It Happened Before

This phenomenon, in which Sikh religious sensibility is calculatedly outraged and their human dignity cruelly injured, has its historical antecedents in this part of the world. It was in the late twenties of this century that a cultural ancestor of the present anti-Sikh Hindu urban crust wrote and published a small book, purporting to be a research-paper in history, under the title of Rangila Rasul : 'Mohammad, the pleasure loving Prophet'. The matrimonial history of this God-intoxicated and world-shaking Prophet was recounted in this booklet in minute details supported by authoritative Muslim writings, and by slants and twists well familiar to history writers, the conclusion was drawn and spelt-out that Mohammad was a lascivious, lecherous man. The booklet was concluded with the mocking epilogue: Bol Rangila Rasul ki jai. Anybody who knows anything about Islam and Muslim sensitiveness and sensibility knows that it is basic to them that while "liberties with God are permissible, not so with Mohammad" : ba khuda diwana bash, wa, ba Mohammad hoshiar. The entire Muslim world of India writhed in anguish at this gross insult to and attack on the Muslim community but they were laughed at and I chided by the citified Hindu Press of Lahore, for being primitive, medieval, religious fanatics, unreformed by sophistication and modern liberal education that teaches objective, critical thinking and dispassionate judgements.

To assuage Muslim feelings the British authorities in Punjab, however. prosecuted in a law-court the publisher of the offensive booklet, under Section 295 of the Indian Panel Code, the only statutory provision available in relation to insults to religion. This provision makes it an offence punishable with imprisonment for two years, 'to injure or defile a place of worship or any object held sacred by any class of persons, with the intention of insulting the religion' of others. The publisher was convicted in the lower court but the Lahore High Court acquitted him, for good reasons, because in the Rangila Rasul, neither a place of worship nor a sacred object had been defiled or injured. The book had maliciously insulted the Muslim religion and outraged the religious feelings of Muslims. It was at this stage that a wailing dirge was often heard in the towns of Punjab during nocturnal stillnesses.

"O, my Master, the Messenger of God, My agony is as great as was yours, When they persecuted you to flee from Mecca to Medina. Give me a place of refuge similar to the one God gave to you. My cruel neighbours would not let me live in peace in India."

In their utter anguish and unredeemed despair the Indian Muslims felt impotent in their rage and consequently a Muslim, 'Ilm Din, by name, murdered the publisher of the offensive booklet in broad day light, for, the real author had remained anonymous. 'I1m Din was convicted and hanged to death for wilful murder under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code. The funeral procession of '11m Din was a huge event, led by no less a person than Sir Mohammad Iqbal, 'the Poet of the East' and Maulana Zafar Ali, 'the Father of Urdu Journalism' to demonstrate the magnitude of injury felt by the entire body of Indian Muslims. This, however, gave rise to a general impression in the minds of those who perversely believe that to insult the religion and to outrage the religious sentiments of a fellow citizen is a fundamental right of 'freedom of expression' and 'liberty of conscience, and that such a fundamental right must be repeatedly asserted. Soon after, somebody in the West Punjab, named a pack-donkey of his, as Mohammad. This was no offence under the law as the High Court Judgement in the Rangila Rasul case had shown. An outraged Muslim murdered the owner of this pack-donkey and was hanged to death by the judicial courts. Muslims were in deep, desperate despair. Not long after, another protagonist of 'freedom of expression' and 'liberty of conscience' named his dog as, Ahmad, a proper name of the Prophet of Islam. A Muslim murdered this owner of the dog also for which he paid with his life on the scaffold. At this stage the authorities of the British Raj took notice of the gravity of the situation and placed a new provision of law on the statute, as 295-A Indian Penal Code, which, as it stands, reads:

"Whoever with deliberate and malicious intention of outraging the religious feelings of any class of citizens of India, by words, either spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representation or otherwise insults or attempts to insult the religion or the religious beliefs of that class, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to three years, or with fine, or with both."

This offence under Section 295 A I.P.C. when committed, is not 'cognisable', that is, neither a police officer on duty, nor a private citizen, can initiate proceedings against the offender; only the State may, in its discretion, do so. But under Section 10 (1) of the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1932, the State Government may declare by notification that this offence shall be cognisable when committed in an area, specified. Since such offences, then, altogether stopped in British India, no notification under Section 10 (1) of the Criminal Law Amendment Act became necessary till 1947. But the process of events that led to bloody communal riots in various parts of India till the creation of India and Pakistan and the partition of the country itself, with tragic losses in men, money and property, is directly and rightly traceable to the attitudes of a section of the majority community exemplified in the matter of Rangila Rasul and the names given to a donkey and a dog. That is how Pakistan was conceived, born and established through bloodshed, and all other explanations are spurious and off the mark.