protesters of Khudai Khidmatgars

Veer Chandra Singh Garhwali

Learning shared cultural values from history during the holy month of Ramzan

The holy festivities of Ramzan have started from today. Greetings to all friends and wishing them good health and wonderful time with their near dear ones. These are precious moments and we hope that people will be at peace with them. The festivities and the fasting give enough time for all of us to strengthen our mental and spiritual needs. At the moment when the world is fighting not merely with the biggest assault from Corona, authoritarian regimes world over are using the fear mongering and strengthening their control over people through not merely by their ‘laws’ but more through surveillance and policing. So digitalisation might be a great idea but at the same point of time, it has become the biggest tool in the hands of the power to exploit and violate the privacy of the people since most of these apps and tools can easily go to third party, which are mostly private parties or cronies of the power. The world is fighting not merely against Corona but also against hatred and prejudice. Those societies which were already theocratic are actually trying to emerge out of that as they have seen the worst in their ‘theocracies’ which never helped people. Theocracies happened in the name of one religion and converted that majoritarian religion a state religion. Every one of us know that religion is merely a tool to suppress people and control power and resources. The democracies which might not have been ‘perfect’ yet were proud of the rich multi-cultural legacy and I am not using the term ‘secular’ because we never really had that. We were a multicultural society and were proud of it but now these societies want to follow the ‘theocratic’ one and feel as if the biggest obstacle in their becoming a ‘world power’ are the ‘minorities’. That everything that is multicultural and celebrate our plurality become a challenge for them. Even at the time of Corona, the hate mongers dont leave their hatred. They continue to spit venom and have become worst than the poisonous reptiles. And amidst this crisis is a threat…