Early days:
My view of muslims, during college days, was that of a typical hindu.They are anti-india by nature and for them religion comes before nationality.But one difference in my view was that i accepted any muslim provided he exhibited true loyalty to india.My anger was fuelled by some incidents given below:
a) one of my muslim friend(i really liked him for he was a good friend) openly supported pakistan during cricket matches.
b) one of my senior(muslim) again supported pakistan indirectly i.e., he used to speak ill of indian players, incl. sachin who was probably at his peak then.It made me even more angry as this person was really a noble person otherwise:-)
c) During an india-pakistan cricket match, a group of local muslims were openly cheering every indian wicket. All these instances were tied to cricket as i was a crazy fan(even now, but mellowed down considerably).I've to say here my room mate during the last two years was a muslim.I was lucky to have a muslim roommate as i got a first-hand chance to observe a muslim.I never had any problem with him over these issues - probably b'cos i was ill-tempered,would not hesitate to pick up a fight and my friend was aware of it:-) My friend was a very hard-working person, came from a lower middle-class and was very responsible.He did not watch any film with us ( we used to watch atleast one per week) thoroughout the 4 years of college life, except in the last semester.Since he did his schooling in tamizh medium, he worked doubly hard.He was also very religious, did namaz on every friday and fasted during ramzan piously.I was really impressed by his dedication for the almighty - i really felt hindus, on the whole, never had such dedication. But nevertheless, i never believed in any ritual, i only believed in heart-felt bhakthi.This association had a real impact on my view of muslims as i clearly felt that they are very much like hindus - with good family values, good manners etc.
Change of mind:
My opinion of a muslim or for that matter any non-hindu, has undergone a sea-change in the last few years.The reasons are many.To quote a few - the biographical book on gandhi(presented by my bro), Hey-Ram film, the documentary on Gujarat riots,my association with AID-India all helped me see the truth.I understood the danger of communal politics played by some of our national parties thru' the age-old divide & rule policy. Why this hatred? Why does an hindu, generally, not have a good opinion on a muslim?
1) Maybe b'cos most of the terrorist activities are carried out in the name of islam.
2) They support pakistan more than india as their religion gets higher priority than the
country.
3) Historically mughal kings were barbarous in nature - looting & killing many hindus.
I don't claim this is an exhaustive list but just what comes to my mind.Now,on the outset, all 3 above seems factually correct, so where is the problem? The problem lies in a simple fact of generalization.
1) How many % of muslims support terrorist activities? Probably fewer than 1%, if not there will be no safe place anywhere in india as it is the second largest muslim population in the world after indonesia.
2) Again what is the statistics for this one, should be less than 5%.Kaif, Zaheer khan, irfan pathan all have represented indian cricket with the same spirit as any other player.More & more youngsters opt to play for the country with the same zeal & enthusiasm like any other player.Many muslim armymen serve us in the border as well.
3) Here, i don't have much knowledge but i can say for sure that Akbar was a secular mughal king who had birbal, an hindu, as his minister.Of course there is an aurangazeb but still..Moreover, it is highly unlikely that every hindu king was noble & pious.
Finally i would like to end my argument with a simple question - how many of your muslim friends have similar aspirations like you w.r.t getting a good job & taking care of their family? How many do you think will end up as an anti-national?
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