Re: [nukkad] Nationalism, patriotism, and religion

["Pankaj Gupta" <>]

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Re-use your plastic bags. 
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Dear Kareliaji

You must have read too much in my letter. I said, I feel ashamed as a Hindu,
because, it is the culture of India. I am a Hindu because I belong to
India--not to the religion.

I am as sorry if you have had bad experiences with people from different
religions. I am saying that this: I hit you, because you hit me, mentality
was somehow thrust upon us. India never believed in this. Indeed, my
experiences have come in form of Muslims as my friends, and Christians as my
friends, not a Hindu afraid in the Muslim neighborhood--but I have felt the
same fear from the brigands that I believe you do from religious hooligans.

My feelings of sorrow don't come from my being a part of a particular group
of Hindus who identify themselves through the spirituality. My feeling of
sorrow comes from the identification with the common culture. My feeling of
sorrow comes from the common nation and national interests. My feeling of
sorrow, Kareliaji, comes from being called a Human when their are people
like me who are butchering and burning others of the same species. My sorrow
doesn't limit me to the boundaries of religion or the nation. My sorrow
grasps me when I see the morals taught to us by the greats such as Mahatma
Gandhi are marked as pseudo-ism or defensiveness. My sorrow, my dear
kareliaji and the rest, doesn't start or end at a particular point. I have
only painted part of the picture which hurt me immediately. The wounds of
Kashmir and Punjab have always remained--they are, however, not immediate
but ongoing. I worry about the woes of Kashmir as much I do about the
atrocities in Gujarat. The only reason Gujarat is a bigger concern is that
when the big fights the small--the small can only hurt the big, but the big
in all probabilities will murder the small: a much greater threat, only if
nascent.

Thank you for raising your concerns and I am sorry if you have to have such
caustic feelings towards certain peoples.

Best regards,
Pankaj

----- Original Message -----
From: "D D Karelia" 
To: "'Pankaj Gupta'" ; <nukkad-list@mumbai-central.com>
Sent: Sunday, January 12, 2003 2:41 PM
Subject: RE: [nukkad] Nationalism, patriotism, and religion


> || Vande Mataram ||



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