and conflict and are enemies of peace and love.
Waseem Altaf
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Waseem Altaf