Persecution of Hindus
Encyclopedia
Persecution of Hindus refers to the religious persecution
inflicted upon Hindu
s. Hindus have been historically persecuted during Islam
ic rule of the Indian subcontinent
and during the Goa Inquisition
. In modern times, Hindus in the Muslim-majority regions of Kashmir
, Pakistan
and Bangladesh
have also suffered persecution.
The Muslim conquest of the Indian subcontinent led to widespread carnage because Muslims regarded the Hindus as infidels
and therefore slaughtered and converted millions of Hindus. Will Durant
argued in his 1935 book The Story of Civilization: Our Oriental Heritage (page 459):
There is no official estimate of the total death toll of Hindus at the hands of Muslims.
As Braudel put it:
"The levies it had to pay were so crushing that one catastrophic harvest was enough to unleash famines and epidemics capable of killing a million people at a time. Appalling poverty was the constant counterpart of the conquerors' opulence."
The backward castes of Hinduism suffered worst. Monarchs (belonging to backward castes) such as Khusrau Bhangi Khan, Hemchandra and Garha-Katanga were knocked off their throne and executed. Backward caste saints like Namadeva were arrested, while women like Kanhopatra
were forced to commit suicide. Ghisadis have an “Urdu” title.
Prof. K.S. Lal, suggests a calculation in his book Growth of Muslim Population in Medieval India
which estimates that between the years 1000 AD and 1500 AD the population of Hindus decreased by 80 million.
Even those Hindus who converted to Islam were not immune from persecution, which was illustrated by the Muslim Caste System
in India as established by Ziauddin al-Barani in the Fatawa-i Jahandari. where they were regarded as "Ajlaf" caste and subjected to severe discrimination by the "Ashraf" castes.
governor of Damascus
, Hajjaj responded to a casus belli
provided by the kidnapping of Muslim women and treasures by pirates off the coast of Debal
, by mobilizing an expedition of 6,000 cavalry under Muhammad bin-Qasim in 712 CE. Records from the campaign recorded in the Chach Nama
record temple demolitions, and mass executions of resisting Sindh
i forces and the enslavement of their dependents. This action was particularly extensive in Debal
, of which Qasim is reported to have been under orders to make an example of while freeing both the captured women and the prisoners of a previous failed expedition. Bin Qasim then enlisted the support of the local Jat
, Meds
and Bhutto
tribes and began the process of subduing and conquering the countryside. The capture of towns was also usually accomplished by means of a treaty with a party from among his "enemy", who were then extended special privileges and material rewards. However, his superior Hajjaj reportedly objected to his method by saying that it would make him look weak and advocated a more hardline military strategy:
In a subsequent communication, Hajjaj reiterated that all able-bodied men were to be killed, and that their underage sons and daughters were to be imprisoned and retained as hostages. Qasim obeyed, and on his arrival at the town of Brahminabad massacred between 6,000 and 16,000 of the defending forces.
The historian, Upendra Thakur records the persecution of Hindus and Buddhists:
Alberuni in his India writes about the famous temple of Multan
:
A famous idol of theirs was that of Multan, dedicated to the sun, .. When Muhammad Ibn Alkasim Ibn Almunabbih, conquered Multan, he inquired how the town had become so very flourishing and so many treasures had there been accumulated, and then he found out that this idol was the cause, for there came pilgrims from all sides to visit it. Therefore he thought to build a mosque at the same place where the temple once stood. When then the Karmatians occupied Multan, Jalam Ibn Shaiban, the usurper, broke the idol into pieces and killed its priests. .. When afterwards the blessed Prince Mahmud swept away their rule from those countries, he made again the old mosque the place of the Friday-worship.
Mahmud, according to several contemporary accounts, considered himself a Ghazi
who waged jihad
on the Hindus. His plunder of Hindu temples and centers of learning is noted later in the article. Al-Biruni
writes:
Various historical sources such as Martin Ewans, E.J. Brill and Farishta have recorded the introduction of Islam to Kabul and other parts of Afghanistan to the invasions of Mahmud of Ghazna
Destruction of Hindu Temples: The later invasions of Mahmud were specifically directed to temple towns as Indian temples were depositories of great wealth and the economic and ideological centers of gravity for the Hindus. Destroying them would destroy the will power of the Hindus attacking the Empire since Mahmud never kept a permanent presence in the Subcontinent; Nagarkot, Thanesar, Mathura, Kanauj, Kalinjar and Somnath were all thus raided. Mahmud's armies stripped the temples of their wealth and then destroyed them at, Maheshwar, Jwalamukhi, Narunkot and Dwarka. During the period of Mahmud invasion, the Sindhi Swarankar Community and other Hindus who escaped conversion fled from Sindh to escape sectarian violence.
Mahmud of Ghazni
destroyed important Hindu shrine- Krishna Janmabhoomi Temple (known as Kesava Deo Temple
) in 1017 AD along with several other Hindu and Buddhist temples in the holy city of Mathura.
Mahmud of Ghazni destroyed and looted another sacred temple of Hindus- Somnath Temple in 1025 AD killing over 50,000 people who tried to defend it.The defenders included the 90-year-old clan leader Ghogha Rana. Ghazni personally broke the gilded lingam to pieces. He took them back to his homeland and placed them in the steps leading to the newly built Jamiah Masjid, so that they would be stepped upon by those going to the mosque to pray.
The following extract is from “Wonders of Things Created, and marvels of Things Existing” by Asaru-L- Bilad, a 13th century Arab geographer
. It contains the description of Somnath temple and its destruction:
(modern Aligarh), Kalinjar and Varanasi. According to Hasan Nizami's Taj-ul-Maasir, 20000 Hindu prisoners were slaughtered and their heads offered to crows. Hasan Nizami's Taj-ul-Maasir records that in Kol, "those of the horizon who were wise and acute were converted to Islam, but those who stood by their ancestoral faith were slain with the sword. 20,000 prisoners were taken and made slaves. Three bastions were raised as high as heaven with their heads and their carcases became food for the beasts of prey." In Kalinjar "50,000 prisoners were taken as slaves." Similarly, in Varnasi or Kasi (Benaras) :Kamil-ut-Tawarikh of Ibn Asir records, "The slaughter of Hindus (at Varanasi) was immense; none were spared except women and children,(who were taken into slavery) and the carnage of men went on until the earth was weary.
Muhammad Ghori destroyed a sacred Hindu shrine- Kashi Vishwanath Temple along with other temples of Varanasi
during his raid in 1194. He had the Hindu temples of Ajmer
demolished and ordered the construction of mosques and Quran schools on their ruins. His armies destroyed many Buddhist structures, including the great Buddhist university of Nalanda
.
: تیمور - Tēmōr, "iron
") (1336 – February 1405), known in the West as Tamerlane, was a 14th century warlord
of Turco-Mongol
descent, conqueror of much of western and central Asia, and founder of the Timurid Empire and Timurid dynasty
(1370–1405) in Central Asia
, which survived in some form until 1857. Perhaps, he is more commonly known by his pejorative Persian name Timur-e Lang which translates to Timur the Lame, as he was lame after sustaining an injury to the leg in battle.
Informed about civil war in India, Timur
began a trek starting in 1397 to invade the territory of the reigning Sultan
Nasir-u Din Mehmud of the Tughlaq Dynasty in the north Indian city of Delhi
.
Timur crossed the Indus River
at Attock
on September 24. The capture of towns and villages was often followed by the massacre of their inhabitants and the raping of their women, as well as pillaging to support his massive army. Timur wrote many times in his memoirs of his specific disdain for the 'idolatrous' Hindu
s, although he also waged war against Muslim Indians during his campaign.
Timur's invasion did not go unopposed and he did meet some resistance during his march to Delhi, most notably by the Sarv Khap coalition in northern India, and the Governor
of Meerut. Although impressed and momentarily stalled by the valour of Ilyaas Awan, Timur was able to continue his relentless approach to Delhi, arriving in 1398 to combat the armies of Sultan Mehmud, already weakened by an internal battle for ascension within the royal family.
The Sultan's army was easily defeated on December 17, 1398. Timur entered Delhi and the city was sacked, destroyed, and left in ruins. Before the battle for Delhi, Timur executed more than 100,000 captives.
Timur himself recorded the invasions in his memoirs, collectively known as Tuzk-i-Timuri. In them, he vividly described the massacre at Delhi
:
According to Malfuzat-i-Timuri, Timur targeted Hindus. In his own words, "Excepting the quarter of the saiyids, the 'ulama and the other Musalmans [sic], the whole city was sacked". In his descriptions of the Loni massacre he wrote, "..Next day I gave orders that the Musalman prisoners should be separated and saved."
During the ransacking of Delhi, almost all inhabitants not killed were captured and enslaved.
Timur left Delhi in approximately January 1399. In April he had returned to his own capital beyond the Oxus (Amu Darya). Immense quantities of spoils were taken from India. According to Ruy Gonzáles de Clavijo
, 90 captured elephants were employed merely to carry precious stones looted from his conquest, so as to erect a mosque
at Samarkand — what historians today believe is the enormous Bibi-Khanym Mosque
. Ironically, the mosque was constructed too quickly and suffered greatly from disrepair within a few decades of its construction.
. The first mosque built in Delhi, the "Quwwat al-Islam" was built after the demolition of the Hindu temple built previously by Prithvi Raj and certain parts of the temple were left outside the mosque proper. This pattern of iconoclasm was common during his reign.
Nizami writes about Aibak's invasion of Ajmer that after Raja Karan was defeated and forced to flee, “fifty thousand infidels were dispatched to hell by the sword” and “more than twenty thousand slaves, and cattle beyond all calculation fell into the hands of the victors”.
The city was sacked, its temples demolished, and its palaces plundered. On his return to Ajmer, Aibak destroyed the Sanskrit College of Visaladeva, and laid the foundations of a mosque which came to be known as ‘Adhai Din ka Jhompada’.
Conquest of Kalinjar in 1202 AD was Aibak’s crowning achievement. Nizami concludes :
, conquered and subjugated the Hindu pilgrimage site Varanasi
in the 11th century and he continued the destruction of Hindu temples and idols that had begun during the first attack in 1194.
In 1235, Iltutmish
sacked Ujjain and destroyed its temples including the Mahakala Temple.
ordered massacre of Hindu population, 30000 Hindu civilians were massacred in a single day and Hindu temples were demolished including the famous Kalika Mata Temple
which was built by Bappa Rawal in 8th century.
Somnath Temple was destroyed in 1300 CE by Allaudin Khilji who sent his general, Alaf Khan, to pillage Somnath.
The Jami Masjid was built by Khan-I-Azam Ulugh Khan (Muhammad Bin Tughlaq), who suppressed the wretched infidels. He eradicated the idolatrous houses and mine of infidelity, along with the idols with the edge of the sword, and made ready this edifice. He made its walls and doors out of the idols; the back of every stone became the place for prostration of the believer.
was the third ruler of the Tughlaq dynasty of the Delhi Sultanate. The "Tarikh-i-Firuz Shah" is a historical record written during his reign that attests to the systematic persecution of Hindus under his rule. In particular, it records atrocities committed against Hindu Brahmin priests who refused to convert to Islam:
Under his rule, Hindus who were forced to pay the mandatory Jizya
tax were recorded as infidels, their communities monitored and, if they violated Imperial ordinances and built temples, they were destroyed. In particular, an incident in the village of Gohana in Haryana
was recorded in the "Insha-i-Mahry" (another historical record written by Amud Din Abdullah bin Mahru) where Hindus had erected a deity and were arrested, brought to the palace and executed en-masse.
In 1230, the Hindu King of Orissa
Anangabhima III consolidated his rule and proclaimed that an attack on Orissa constituted an attack on the king's god. A sign of Anangabhima's determination to protect Hindu culture is the fact that he named is new capital in Cuttack “Abhinava Varanasi.” His anxieties about further Muslim advances in Orissa proved to be well founded.
.
The Mughal Empire
was marked by periods of tolerance of non-Muslims, such as Hindus and Sikhs, as well as periods of violent oppression and persecution of those people.
ordered massacres of 'infidel' Hindus. He described his campaign against the Hindus as 'jihad
'. In Bajaur (Pakistan’s NWFP) , he describes a general massacre of the enemies of Islam and made a tower of heads. He describes his battle against Rana Sanga as a holy war. About the battle he wrote : “These are the unbelievers, the wicked.” At Agra, “mounds were made of the bodies of the slain, pillars of their heads.” (‘Barburnama’,Babur’s memoirs, Bostom p 651-3). In 1528 he attacked Kanauj, massacred Hindus and enslaved many. Regarding Hindu captives his memoirs state : “Those who were brought in alive (having surrendered) were ordered beheaded, after which a tower of skulls was erected in the camp” (Sookdheo p 264).
Hindu nationalists claim that Babur destroyed the Ram Mandir
in Ayodhya, located at the birthplace of Rama
, and built the Babri Masjid on the holy site, which has since been a source of tension between the Hindu and Muslim communities. ASI report confirmed that there existed a Hindu temple at the site of Babri Masjid.
Writer Fernand Braudel wrote in A History of Civilizations (Penguin 1988/1963, p.232-236), Islamic rule in India as a "colonial experiment" was "extremely violent", and "the Muslims could not rule the country except by systematic terror. Cruelty was the norm -- burnings, summary executions, crucifixions or impalements, inventive tortures. Hindu temples were destroyed to make way for mosques. On occasion there were forced conversions. If ever there were an uprising, it was instantly and savagely repressed: houses were burned, the countryside was laid waste, men were slaughtered and women were taken as slaves."
invaded north-India three times (1757, 1760, 1761) in response to such requests and aimed to destroy Maratha resistance. He slaughtered, plundered and enslaved thousands of Hindus. On his way back in 1757, he demolished the sacred Sikh shrine Harmandir Sahib
in Amritsar and filled its sacred pool with the blood of slaughtered cows.
When returning home after his last invasion, Durrani was taking about 2200 Hindu women and girls as captives. They were to be sold into slavery in Afghanistan. On the way they were to be used by the Afghan soldiers to satisfy their lust. However Sikhs attacked his camp in Goindwal and freed all the captives.
, Captivity of Kodavas at Seringapatam)
The attitudes of Muslim ruler Tippu Sultan have been criticized as anti-Hindu. In the first part of his reign in particular he appears to have been notably more aggressive and religiously doctrinaire than his father, Haidar Ali. There are some historians who claim that Tippu Sultan was a religious persecutor of Hindus.
C. K. Kareem also notes that Tippu Sultan issued an edict for the destruction of Hindu temples in Kerala
.
Historian Hayavadana C. Rao wrote about Tippu in his encyclopaedic work on the History of Mysore. He asserted that Tippu's "religious fanaticism and the excesses committed in the name of religion, both in Mysore and in the provinces, stand condemned for all time. His bigotry, indeed, was so great that it precluded all ideas of toleration". He further asserts that the acts of Tippu that were constructive towards Hindus were largely political and ostentatious rather than an indication of genuine tolerance.
Hindu groups revile Tipu Sultan
as a bigot who massacred Hindus. He was known to carry out forced conversions of Hindus and Christians.. During Tipu Sultan
's invasion of Malabar
in the late 18th century, he forcefully converted over 400,000 Hindus to Islam.
Tipu sent a letter on January 19, 1790 to Budruz Zuman Khan. It says:
According to the Malabar Manual of William Logan, Thrichambaram and Thalipparampu temples in Chirackal Taluk, Thiruvangatu Temple (Brass Pagoda) in Tellicherry, and Ponmeri Temple near Badakara were all destroyed by the Mysore forces of Tipu Sultan. The Malabar Manual mention that the Maniyoor mosque was once a Hindu temple. The local belief is that it was converted to a mosque during the days of Mysore rule of Tipu Sultan.
Hindus were treated as second class citizens within Hyderabad state and they were severely discriminated against, despite the vast majority of the population being Hindu. The 1941 census estimated the population of Hyderabad to be 16.34 million. Over 85% of the populace were Hindus with Muslims accounting for about 12%. Hyderabad was also a multi-lingual state consisting of peoples speaking Telugu (48.2%), Marathi (26.4%), Kannada (12.3%) and Urdu (10.3%). Nonetheless, the number of Hindus in government positions was disproportionately small. Of 1765 officers, 1268 were Muslims, 421 were Hindus, and 121 were "Others" (presumably British Christians, Parsis and Sikhs). Of the officials drawing pay between Rs.600-1200 pm, 59 were Muslims, 38 were "Others", and a mere 5 were Hindus. The Nizam and his nobles, who were mostly Muslims, owned 40% of the total land in the kingdom.
In 1947; Nizam, the ruler of Hyderabad refused to merge his kingdom with India. For the independence of the Islamic state of Hyderabad
and to resist Indian integration, All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen
, the then dominating political party persecuted Hindus and their 1,50,000 cadre strong militant
wing named Razakars killed a number of Hindus under the leadership of Qasim Rizwi.
temples in India
during the Islamic conquest of India occurred from the beginning of Muslim conquest until the end the Mughal Empire
throughout the Indian subcontinent
.
In his book "Hindu Temples - What Happened to Them
", Sita Ram Goel included a list of 2000 mosques that it is claimed were built on Hindu temples. The second volume of the book excerpts from medieval histories and chronicles and from inscriptions concerning the destruction of Hindu, Jain and Buddhist temples.
In Indonesia
, where popular conversion from Hinduism to Islam was more voluntary and peaceful, it is believed that the minaret
of the Menara Kudus Mosque
, in Java, was originally part of a Hindu temple.
The Goa Inquisition
, was established in 1560 by Portuguese missionaries. It was aimed primarily at Hindus and wayward new converts and by the time it was suppressed in 1774, the inquisition had had thousands of Hindus tortured and executed by burning. The British East India Company
engaged in a covert and well-financed campaign of evangelical
conversions in the 19th century. While officially discouraging conversions, officers of the Company routinely converted Sepoys to Christianity, often by force. This was one of the factors that led to the First Indian War of Independence
.
What makes matters worse is that ruling political parties often subscribe to ideologies which are inherently hostile or prejudiced towards Hinduism. Thus, Hindu temples and institutes live under constant threat of ideologically motivated government take-over and subsequent destruction. For instance, State of Tamil Nadu is ruled by Dravidian parties for over two decades. Dravidian ideology believes in discredited racial theory of Aryan Invasion. It is openly anti Shri Ram, anti Sanskrit and anti Brahmin. Ruling ideology has a history of publicly issuing threats and has carried out those threats in many instances. At some junctures, interpretation of the laws has also disadvantaged Hindus
Many organizations feel that Hindu label is a liability. It exposes them to ideologically inspired attacks, places them at a financial disadvantage and paves way for government confiscation. As a result, several entities like Rama-Krishna Mission, Arya Samaj, etc. have filed law-suits and done intense lobbying to declare them self a non-Hindu minority religion. For Instance, in west Bengal, Rama Krishna Mission whose colleges and schools were in danger of hostile take-over by Marxist government petitioned the courts to have their organization and movement declared a non-Hindu minority religion.
Hindus from other countries hoping to come to India have also been treated unfavorably by the Indian government
Recently the issue of Love Jihad
created huge controversy in Southern India, although similar incidents were ignored in Northern India.
Kashmiri militants have engaged in attacks on Hindu pilgrims in both Kashmir and neighboring Jammu
. Kashmiri militants have attacked Hindus in the region, as well as moderate Muslims suspected of siding with India. Kashmiri Pandit
Hindus, who have been residents of Kashmir
for centuries, have been ethnically cleansed from Kashmir by Islamic militants. In particular, the Wandhama Massacre
in 1998 was an incident in which 24 Kashmiri Hindus were gunned down by Islamists disguised as Indian soldiers. In 1998 Prankote massacre
, 26 Kashmiri Hindus were beheaded by Islamist militants after their denial of converting into Islam. Many Kashmiri Hindus have been killed and thousands of children orphaned over the course of the conflict in Kashmir.
(See: Kashmiri Pandits)
In Northeastern India, especially in Nagaland
, Hindus are not able to celebrate Durga Puja
and other essential festivals due to harassment and killing by Christian terrorist groups. In Tripura, the NLFT, "National Liberation Front of Tripura", has targeted Swamis and temples for attacks. They are known to have forcefully converted Hindus to Christianity. The Baptist
Church of Tripura is alleged to have supplied the NLFT with arms and financial support and to have encouraged the murder of Hindus, particularly infants.
In Assam
, members of the primarily Christian Hmar ethnic group have placed bloodstained crosses in temples and forced Hindus to convert at gunpoint.
The period of insurgency in Punjab around Operation Bluestar saw clashes of the Sikh militants with the police, as well as with the Hindu-Nirankari groups resulting in many Hindu deaths. In 1987, 38 Hindus were pulled out of a bus and shot, near Lalru in Punjab by Sikh militants. On June 15 1991, Sikh militants stormed two passenger trains in Punjab state, raking them with indiscriminate machine-gun fire and killing at least 110 people, most victims were Hindus. In two decades of Sikh militancy, thousands of Hindus were massacred.
Kerala
is a Hindu majority state but with the most slim majority in India. Kerala has witnessed many riots and rebellions against Hindus throughout it history and more so in independent India; notably the Marad Massacre
. In 1921 Mappila riots
, 21000 Hindus were butchered and over 1 lakh were made homeless by Muslims. Many Muslim organizations allegedly supported Love Jihad
where Muslim boys targeted non-Muslim young girls, especially Hindu girls to convert them to Islam by feigning love.
atrocities in Bangladesh, a topic that many Indians and Indian governments over the years have preferred not to acknowledge. Such atrocities, including targeted attacks against temples, open theft of Hindu property, and rape
of young Hindu women and enticements to convert to Islam
, have increased sharply in recent years after the Jamat-e-Islami joined the coalition government led by the Bangladesh National Party.
Bangladesh has had a troublesome history of persecution of Hindus as well. A US-based human rights organisation, Refugees International, has claimed that religious minorities, especially Hindus, still face discrimination in Bangladesh.
The government of Bangladesh, a nationalist party openly calls for ‘Talibanisation’ of the state. However, the prospect of actually "Talibanizing" the state is regarded as a remote possibility, since Bangladeshi Islamic society is generally more progressive than the extremist Taliban of Afghanistan. Political scholars conclude that while the Islamization of Bangladesh is real, the country is not on the brink of being Talibanized. In 1971 at the time of the liberation of Bangladesh from East Pakistan, the Hindu population accounted for 15% of the total population. Thirty years on, it is now estimated at just 10.5%. The ‘Vested Property Act’ previously named the ‘Enemy Property Act’ has seen up to 40% of Hindu land snatched away forcibly. Since this government has come into power, of all the rape crimes registered in Bangladesh, 98% have been registered by Hindu women. Hindu temples in Bangladesh have also been vandalised. The United States Congressional Caucus on India has condemned these atrocities.
Bangladeshi feminist Taslima Nasrin
's 1993 novel Lajja
deals with the anti-Hindu riots and anti-secular sentiment in Bangladesh in the wake of the destruction of the Babri Masjid in India. The book was banned in Bangladesh, and helped draw international attention to the situation of the Bangladeshi Hindu minority.
In October 2006, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom
published a report titled 'Policy Focus on Bangladesh', which said that since its last election, 'Bangladesh has experienced growing violence by religious extremists, intensifying concerns expressed by the countries religious minorities'. The report further stated that Hindus are particularly vulnerable in a period of rising violence and extremism, whether motivated by religious, political or criminal factors, or some combination. The report noted that Hindus had multiple disadvantages against them in Bangladesh, such as perceptions of dual loyalty
with respect to India and religious beliefs that are not tolerated by the politically dominant Islamic Fundamentalists of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party
. Violence against Hindus has taken place "in order to encourage them to flee in order to seize their property".The previous reports of the Hindu American Foundation
were acknowledged and confirmed by this non-partisan report.
On November 2, 2006, USCIRF criticized Bangladesh for its continuing persecution of minority Hindus. It also urged the Bush administration to get Dhaka
to ensure protection of religious freedom and minority rights before Bangladesh's next national elections in January 2007.
On the February 6, 2010, Sonargaon temple in Narayanganj district of Bangladesh was destroyed by Islamic fanatics. Five people were seriously injured during the attack. Temples were also attacked and destroyed in 2011
According to the Sustainable Development Policy Institute
report 'Associated with the insistence on the Ideology of Pakistan has been an essential component of hate against India and the Hindus. For the upholders of the Ideology of Pakistan, the existence of Pakistan is defined only in relation to Hindus, and hence the Hindus have to be painted as negatively as possible' A 2005 report by the National Commission for Justice and Peace a non profit organization in Pakistan, found that Pakistan Studies textbooks in Pakistan have been used to articulate the hatred that Pakistani policy-makers have attempted to inculcate towards the Hindus. 'Vituperative animosities legitimise military and autocratic rule, nurturing a siege mentality. Pakistan Studies textbooks are an active site to represent India as a hostile neighbour' the report stated. 'The story of Pakistan’s past is intentionally written to be distinct from, and often in direct contrast with, interpretations of history found in India. From the government-issued textbooks, students are taught that Hindus are backward and superstitious.' Further the report stated 'Textbooks reflect intentional obfuscation. Today’s students, citizens of Pakistan and its future leaders are the victims of these partial truths'.
An editorial in Pakistan's oldest newspaper Dawn
commenting on a report in The Guardian
on Pakistani Textbooks noted 'By propagating concepts such as jihad
, the inferiority of non-Muslims, India’s ingrained enmity with Pakistan, etc., the textbook board publications used by all government schools promote a mindset that is bigoted and obscurantist. Since there are more children studying in these schools than in madrassahs the damage done is greater. ' According to the historian Professor Mubarak Ali
, textbook reform in Pakistan began with the introduction of Pakistan Studies and Islamic studies by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in 1971 into the national curriculum as compulsory subject. Former military dictator Gen Zia-ul-Haq under a general drive towards Islamization, started the process of historical revisionism in earnest and exploited this initiative. 'The Pakistani establishment taught their children right from the beginning that this state was built on the basis of religion – that's why they don't have tolerance for other religions and want to wipe-out all of them.'
According to Pervez Hoodbhoy
, a physics professor at Quaid-i-Azam University
in Islamabad
, the "Islamizing" of Pakistan's schools began in 1976 when an act of parliament required all government and private schools (except those teaching the British O-levels from Grade 9) to follow a curriculum that includes learning outcomes for the federally approved Grade 5 social studies class such as: 'Acknowledge and identify forces that may be working against Pakistan,' 'Make speeches on Jihad,' 'Collect pictures of policemen, soldiers, and national guards,' and 'India's evil designs against Pakistan.'
During the 1971 Bangladesh atrocities
there were widespread killings and acts of ethnic cleansing
of civilians in Bangladesh
(then East Pakistan
, a province of Pakistan), and widespread violations of human rights were carried out by the Pakistan Army, which was supported by political and religious militias during the Bangladesh Liberation War. In Bangladesh, the atrocities are identified as a genocide. Many of the victims were Hindus, and the total death toll was in the millions.TIME
magazine reported that "The Hindus, who account for three-fourths of the refugees and a majority of the dead, have borne the brunt of the Muslim military's hatred."
Hindu women have also been known to be victims of kidnapping and forced conversion to Islam. Around 25 Hindu girls are abducted every month and converted to Islam forcibly in Pakistan, as reported by Pakistani media. Krishan Bheel
, a Hindu member of the National Assembly of Pakistan
, came into the news recently for manhandling Qari Gul Rehman after being taunted with a religious insult.
On October 18, 2005, Sanno Amra and Champa, a Hindu couple residing in the Punjab Colony, Karachi, Sindh returned home to find that their three teenage daughters had disappeared. After inquiries to the local police, the couple discovered that their daughters had been taken to a local madrassah, had been converted to Islam, and were denied unsupervised contact with their parents.
A Pakistan Muslim League
politician has states that abduction of Hindus and Sikhs is a business in Pakistan, along with conversions of Hindus to Islam
Several Hindu temples have been destroyed in Pakistan. A notable incident was the destruction of the Ramna Kali Mandir
in former East Pakistan
. The temple was bulldozed by the Pakistan Army on March 27, 1971.The Dhakeshwari Temple
was severely damaged during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971
, and over half of the temple's buildings were destroyed. In a major disrespect of the religion, the main worship hall was taken over by the Pakistan
Army and used as an ammunitions storage area. Several of the temple custodians were tortured and killed by the Army though most, including the Head Priest, fled first to their ancestral villages and then to India and therefore escaped death.
In 2006, the last Hindu temple in Lahore
was destroyed to pave the way for construction of a multi-storied commercial building. The temple was demolished after officials of the Evacuee Property Trust Board concealed facts from the board chairman about the nature of the building. When reporters from Pakistan-based newspaper Dawn
tried to cover the incident, they were accosted by the henchmen of the property developer, who denied that a Hindu temple existed at the site.
Several political parties in Pakistan have objected to this move, such as the Pakistan People's party and the Pakistani Muslim League-N. The move has also evoked strong condemnation
in India from minority bodies and political parties, including the Bharatiya Janata Party
(BJP), the Congress Party
, as well as Muslim advocacy political parties such as the All India Muslim Majlis-e-Mushawarat. A firm of lawyers representing the Hindu minority has
approached the Lahore High Court seeking a directive to the builders to stop the construction of the commercial plaza and reconstruct the temple at the site. The petitioners maintain that the demolition violates section 295 of the Pakistan Penal Code prohibiting the demolition of places of worship.
On June 29, 2005, following the arrest of an illiterate Christian janitor on allegations of allegedly burning Qur'an pages, a mob of between 300 and 500 Muslims destroyed a Hindu temple and houses belonging to Christian and Hindu families in Nowshera. Under the terms of a deal negotiated between Islamic religious leaders and the Hindu/Christian communities, Pakistani police later released all previously arrested perpetrators without charge.
Although Hindus were frequently soft targets in Pakistan, the rise of Taliban forces in the political arena has particularly unsettled the already fragile situation for the minority community. Increasing persecution, ostracism from locals and lack of a social support system is forcing more and more Hindus to flee to India. This has been observed in the past whenever the conflicts between the two nations escalated but this has been a notable trend in view of the fact the recent developments are due to internal factors almost exclusively. The Taliban have used false lures, as well as the cooperation of zealots within local authorities to perpetrate religious cleansing
.
s were passed in 2001 which forced Hindus to wear yellow badge
s in public to identify themselves as such. This has been compared to Adolf Hitler
's treatment of Jews
in Nazi Germany
during World War II
. Hindu women were forced to dress according to Islamic hijab
, ostensibly a measure to "protect" them from harassment. This was part of the Taliban's plan to segregate "un-Islamic" and "idolatrous" communities from Islamic ones. In addition, Hindus were forced to mark their places of residence identifying them as Hindu homes.
The decree was condemned by the Indian and United States governments as a violation of religious freedom. Widespread protests against the Taliban regime broke out in Bhopal, India. In the United States, chairman of the Anti-Defamation League
Abraham Foxman
compared the decree to the practices of Nazi Germany
, where Jews
were required to wear labels identifying them as such. The comparison was also drawn by California Democrat and holocaust survivor Tom Lantos, and New York Democrat and author of the bipartisan 'Sense of the Congress' non-binding resolution against the anti-Hindu decree Eliot L Engel. In the United States, congressmen and several lawmakers. wore yellow badges on the floor of the Senate during the debate as a demonstration of their solidarity with the Hindu minority in Afghanistan.
Indian analyst Rahul Banerjee said that this was not the first time that Hindus have been singled out for state-sponsored oppression in Afghanistan. Violence against Hindus has caused a rapid depletion in the Hindu population over the years. Since the 1990s many Afghan Hindus have fled the country, seeking asylum in countries such as Germany.
expelled roughly 100,000 ethnic Nepalis (Lhotshampa
), most of whom have been living in seven refugee camps in eastern Nepal
ever since. The Lhotshampa are generally classified as Hindu
s. In March 2008, this population began a multiyear resettlement to third countries including the U.S., Canada, New Zealand, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands and Australia. At present, the United States is working towards resettling more than 60,000 of these refugee
s in the US as third country settlement programme.
celebrations, the Italian police shut down a previously approved Durga Puja celebration in Rome. The affront was seen by some as a statement against alleged persecution of Christians
in India.
On November 20, 2006, three buses full of riot police, two ambulances, two empty lorries, and executors of the Karasai district arrived at the community in sub-zero weather and evicted the Hare Krishna followers from thirteen homes, which the police proceeded to demolish.
The Forum 18 News Service
reported, "Riot police who took part in the destruction threw the personal belongings of the Hare Krishna devotees into the snow, and many devotees were left without clothes. Power for lighting and heating systems had been cut off before the demolition began. Furniture and larger household belongings were loaded onto trucks. Officials said these possessions would be destroyed. Two men who tried to prevent the bailiffs from entering a house to destroy it were seized by 15 police officers who twisted their hands and took them away to the police car."
The Hare Krishna community had been promised that no action would be taken before the report of a state commission – supposedly set up to resolve the dispute – was made public. On the day the demolition began, the commission's chairman, Amanbek Mukhashev, told Forum 18, "I know nothing about the demolition of the Hare Krishna homes – I'm on holiday." He added, "As soon as I return to work at the beginning of December we will officially announce the results of the Commission's investigation." Other officials also refused to comment.
The United States urged Kazakhstan's authorities to end what it called an "aggressive" campaign against the country's tiny Hare Krishna community.
Indians, of whom nearly 90 percent are practicing Hindus. Indian settlers came to Malaysia from Tamil Nadu
in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Between April to May 2006, several Hindu temples were demolished by city hall authorities in the country, accompanied by violence against Hindus. On April 21, 2006, the Malaimel Sri Selva Kaliamman Temple in Kuala Lumpur was reduced to rubble after the city hall sent in bulldozers.
The president of the Consumers Association of Subang and Shah Alam in Selangor State has been helping to organise efforts to stop the local authorities in the Muslim dominated city of Shah Alam from demolishing a 107-year-old Hindu temple. The growing Islamization in Malaysia is a cause for concern to many Malaysians who follow minority religions such as Hinduism. On May 11, 2006, armed city hall officers from Kuala Lumpur
forcefully demolished part of a 60-year-old suburban temple that serves more than 1,000 Hindus. The "Hindu Rights Action Force", a coalition of several NGO's, have protested these demolitions by lodging complaints with the Malaysian Prime Minister. Many Hindu advocacy groups have protested what they allege is a systematic plan of temple cleansing in Malaysia. The official reason given by the Malaysian government has been that the temples were built "illegally". However, several of the temples are centuries old.
According to a lawyer for the Hindu Rights Action Task Force, a Hindu temple
is demolished in Malaysia once every three weeks.
Malaysian Muslims have also grown more anti-Hindu
over the years. In response to the proposed construction of a temple in Selangor
, Muslims chopped off the head of a cow to protest, with leaders saying there would be blood if a temple was constructed in Shah Alam
.
Laws in the country, especially those concerning religious identity, are generally slanted towards compulsion into converting to Islam
.
The Methodist church of Fiji repeatedly calls for the creation of a Christian State since a coup d'etat in 1987 and has stated that those who are not Christian should be "tolerated as long as they obey Christian law".
The Methodist Church of Fiji specifically objects to the constitutional protection of minority religious communities such as Hindus and Muslims. State favoritism of Christianity, and systematic attacks on temples, are some of the greatest threats faced by Fijian Hindus. Despite the creation of a human rights commission, the plight of Hindus in Fiji continues to be precarious.
Intensified protests over the course of the 1980s led to an improvement in the state's attitudes towards Hindus. The divergence of some of the fundamental aspects of local Hindu culture, the segregation of the Hindu community from Trinidad, and the disinclination to risk erasing the more fundamental aspects of what had been constructed as "Trinidad Hinduism" in
which the identity of the group had been rooted, would often generate dissension when certain dimensions of Hindu culture came into contact with the State. While the incongruences continue to generate debate, and often conflict, it is now tempered with growing awareness and consideration on the part of the state to the Hindu minority. Hindus have been also been subjected to persistent proselytization by Christian missionaries.
Specifically the evangelical and Pentecostal Christians. Such activities reflect racial tensions that at times arise between the Christianized Afro-Trinidadian and Hindu Indo-Trinidadian communities.
" in the New Jersey area in the year 1987. The lackadaisical attitude of the Police, prompted the South Asian community to arrange small groups all across the state to fight back against the street gang. The perpetrators have been put to trial.
Other religions:
Religious persecution
Religious persecution is the systematic mistreatment of an individual or group of individuals as a response to their religious beliefs or affiliations or lack thereof....
inflicted upon Hindu
Hindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...
s. Hindus have been historically persecuted during Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
ic rule of the Indian subcontinent
Indian subcontinent
The Indian subcontinent, also Indian Subcontinent, Indo-Pak Subcontinent or South Asian Subcontinent is a region of the Asian continent on the Indian tectonic plate from the Hindu Kush or Hindu Koh, Himalayas and including the Kuen Lun and Karakoram ranges, forming a land mass which extends...
and during the Goa Inquisition
Goa Inquisition
The Goa Inquisition was the office of the Inquisition acting in the Indian state of Goa and the rest of the Portuguese empire in Asia. It was established in 1560, briefly suppressed from 1774–1778, and finally abolished in 1812. The Goan Inquisition is considered a blot on the history of...
. In modern times, Hindus in the Muslim-majority regions of Kashmir
Kashmir
Kashmir is the northwestern region of the Indian subcontinent. Until the mid-19th century, the term Kashmir geographically denoted only the valley between the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal mountain range...
, Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...
and Bangladesh
Bangladesh
Bangladesh , officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh is a sovereign state located in South Asia. It is bordered by India on all sides except for a small border with Burma to the far southeast and by the Bay of Bengal to the south...
have also suffered persecution.
During Islamic rule of the Indian sub-continent
Kafir
Kafir is an Arabic term used in a Islamic doctrinal sense, usually translated as "unbeliever" or "disbeliever"...
and therefore slaughtered and converted millions of Hindus. Will Durant
Will Durant
William James Durant was a prolific American writer, historian, and philosopher. He is best known for The Story of Civilization, 11 volumes written in collaboration with his wife Ariel Durant and published between 1935 and 1975...
argued in his 1935 book The Story of Civilization: Our Oriental Heritage (page 459):
There is no official estimate of the total death toll of Hindus at the hands of Muslims.
As Braudel put it:
"The levies it had to pay were so crushing that one catastrophic harvest was enough to unleash famines and epidemics capable of killing a million people at a time. Appalling poverty was the constant counterpart of the conquerors' opulence."
The backward castes of Hinduism suffered worst. Monarchs (belonging to backward castes) such as Khusrau Bhangi Khan, Hemchandra and Garha-Katanga were knocked off their throne and executed. Backward caste saints like Namadeva were arrested, while women like Kanhopatra
Kanhopatra
Kanhopatra or Kanhupatra was a 15th century Marathi saint-poetess, venerated by the Varkari sect of Hinduism.Little is known about Kanhopatra. According to most traditional accounts, Kanhopatra was a courtesan and dancing-girl...
were forced to commit suicide. Ghisadis have an “Urdu” title.
Prof. K.S. Lal, suggests a calculation in his book Growth of Muslim Population in Medieval India
Growth of Muslim Population in Medieval India
Growth of Muslim Population in Medieval India is a book by K.S. Lal published in 1973.The book assesses the demographics of India between 1000 and 1500 AD. On the basis of the available historical evidence, K.S. Lal concluded that the population of India in 1000 was about 200 million and in 1500...
which estimates that between the years 1000 AD and 1500 AD the population of Hindus decreased by 80 million.
Even those Hindus who converted to Islam were not immune from persecution, which was illustrated by the Muslim Caste System
Caste system among South Asian Muslims
Caste system among South Asian Muslims refers to units of social stratification that have developed among Muslims in South Asia.Religious, historical and socio-cultural factors have helped define the bounds of endogamous groups for Muslims in South Asia...
in India as established by Ziauddin al-Barani in the Fatawa-i Jahandari. where they were regarded as "Ajlaf" caste and subjected to severe discrimination by the "Ashraf" castes.
By Arabs (Muhammad bin Qasim)
Muslim conquest of the Indian subcontinent began during the early 8th century, when the UmayyadUmayyad
The Umayyad Caliphate was the second of the four major Arab caliphates established after the death of Muhammad. It was ruled by the Umayyad dynasty, whose name derives from Umayya ibn Abd Shams, the great-grandfather of the first Umayyad caliph. Although the Umayyad family originally came from the...
governor of Damascus
Damascus
Damascus , commonly known in Syria as Al Sham , and as the City of Jasmine , is the capital and the second largest city of Syria after Aleppo, both are part of the country's 14 governorates. In addition to being one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, Damascus is a major...
, Hajjaj responded to a casus belli
Casus belli
is a Latin expression meaning the justification for acts of war. means "incident", "rupture" or indeed "case", while means bellic...
provided by the kidnapping of Muslim women and treasures by pirates off the coast of Debal
Debal
-Introduction:Debal was an ancient port located near modern Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan. In Arabic, it was usually called Daybul it is adjacent to the nearby Manora Island and was administered by Mansura, and later Thatta....
, by mobilizing an expedition of 6,000 cavalry under Muhammad bin-Qasim in 712 CE. Records from the campaign recorded in the Chach Nama
Chach Nama
Chach Nama also known as the Fateh nama Sindh ,and also known as Tarekh-e-Hind wa Sindh Arabic is a book about the history of Sindh, chronicling the Chacha Dynasty's period, following the demise of the Rai Dynasty and the ascent of Chach of Alor to the throne, down to the Arab conquest by...
record temple demolitions, and mass executions of resisting Sindh
Sindh
Sindh historically referred to as Ba'ab-ul-Islam , is one of the four provinces of Pakistan and historically is home to the Sindhi people. It is also locally known as the "Mehran". Though Muslims form the largest religious group in Sindh, a good number of Christians, Zoroastrians and Hindus can...
i forces and the enslavement of their dependents. This action was particularly extensive in Debal
Debal
-Introduction:Debal was an ancient port located near modern Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan. In Arabic, it was usually called Daybul it is adjacent to the nearby Manora Island and was administered by Mansura, and later Thatta....
, of which Qasim is reported to have been under orders to make an example of while freeing both the captured women and the prisoners of a previous failed expedition. Bin Qasim then enlisted the support of the local Jat
Jat people
The Jat people are a community of traditionally non-elite tillers and herders in Northern India and Pakistan. Originally pastoralists in the lower Indus river-valley of Sindh, Jats migrated north into the Punjab region in late medieval times, and subsequently into the Delhi Territory,...
, Meds
Meds
Meds is the fifth studio album by British alternative rock band Placebo, released in 2006 on Virgin Records. It was released in most countries on 13 March 2006, although it was released three days earlier in Australia and New Zealand...
and Bhutto
Bhutto
Bhutto is a Sindhi, Rajput tribe settled in Sindh, Pakistan.-Bhutto tribe:The Bhutto tribe is a Rajput tribe that has been settled in Sindh for over two centuries, occupying part of Balochistan in Kachhi, Sibi, Dera Murad Jamali, Bhag and Mithri, having migrated to Sindh from Jaiselmere in India...
tribes and began the process of subduing and conquering the countryside. The capture of towns was also usually accomplished by means of a treaty with a party from among his "enemy", who were then extended special privileges and material rewards. However, his superior Hajjaj reportedly objected to his method by saying that it would make him look weak and advocated a more hardline military strategy:
In a subsequent communication, Hajjaj reiterated that all able-bodied men were to be killed, and that their underage sons and daughters were to be imprisoned and retained as hostages. Qasim obeyed, and on his arrival at the town of Brahminabad massacred between 6,000 and 16,000 of the defending forces.
The historian, Upendra Thakur records the persecution of Hindus and Buddhists:
Alberuni in his India writes about the famous temple of Multan
Multan
Multan , is a city in the Punjab Province of Pakistan and capital of Multan District. It is located in the southern part of the province on the east bank of the Chenab River, more or less in the geographic centre of the country and about from Islamabad, from Lahore and from Karachi...
:
A famous idol of theirs was that of Multan, dedicated to the sun, .. When Muhammad Ibn Alkasim Ibn Almunabbih, conquered Multan, he inquired how the town had become so very flourishing and so many treasures had there been accumulated, and then he found out that this idol was the cause, for there came pilgrims from all sides to visit it. Therefore he thought to build a mosque at the same place where the temple once stood. When then the Karmatians occupied Multan, Jalam Ibn Shaiban, the usurper, broke the idol into pieces and killed its priests. .. When afterwards the blessed Prince Mahmud swept away their rule from those countries, he made again the old mosque the place of the Friday-worship.
Mahmud of Ghazni
Ghazi
Ghazi is a title given to Muslim warriors or champions. It may be used out of respect or officially. Many of the Ottoman Sultans and Caliphs wore this title officially , along with Khan and Caesar...
who waged jihad
Jihad
Jihad , an Islamic term, is a religious duty of Muslims. In Arabic, the word jihād translates as a noun meaning "struggle". Jihad appears 41 times in the Quran and frequently in the idiomatic expression "striving in the way of God ". A person engaged in jihad is called a mujahid; the plural is...
on the Hindus. His plunder of Hindu temples and centers of learning is noted later in the article. Al-Biruni
Al-Biruni
Abū al-Rayḥān Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad al-BīrūnīArabic spelling. . The intermediate form Abū Rayḥān al-Bīrūnī is often used in academic literature...
writes:
"In the interest of his successors he constructed, in order to weaken the Indian frontier, those roads on which afterwards his son Mahmud marched into India during a period of thirty years and more. God be merciful to both father and son! Mahmud utterly ruined the prosperity of the country, and performed there wonderful exploits, by which the Hindus became like atoms of dust scattered in all directions, and like a tale of old in the mouth of the people. Their scattered remains cherish, of course, the most inveterate aversion towards all Muslims. This is the reason, too, why Hindu sciences have retired far away from those parts of the country conquered by us, and have fled to places which our hand cannot yet reach, to Kashmir, Benares, and other places. And there the antagonism between them and all foreigners receives more and more nourishment both from political and religious sources."
Various historical sources such as Martin Ewans, E.J. Brill and Farishta have recorded the introduction of Islam to Kabul and other parts of Afghanistan to the invasions of Mahmud of Ghazna
Destruction of Hindu Temples: The later invasions of Mahmud were specifically directed to temple towns as Indian temples were depositories of great wealth and the economic and ideological centers of gravity for the Hindus. Destroying them would destroy the will power of the Hindus attacking the Empire since Mahmud never kept a permanent presence in the Subcontinent; Nagarkot, Thanesar, Mathura, Kanauj, Kalinjar and Somnath were all thus raided. Mahmud's armies stripped the temples of their wealth and then destroyed them at, Maheshwar, Jwalamukhi, Narunkot and Dwarka. During the period of Mahmud invasion, the Sindhi Swarankar Community and other Hindus who escaped conversion fled from Sindh to escape sectarian violence.
Mahmud of Ghazni
Mahmud of Ghazni
Mahmud of Ghazni , actually ', was the most prominent ruler of the Ghaznavid dynasty who ruled from 997 until his death in 1030 in the eastern Iranian lands. Mahmud turned the former provincial city of Ghazni into the wealthy capital of an extensive empire which covered most of today's Iran,...
destroyed important Hindu shrine- Krishna Janmabhoomi Temple (known as Kesava Deo Temple
Kesava Deo Temple
Krishna Janmasthan or Kesava Deo Temple is a temple in Mathura, India and is among the sacred of Hindu sites.-History:It was built in Mathura over the prison which was believed to be the birthplace of Lord Krishna. In contemporary memory, it was built by Raja Vir Sinh Bundela of Orchaa, in the...
) in 1017 AD along with several other Hindu and Buddhist temples in the holy city of Mathura.
The following extract is from “Wonders of Things Created, and marvels of Things Existing” by Asaru-L- Bilad, a 13th century Arab geographer
Geographer
A geographer is a scholar whose area of study is geography, the study of Earth's natural environment and human society.Although geographers are historically known as people who make maps, map making is actually the field of study of cartography, a subset of geography...
. It contains the description of Somnath temple and its destruction:
“SomnathSomnathThe Somnath Temple located in the Prabhas Kshetra near Veraval in Saurashtra, on the western coast of Gujarat, India, is one of the twelve Jyotirlinga shrines of the God Shiva. Somnath means "The Protector of Moon God". The Somnath Temple is known as "the Shrine Eternal", having been destroyed...
: celebrated city of India, situated on the shore of the sea, and washed by its waves. Among the wonders of that place was the temple in which was placed the idol called Somnath. This idol was in the middle of the temple without anything to support it from below, or to suspend it from above. It was held in the highest honor among the Hindus, and whoever beheld it floating in the air was struck with amazement, whether he was a Musulman or an infidelInfidelAn infidel is one who has no religious beliefs, or who doubts or rejects the central tenets of a particular religion – especially in reference to Christianity or Islam....
. The Hindus used to go on pilgrimage to it whenever there was an eclipse of the moon, and would then assemble there to the number of more than a hundred thousand."
“When the Sultan Yaminu-d Daula Mahmud Bin Subuktigin (Mahmud of Ghazni) went to wage religious war against India, he made great efforts to capture and destroy Somnath, in the hope that the Hindus would then become Muhammadans. As a result thousands of Hindus were forcibly converted to Islam. He arrived there in the middle of Zi-l k’ada, 416 A.H. (December, 1025 A.D.). “The king looked upon the idol with wonder, and gave orders for the seizing of the spoil, and the appropriation of the treasures. There were many idols of gold and silver and vessels set with jewels, all of which had been sent there by the greatest personages in India. The value of the things found in the temples of the idols exceeded twenty thousand dinars."
Muhammad Ghori
Muhammad Ghori committed genocide against Hindus at KolKol
Kol may refer to:* Kol people, tribes of eastern India* Kol language * Kol, an earlier name of the city Aligarh* Kol, Nepal, geographic & administrative subdivision* Kol , a dinosaur from Mongolia...
(modern Aligarh), Kalinjar and Varanasi. According to Hasan Nizami's Taj-ul-Maasir, 20000 Hindu prisoners were slaughtered and their heads offered to crows. Hasan Nizami's Taj-ul-Maasir records that in Kol, "those of the horizon who were wise and acute were converted to Islam, but those who stood by their ancestoral faith were slain with the sword. 20,000 prisoners were taken and made slaves. Three bastions were raised as high as heaven with their heads and their carcases became food for the beasts of prey." In Kalinjar "50,000 prisoners were taken as slaves." Similarly, in Varnasi or Kasi (Benaras) :Kamil-ut-Tawarikh of Ibn Asir records, "The slaughter of Hindus (at Varanasi) was immense; none were spared except women and children,(who were taken into slavery) and the carnage of men went on until the earth was weary.
Muhammad Ghori destroyed a sacred Hindu shrine- Kashi Vishwanath Temple along with other temples of Varanasi
Varanasi
-Etymology:The name Varanasi has its origin possibly from the names of the two rivers Varuna and Assi, for the old city lies in the north shores of the Ganga bounded by its two tributaries, the Varuna and the Asi, with the Ganges being to its south...
during his raid in 1194. He had the Hindu temples of Ajmer
Ajmer
Ajmer , formerly written as Ajmere, is a city in Ajmer District in Rajasthan state in India. Ajmer has a population of around 800,000 , and is located west of the Rajasthan state capital Jaipur, 200 km from Jodhpur, 274 km from Udaipur, 439 km from Jaisalmer, and 391 km from...
demolished and ordered the construction of mosques and Quran schools on their ruins. His armies destroyed many Buddhist structures, including the great Buddhist university of Nalanda
Nalanda
Nālandā is the name of an ancient center of higher learning in Bihar, India.The site of Nalanda is located in the Indian state of Bihar, about 55 miles south east of Patna, and was a Buddhist center of learning from the fifth or sixth century CE to 1197 CE. It has been called "one of the...
.
Timur the Lame's campaign against India
Tīmūr bin Taraghay Barlas (Chagatai TurkicChagatai language
The Chagatai language is an extinct Turkic language which was once widely spoken in Central Asia, and remained the shared literary language there until the early twentieth century...
: تیمور - Tēmōr, "iron
Iron
Iron is a chemical element with the symbol Fe and atomic number 26. It is a metal in the first transition series. It is the most common element forming the planet Earth as a whole, forming much of Earth's outer and inner core. It is the fourth most common element in the Earth's crust...
") (1336 – February 1405), known in the West as Tamerlane, was a 14th century warlord
Warlord
A warlord is a person with power who has both military and civil control over a subnational area due to armed forces loyal to the warlord and not to a central authority. The term can also mean one who espouses the ideal that war is necessary, and has the means and authority to engage in war...
of Turco-Mongol
Turco-Mongol
Turko-Mongol is a modern designation for various nomads who were subjects of the Mongol Empire. Being progressively Turkicized in terms of language and identity following the Mongol conquests, they derived their ethnic and cultural origins from steppes of Central Asia...
descent, conqueror of much of western and central Asia, and founder of the Timurid Empire and Timurid dynasty
Timurid Dynasty
The Timurids , self-designated Gurkānī , were a Persianate, Central Asian Sunni Muslim dynasty of Turko-Mongol descent whose empire included the whole of Iran, modern Afghanistan, and modern Uzbekistan, as well as large parts of contemporary Pakistan, North India, Mesopotamia, Anatolia and the...
(1370–1405) in Central Asia
Central Asia
Central Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...
, which survived in some form until 1857. Perhaps, he is more commonly known by his pejorative Persian name Timur-e Lang which translates to Timur the Lame, as he was lame after sustaining an injury to the leg in battle.
Informed about civil war in India, Timur
Timur
Timur , historically known as Tamerlane in English , was a 14th-century conqueror of West, South and Central Asia, and the founder of the Timurid dynasty in Central Asia, and great-great-grandfather of Babur, the founder of the Mughal Dynasty, which survived as the Mughal Empire in India until...
began a trek starting in 1397 to invade the territory of the reigning Sultan
Sultan
Sultan is a title with several historical meanings. Originally, it was an Arabic language abstract noun meaning "strength", "authority", "rulership", and "dictatorship", derived from the masdar سلطة , meaning "authority" or "power". Later, it came to be used as the title of certain rulers who...
Nasir-u Din Mehmud of the Tughlaq Dynasty in the north Indian city of Delhi
Delhi
Delhi , officially National Capital Territory of Delhi , is the largest metropolis by area and the second-largest by population in India, next to Mumbai. It is the eighth largest metropolis in the world by population with 16,753,265 inhabitants in the Territory at the 2011 Census...
.
Timur crossed the Indus River
Indus River
The Indus River is a major river which flows through Pakistan. It also has courses through China and India.Originating in the Tibetan plateau of western China in the vicinity of Lake Mansarovar in Tibet Autonomous Region, the river runs a course through the Ladakh district of Jammu and Kashmir and...
at Attock
Attock
Attock is a city located in the northern border of the Punjab province of Pakistan and the headquarters of Attock District...
on September 24. The capture of towns and villages was often followed by the massacre of their inhabitants and the raping of their women, as well as pillaging to support his massive army. Timur wrote many times in his memoirs of his specific disdain for the 'idolatrous' Hindu
Hindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...
s, although he also waged war against Muslim Indians during his campaign.
Timur's invasion did not go unopposed and he did meet some resistance during his march to Delhi, most notably by the Sarv Khap coalition in northern India, and the Governor
Governor
A governor is a governing official, usually the executive of a non-sovereign level of government, ranking under the head of state...
of Meerut. Although impressed and momentarily stalled by the valour of Ilyaas Awan, Timur was able to continue his relentless approach to Delhi, arriving in 1398 to combat the armies of Sultan Mehmud, already weakened by an internal battle for ascension within the royal family.
The Sultan's army was easily defeated on December 17, 1398. Timur entered Delhi and the city was sacked, destroyed, and left in ruins. Before the battle for Delhi, Timur executed more than 100,000 captives.
Timur himself recorded the invasions in his memoirs, collectively known as Tuzk-i-Timuri. In them, he vividly described the massacre at Delhi
Delhi
Delhi , officially National Capital Territory of Delhi , is the largest metropolis by area and the second-largest by population in India, next to Mumbai. It is the eighth largest metropolis in the world by population with 16,753,265 inhabitants in the Territory at the 2011 Census...
:
In a short space of time all the people in the [Delhi] fort were put to the sword, and in the course of one hour the heads of 10,000 infidels were cut off. The sword of Islam was washed in the blood of the infidels, and all the goods and effects, the treasure and the grain which for many a long year had been stored in the fort became the spoil of my soldiers. They set fire to the houses and reduced them to ashes, and they razed the buildings and the fort to the ground....All these infidel Hindus were slain, their women and children, and their property and goods became the spoil of the victors. I proclaimed throughout the camp that every man who had infidel prisoners should put them to death, and whoever neglected to do so should himself be executed and his property given to the informer. When this order became known to the ghaziGhaziGhazi is a title given to Muslim warriors or champions. It may be used out of respect or officially. Many of the Ottoman Sultans and Caliphs wore this title officially , along with Khan and Caesar...
s of Islam, they drew their swords and put their prisoners to death.
One hundred thousand infidels, impious idolators, were on that day slain. Maulana Nasiruddin Umar, a counselor and man of learning, who, in all his life, had never killed a sparrow, now, in execution of my order, slew with his sword fifteen idolatrous Hindus, who were his captives....on the great day of battle these 100,000 prisoners could not be left with the baggage, and that it would be entirely opposed to the rules of war to set these idolaters and enemies of Islam at liberty...no other course remained but that of making them all food for the sword.
According to Malfuzat-i-Timuri, Timur targeted Hindus. In his own words, "Excepting the quarter of the saiyids, the 'ulama and the other Musalmans [sic], the whole city was sacked". In his descriptions of the Loni massacre he wrote, "..Next day I gave orders that the Musalman prisoners should be separated and saved."
During the ransacking of Delhi, almost all inhabitants not killed were captured and enslaved.
Timur left Delhi in approximately January 1399. In April he had returned to his own capital beyond the Oxus (Amu Darya). Immense quantities of spoils were taken from India. According to Ruy Gonzáles de Clavijo
Ruy Gonzáles de Clavijo
Ruy González de Clavijo was a Castilian traveller and writer. In 1403-05 Clavijo was the ambassador of Henry III of Castile to the court of Timur, founder and ruler of the Timurid Empire...
, 90 captured elephants were employed merely to carry precious stones looted from his conquest, so as to erect a mosque
Mosque
A mosque is a place of worship for followers of Islam. The word is likely to have entered the English language through French , from Portuguese , from Spanish , and from Berber , ultimately originating in — . The Arabic word masjid literally means a place of prostration...
at Samarkand — what historians today believe is the enormous Bibi-Khanym Mosque
Bibi-Khanym Mosque
Bibi-Khanym Mosque is a famous historical Friday mosque in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, whose name comes from the wife of 14th-century ruler, Amir Timur.-Features:...
. Ironically, the mosque was constructed too quickly and suffered greatly from disrepair within a few decades of its construction.
Qutb-ud-din Aibak
Historical records compiled by Muslim historian Maulana Hakim Saiyid Abdul Hai attest to the iconoclasm of Qutb-ud-din AybakQutb-ud-din Aybak
Qutb-ud-din Aibak was a Turkic king of Northwest India who ruled from his capital in Delhi where he built the Qutub Minar and the Quwwat Al Islam mosque. He was of Turkic descent from central Asia, the first Sultan of Delhi and founder of the Slave dynasty of India. He ruled for only four years,...
. The first mosque built in Delhi, the "Quwwat al-Islam" was built after the demolition of the Hindu temple built previously by Prithvi Raj and certain parts of the temple were left outside the mosque proper. This pattern of iconoclasm was common during his reign.
Nizami writes about Aibak's invasion of Ajmer that after Raja Karan was defeated and forced to flee, “fifty thousand infidels were dispatched to hell by the sword” and “more than twenty thousand slaves, and cattle beyond all calculation fell into the hands of the victors”.
The city was sacked, its temples demolished, and its palaces plundered. On his return to Ajmer, Aibak destroyed the Sanskrit College of Visaladeva, and laid the foundations of a mosque which came to be known as ‘Adhai Din ka Jhompada’.
Conquest of Kalinjar in 1202 AD was Aibak’s crowning achievement. Nizami concludes :
Iltutmish
Another ruler of the sultanate, Shams-ud-din IltutmishIltutmish
Shams-ud-din Iltutmish was the third ruler of the Mamluk dynasty of Delhi of Turkic origin. He was a slave of Qutub-ud-din-Aybak and later became his son-in-law and close lieutenant. He was the Governor of Badaun when he deposed Qutub-ud-din's successor Aram Shah and acceeded to the throne of the...
, conquered and subjugated the Hindu pilgrimage site Varanasi
Varanasi
-Etymology:The name Varanasi has its origin possibly from the names of the two rivers Varuna and Assi, for the old city lies in the north shores of the Ganga bounded by its two tributaries, the Varuna and the Asi, with the Ganges being to its south...
in the 11th century and he continued the destruction of Hindu temples and idols that had begun during the first attack in 1194.
In 1235, Iltutmish
Iltutmish
Shams-ud-din Iltutmish was the third ruler of the Mamluk dynasty of Delhi of Turkic origin. He was a slave of Qutub-ud-din-Aybak and later became his son-in-law and close lieutenant. He was the Governor of Badaun when he deposed Qutub-ud-din's successor Aram Shah and acceeded to the throne of the...
sacked Ujjain and destroyed its temples including the Mahakala Temple.
Alauddin Khilji
In his siege of Chittor, Alauddin KhiljiAlauddin Khilji
Ali Gurshap Khan better known by his titular name as Sultan Ala-ud-din Khilji was the second ruler of the Turko-Afghan Khilji dynasty in India.He was a well and capable ruler. He belonged to the Afghanized Turkic tribe of the Khiljis...
ordered massacre of Hindu population, 30000 Hindu civilians were massacred in a single day and Hindu temples were demolished including the famous Kalika Mata Temple
Kalika Mata Temple, Chittorgarh Fort
Kalika Mata Temple is an ancient Hindu temple located within the Chittorgarh Fort in the Chittorgarh municipality of Rajasthan state in India. It predates Maharana Pratap and has thousands of visitors every day. The goddess worshipped at this temple is an aspect of goddess Bhadrakali, clan goddess...
which was built by Bappa Rawal in 8th century.
Somnath Temple was destroyed in 1300 CE by Allaudin Khilji who sent his general, Alaf Khan, to pillage Somnath.
Muhammad bin Tughluq
An inscription of 1462 A.D. at Jami Masjid at Malan, in Banaskantha District of Gujarat states:The Jami Masjid was built by Khan-I-Azam Ulugh Khan (Muhammad Bin Tughlaq), who suppressed the wretched infidels. He eradicated the idolatrous houses and mine of infidelity, along with the idols with the edge of the sword, and made ready this edifice. He made its walls and doors out of the idols; the back of every stone became the place for prostration of the believer.
Firuz Shah Tughlaq
Firuz Shah TughluqFiruz Shah Tughluq
-External links:*...
was the third ruler of the Tughlaq dynasty of the Delhi Sultanate. The "Tarikh-i-Firuz Shah" is a historical record written during his reign that attests to the systematic persecution of Hindus under his rule. In particular, it records atrocities committed against Hindu Brahmin priests who refused to convert to Islam:
Under his rule, Hindus who were forced to pay the mandatory Jizya
Jizya
Under Islamic law, jizya or jizyah is a per capita tax levied on a section of an Islamic state's non-Muslim citizens, who meet certain criteria...
tax were recorded as infidels, their communities monitored and, if they violated Imperial ordinances and built temples, they were destroyed. In particular, an incident in the village of Gohana in Haryana
Haryana
Haryana is a state in India. Historically, it has been a part of the Kuru region in North India. The name Haryana is found mentioned in the 12th century AD by the apabhramsha writer Vibudh Shridhar . It is bordered by Punjab and Himachal Pradesh to the north, and by Rajasthan to the west and south...
was recorded in the "Insha-i-Mahry" (another historical record written by Amud Din Abdullah bin Mahru) where Hindus had erected a deity and were arrested, brought to the palace and executed en-masse.
In 1230, the Hindu King of Orissa
Orissa
Orissa , officially Odisha since Nov 2011, is a state of India, located on the east coast of India, by the Bay of Bengal. It is the modern name of the ancient nation of Kalinga, which was invaded by the Maurya Emperor Ashoka in 261 BC. The modern state of Orissa was established on 1 April...
Anangabhima III consolidated his rule and proclaimed that an attack on Orissa constituted an attack on the king's god. A sign of Anangabhima's determination to protect Hindu culture is the fact that he named is new capital in Cuttack “Abhinava Varanasi.” His anxieties about further Muslim advances in Orissa proved to be well founded.
Muzaffer Shah I & Mahmud Begda
In 1375 CE, Muzaffar Shah I, the Sultan of Gujarat massacred Hindus in Gujarat and destroyed the Somnath temple. In 1451 CE, the temple was once again destroyed by Mahmud BegadaMahmud Begada
Sultan Abu'l Fath Nasir-ud-Din Mahmud Shah I, popularly known as Mahmud Begada was the most prominent sultan of Gujarat. He was the great-grandson of Ahmad Shah I, the founder of the Muzaffarid dynasty, and of the city of Ahmedabad in the present-day state of Gujarat, India. He was known to be...
.
In the Mughal Empire
Mughal Empire
The Mughal Empire , or Mogul Empire in traditional English usage, was an imperial power from the Indian Subcontinent. The Mughal emperors were descendants of the Timurids...
was marked by periods of tolerance of non-Muslims, such as Hindus and Sikhs, as well as periods of violent oppression and persecution of those people.
Babur
On his invasion of India, BaburBabur
Babur was a Muslim conqueror from Central Asia who, following a series of setbacks, finally succeeded in laying the basis for the Mughal dynasty of South Asia. He was a direct descendant of Timur through his father, and a descendant also of Genghis Khan through his mother...
ordered massacres of 'infidel' Hindus. He described his campaign against the Hindus as 'jihad
Jihad
Jihad , an Islamic term, is a religious duty of Muslims. In Arabic, the word jihād translates as a noun meaning "struggle". Jihad appears 41 times in the Quran and frequently in the idiomatic expression "striving in the way of God ". A person engaged in jihad is called a mujahid; the plural is...
'. In Bajaur (Pakistan’s NWFP) , he describes a general massacre of the enemies of Islam and made a tower of heads. He describes his battle against Rana Sanga as a holy war. About the battle he wrote : “These are the unbelievers, the wicked.” At Agra, “mounds were made of the bodies of the slain, pillars of their heads.” (‘Barburnama’,Babur’s memoirs, Bostom p 651-3). In 1528 he attacked Kanauj, massacred Hindus and enslaved many. Regarding Hindu captives his memoirs state : “Those who were brought in alive (having surrendered) were ordered beheaded, after which a tower of skulls was erected in the camp” (Sookdheo p 264).
Hindu nationalists claim that Babur destroyed the Ram Mandir
Ram Janmabhoomi
Ram Janmabhoomi is the "Birthplace of Lord Rama."Lord Rama is a major God in Hindu theology and the Hindu religion where He is described as an Avatar of Lord Vishnu in Hinduism. The exact location of Lord Rama's birth as stated in holy Ramayan as being in the city of Ayoudhya in Uttar Pardesh...
in Ayodhya, located at the birthplace of Rama
Rama
Rama or full name Ramachandra is considered to be the seventh avatar of Vishnu in Hinduism, and a king of Ayodhya in ancient Indian...
, and built the Babri Masjid on the holy site, which has since been a source of tension between the Hindu and Muslim communities. ASI report confirmed that there existed a Hindu temple at the site of Babri Masjid.
Writer Fernand Braudel wrote in A History of Civilizations (Penguin 1988/1963, p.232-236), Islamic rule in India as a "colonial experiment" was "extremely violent", and "the Muslims could not rule the country except by systematic terror. Cruelty was the norm -- burnings, summary executions, crucifixions or impalements, inventive tortures. Hindu temples were destroyed to make way for mosques. On occasion there were forced conversions. If ever there were an uprising, it was instantly and savagely repressed: houses were burned, the countryside was laid waste, men were slaughtered and women were taken as slaves."
Ahmad Shah Durrani
Ahmad Shah DurraniAhmad Shah Durrani
Ahmad Shah Durrani , also known as Ahmad Shāh Abdālī and born as Ahmad Khān, was the founder of the Durrani Empire in 1747 and is regarded by many to be the founder of the modern state of Afghanistan.Ahmad Khan enlisted as a young soldier in the military of the Afsharid kingdom and quickly rose...
invaded north-India three times (1757, 1760, 1761) in response to such requests and aimed to destroy Maratha resistance. He slaughtered, plundered and enslaved thousands of Hindus. On his way back in 1757, he demolished the sacred Sikh shrine Harmandir Sahib
Harmandir Sahib
The Harmandir Sahib also Darbar Sahib , also referred to as the Golden Temple, is a prominent Sikh gurdwara located in the city of Amritsar, Punjab . Construction of the gurdwara was begun by Guru Ram Das, the fourth Sikh Guru, and completed by his successor, Guru Arjan Dev...
in Amritsar and filled its sacred pool with the blood of slaughtered cows.
When returning home after his last invasion, Durrani was taking about 2200 Hindu women and girls as captives. They were to be sold into slavery in Afghanistan. On the way they were to be used by the Afghan soldiers to satisfy their lust. However Sikhs attacked his camp in Goindwal and freed all the captives.
Tipu Sultan
(See also- Mysore invasion of Kerala, Captivity of Nairs at SeringapatamCaptivity of Nairs at Seringapatam
The Captivity of Nairs at Seringapatam was imposed on the Nair Hindus of Malabar by Muslims under Tipu Sultan, the de facto ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore from 1786 to 1789. They were subjected to forcible conversions to Islam, death, and torture. The Nairs were treated with extreme brutality by...
, Captivity of Kodavas at Seringapatam)
The attitudes of Muslim ruler Tippu Sultan have been criticized as anti-Hindu. In the first part of his reign in particular he appears to have been notably more aggressive and religiously doctrinaire than his father, Haidar Ali. There are some historians who claim that Tippu Sultan was a religious persecutor of Hindus.
C. K. Kareem also notes that Tippu Sultan issued an edict for the destruction of Hindu temples in Kerala
Kerala
or Keralam is an Indian state located on the Malabar coast of south-west India. It was created on 1 November 1956 by the States Reorganisation Act by combining various Malayalam speaking regions....
.
Historian Hayavadana C. Rao wrote about Tippu in his encyclopaedic work on the History of Mysore. He asserted that Tippu's "religious fanaticism and the excesses committed in the name of religion, both in Mysore and in the provinces, stand condemned for all time. His bigotry, indeed, was so great that it precluded all ideas of toleration". He further asserts that the acts of Tippu that were constructive towards Hindus were largely political and ostentatious rather than an indication of genuine tolerance.
Hindu groups revile Tipu Sultan
Tipu Sultan
Tipu Sultan , also known as the Tiger of Mysore, was the de facto ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore. He was the son of Hyder Ali, at that time an officer in the Mysorean army, and his second wife, Fatima or Fakhr-un-Nissa...
as a bigot who massacred Hindus. He was known to carry out forced conversions of Hindus and Christians.. During Tipu Sultan
Tipu Sultan
Tipu Sultan , also known as the Tiger of Mysore, was the de facto ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore. He was the son of Hyder Ali, at that time an officer in the Mysorean army, and his second wife, Fatima or Fakhr-un-Nissa...
's invasion of Malabar
Malabar Coast
The Malabar Coast is a long and narrow coastline on the south-western shore line of the mainland Indian subcontinent. Geographically, it comprises the wettest regions of southern India, as the Western Ghats intercept the moisture-laden monsoon rains, especially on their westward-facing mountain...
in the late 18th century, he forcefully converted over 400,000 Hindus to Islam.
Tipu sent a letter on January 19, 1790 to Budruz Zuman Khan. It says:
According to the Malabar Manual of William Logan, Thrichambaram and Thalipparampu temples in Chirackal Taluk, Thiruvangatu Temple (Brass Pagoda) in Tellicherry, and Ponmeri Temple near Badakara were all destroyed by the Mysore forces of Tipu Sultan. The Malabar Manual mention that the Maniyoor mosque was once a Hindu temple. The local belief is that it was converted to a mosque during the days of Mysore rule of Tipu Sultan.
Hindus were treated as second class citizens within Hyderabad state and they were severely discriminated against, despite the vast majority of the population being Hindu. The 1941 census estimated the population of Hyderabad to be 16.34 million. Over 85% of the populace were Hindus with Muslims accounting for about 12%. Hyderabad was also a multi-lingual state consisting of peoples speaking Telugu (48.2%), Marathi (26.4%), Kannada (12.3%) and Urdu (10.3%). Nonetheless, the number of Hindus in government positions was disproportionately small. Of 1765 officers, 1268 were Muslims, 421 were Hindus, and 121 were "Others" (presumably British Christians, Parsis and Sikhs). Of the officials drawing pay between Rs.600-1200 pm, 59 were Muslims, 38 were "Others", and a mere 5 were Hindus. The Nizam and his nobles, who were mostly Muslims, owned 40% of the total land in the kingdom.
In 1947; Nizam, the ruler of Hyderabad refused to merge his kingdom with India. For the independence of the Islamic state of Hyderabad
Hyderabad State
-After Indian independence :When India gained independence in 1947 and Pakistan came into existence in 1947, the British left the local rulers of the princely states the choice of whether to join one of the new dominions or to remain independent...
and to resist Indian integration, All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen
All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen
All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen also AIMIM or MIM , is a center -right Muslim political party in India. The Hyderabad is the stronghold of AIMIM. It has retained Hyderabad Lok Sabha parliament seat in 2009 election...
, the then dominating political party persecuted Hindus and their 1,50,000 cadre strong militant
Militant
The word militant, which is both an adjective and a noun, usually is used to mean vigorously active, combative and aggressive, especially in support of a cause, as in 'militant reformers'. It comes from the 15th century Latin "militare" meaning "to serve as a soldier"...
wing named Razakars killed a number of Hindus under the leadership of Qasim Rizwi.
Conversion of Hindu Temples to Mosques
The destruction of HinduHindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...
temples in India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
during the Islamic conquest of India occurred from the beginning of Muslim conquest until the end the Mughal Empire
Mughal Empire
The Mughal Empire , or Mogul Empire in traditional English usage, was an imperial power from the Indian Subcontinent. The Mughal emperors were descendants of the Timurids...
throughout the Indian subcontinent
Indian subcontinent
The Indian subcontinent, also Indian Subcontinent, Indo-Pak Subcontinent or South Asian Subcontinent is a region of the Asian continent on the Indian tectonic plate from the Hindu Kush or Hindu Koh, Himalayas and including the Kuen Lun and Karakoram ranges, forming a land mass which extends...
.
In his book "Hindu Temples - What Happened to Them
Hindu Temples - What Happened to Them
Hindu Temples – What Happened to Them is a two-volume book by Sita Ram Goel, Arun Shourie, Harsh Narain, Jay Dubashi and Ram Swarup. The first volume was published in spring 1990....
", Sita Ram Goel included a list of 2000 mosques that it is claimed were built on Hindu temples. The second volume of the book excerpts from medieval histories and chronicles and from inscriptions concerning the destruction of Hindu, Jain and Buddhist temples.
In Indonesia
Indonesia
Indonesia , officially the Republic of Indonesia , is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 13,000 islands. It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people, and is the world's fourth most populous country. Indonesia is a republic, with an...
, where popular conversion from Hinduism to Islam was more voluntary and peaceful, it is believed that the minaret
Minaret
A minaret مناره , sometimes مئذنه) is a distinctive architectural feature of Islamic mosques, generally a tall spire with an onion-shaped or conical crown, usually either free standing or taller than any associated support structure. The basic form of a minaret includes a base, shaft, and gallery....
of the Menara Kudus Mosque
Menara Kudus Mosque
The Menara Kudus Mosque or Al-Manar Mosque is located in Kudus in the Indonesian province of Central Java. Dating from 1549, it is one of the oldest mosques in Indonesia, built at the time of Islam's spread through Java...
, in Java, was originally part of a Hindu temple.
Goa
Goa Inquisition
The Goa Inquisition was the office of the Inquisition acting in the Indian state of Goa and the rest of the Portuguese empire in Asia. It was established in 1560, briefly suppressed from 1774–1778, and finally abolished in 1812. The Goan Inquisition is considered a blot on the history of...
, was established in 1560 by Portuguese missionaries. It was aimed primarily at Hindus and wayward new converts and by the time it was suppressed in 1774, the inquisition had had thousands of Hindus tortured and executed by burning. The British East India Company
British East India Company
The East India Company was an early English joint-stock company that was formed initially for pursuing trade with the East Indies, but that ended up trading mainly with the Indian subcontinent and China...
engaged in a covert and well-financed campaign of evangelical
Evangelism
Evangelism refers to the practice of relaying information about a particular set of beliefs to others who do not hold those beliefs. The term is often used in reference to Christianity....
conversions in the 19th century. While officially discouraging conversions, officers of the Company routinely converted Sepoys to Christianity, often by force. This was one of the factors that led to the First Indian War of Independence
Indian Rebellion of 1857
The Indian Rebellion of 1857 began as a mutiny of sepoys of the British East India Company's army on 10 May 1857, in the town of Meerut, and soon escalated into other mutinies and civilian rebellions largely in the upper Gangetic plain and central India, with the major hostilities confined to...
.
Contemporary persecution
While the vast majority of Hindus live in Hindu-majority areas of India, Hindus in other parts of South Asia and in the diaspora have sometimes faced persecution.Republic of India
Although the Indian government allows for freedom of religion, its constitution provides lesser rights and protection to Hindus vs. non-Hindus paving way for government confiscation of Hindu institutes and places of worship. More-over, Minority institutes also receive government patronage in form of Exemption from 2005 Amendment to the Article 15, 95% grant-in-aid, College Scholarship to pursue higher education.What makes matters worse is that ruling political parties often subscribe to ideologies which are inherently hostile or prejudiced towards Hinduism. Thus, Hindu temples and institutes live under constant threat of ideologically motivated government take-over and subsequent destruction. For instance, State of Tamil Nadu is ruled by Dravidian parties for over two decades. Dravidian ideology believes in discredited racial theory of Aryan Invasion. It is openly anti Shri Ram, anti Sanskrit and anti Brahmin. Ruling ideology has a history of publicly issuing threats and has carried out those threats in many instances. At some junctures, interpretation of the laws has also disadvantaged Hindus
Many organizations feel that Hindu label is a liability. It exposes them to ideologically inspired attacks, places them at a financial disadvantage and paves way for government confiscation. As a result, several entities like Rama-Krishna Mission, Arya Samaj, etc. have filed law-suits and done intense lobbying to declare them self a non-Hindu minority religion. For Instance, in west Bengal, Rama Krishna Mission whose colleges and schools were in danger of hostile take-over by Marxist government petitioned the courts to have their organization and movement declared a non-Hindu minority religion.
Hindus from other countries hoping to come to India have also been treated unfavorably by the Indian government
Recently the issue of Love Jihad
Love Jihad
Love Jihad also called Romeo Jihad, is an alleged activity under which some young Muslim boys and men reportedly target college girls belonging to non-Muslim communities for conversion to Islam by feigning love. While similar activities have been reported elsewhere, the term has been used to...
created huge controversy in Southern India, although similar incidents were ignored in Northern India.
Jammu and Kashmir
Kashmiri militants have engaged in attacks on Hindu pilgrims in both Kashmir and neighboring Jammu
Jammu
Jammu , also known as Duggar, is one of the three administrative divisions within Jammu and Kashmir, the northernmost state in India.Jammu city is the largest city in Jammu and the winter capital of Jammu and Kashmir...
. Kashmiri militants have attacked Hindus in the region, as well as moderate Muslims suspected of siding with India. Kashmiri Pandit
Kashmiri Pandit
The Kashmiri Pandits are a Hindu Brahmin community originating from Kashmir, a mountainous region in South Asia.-Background:The Hindu caste system of the region was influenced by the influx of Buddhism from the time of Asoka, around the third century BCE, and a consequence of this was that the...
Hindus, who have been residents of Kashmir
Kashmir
Kashmir is the northwestern region of the Indian subcontinent. Until the mid-19th century, the term Kashmir geographically denoted only the valley between the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal mountain range...
for centuries, have been ethnically cleansed from Kashmir by Islamic militants. In particular, the Wandhama Massacre
Wandhama massacre
The 1998 Wandhama massacre refers to the murder of 23 Kashmiri Pandit Hindus in the town of Wandhama in the Muslim-majority Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir on 25 January 1998. The victims included four children, nine women and 10 men...
in 1998 was an incident in which 24 Kashmiri Hindus were gunned down by Islamists disguised as Indian soldiers. In 1998 Prankote massacre
1998 Prankote massacre
The 1998 Prankote massacre was the killing of 26 Hindus in the villages of Prankote and Dakikote in Udhampur district of Jammu and Kashmir on 17 April 1998.-Background:...
, 26 Kashmiri Hindus were beheaded by Islamist militants after their denial of converting into Islam. Many Kashmiri Hindus have been killed and thousands of children orphaned over the course of the conflict in Kashmir.
(See: Kashmiri Pandits)
Northeast India
In Northeastern India, especially in Nagaland
Nagaland
Nagaland is a state in the far north-eastern part of India. It borders the state of Assam to the west, Arunachal Pradesh and part of Assam to the north, Burma to the east and Manipur to the south. The state capital is Kohima, and the largest city is Dimapur...
, Hindus are not able to celebrate Durga Puja
Durga Puja
Durga puja ; দুর্গা পূজা,ଦୁର୍ଗା ପୂଜା,‘Worship of Durga’), also referred to as Durgotsava ; , is an annual Hindu festival in South Asia that celebrates worship of the Hindu goddess Durga. It refers to all the six days observed as Mahalaya, Shashthi, Maha Saptami, Maha Ashtami, Maha Navami and...
and other essential festivals due to harassment and killing by Christian terrorist groups. In Tripura, the NLFT, "National Liberation Front of Tripura", has targeted Swamis and temples for attacks. They are known to have forcefully converted Hindus to Christianity. The Baptist
Baptist
Baptists comprise a group of Christian denominations and churches that subscribe to a doctrine that baptism should be performed only for professing believers , and that it must be done by immersion...
Church of Tripura is alleged to have supplied the NLFT with arms and financial support and to have encouraged the murder of Hindus, particularly infants.
In Assam
Assam
Assam , also, rarely, Assam Valley and formerly the Assam Province , is a northeastern state of India and is one of the most culturally and geographically distinct regions of the country...
, members of the primarily Christian Hmar ethnic group have placed bloodstained crosses in temples and forced Hindus to convert at gunpoint.
Punjab
The period of insurgency in Punjab around Operation Bluestar saw clashes of the Sikh militants with the police, as well as with the Hindu-Nirankari groups resulting in many Hindu deaths. In 1987, 38 Hindus were pulled out of a bus and shot, near Lalru in Punjab by Sikh militants. On June 15 1991, Sikh militants stormed two passenger trains in Punjab state, raking them with indiscriminate machine-gun fire and killing at least 110 people, most victims were Hindus. In two decades of Sikh militancy, thousands of Hindus were massacred.
Kerala
Kerala
Kerala
or Keralam is an Indian state located on the Malabar coast of south-west India. It was created on 1 November 1956 by the States Reorganisation Act by combining various Malayalam speaking regions....
is a Hindu majority state but with the most slim majority in India. Kerala has witnessed many riots and rebellions against Hindus throughout it history and more so in independent India; notably the Marad Massacre
Marad Massacre
The Marad massacre was the killing of eight Hindus by a Muslim mob on 2 May 2003 at the Marad beach of the Kozhikode district, Kerala, India. One attacker, Mohammed Ashker was hit by accident and was also killed. The judicial commission that probed the incident concluded that the Indian Union...
. In 1921 Mappila riots
Mappila riots
Mappila Riots or Mappila Outbreaks refers to a series of riots by the Mappila Muslims of Malabar, South India in the 19th century and the early 20th century against Hindu landlords and the state. The Malabar Rebellion of 1921 is often considered as the culmination of Mappila riots. Mappilas...
, 21000 Hindus were butchered and over 1 lakh were made homeless by Muslims. Many Muslim organizations allegedly supported Love Jihad
Love Jihad
Love Jihad also called Romeo Jihad, is an alleged activity under which some young Muslim boys and men reportedly target college girls belonging to non-Muslim communities for conversion to Islam by feigning love. While similar activities have been reported elsewhere, the term has been used to...
where Muslim boys targeted non-Muslim young girls, especially Hindu girls to convert them to Islam by feigning love.
Bangladesh
The HAF report documents the long history of anti-HinduAnti-Hindu
Anti-Hindu prejudice is a negative perception or religious intolerance against the practice and practitioners of Hinduism. Anti-Hindu sentiments have been expressed by Muslims in Pakistan, Bangladesh, leading to significant persecution of Hindus in those regions, such as the 1971 Bangladesh...
atrocities in Bangladesh, a topic that many Indians and Indian governments over the years have preferred not to acknowledge. Such atrocities, including targeted attacks against temples, open theft of Hindu property, and rape
Rape
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...
of young Hindu women and enticements to convert to Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
, have increased sharply in recent years after the Jamat-e-Islami joined the coalition government led by the Bangladesh National Party.
Bangladesh has had a troublesome history of persecution of Hindus as well. A US-based human rights organisation, Refugees International, has claimed that religious minorities, especially Hindus, still face discrimination in Bangladesh.
The government of Bangladesh, a nationalist party openly calls for ‘Talibanisation’ of the state. However, the prospect of actually "Talibanizing" the state is regarded as a remote possibility, since Bangladeshi Islamic society is generally more progressive than the extremist Taliban of Afghanistan. Political scholars conclude that while the Islamization of Bangladesh is real, the country is not on the brink of being Talibanized. In 1971 at the time of the liberation of Bangladesh from East Pakistan, the Hindu population accounted for 15% of the total population. Thirty years on, it is now estimated at just 10.5%. The ‘Vested Property Act’ previously named the ‘Enemy Property Act’ has seen up to 40% of Hindu land snatched away forcibly. Since this government has come into power, of all the rape crimes registered in Bangladesh, 98% have been registered by Hindu women. Hindu temples in Bangladesh have also been vandalised. The United States Congressional Caucus on India has condemned these atrocities.
Bangladeshi feminist Taslima Nasrin
Taslima Nasrin
Taslima Nasrin is a Bengali Bangladeshi ex-doctor turned author who has been living in exile since 1994. From a modest literary profile in the late 1980s, she rose to global fame by the end of the 20th century owing to her feminist views and her criticism of Islam in particular and of religion in...
's 1993 novel Lajja
Lajja
Lajja is a novel in Bengali by Taslima Nasrin, a writer of Bangladesh. The word lajja/lôjja means "shame" in Bengali and many other Indic languages. The book was first published in 1993 in the Bengali language, and was subsequently banned in Bangladesh, and a few states of India...
deals with the anti-Hindu riots and anti-secular sentiment in Bangladesh in the wake of the destruction of the Babri Masjid in India. The book was banned in Bangladesh, and helped draw international attention to the situation of the Bangladeshi Hindu minority.
In October 2006, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom
United States Commission on International Religious Freedom
The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom is an independent, bipartisan U.S. federal government commission created by the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998. USCIRF Commissioners are appointed by the President and the leadership of both political parties in the Senate...
published a report titled 'Policy Focus on Bangladesh', which said that since its last election, 'Bangladesh has experienced growing violence by religious extremists, intensifying concerns expressed by the countries religious minorities'. The report further stated that Hindus are particularly vulnerable in a period of rising violence and extremism, whether motivated by religious, political or criminal factors, or some combination. The report noted that Hindus had multiple disadvantages against them in Bangladesh, such as perceptions of dual loyalty
Dual loyalty
In politics, dual loyalty is loyalty to two separate interests that potentially conflict with each other.-Inherently controversial:While nearly all examples of alleged "dual loyalty" are considered highly controversial, these examples point to the inherent difficulty in distinguishing between what...
with respect to India and religious beliefs that are not tolerated by the politically dominant Islamic Fundamentalists of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party
Bangladesh Nationalist Party
The Bangladesh Nationalist Party , commonly referred to as the BNP, is the mainstream center-right political party in Bangladesh. BNP ruled Bangladesh total 18 years since her independence, the longest than any other party in Bangladesh...
. Violence against Hindus has taken place "in order to encourage them to flee in order to seize their property".The previous reports of the Hindu American Foundation
Hindu American Foundation
The Hindu American Foundation is an American Hindu human rights group advocating on behalf of the Hindu community in the United States. Dr...
were acknowledged and confirmed by this non-partisan report.
On November 2, 2006, USCIRF criticized Bangladesh for its continuing persecution of minority Hindus. It also urged the Bush administration to get Dhaka
Dhaka
Dhaka is the capital of Bangladesh and the principal city of Dhaka Division. Dhaka is a megacity and one of the major cities of South Asia. Located on the banks of the Buriganga River, Dhaka, along with its metropolitan area, had a population of over 15 million in 2010, making it the largest city...
to ensure protection of religious freedom and minority rights before Bangladesh's next national elections in January 2007.
On the February 6, 2010, Sonargaon temple in Narayanganj district of Bangladesh was destroyed by Islamic fanatics. Five people were seriously injured during the attack. Temples were also attacked and destroyed in 2011
Pakistan
There are a number of instances of persecution of Hindus in Pakistan. Minority members of the Pakistan National Assembly have alleged that Hindus were being hounded and humiliated to force them to leave Pakistan. In 1951, Hindus constituted 22 percentage of the Pakistani population (that includes the modern day Bangladesh); Today, the share of Hindus are down to 1.7 percent in Pakistan, and 9.2 percent in Bangladesh (In 1951, Bangladesh alone had 22% Hindu population)Pakistan Studies curriculum issues
According to the Sustainable Development Policy Institute
Sustainable Development Policy Institute
The Sustainable Development Policy Institute provides the global sustainable development community with representation from Pakistan as well as South Asia as a whole. The Institute's mission is: "To catalyse the transition towards sustainable development, defined as the enhancement of peace,...
report 'Associated with the insistence on the Ideology of Pakistan has been an essential component of hate against India and the Hindus. For the upholders of the Ideology of Pakistan, the existence of Pakistan is defined only in relation to Hindus, and hence the Hindus have to be painted as negatively as possible' A 2005 report by the National Commission for Justice and Peace a non profit organization in Pakistan, found that Pakistan Studies textbooks in Pakistan have been used to articulate the hatred that Pakistani policy-makers have attempted to inculcate towards the Hindus. 'Vituperative animosities legitimise military and autocratic rule, nurturing a siege mentality. Pakistan Studies textbooks are an active site to represent India as a hostile neighbour' the report stated. 'The story of Pakistan’s past is intentionally written to be distinct from, and often in direct contrast with, interpretations of history found in India. From the government-issued textbooks, students are taught that Hindus are backward and superstitious.' Further the report stated 'Textbooks reflect intentional obfuscation. Today’s students, citizens of Pakistan and its future leaders are the victims of these partial truths'.
An editorial in Pakistan's oldest newspaper Dawn
Dawn (newspaper)
Dawn is Pakistan's oldest and most widely read English-language newspaper. One of the country's two largest English-language dailies, it is the flagship of the Dawn Group of Newspapers, published by Pakistan Herald Publications, which also owns the Herald, a magazine, the evening paper The Star and...
commenting on a report in The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
on Pakistani Textbooks noted 'By propagating concepts such as jihad
Jihad
Jihad , an Islamic term, is a religious duty of Muslims. In Arabic, the word jihād translates as a noun meaning "struggle". Jihad appears 41 times in the Quran and frequently in the idiomatic expression "striving in the way of God ". A person engaged in jihad is called a mujahid; the plural is...
, the inferiority of non-Muslims, India’s ingrained enmity with Pakistan, etc., the textbook board publications used by all government schools promote a mindset that is bigoted and obscurantist. Since there are more children studying in these schools than in madrassahs the damage done is greater. ' According to the historian Professor Mubarak Ali
Mubarak Ali
Dr. Mubarak Ali is an eminent historian, activist and scholar of Pakistan.Ali was born in Tonk, British India in April 1941. He wrote in one of his books that he made up his birthdate because his parents did not know it accurately.- Career :Ali obtained an M.A. in History from Sindh University,...
, textbook reform in Pakistan began with the introduction of Pakistan Studies and Islamic studies by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in 1971 into the national curriculum as compulsory subject. Former military dictator Gen Zia-ul-Haq under a general drive towards Islamization, started the process of historical revisionism in earnest and exploited this initiative. 'The Pakistani establishment taught their children right from the beginning that this state was built on the basis of religion – that's why they don't have tolerance for other religions and want to wipe-out all of them.'
According to Pervez Hoodbhoy
Pervez Hoodbhoy
Dr. Prof. Pervez Amirali Hoodbhoy , is a Pakistani nuclear physicist, essayist and political-defence analyst. He is the professor of nuclear and high-energy physics, and the head of the Physics Department at the Quaid-e-Azam University . He graduated and also received PhD from MIT and continues to...
, a physics professor at Quaid-i-Azam University
Quaid-i-Azam University
The Quaid-i-Azam University is a public, research university in Islamabad Capital Territory of Pakistan. It was initially founded as the "University of Islamabad" in July 1967...
in Islamabad
Islamabad
Islamabad is the capital of Pakistan and the tenth largest city in the country. Located within the Islamabad Capital Territory , the population of the city has grown from 100,000 in 1951 to 1.7 million in 2011...
, the "Islamizing" of Pakistan's schools began in 1976 when an act of parliament required all government and private schools (except those teaching the British O-levels from Grade 9) to follow a curriculum that includes learning outcomes for the federally approved Grade 5 social studies class such as: 'Acknowledge and identify forces that may be working against Pakistan,' 'Make speeches on Jihad,' 'Collect pictures of policemen, soldiers, and national guards,' and 'India's evil designs against Pakistan.'
1971 Bangladesh atrocities
During the 1971 Bangladesh atrocities
1971 Bangladesh atrocities
Beginning with the start of Operation Searchlight on 25 March 1971 and continuing throughout the Bangladesh Liberation War, there were widespread violations of human rights in East Pakistan perpetrated by the Pakistan Army, with support from local political and religious militias, especially...
there were widespread killings and acts of ethnic cleansing
Ethnic cleansing
Ethnic cleansing is a purposeful policy designed by one ethnic or religious group to remove by violent and terror-inspiring means the civilian population of another ethnic orreligious group from certain geographic areas....
of civilians in Bangladesh
Bangladesh
Bangladesh , officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh is a sovereign state located in South Asia. It is bordered by India on all sides except for a small border with Burma to the far southeast and by the Bay of Bengal to the south...
(then East Pakistan
East Pakistan
East Pakistan was a provincial state of Pakistan established in 14 August 1947. The provincial state existed until its declaration of independence on 26 March 1971 as the independent nation of Bangladesh. Pakistan recognized the new nation on 16 December 1971. East Pakistan was created from Bengal...
, a province of Pakistan), and widespread violations of human rights were carried out by the Pakistan Army, which was supported by political and religious militias during the Bangladesh Liberation War. In Bangladesh, the atrocities are identified as a genocide. Many of the victims were Hindus, and the total death toll was in the millions.TIME
Time
Time is a part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify rates of change such as the motions of objects....
magazine reported that "The Hindus, who account for three-fourths of the refugees and a majority of the dead, have borne the brunt of the Muslim military's hatred."
Forced Conversions
Hindu women have also been known to be victims of kidnapping and forced conversion to Islam. Around 25 Hindu girls are abducted every month and converted to Islam forcibly in Pakistan, as reported by Pakistani media. Krishan Bheel
Krishan Bheel
Krishan Bheel is a Pakistani politician. He is one of the few Hindu politicians in Pakistan. and belongs to Pakistan Muslim League .-Early life:...
, a Hindu member of the National Assembly of Pakistan
National Assembly of Pakistan
The National Assembly of Pakistan is the lower house of the bicameral Majlis-e-Shura, which also compromises the President of Pakistan and Senate . The National Assembly and the Senate both convene at Parliament House in Islamabad...
, came into the news recently for manhandling Qari Gul Rehman after being taunted with a religious insult.
On October 18, 2005, Sanno Amra and Champa, a Hindu couple residing in the Punjab Colony, Karachi, Sindh returned home to find that their three teenage daughters had disappeared. After inquiries to the local police, the couple discovered that their daughters had been taken to a local madrassah, had been converted to Islam, and were denied unsupervised contact with their parents.
A Pakistan Muslim League
Pakistan Muslim League
The Pakistan Muslim League was founded in 1962, as a successor to the previously disbanded Muslim League in Pakistan. Unlike the original PML which ended in 1958 when General Ayub Khan banned all political parties, each subsequent Muslim League was in some way propped by the military dictators of...
politician has states that abduction of Hindus and Sikhs is a business in Pakistan, along with conversions of Hindus to Islam
Temple Destruction
Several Hindu temples have been destroyed in Pakistan. A notable incident was the destruction of the Ramna Kali Mandir
Ramna Kali Mandir
The Ramna Kali Mandir , also known as the Ramna Kalibari was one of the most famous Hindu temples of the Indian subcontinent...
in former East Pakistan
East Pakistan
East Pakistan was a provincial state of Pakistan established in 14 August 1947. The provincial state existed until its declaration of independence on 26 March 1971 as the independent nation of Bangladesh. Pakistan recognized the new nation on 16 December 1971. East Pakistan was created from Bengal...
. The temple was bulldozed by the Pakistan Army on March 27, 1971.The Dhakeshwari Temple
Dhakeshwari Temple
Dhakeshwari National Temple is a famous Hindu temple in Dhaka, Bangladesh and is state-owned, giving it the distinction of Bangladesh's "National Temple". The name "Dhakeshwari" means "Goddess of Dhaka". The temple is located southwest of the Salimullah Hall of Dhaka University...
was severely damaged during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971
Indo-Pakistani War of 1971
The Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 was a military conflict between India and Pakistan. Indian, Bangladeshi and international sources consider the beginning of the war to be Operation Chengiz Khan, Pakistan's December 3, 1971 pre-emptive strike on 11 Indian airbases...
, and over half of the temple's buildings were destroyed. In a major disrespect of the religion, the main worship hall was taken over by the Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...
Army and used as an ammunitions storage area. Several of the temple custodians were tortured and killed by the Army though most, including the Head Priest, fled first to their ancestral villages and then to India and therefore escaped death.
In 2006, the last Hindu temple in Lahore
Lahore
Lahore is the capital of the Pakistani province of Punjab and the second largest city in the country. With a rich and fabulous history dating back to over a thousand years ago, Lahore is no doubt Pakistan's cultural capital. One of the most densely populated cities in the world, Lahore remains a...
was destroyed to pave the way for construction of a multi-storied commercial building. The temple was demolished after officials of the Evacuee Property Trust Board concealed facts from the board chairman about the nature of the building. When reporters from Pakistan-based newspaper Dawn
Dawn (newspaper)
Dawn is Pakistan's oldest and most widely read English-language newspaper. One of the country's two largest English-language dailies, it is the flagship of the Dawn Group of Newspapers, published by Pakistan Herald Publications, which also owns the Herald, a magazine, the evening paper The Star and...
tried to cover the incident, they were accosted by the henchmen of the property developer, who denied that a Hindu temple existed at the site.
Several political parties in Pakistan have objected to this move, such as the Pakistan People's party and the Pakistani Muslim League-N. The move has also evoked strong condemnation
in India from minority bodies and political parties, including the Bharatiya Janata Party
Bharatiya Janata Party
The Bharatiya Janata Party ,; translation: Indian People's Party) is one of the two major political parties in India, the other being the Indian National Congress. Established in 1980, it is India's second largest political party in terms of representation in the parliament...
(BJP), the Congress Party
Indian National Congress
The Indian National Congress is one of the two major political parties in India, the other being the Bharatiya Janata Party. It is the largest and one of the oldest democratic political parties in the world. The party's modern liberal platform is largely considered center-left in the Indian...
, as well as Muslim advocacy political parties such as the All India Muslim Majlis-e-Mushawarat. A firm of lawyers representing the Hindu minority has
approached the Lahore High Court seeking a directive to the builders to stop the construction of the commercial plaza and reconstruct the temple at the site. The petitioners maintain that the demolition violates section 295 of the Pakistan Penal Code prohibiting the demolition of places of worship.
2005 unrest in Nowshera
On June 29, 2005, following the arrest of an illiterate Christian janitor on allegations of allegedly burning Qur'an pages, a mob of between 300 and 500 Muslims destroyed a Hindu temple and houses belonging to Christian and Hindu families in Nowshera. Under the terms of a deal negotiated between Islamic religious leaders and the Hindu/Christian communities, Pakistani police later released all previously arrested perpetrators without charge.
Discrimination due to the rise of Taliban
Although Hindus were frequently soft targets in Pakistan, the rise of Taliban forces in the political arena has particularly unsettled the already fragile situation for the minority community. Increasing persecution, ostracism from locals and lack of a social support system is forcing more and more Hindus to flee to India. This has been observed in the past whenever the conflicts between the two nations escalated but this has been a notable trend in view of the fact the recent developments are due to internal factors almost exclusively. The Taliban have used false lures, as well as the cooperation of zealots within local authorities to perpetrate religious cleansing
Religious cleansing
Religious cleansing is a euphemism for a form of religious persecution in which members of a religious population are subjected to imprisonment, expulsion, or death by a majority to achieve religious homogeneity in majority-controlled territory...
.
Afghanistan
During the Taliban regime, Sumptuary lawSumptuary law
Sumptuary laws are laws that attempt to regulate habits of consumption. Black's Law Dictionary defines them as "Laws made for the purpose of restraining luxury or extravagance, particularly against inordinate expenditures in the matter of apparel, food, furniture, etc." Traditionally, they were...
s were passed in 2001 which forced Hindus to wear yellow badge
Yellow badge
The yellow badge , also referred to as a Jewish badge, was a cloth patch that Jews were ordered to sew on their outer garments in order to mark them as Jews in public. It is intended to be a badge of shame associated with antisemitism...
s in public to identify themselves as such. This has been compared to Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
's treatment of Jews
Jews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
in Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. Hindu women were forced to dress according to Islamic hijab
Hijab
The word "hijab" or "'" refers to both the head covering traditionally worn by Muslim women and modest Muslim styles of dress in general....
, ostensibly a measure to "protect" them from harassment. This was part of the Taliban's plan to segregate "un-Islamic" and "idolatrous" communities from Islamic ones. In addition, Hindus were forced to mark their places of residence identifying them as Hindu homes.
The decree was condemned by the Indian and United States governments as a violation of religious freedom. Widespread protests against the Taliban regime broke out in Bhopal, India. In the United States, chairman of the Anti-Defamation League
Anti-Defamation League
The Anti-Defamation League is an international non-governmental organization based in the United States. Describing itself as "the nation's premier civil rights/human relations agency", the ADL states that it "fights anti-Semitism and all forms of bigotry, defends democratic ideals and protects...
Abraham Foxman
Abraham Foxman
Abraham H. Foxman is the National Director of the Anti-Defamation League.-Early life:Foxman, an only son, was born in Baranovichi, just months after the USSR took the town from Poland in the Nazi-Soviet Pact and incorporated it into the BSSR. The town is now in Belarus...
compared the decree to the practices of Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
, where Jews
Jews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
were required to wear labels identifying them as such. The comparison was also drawn by California Democrat and holocaust survivor Tom Lantos, and New York Democrat and author of the bipartisan 'Sense of the Congress' non-binding resolution against the anti-Hindu decree Eliot L Engel. In the United States, congressmen and several lawmakers. wore yellow badges on the floor of the Senate during the debate as a demonstration of their solidarity with the Hindu minority in Afghanistan.
Indian analyst Rahul Banerjee said that this was not the first time that Hindus have been singled out for state-sponsored oppression in Afghanistan. Violence against Hindus has caused a rapid depletion in the Hindu population over the years. Since the 1990s many Afghan Hindus have fled the country, seeking asylum in countries such as Germany.
Bhutan
In 1991-92, BhutanBhutan
Bhutan , officially the Kingdom of Bhutan, is a landlocked state in South Asia, located at the eastern end of the Himalayas and bordered to the south, east and west by the Republic of India and to the north by the People's Republic of China...
expelled roughly 100,000 ethnic Nepalis (Lhotshampa
Lhotshampa
Lhotshampa, or Lhotsampa, means "southerners" in Dzongkha, the national language of Bhutan. The term refers to the heterogeneous ethnic Nepalese population of Bhutan.-History:...
), most of whom have been living in seven refugee camps in eastern Nepal
Nepal
Nepal , officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, is a landlocked sovereign state located in South Asia. It is located in the Himalayas and bordered to the north by the People's Republic of China, and to the south, east, and west by the Republic of India...
ever since. The Lhotshampa are generally classified as Hindu
Hindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...
s. In March 2008, this population began a multiyear resettlement to third countries including the U.S., Canada, New Zealand, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands and Australia. At present, the United States is working towards resettling more than 60,000 of these refugee
Refugee
A refugee is a person who outside her country of origin or habitual residence because she has suffered persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or because she is a member of a persecuted 'social group'. Such a person may be referred to as an 'asylum seeker' until...
s in the US as third country settlement programme.
Italy
In Italy, Hinduism is not recognized as a religion, and during Durga PujaDurga Puja
Durga puja ; দুর্গা পূজা,ଦୁର୍ଗା ପୂଜା,‘Worship of Durga’), also referred to as Durgotsava ; , is an annual Hindu festival in South Asia that celebrates worship of the Hindu goddess Durga. It refers to all the six days observed as Mahalaya, Shashthi, Maha Saptami, Maha Ashtami, Maha Navami and...
celebrations, the Italian police shut down a previously approved Durga Puja celebration in Rome. The affront was seen by some as a statement against alleged persecution of Christians
Persecution of Christians
Persecution of Christians as a consequence of professing their faith can be traced both historically and in the current era. Early Christians were persecuted for their faith, at the hands of both Jews from whose religion Christianity arose, and the Roman Empire which controlled much of the land...
in India.
Kazakhstan
In 2005 and 2006 Kazakh officials persistently and repeatedly tried to close down the Hare Krishna farming community near Almaty.On November 20, 2006, three buses full of riot police, two ambulances, two empty lorries, and executors of the Karasai district arrived at the community in sub-zero weather and evicted the Hare Krishna followers from thirteen homes, which the police proceeded to demolish.
The Forum 18 News Service
Forum 18
Forum 18 is a Norwegian human rights organization that promotes religious freedom. The organization's name is based on Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights...
reported, "Riot police who took part in the destruction threw the personal belongings of the Hare Krishna devotees into the snow, and many devotees were left without clothes. Power for lighting and heating systems had been cut off before the demolition began. Furniture and larger household belongings were loaded onto trucks. Officials said these possessions would be destroyed. Two men who tried to prevent the bailiffs from entering a house to destroy it were seized by 15 police officers who twisted their hands and took them away to the police car."
The Hare Krishna community had been promised that no action would be taken before the report of a state commission – supposedly set up to resolve the dispute – was made public. On the day the demolition began, the commission's chairman, Amanbek Mukhashev, told Forum 18, "I know nothing about the demolition of the Hare Krishna homes – I'm on holiday." He added, "As soon as I return to work at the beginning of December we will officially announce the results of the Commission's investigation." Other officials also refused to comment.
The United States urged Kazakhstan's authorities to end what it called an "aggressive" campaign against the country's tiny Hare Krishna community.
Malaysia
Approximately nine percent of the population of Malaysia are TamilTamil people
Tamil people , also called Tamils or Tamilians, are an ethnic group native to Tamil Nadu, India and the north-eastern region of Sri Lanka. Historic and post 15th century emigrant communities are also found across the world, notably Malaysia, Singapore, Mauritius, South Africa, Australia, Canada,...
Indians, of whom nearly 90 percent are practicing Hindus. Indian settlers came to Malaysia from Tamil Nadu
Tamil Nadu
Tamil Nadu is one of the 28 states of India. Its capital and largest city is Chennai. Tamil Nadu lies in the southernmost part of the Indian Peninsula and is bordered by the union territory of Pondicherry, and the states of Kerala, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh...
in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Between April to May 2006, several Hindu temples were demolished by city hall authorities in the country, accompanied by violence against Hindus. On April 21, 2006, the Malaimel Sri Selva Kaliamman Temple in Kuala Lumpur was reduced to rubble after the city hall sent in bulldozers.
The president of the Consumers Association of Subang and Shah Alam in Selangor State has been helping to organise efforts to stop the local authorities in the Muslim dominated city of Shah Alam from demolishing a 107-year-old Hindu temple. The growing Islamization in Malaysia is a cause for concern to many Malaysians who follow minority religions such as Hinduism. On May 11, 2006, armed city hall officers from Kuala Lumpur
Kuala Lumpur
Kuala Lumpur is the capital and the second largest city in Malaysia by population. The city proper, making up an area of , has a population of 1.4 million as of 2010. Greater Kuala Lumpur, also known as the Klang Valley, is an urban agglomeration of 7.2 million...
forcefully demolished part of a 60-year-old suburban temple that serves more than 1,000 Hindus. The "Hindu Rights Action Force", a coalition of several NGO's, have protested these demolitions by lodging complaints with the Malaysian Prime Minister. Many Hindu advocacy groups have protested what they allege is a systematic plan of temple cleansing in Malaysia. The official reason given by the Malaysian government has been that the temples were built "illegally". However, several of the temples are centuries old.
According to a lawyer for the Hindu Rights Action Task Force, a Hindu temple
Hindu temple
A Mandir, Devalayam, Devasthanam, or a Hindu temple is a place of worship for followers of Hinduism...
is demolished in Malaysia once every three weeks.
Malaysian Muslims have also grown more anti-Hindu
Anti-Hindu
Anti-Hindu prejudice is a negative perception or religious intolerance against the practice and practitioners of Hinduism. Anti-Hindu sentiments have been expressed by Muslims in Pakistan, Bangladesh, leading to significant persecution of Hindus in those regions, such as the 1971 Bangladesh...
over the years. In response to the proposed construction of a temple in Selangor
Selangor
Selangor also known by its Arabic honorific, Darul Ehsan, or "Abode of Sincerity") is one of the 13 states of Malaysia. It is on the west coast of Peninsular Malaysia and is bordered by Perak to the north, Pahang to the east, Negeri Sembilan to the south and the Strait of Malacca to the west...
, Muslims chopped off the head of a cow to protest, with leaders saying there would be blood if a temple was constructed in Shah Alam
Shah Alam
Shah Alam is the state capital of Selangor, Malaysia situated within the Petaling District and a small portion of the neighboring Klang District. It is located about west of the country's capital, Kuala Lumpur. Shah Alam replaced Kuala Lumpur as the capital city of the state of Selangor in 1978...
.
Laws in the country, especially those concerning religious identity, are generally slanted towards compulsion into converting to Islam
Saudi Arabia
On March 24, 2005, Saudi authorities destroyed religious items found in a raid on a makeshift Hindu shrine found in an apartment in RiyadhRiyadh
Riyadh is the capital and largest city of Saudi Arabia. It is also the capital of Riyadh Province, and belongs to the historical regions of Najd and Al-Yamama. It is situated in the center of the Arabian Peninsula on a large plateau, and is home to 5,254,560 people, and the urban center of a...
.
Fiji
Hindus in Fiji constitute approximately 38% of the population. During the late 1990s there were several riots against Hindus by radical elements in Fiji. In the Spring of 2000, the democratically elected Fijian government led by Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry was held hostage by a guerilla group, headed by George Speight. They were demanding a segregated state exclusively for the native Fijians, thereby legally abolishing any rights the Hindu inhabitants have now. The majority of Fijian land is reserved for the ethnically Fijian community. Since the practitioners of Hindu faith are predominantly Indians, racist attacks by the extremist Fijian Nationalists too often culminated into violence against the institutions of Hinduism. According to official reports, attacks on Hindu institutions increased by 14% compared to 2004. Hindus and Hinduism, being labeled the “outside others,” especially in the aftermath of the May 2000 coup, have been victimized by Fijian fundamentalist and nationalists who wish to create a theocratic Christian state in Fiji. This intolerance of Hindus has found expression in anti-Hindu speeches and destruction of temples, the two most common forms of immediate and direct violence against Hindus. Between 2001 and April 2005, one hundred cases of temple attacks have been registered with the police. The alarming increase of temple destruction has spread fear and intimidation among the Hindu minorities and has hastened immigration to neighboring Australia and New Zealand. organized religious institutions, such as the Methodist Church of Fiji, have repeatedly called for the creation of a theocratic Christian State and have propagated anti-Hindu sentiment.The Methodist church of Fiji repeatedly calls for the creation of a Christian State since a coup d'etat in 1987 and has stated that those who are not Christian should be "tolerated as long as they obey Christian law".
The Methodist Church of Fiji specifically objects to the constitutional protection of minority religious communities such as Hindus and Muslims. State favoritism of Christianity, and systematic attacks on temples, are some of the greatest threats faced by Fijian Hindus. Despite the creation of a human rights commission, the plight of Hindus in Fiji continues to be precarious.
Trinidad & Tobago
During the initial decades of Indian indenture, Indian cultural forms were met with either contempt or indifference by the Christian majority. Hindus have made many contributions to Trinidad history and culture even though the state historically regarded Hindus as second class citizens. Hindus in Trinidad struggled over the granting of adult franchise, the Hindu marriage bill, the divorce bill, cremation ordinance, and others. After Trinidad's independence from colonial rule, Hindus were marginalized by the African based People's National Movement. The opposing party, the People's Democratic party, was portrayed as a "Hindu group", and Hindus were castigated as a "recalcitrant and hostile minority". The displacement of PNM from power in 1985 would improve the situation.Intensified protests over the course of the 1980s led to an improvement in the state's attitudes towards Hindus. The divergence of some of the fundamental aspects of local Hindu culture, the segregation of the Hindu community from Trinidad, and the disinclination to risk erasing the more fundamental aspects of what had been constructed as "Trinidad Hinduism" in
which the identity of the group had been rooted, would often generate dissension when certain dimensions of Hindu culture came into contact with the State. While the incongruences continue to generate debate, and often conflict, it is now tempered with growing awareness and consideration on the part of the state to the Hindu minority. Hindus have been also been subjected to persistent proselytization by Christian missionaries.
Specifically the evangelical and Pentecostal Christians. Such activities reflect racial tensions that at times arise between the Christianized Afro-Trinidadian and Hindu Indo-Trinidadian communities.
South Africa
South Africa is home to a small Hindu minority. In 2006, the son of an Islamic cleric named Ahmed Deedat, circulated a DVD that denounced South African Hindus. The elder Deedat, former head of the Arab funded "Islamic Propagation Centre International" (IPCI), had previously circulated an anti-Hindu video in the 80's where he said that Indian Muslims were 'fortunate' that their Hindu forefathers 'saw the light' and converted to Islam when Muslim rulers dominated some areas of India. His video was widely criticized. While Hindus in South Africa have largely ignored the new anti-Hindu DVD circulated by Deedat Junior, he has been severely criticized by local Muslims, including other members of the IPCI.The IPCI said in a statement that Yusuf Deedat did not represent the organisation in any way. Deedat Junior, undeterred by the opposition from his own brethren, continues to circulate the material.He has placed advertisements in newspapers inviting anyone to collect a free copy from his residence to see for themselves "what the controversy is about".United States of America
Hindu immigrants, constitute approximately 0.5% of the total population. They are also the second most affluent religious group after the Jews. Hindus in USA enjoy both de jure and de facto legal equality. However, it is widely acknowledged that the Hindu community in USA became more politically active after a series of attacks by a street gang called the "DotbustersDotbusters
The Dotbusters was a hate group in Jersey City, New Jersey, that attacked and threatened South Asians in the fall of 1987. The name originated from the fact that traditional Hindu women and girls wear a bindi on their forehead .In July 1987, they had a letter published in the Jersey Journal stating...
" in the New Jersey area in the year 1987. The lackadaisical attitude of the Police, prompted the South Asian community to arrange small groups all across the state to fight back against the street gang. The perpetrators have been put to trial.
See also
- Anti-Hinduism
- Negationism in India - Concealing the Record of IslamNegationism in India - Concealing the Record of IslamNegationism in India: Concealing the Record of Islam is a book by Koenraad Elst published in 1992.The book attempts to demonstrate that there exists a 'prohibition' of criticism of Islam and a denial of its 'historic crimes against humanity' that amounts to censorship, comparing it to Holocaust...
- Hindu Temples - What Happened to ThemHindu Temples - What Happened to ThemHindu Temples – What Happened to Them is a two-volume book by Sita Ram Goel, Arun Shourie, Harsh Narain, Jay Dubashi and Ram Swarup. The first volume was published in spring 1990....
- Conversion of non-Muslim places of worship into mosquesConversion of non-Muslim places of worship into mosquesConversion of non-Muslim places of worship into mosques began during the life of Muhammad and continued during subsequent Islamic conquests and under the Muslim rule...
- The History of India, as Told by Its Own Historians. The Muhammadan Period (Book)
- Hinduism in IranHinduism in Iran-Hindu based Organisations in Iran prior to 1979:Prior to the Iranian Revolution of 1979, some Hindu-based missions such as the International Society for Krishna Consciousness and Transcendental meditation, had locations in Iran. A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada traveled to Tehran in March 1975...
- 2007 HINDRAF rally2007 HINDRAF rallyThe 2007 HINDRAF rally was a rally held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on November 25, 2007. The rally organizer, the Hindu Rights Action Force, had called the protest over alleged discriminatory policies which favour ethnic Malays...
- Anti-BrahmanismAnti-BrahmanismAnti-Brahminism, also spelled as Anti-Brahmanism, is, people's revolt directed against the Brahmin caste, as opposed to Anti-Hinduism which rejects Hinduism as a whole...
- Muslim League Attack on Sikhs and Hindus in the Punjab 1947Muslim League Attack on Sikhs and Hindus in the Punjab 1947Muslim League Attack on Sikhs and Hindus in the Punjab 1947 is a book by Sikh author Gurbachan Singh Talib. It was first published in 1950 by the Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee and has been reprinted several times....
- Expulsion of Indians from Burma in 1962
- Expulsion of Asians in Uganda in 1972Expulsion of Asians in Uganda in 1972On 4 August 1972, the then President of Uganda, Idi Amin, ordered the expulsion of his country's Indian minority, giving them 90 days to leave Uganda...
- Love JihadLove JihadLove Jihad also called Romeo Jihad, is an alleged activity under which some young Muslim boys and men reportedly target college girls belonging to non-Muslim communities for conversion to Islam by feigning love. While similar activities have been reported elsewhere, the term has been used to...
Other religions:
- Persecution of JewsPersecution of JewsPersecution of Jews has occurred on numerous occasions and at widely different geographical locations. As well as being a major component in Jewish history, it has significantly affected the general history and social development of the countries and societies in which the persecuted Jews...
- Persecution of ChristiansPersecution of ChristiansPersecution of Christians as a consequence of professing their faith can be traced both historically and in the current era. Early Christians were persecuted for their faith, at the hands of both Jews from whose religion Christianity arose, and the Roman Empire which controlled much of the land...
- Persecution of MuslimsPersecution of MuslimsPersecution of Muslims is the religious persecution of Muslims as a consequence of professing their faith, both historically and in the current era.-Anatolia:...
- Persecution of Ahmadi Muslims
- Persecution of Roman religionPersecution of Roman religionAs the Roman Republic, and later the Roman Empire, expanded, it came to include people from a variety of cultures, and religions. The worship of an ever increasing number of deities was tolerated and accepted. The government, and the Romans in general, tended to be tolerant towards most religions...
- Persecution of Ancient Greek religion
- Persecution of HeathensPersecution of HeathensPersecution of Heathens can refer to:*Christianization**Decline of Hellenistic polytheism*Religious discrimination against Neopagans*contemporary traditional religions**Persecution of African traditional religions**Kalash people#History...
External links
- Human Rights Congress for Bangladesh Minorities
- The Hindu Minority in Bangladesh
- Attacks on the Hindu Minority in Bangladesh - Amnesty International
- Atrocities on Hindus catch US Congressmen's attention - United States Commission on Religious Freedom
- Row over Krishna temple in Moscow