z:\ ambedkar\vol 08\vol8 03.indd MK SJ+YS 28 9 2013 159
PAKISTAN : HINDU ALTERNATIVE TO PAKISTAN
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“The Working Committee regrets to find that there have been instances of so-called Forcible conversion by some fanatics among Moplas, but warns the public against believing in the Government and inspired versions. The Report before the Committee says :
“The families, which have been reported to have been forcibly converted into Mahomedanism, lived in the neighbourhood of Manjeri. It is clear that conversions were forced upon Hindus by a fanatic gang which was always opposed to the Khilafat and Non-co-operation Movement and there were only three cases so far as our information goes.”
The following instances of Muslim intransigence, over which Mr. Gandhi kept mum are recorded by Swami Shradhanand in his weekly journal called the Liberator. Writing in the issue of 30th September 1926 the Swamiji says :
“As regards the removal of untouchability it has been authoritatively ‘ ruled several times that it is the duty of Hindus to expiate for their past sins and non-Hindus should have nothing to do with it. But the Mahomedan and the Christian Congressmen have openly revolted against the dictum of Mr. Gandhi at Vaikom and other places. Even such an unbiased leader as Mr. Yakub Hassan, presiding over a meeting called to present an address to me at Madras, openly enjoined upon Musalmans the duty of converting all the untouchables in India to Islam.”
But Mr. Gandhi said nothing by way of remonstrance either to the Muslims or to the Christians.
In his issue of July 1926 the Swami writes :
“There was another prominent fact to which I drew the attention of Mahatma Gandhi. Both of us went together one night to the Khilafat Conference at Nagpur. The Ayats (verses) of the Quran recited by the Maulanas on that occasion, contained frequent references to Jihad and killing of the Kaffirs. But when I drew his attention to this phase of the Khilafat movement, Mahatmaji smiled and said, ‘They are alluding to the British Bureaucracy’. In reply I said that it was all subversive of the idea of non-violence and when the reversion of feeling came the Mahomedan Maulanas would not refrain from using these verses against the Hindus.”
The Swami’s third instance relates to the Mopla riots. Writing in the Liberator of 26th August 1926 the Swami says :
“The first warning was sounded when the question of condemning the Moplas for their atrocities on Hindus came up in the Subjects Committee. The original resolution condemned the Moplas wholesale for the killing of Hindus and burning of Hindu homes and