In the last two issues, I had promised to publish my charge-sheet against the Congress government and advised the Prime Minister to disassociate himself from the dirt of corruption surrounding him to save his character and conscience. Since then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has at least partially redeemed himself by bringing about the resignation of his Telecom Minister. I am hoping that this is not the first and the last step. I can see that this step was dictated by insurmountable pressure. The pressure will not vanish because of this long overdue step.
Investigative journalists have already unearthed the Raja-Radia story. A startling but interesting story is waiting to entertain the readers. Prima facie it is difficult to disagree with the conclusion of political commentator Pratap Bhanu Mehta: “It’s hard to believe this issue wasn’t discussed in the Cabinet for two years. If it was, the PM has been less than transparent.”
I have, therefore, decided to suspend the publication of the charge-sheet for at least a week.
From 7 to 9 November I attended “The Ottawa Conference on Combating Anti Semitism” in Canada. I was not the only Indian. The venerable Imam Ilyasi, who had for many years shown tremendous wisdom and objectivity in dealing with the Israel-Palestine dispute and his abhorrence for the rising tide of hatred against Israel and Jews all over the world, was also present and made a significant contribution to the understanding of the minds and attitudes of the Muslims of India.
It is well known that I have been totally opposed to all those forces that are plotting to wipe Israel off the map of the world. I have long been a critic of the policies of successive Congress governments which refused to establish full diplomatic relations with the State of Israel. Though India had accorded both de-facto and de-jure recognition to the State of Israel from the moment of its birth Israel was prevented from having an embassy in Delhi. It had to be contained with a consul located in and confined to Bombay. The decision was sordid when taken and became increasingly ridiculous until the Late Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao bravely put an end to it.
More than 20 years ago I had written, “No one, however hard-hearted, can deny that the story of the Jews between the Dispersion and the creation of Israel is a tragic epic of world history. Add to this moving account the horrendous story of Hitler’s Final Solution, the gas chambers, the killing fields of Nazi Germany and the murder in cold blood of six million of this unfortunate race… Yet the PLO’s charter, in its Arabic version, even today proclaims as its prime political objective ‘to wipe Israel off the world’s map’. This so, despite Arafat having generously declared that he will, after all, allow Israel to exist, but on his own terms.”
To me it appeared cruel and immoral that we should do this to Israel when we had full diplomatic relations with China and Pakistan, countries with which we have been at war and who are in occupation of Indian territory. I had pleaded that with our contacts and influence in the Muslim world we should strive to establish peace in West Asia. Only if India had been neutral and impartial, the peace talks between the two would have been held in New Delhi. Israel is part of the Orient, it wants desperately to be so recognised. During the Chinese attack on us it acted like a friend. It offered all help during the Bangladesh War. But we remained ungrateful and refused to acknowledge Israel’s gestures of friendship. It is a matter of great satisfaction that we have now established a relationship of friendship and cooperation even more cordial than with many other states. It is a step that is good for international peace and helpful in the fight against terrorism. The volume of trade between the two countries has been steadily rising.
It was sad to hear at the Ottawa meet that in many civilised countries anti-Semitism is rearing its ugly head, particularly in university campuses among the young generation. While deploring the earlier attitude of Government of India towards Israel I could assure the vast gathering that India is a country which never in its long history ever provided any hospitality to the spirit or practice of anti-Semitism. Our Jewish citizens rose to the highest positions in the fields of education, art, movies and the armed forces.
I am tempted to reproduce a small part of my somewhat longish speech at the conference.
“Anyone who has even a perfunctory knowledge of your long history of suffering, your magnificent struggle for survival and your breathtaking contribution and achievement — with your incomparable genius in every field of human thought and endeavour — must bow down in admiration and empathy. Only the sons of Satan would wish you ill or plan your annihilation. It is a shameful blot on the civilised world of today that there still exist such malignant characters and their number and capacity for mischief are by no means insignificant to be ignored as innocuous…
“Your troubles started soon after the birth of Christianity. Within 70 years the holy city of Jerusalem was captured by the Romans and that started the long saga of Dispersion. For 4,000 years before that event you were the Chosen People of God. It is strange that your tragedy did not invoke the compassion and fellow feeling even of those who professed belief in the Sermon on the Mount…
“Spinoza, one of the greatest Jews, though excommunicated from the synagogue for his refreshing freedom of thought reached the conclusion that Christian persecution gave you the unity and solidarity so essential for your continued racial existence and survival…
“Then came the birth of Islam in the country of the Arabs of the Middle East, some six centuries later. Both Christianity and Islam are products of Jewish scriptures and their world memories. Their hostility is not rationally explicable; though in fairness it must be recognised that in earlier times you were better off in the easy world of Islam’s ascendancy. Outcast and excommunicated, insulted and injured, condemned to the peripheral ghettos of urban existence, you were mobbed by the commoners and robbed by the kings…
“But the wicked, wallowing in religion’s fanaticism, have been burning with malice and hatred. Like the pusillanimous child that tries to crush the insect it dare not look at, they spawned a Hitler who planned your genocide, but ended in his own shameful suicide…
“After more than 2000 years of wandering your friends have watched with profound admiration your restoration to your ancient but never forgotten home. What drama could rival the grandeur of your sufferings and the justice and glory of its end. ‘What fiction could match the romance of this reality’, wrote Will Durant, the historian.
“The Christian world has owned its wrongs of the past and is even busy making recompense and providing protection against those who are still encompassing your extinction as a free people. Those who genuinely follow the pristine and peaceful Islam of the Prophet are not amongst them; it is the followers of a counterfeit version known as the Wahhabi faith generated from Saudi Arabia in the late 18th century by an evil non human being, Ibn Wahhab. The core of that faith is that all Mushrikun have forfeited their right to live. According to his teaching the Mushrikun include Jews, Christians, Hindus, all non believers and Muslim Shias too. Jihad against these and their destruction is a religious duty. Osama Bin Laden is a Wahhabi and his quarrel with the Saudi regime is that it is not sufficiently Wahhabi.
“All the secular democracies of the world — and Canada is one of them — must come together and master this menace to all civilisation, not merely Israel or the Jews of the world.
“No government that spawns terrorists and terrorist organisations is fit to be a member of the United Nations. To prevent such governments from acquiring access to nuclear weapons is a categorical imperative of our survival.
“Diplomacy, dialogue and delay are only steps towards suicide. Prevention is much easier than cure. Anti-Semitism has to be wiped out before it destroys its victims and their friends too. That means practically the whole civilised world.
“You need foolproof insurance against the trauma of another Holocaust. I know you have powerful friends. But friends can become fickle depending on the sacrifice friendship needs and the kaleidoscope of conflicting interests when the critical time arrives. “Your faith in your Prophets, your indomitable will, your valour, your nukes and nuclear submarines are more reliable policies of insurance.
“May God Bless you.”