The consequences of the Partition which "disrupted" and "ruptured" the age-old syncretic culture of India are felt even today and people who took that decision are "extremely guilty" for what is happening in the country now, noted author-journalist Saeed Naqvi said today.
He said the conflict came on the political scale only after the first War of Independence in 1857.
"Entire syncretic experience of India is a social experience...It was disrupted and ruptured by politics. The partition of 1947 created conditions for its rupturing," Naqvi said.
"What we see today is a consequence of that decision and therefore everybody who was involved in 1947 is extremely guilty and the guilt of what is going on in the country must be laid at their doors," he said.
Naqvi was in conversation with British-Pakistani novelist Qaisra Shahraz, activist-writer Sadia Dehlvi, and author Tabish Khair at a session titled, "Being the Other" at a session at the ongoing Jaipur Literature Festival here.
He also said engaging with Pakistan was important to find a solution to the Kashmir issue.
"In 1947 we trapped ourselves in a triangle, the triangle of New Delhi-Srinagar, India-Pakistan and Hindu-Muslim, one complex of issues. If anyone says he is charging to Srinagar to solve the Kashmir issues, is lying to himself, is lying to you, is lying to the Kashmiris, and is lying to Indians and to the Pakistanis as well.
"Unless you bring Pakistan in, that issue cannot be solved. The minute you bring Pakistan in, the Hindu-Muslim temperature comes up, and the minute that happens, the pausing of Hindu consolidation is a big concern, so we are in that trap. Unless we take ourselves out, we will not be able to get out of it," Naqvi said.
Talking about the growing radicalisation in the West,
particularly among the younger generation, Khair said it was a prevailing sense of excessive pride and self-confidence, that contributes to such extreme feelings.
"There is a lot of hubris in the West and when girls and boys grow in such cultures they feel 'impoverished' which contributes to radicalisation," he said.
According to Shahraz, Muslims in the west are sandwiched between ISIS and islamophobia, with the religion being "demonised", ever more since the World Trade Centre in New York was attacked in 2001.
"It has been a nightmare for Muslims to live in the West since 9/11. We are stuck between ISIS on the one side and islamophobia on the other. Islam has been hijacked. It has been demonised," Qaisra Shahraz said.
Dehlvi felt that it was important for Muslims to reclaim the "ground of moderation" that is shaking now, and said sufism was one of the ways out.
"Sufism represents the dynamism of Islam. There is so much that has been exchanged between yogis and sufis, which was beyond politics," she said.
Noting that there are many interpretations of Islam, Dehlvi said every religion has some people who constitute the "fundamentalists".
"Extremist elements have hijacked Islam. There are reasons for it. Some are internal and some are external. I think it is the petrodollars that has been the biggest curse. It is ripping apart cultures. And what they are doing are rejecting 1400 years of scholarship, philosophy, culture, local traditions," she said.
