Not
'Hramzade', it's 'Ramzade' that pinches 'secularists'
By
Amba Charan Vashishth
One should be discreet in the use of one's words.
Think before you speak, is another good sermon. This is more apt for persons in
politics. One's opponents are always prying for the slip of tongue to put one
on the mat. They wish to milch the opponent's cow hard enough to squeeze out
the blood of political mileage.
This is more true in the recent controversy that
has erupted because of the utterings of Union Minister Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti
who while addressing a public meeting in Delhi is reported to have said that
the Delhi voter has to make a choice between Ramzadon and Hramzadon.
Later, clarifying on her remarks she is reported to have said that in India
everyone is the child of Lord Ram and all others are those who changed their
mode of worship. This created a great furore and functioning in both houses of
Parliament was disrupted by the opposition. For obvious political reasons, her
detractors remained unsatisfied even when the Sadhvi clarified in Parliament:
"My intention was not to hurt anyone. If my speech outside the House has
hurt anyone, I express my deep regrets".
But this didn't close the matter. The Opposition
wants the head of the minister; she should resign or be dismissed. They — and
the media — have gone to the extent of dubbing it as "hate speech"
and against the Constitution of which she had taken oath. They further demanded
that a criminal case be registered against her.
The hypocrisy of the opposition is not new. When Congress
President Mrs. Sonia Gandhi in an election meeting in 2007 had described the
then Gjujarat chief Minister Narendra Modi as maut ka saudagar, for our
'secularists' and 'liberal' media it did not amount to "hate speech"
nor did it hurt the 'secular' psyche.
The opposition and the media stand on the same
pedestal on the issue. The former wishes to fish political capital in the
trouble waters and the latter, to thrive in grabbing a higher TRP by whipping up flames of controversy. In their heart
they know they are only flagging a dead horse.
Zade is an Urdu word which has come to be used in Hindi too
when one speaks of Shahzade (prince), Sahibzade (offsprings of a
great ancestry), and conjoined with other words to give a particularly special
meaning, like hramzade and the like. Ramzade means the
off-springs of Lord Ram. He is a god to an overwhelming majority of Indians.
Every religion, Hindus included, says that all human beings are the children of
god, be it the Christians, Muslims and so on. Nobody challenges this claim. India
is a land of Hindus where people have the unchallenged liberty to adopt
whatever form of worship they like. Within Hindus there are numerous forms of
worship, yet all remain one: Hindu. After the invasion by Muslim and Christian
raiders, a section of the people adopted Christian and Muslim ways of worship.
The Hindus respect it. Why, therefore, should the use of word Ramzade
hurt any section of society? All Indians are the children of god whomever they
worship or have faith in.
The dictionary meaning of the
word hramzade is bastard, rascal, scoundrel, and ill-begotten. This is
the word people use in their everyday life to describe certain individuals. Namakhraam
is a word in common usage. By using the words Ramzade and hramzade
the Sadhvi just tried to draw a distinction between men of god, gentlemen and
civilized persons on the one hand and bastards, rascals and scoundrels, on the
other. Do the media and opposition wish to make us believe that among we
Indians there are no bastards, rascals and scoundrels at all? Is it, then, a
crime to call upon people to choose between men of god and scoundrels?
Needless to call the famous
quote of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru: Aaraam hraam hai. Nobody has felt —
and should — offended by these words.
Similarly, halaal is a
common Urdu word. Everybody knows its meaning and connotation. When in rage,
people are usually seen threatening others: Main tujhe halaal kar rakh
doonga (Will slaughter you like a goat "in accordance with
conventional prescription").
It is a political travesty of
the democracy and 'secularism' that in India with a population of more than 80
percent Hindus the very word Ram pinches very hard the delicate heart of our
so-called self-styled liberal-secularists. It is a 'crime' to take His name.
Whoever does is branded a fundamentalist 'communal'. A Hindu doesn't have the
right to proclaim that he is proud of being one while all other non-Hindus have
this privilege.
The writer is a
Delhi-based political analyst.
