Bernie’s Hinduphobic democratic machinery: A class act in bigotry.
Recently, browngirl magazine featured a really interesting piece of propaganda [hopefully not their own].
This post on their fora was authored by “Chair of Progressive Caucus of California Democratic Party”, Amar Shergill.
In this piece of work [ and a really nice “work” on facts at that] this author parroted some really interesting stereotypes surrounding the Modi government and the Indian diaspora’s allegiance towards their land(s).
Across America, South Asian Americans (Pakistanis, Indians, Sri Lankans, Nepalis, etc.) vote overwhelmingly for Democrats. Although President Donald Trump has publicized his relationship with a small group of Republican Hindus, there appears to be no danger that Democrats are losing their favored status with South Asian voters. However, there is a real risk that the burgeoning alliance between Trump and authoritarian-right-wing Indian Prime Minister Modi will harm how South Asians are viewed by their neighbors. The Modi-Trump political rally in Houston this week may be an unfortunate turning point.
The neighbors in this case are bangladesh, pakistan and sri lanka.
The first two are entities born out of a genocidal cleansing of Hindus / Sikhs from the respective lands in 1947.
They are an absolute muslim majority entity which don’t have a pro-India history in the first place.
Both these lands have a long,sordid history of anti-Hindu genocides and pogroms, the peak of which was the 1971 genocide of 2.5 million Hindus in what is now Bangladesh, which created a stream of over 10 million refugees that year, over 85 to 90% of them Hindus, who only made up ~22 percent of the land known as bangladesh in 1971.
Then why would they change their opinion of the Indian land and Hindus with this expression of common ground between PM Modi and Donald Trump? There is no motive for them to do so, as they are already rabidly anti-Indian in their outlook.
That, they vote for a party which feigns pro-immigrant views for its electoral progress, is a mere coincidence.
This democratic leader then continues with standard democratic fare espoused by Bernie, whom this democratic leader unsurprisingly supports.
The most amazing piece of bigotry in this guy’s article lies in the lines below.
On August 5, 2019, India made a rare appearance on American news channels when Indian Prime Minister Narinder Modi stripped Muslim-majority Kashmir of all autonomy, eliminated democratic institutions, cut off the internet, and essentially turned the state into a vassal of the central government in New Delhi.
Since then, news coverage in the U.S. has been mostly negative and often referred to Modi’s status as a purveyor of bigotry and religious discrimination.
The move was widely condemned in the United States, including by South Asian American leaders.
In the subsequent six weeks, there have been regular news pieces describing human rights violations and suffering in Kashmir.
Why does he forget to mention the implications of removing Article 370, which the democrats ought to LOVE?
For example:
- The fact that a Hindu resident of the state of J&K would lose all rights to inheritance and ownership of fixed assets in Kashmir upon marrying an outsider ( non-Kashmiri Indian), but a kashmiri muslim woman marrying a pakistani wouldn’t, isn’t touched upon.
- Neither does he mention the fact that several hundred thousand lower caste Hindus couldn’t gain permanent employee status under the kashmiri governments from 1947 till 4 August 2019, rendering them “vassals” of the islamic state of kashmir, purely due to Article 370.
The second paragraph above [and below] deserves a special applause.
Since then, news coverage in the U.S. has been mostly negative and often referred to Modi’s status as a purveyor of bigotry and religious discrimination.
Narendra Modi has given India the most peaceful governance in recent times.
This is backed by data which American media houses themselves use, but unfortunately, they also present with inaccurate conclusions based upon selective pickings.
A case in point is this article by Washington Post, which references a data set by the Indian government and presents a contrarian conclusion.
This article states the following in its 2nd paragraph.
“Reports of religious-based hate-crime cases have spiked in India since the pro-Hindu nationalist government of Narendra Modi came to power in 2014, according to new data from IndiaSpend, which tracks reports of violence in English-language media. The data shows that Muslims are overwhelmingly the victims and Hindus the perpetrators of the cases reported.”
And it goes on to present a few interesting statistics.
The government of India does not record religious-based hate crimes as separate offenses and so does not provide data on the category. The government does monitor incidents of communal violence — such as riots between religious communities — and has data that shows such incidents rose 28 percent between 2014 and 2017.
But such narratives belie all facts.
Contrasted with previous governments of the UPA, there is a DOWNSWING in violence.
The figures for 2008, when the INC was in power are 943 incidents, 167 deaths, 2354 injuries.
Compared to 2014, the 2008 stats are 46% higher in terms of # of incidents, 78% in terms of deaths, and 23% higher in terms of injuries.
This non-existential upsurge in communal rhetoric is further exposed by a decadal plot of statistics on such violence.
His communal diatribe doesn’t stop right there. This man further says:
This week, Houston’s largest arena will be the site of a fifty thousand attendee political rally headlined by PM Modi and President Donald Trump. The sight of such a large and unique crowd is sure to be at the top of every national news broadcast, a political website, and insider podcast.
Americans will see a rabid crowd of brown faces cheering two leaders, an American bigot and an Indian bigot, both with virulent anti-Muslim policies that push the limits of their respective national institutions.
Although there are sure to be protestors from across the political and ethnic spectrum, the lasting image in the U.S. will be of two horrid leaders being hailed by South Asians.
Despite the potential damage of these images, there is cause for hope in the South Asian political community.
The progressive movement across the country has a growing list of South Asians in leadership positions that are a counterweight to the Trump-Modi disaster. From Congressman Ro Khanna (Vice-Chair of the Bernie Sanders campaign) and Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal (sponsor of the Medicare For All Bill) to Varshini Prakash (Executive Director of the Sunrise Movement) and Joseph Geevarghese (Executive Director of Our Revolution), there is a deep bench that is changing minds and leading political conversations.
Why does this man’s list of progressive Americans across the country only include democrats and pro-democrats?
Ex: Varshini Prakash’s sunrise movement has openly aligned with democrats in the past.
Ro-Khanna and Pramila Jayapal are 2 democrat politicians and Joseph Geevarghese has also advocated Bernie as the best alternative to Trump.
Not content with labelling his colleagues as the only progressives in the entire United States of America, he continues disparaging India and Hindus.
These two opposing forces within the South Asian American community, religious nationalism versus American progressivism, are rapidly drawing battle lines in the United States with ‘Hindutva’ as the dominating point of dispute.
As I have discussed elsewhere, Hindutva is a fascist and supremacist movement similar to white supremacist movements in the U.S. It mobilizes around a virulent religious ethnonationalism, holding that India is a homeland for only Hindus and using violence to intimidate compliance around its economic and political policies.
Indian Prime Minister Modi, his political party (BJP), and its cultural counterpart organizations (RSS, VHP, etc.) have won elections by pairing violent Hindutva political rhetoric with virtual impunity for those that engage in the rape, torture, murder and oppression of Indian Christians, Muslims, Sikhs, Buddhists, Ravidassias, and Hindu Dalits.
(See the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom Reports for detail.) The sad truth is that there is a significant American contingent of South Asians that hypocritically support bigotry-fueled Hindutva for India while asserting liberal human rights protections in the U.S.
India was never meant to be a Hindu-only land, but it was treated as such by muslims and Britishers [ dare I say christians] who chopped this nation into 3 pieces in 1947.
Not content with this, both the communities continued attacking Hindus throughout the length and breadth of this country since India’s “independence”.
This is in addition to the mass proselytization and secessionist programs initiated by missionaries in north-eastern India between 1930 and 1950, which can be heard from an American missionary’s mouth himself.
The 2nd hand treatment of India by muslims and christians speaks volumes about their concern for this nation, but this democrat won’t bother.
Seems as if anti-Hindu bigotry is kosher for this Sikh man.
Such “progressives” equate muslims and christians of India with the blacks of America, ignoring absolutely polar-opposite power enjoyed and “received” by either community in their respective lands.
This democrat party leader forgets to mention the fact that the muslims of kashmir colluded with pakistani origin terrorists to murder over 2000 Hindu community leaders and around 100 secular muslims.
The end result was the exodus of 400,000 Hindus from Kashmir in 1990, reducing a thriving population to a mere 1000 odd families in Kashmir as of today.
Is it due to his party pandering to the muslim vote-banks, who are more likely to vote for the (seemingly) pro-immigrant democrats as they (muslims) vote in blocs?
Can it be because the democratic party leadership panders to muslims, even to the extent of whitewashing their crimes of genocide and jihad against non-muslims?
If you are a Bernie Lover, the answer is a strong YES.
Bernie quotes in an article in the houston chronicle today the following.
Read the line in bold twice:
The Modi-Trump rally is happening at a moment when the state of Kashmir remains under lockdown. In early August, Modi’s government unilaterally revoked Kashmir’s longstanding autonomy, has cracked down on dissent, jailed political leaders and instituted a communications blackout.
To be clear, Pakistan has also often played a bad role in Kashmir.
But I believe the U.S. president must speak clearly in support of international humanitarian law and in support of a UN-backed peaceful resolution between India and Pakistan that respects the will of the Kashmiri people.
Unfortunately, Trump has chosen to abandon the United States’ global leadership role.
He is remaining silent on the Kashmir crisis while planning to hold a public rally with India’s prime minister.
pakistan : a country which
1. Shortly after India’s independence, sent its army and tribals to invade and capture Kashmir despite the ruler requesting India and pakistan for time to decide which country to align with.
Just a small sample of the pakistani savagery:
They turned a Sikh Gurudwara [ non-indics read: a Sikh temple] into a prison and butchered people there en-masse.
2. In 1965, sent its terrorists and army men in unison to invade kashmir and merge it with pakistan.
In the first two weeks of May 1999, several patrols were conducted in the Kaksar Langpa area of Kargil district to check whether the snow had retreated enough for the summer positions to be re-occupied.[6] Lt Saurabh Kalia was the first Indian army officer to observe and report large-scale intrusion of Pakistani Army and foreign mercenaries on the Indian side of the Line of Control (LoC) at Kargil. He assumed guard of “Bajrang Post” at 13,000–14,000 feet to check infiltration in the Kaksar area.[7]
On 15 May 1999 Lt Saurabh Kalia and five other soldiers — Sepoys Arjun Ram, Bhanwar Lal Bagaria, Bhika Ram, Moola Ram and Naresh Singh[8] of the 4 Jat Regiment had gone for a routine patrol of the Bajrang Post in the Kaksar sector in the rugged, treeless Ladakh mountains.
After a continuous cross fire with Pakistan armed forces from across the LOC, he and his troops ran out of ammunition. They were finally encircled by a platoon of Pakistani rangers and captured alive before Indian reinforcements could reach them.
No trace of the patrol was left, meanwhile Radio Skardu of Pakistan announced that Captain Saurabh Kalia had been captured by Pakistani troops.[4][9]
It was after this that India discovered hundreds of guerrillas had established fortified positions on the peaks of the hills deep inside the Indian side of the Line of control, with sophisticated equipment and supply lines back to Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir.[1]
Indian officials claim that, Lt Saurabh Kalia and his men were in captivity from 15 May 1999–7 June 1999 (over twenty-two days), and were subjected to torture as evident from injuries to their bodies when they were handed over by the Pakistani Army on 9 June 1999.[4]
Post-mortem examinations conducted by India, revealed that the Pakistanis had tortured their prisoners by:
burning their bodies with cigarettes,
piercing the ear-drums with hot rods,
puncturing eyes before removing them,
breaking most of their teeth and bones,
fracturing their skulls,
cutting the lips,
chipping of nose,
chopping off limbs and private organs of the soldiers,
and finally shooting them dead, as evidenced by bullet wounds to the temple.The post-mortem also confirmed the injuries were inflicted ante-mortem (before death).
So easily forgotten are the grisly burning of 19 Indian soldiers in their sleep in the Uri attack in 2016 and the suicide bombing murders of 40 Indian soldiers earlier this year in Pulwama.
Think this democrat stops there? HELL NO !!!
Modi-supporting South Asian Americans pushed the latter hashtag as part of a campaign to publicize the Modi rally.
However, it was quickly taken over by a coalition of social justice activists and organizations as they countered the whitewashed narrative with stories of persecution and oppression in India.
Although this tension has been simmering for some time, it appeared to boil over with the recent announcement that Trump will join Modi on the main stage.
Representative Ami Bera had been a long time and effective supporter of the Modi-led Indian government, despite the latter’s deplorable human rights records.
However, he is now one of the high profile South Asian Americans declining the invitation to the Modi-Trump rally. Representative Brad Sherman had publicly defended his decision to invite his colleagues to the event but even he reversed his position after hearing from constituents. The list of Democrat elected official attendees appears to be shrinking by the hour.
Although the South Asian American community continues to be solidly Democratic and the rejection of the Modi-Trump rally by elected officials is a good sign, the truth remains that the upcoming media narrative is likely to damage the reputation of the South Asian American community. It is never helpful for any community to fill a stadium in honor and appreciation of bigots, foreign or domestic.
So, the right to represent Indians abroad remains with the Indian who has all the following qualities:
- Clueless about domestic politics of India.
- Fed news exclusively by their home nation
- Aligns with Hinduphobes like the democrats
- Speaks against “their own religion and/or country” while living in another land.
- Totally unaware of the crippling of Indian economy caused by the democrats OPENLY over the last 3 decades.
Do you know what is the icing on the cake which this article is:
This Sikh leader sitting in the “progressive” chair of the Californian democratic party quotes a virulently Hinduphobic and Sikh-phobic woman named Audrey Truschke who openly adores the islamic bigot and mass murderer of Hindus/Sikhs , the mughal emperor Aurangzeb.
The same man, who
Aurangzeb introduced the jizya tax to be paid by infidels in accordance with islamic ethics, demolished a massive number of Hindu temples and executed Maratha [non-Indics read: Hindu] Maratha king Sambhaji and the ninth Sikh guru Tegh Bahadur.
Imagine the audacity of this “progressive Sikh”. In order to please his political masters, he dares denigrate his community by endorsing a known bigot like audrey truschke.
Not yet done, his article also quotes Ashok Swain, a Swedish far-leftist Hinduphobe who uses tropes similar to the democratic machinery.
In an article authored not too long ago, he [swain] subtly endorsed Sikh secession from India while whitewashing pakistan’s role altogether.
N: Let us ask you one final question on geopolitical issues. BJP party has claimed that the pro-independence movement in Punjab and abroad is being funded, or at least supported, by Pakistan, an allegation that the party also extends to the issue of Kashmir. To what extent do you believe this could be a part of the whole picture? And more broadly speaking: what capacity could have an independent Punjabi state to survive and sustain itself, given the fact that it would be sandwiched between Pakistan and India? Wouldn’t it be still quite dependent on one or both of those powerful neighbors?
A. S.: Pakistan’s role in Punjab issue is much more limited than compared to its role in Kashmir. Punjab independence project has been primarily a diaspora initiative. There has been some support from Pakistan to Punjab separatists, but it has not been that important. Even though, it is also true that in recent months Pakistan has been trying to woo Sikhs in India by allowing them to visit a Sikh holy site inside Pakistan by creating a special corridor.
Whether Punjab as an independent state will survive or not — if Nepal and Bhutan can survive as independent states, why not Punjab?
That, ladies and gentlemen, is the democratic party and it’s leadership for you.
