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On Friday, Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif addressed the United Nations General Assembly. But before that, he met with US President Donald Trump, along with his army chief Asim Munir. The speech was all paeans to Trump crediting him with stopping the India-Pakistan war. India has repeatedly denied any third-party intervention in stopping the war, saying it was Pakistan, which directly approached India for a ceasefire.

 

Pakistan has recommended the Nobel Peace Prize for Trump, saying had he not intervened, “the consequences of a full-fledged war would have been catastrophic.” This was obviously music to Trump’s ears, whose desperation for getting the Nobel Peace prize has turned epic.

 

In a typical and characteristic manner that Pakistan leaders are always obsessed about while speaking at the UN, Sharif referred to India and Kashmir. This time, however, he not only referred to Kashmir, but also the “Hindutva”, a socio-cultural theme of the ruling dispensation in India, describing it as a “Hindu Supermacist” and “Islamophobic” ideology.

 

Although there were no buyers for his “Hindutva” thesis at the UN as neither any country nor the media took note of it, the import of the message was however not lost on those closely following India and South Asian subcontinent.

 

Sharif’s “Hindutva rant” was aimed more at people living in India than anyone listening to his speech in the UN General Assembly. His remarks need to be viewed in continuation with his army chief’s April 16 speech in Islamabad to overseas Pakistanis where he said that the Hindus and Muslims cannot live together or stay together as they were different in every possible aspect of life, including religion, customs, traditions, thoughts and ambitions. This was a direct leaf picked from Pakistan founder Mohammad Ali Jinnah’s two-nation theory.

 

Munir’s speech was followed by a deadly terrorist attack in Pahalgam, a tourist spot in Indian province of Jammu and Kashmir within six days, on April 22 when 25 Hindu tourists were selectively picked up and shot dead one by one after terrorists verified their religious identities. It could not have been a coincidence. While in numerous earlier terror attacks in Kashmir people were targeted primarily for their religion, but they were never identified by their ability to recite the ‘Kalima’ or being checked whether they were circumcised or not for ensuring that those killed were Hindus only—echoing Munir’s speech in terrorists’ macabre action.

 

Munir’s “anti-Hindu” rant was echoed by Sharif at the UN five months later. Sharif described Hindutva as a “hate filled Hindu supremacist Islamophobic ideology”, claiming that it was not only a threat to Muslims but to the entire world. Among other things, this was a counter to the worldwide concerns over the prevailing “Islamic extremism” across the world, which is considered to be a major threat to global peace. Sharif apparently sought to equate Islamic extremism with Hindutva.

 

That Sharif's speech was dictated by Munir before it was approved by Trump, as both met him (Trump) before Sharif’s address, goes without saying. Trump of course would be least bothered or interested about Munir-Sharif’s “Hindutva threat” as his concern was only about his mention in the speech that he stopped a possible “nuclear catastrophic conflagration” between India and Pakistan, thus strengthening his claims for the Nobel Peace prize.

 

Munir is known to be following in the footsteps of one of his predecessors, probably an ideal as well, General Zia-ul-Haq, a former military dictator who also believed and practiced the puritan version of Islam. Not only did he radicalise Pakistani society, he also radicalised the Pakistani army. Munir was recruited in the Pakistani Army in 1986, when Zia was at the peak of his career and power and indoctrination of the defence services was at its extreme.

 

Also read: India slams Pak PM Sharif for absurd theatrics at UN

 

Sharif, who does not even take a step or speak a word without Munir’s approval, at his behest, has tried to touch an “Islamic raw nerve” in anticipation of appealing not only to people of Kashmir, but to the Muslims across the globe, including 20 crore Muslims living in India that “Hindutva”, which according to him is a “Hindu supremacist Islamophobic ideology” was a threat to all of them.

 

By invoking the “Hindutva threat”, Sharif has set the proverbial cat among the Indian opposition political parties as well, particularly the Congress. The entire opposition in India has been describing “Hindutva” as a threat to “their” so called “idea of India”. Not surprisingly, there has been a complete silence from the Congress this time to Sharif’s thoroughly anti-India rant. Normally and mostly the Congress does intervene on such occasions when the issue is of national interest. Since the party has been saying the same thing about Hindutva what Sharif said in the United Nations General Assembly, it must have felt itself in an unenviably odd position to react. 

 

Unlike what Sharif said or the Indian opposition alleges, “Hindutva” is neither any “Hindu supremacist ideology” nor a “threat to idea of India”. The Hindutva ideology believes in strong ideological and cultural foundations of India based on its ancient culture, that incidentally is the Hindu culture. It is the same culture that accommodated and adjusted with all the foreign religions whether Christianity and Islam, besides letting other religions to grow from within.

 

People believing in Hindutva ideology have been ruling India continuously for the last 11 years. There has been no “Hindu supremacist” idea or practice imposed on anyone. Nor has there been any threat to “the idea of India”. In fact, India has strengthened culturally, politically and socially during this period in continuation with the previous regimes, mostly of the Congress. This is in no way to suggest or assume that the Congress had in any way less contribution in strengthening India. Rather the Congress’ contribution towards nation building has been more, given the fact that unlike the BJP, it had to pick up from the scratch.

 

Ignoring the semantics of political rhetoric that parties resort to against each other for domestic political compulsions and expediencies is acceptable within the country. When it comes to challenges from outside, there needs to be a single, unified and unanimous response that, we may have our differences of opinion and ideas, but defending and protecting India’s integrity and sovereignty is non-negotiable and no price will be too high to pay for it.

 

India needs to call Pakistan's “Hindutva” bluff. It is strange that a country that is mired in religious puritanism and extremism, having almost completely wiped out all religious minorities, is challenging the secular credentials of a nation that has survived as a pluralistic society despite having been cleaved into two parts in the name of Islam. It is something proverbial, the pot calling the kettle black.