Undoubtedly the Muslims of India are Hindu Mussalmans

I was once examining patients in a rural medical camp in West Bengal and called a patient by name Jahanbee without realizing that the woman that came forward who had a spot of vermillion on her forehead, so very normally sitting there was the one I was calling.

I have known some of the highly educated Bangla Deshi women who routinely sport a spot of vermillion and if they are not speaking in English they speak Bangla. No one has ever chastised them over it whereas on the mainland there is so much ruckus over this.

In a lovely film named Ankur, Shabana Azmi wears a beautiful one and looks more Hindu than even the Hindu women. Till the releases of Ankur and for many years after the maturity of the Indian Society was intact.

Tuljapur is a small place in the present Marathwada region of Maharashtra earlier under the Nizam of Hyderabad. It has a more than substantial population of Muslims. Tuljapur is famous for the idol and shrine of Tulaja Bhavani the deity of the clan of Shivaji Maharaj, which was hammered to pieces by Afzal Khan the mighty and feared knight of the Vijapur Darbar on his way to kill Shivaji.

Till date, during the ten days of her festival no Muslim of the town sleeps on a cot since in these ten days the Bhavani in the night is supposed to sleep on her majestic bed. Every Muslim family carries the sweet Prasad (the offering of the deity) home to eat. This is not a place to challenge these practices as ridiculous or foolish. The point here is the common devotion of these two communities and to search for its fountainhead.

Could we find a Hindu Marriage not solemnized under the divine notes of Bismillah Khan’s Shehnai? Everyone likes it immensely. No Muslim has ever said that a Nikah according to or not according to the Quranic rites should be played for by a Muslim. When Bismillah Khan was asked why he does not want to migrate to Pakistan he does not have an elaborate political explanation. He says – “where can I go leaving my mother Ganga behind?”

In the late 19^th and early 20^th century who were the stalwarts of the North Indian Classical Music? Rahimat Khan called as the immortal, divine voice on this mortal earth – the Bhoo Gandharva, Ustad Faiyaz Khan, Marhoom Abdul Karim and Vilayat Khan, Amir Khan of the famous Jugalbandi – duel competition - from Baiju Bawara with D V Paluskar, Dagar Brothers, right down to Faiyaz and Parveen Sultana of yesteryears. Ahamadjan Thirkava devoted his life as the accompanying tabla maestro for Bal Gandharva. What was the central theme of their music? It was Krishna Bhakti – devotion to Lord Krishna. Abdul Karim Khan Sahib used to sport a Hindu style turban and sported a tilak. Every element of what I mention is not Quranic. And yet, not a word of protest ever arose from Indian Muslims for over 150 years now. Why?

I will now raise a number of questions and give a few tentative answers before coming to the final one. Why and how come the Pakistani Punjabi poets wrote songs on Shri Krishna, an idol, a god, so alien to the Islamic concept of Allah without a form? We may not see an answer to this anomaly immediately. Why is it that both Hindus and Muslims do not look at those wonderful and great heroines as Muslims but identify them just with the role they are playing? Are both the audiences such connoisseurs of art that such questions do not enter their heads? I doubt if this is the case.

Even more importantly why is it that these heroines themselves so completely merge to forget their identity, with their roles, becoming as much Hindu in their demeanour, their expressions as they would if they are playing the role of a Muslim character? There is no answer immediately apparent to this question either.

Is it only their acting prowess that enables them to so successfully do so? An overwhelming answer probably would be that the prowess alone is not sufficient. Or is there something from their surroundings and environment or the traditional lives led by people from different faiths that so easily surfaces? If it is there we have no way of knowing. Or are there indelible impressions much deeper within them that surface so naturally?

The same questions could be asked of Baiju Bawara and how a trio of Indian Muslims could produce such immortal magic of the traditional Hindu devotional ethos? Why is it that in the masterpiece of Sahir mentioned above, such strong threads of Hindu ideas, concepts, appear? Why is it that ideas with a shade of Sufism float in ethereally? Why does Tuljapur occur every year? Why is it that the Maestros mentioned above have no quarrel with praying a god with a well-entrenched form in the minds of all Indians which the Quran and tradition denies so vehemently for its Allah? Why has a controversy over the Tilak not arisen for over 60 years and has become so controversial now? The most important question above all is why have there been no protests over all these things for 60 years?

Or is it that the Muslim tolerance and maturity has suddenly deteriorated and want to the Hindu ideas alien to them be tarnished and contempt hurled at them? I will strongly deny that. The “apparent” intolerance has arisen out of a deliberately perpetrated and falsely interpreted reading of the scriptures and traditions for nefarious political and selfish ends. The Muslims are no longer fooled by it. If all the answers I have proposed are either not adequate or incorrect, then what is the cause of all these phenomena described above?

The answer I believe lies in what Carl Gustav Jung has described as the ‘Archetypal Memory of a Race’. This in itself and in psychology, Western or other, is one of the greatest concept. This idea among others was a major difference between Freud and Jung. The beauty of this idea can be understood only by reading in original Jung.

In short an individual born in a location, surroundings and tradition, mixed or however varied that has existed side by side over generations; is born with the memory of the race as a whole. This always influences the character, shape of the emotions and expressions, the understanding of the past of the tradition, mind-set, and creates an individual so undifferentially understanding all this, seamlessly and remains characterized as an entity of the race, indistinguishable.

All the Indian Muslims have this Archetypal Memory of their own race as existed in India for over 1200 years now, notwithstanding all the conflicts and the bloodshed. That is why when extra ordinary matters seem to take place and these articles are full of such examples, this Archetypal Memory makes everything so natural, so spontaneous, so acceptable, enjoyable.

If not for any other reason but this, Indian Muslims are Hindu Musalmans!

Undoubtedly the Muslims of India are Hindu Mussalmans –III