Shastry – Atanu is highlighting the recent attack on an ancient Buddha statue in Swat, not the Bamiyan Buddhas.

And moron My forefathers “converted”(as per your term….without going through a ceremony or renouncing any priror zahiliyat) It was accomplisted by moving out of muslim dominated area and overtime became baniyas. Had they remained where they were they would be forced by taxation if not outright death threat.
Incidentally Same thing happened to the Jains in North India.
Qutub Minar was an old Jain complex of about 24 temples. In central india and you find jains originaly from there.

My ancestory is from whats been called NWFP these days. The legends are that we were buddhist prior to all artisans turning into muslims a few of us refused and got amalgated into hindus baniyas.

if you like popular history you can check out
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shahi
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rai_Dynasty
do see who brought down the Buddhist dynasties and how. The keyword is not”hindu” but”brahmin”

I’ll take you on your writing only. You wrote, “The entire existence of extremist depends upon the sharpening of social fault lines that are so cherished by him”
To which One has to only read history and the vile history of islam into dividing those into submissives and infedels, house of war house of islam, worthy of people of book status (cause of consanguinity with prior prophets but no future ones tehre) or north.
you are a fool to suggest that Deys viewpoint is prejudicial. Its your which however is by lumping those who tell there kids not to play with blacks etc.
You ought to get educated about the kind of people who oppose banal assertions about islam being a religion of peace, egalitarian and other hogwash.

Religious and cultural chauvinism, contempt for conciliatory policies of Nehru and Gandhi, admiration for dictatorship, mistrust of affirmative action policies, and minority baiting, all fit neatly into this right wing world view.

So does the sudden remembrance of Bamiyan, has anything to do with this world view? After all, this is neither buddha jayanti nor anniversary of Bamiyan nor the wake of a similar incident but in back drop of Tehelka expose that Atanu has suddenly remembered Bamiyan.

The entire existence of extremist depends upon the sharpening of social fault lines that are so cherished by him and anything that suggests that the “evil” is not so evil and the “good” is not the “little good victim” is an occasion for stoking paranoia by appealing to what is happening elsewhere – so that the ugly realities nearer home could be denied.

It should also come as a reminder to those who believe that education alone can cure men of their prejudices and help them being better human beings. You take a fool and educate him, but all you get in the end is an educated fool.

Moreover, I am not preventing you from trying to live your dream of ridding India of Taj. But if you do it within the framework of law, you would find that a lot of Indians wouldn’t let you do that
About Identities – If you could decipher I have already touched that point — I find Atanu the economist interesting and Atanu the religion baiter pitiable.

@Notsure
at the risk of starting a my-history-is-truer-than-yours contest -
Chach, the sindh ruler, was a Brahmin who usurped the Buddhist empire (Rai dynasty).
Before buddhist that area had Persians (who were not muslim at that time) and afterwards they had white-huns.

I am not apologizing for anyone. you are having difficulty digesting the fact that Hinduism was a major cause of demise of Indian (including Afghan) Buddhism
Coming back to Afghanistan – last Buddhist dynasty was Turk Shahi… Their last king was imprisoned by his Brahmin wazir who began the Hindu-Shahi dynasty.

So dude get your fact cleared stop calling others liars.

Bawara – what Amartya Sen forgot to mention is that, these multiple identities also have hierarchies.

“Moreover, one must remember to not get bogged down in symbolism. ”

Should we get rid of the Taj Mahal?

What is worrying is the trend of picking up every negative deed by every muslim psycho and then spewing venom about muslims. Some people are stuck on religious identities (there are many identities that a person has)..but that’s their nature and world view… I can’t do much about it.

It is a really sad thing that Bamiyan Buddha got defaced. Gives a sort of a dejavu feeling .. go to any heritage monument near you..loads of “Ramesh loves Geeta” grafitti will break your heart. Nearer my home – upkeep of all delhi heritage buildings is totally appalling.

Moreover, one must remember to not get bogged down in symbolism. Bamiyan buddha is symbolic of a cultural civilization that flourished in the north of our lands. The cultural civilization was not brought down by muslims. Hinduism was its nemesis.

If i were the ghost of a bamiyan buddhist monk I would deeply saddened by the fate of Bamiyan buddha .. but I would be much more pained by the fact that my cultural civilization got wiped out from my land.

What’s missing from this action ??? Counter-comments with MC BC and a no holds barred slugfest.

Lets see if that kind of crowd reads this post (and if comments are not selectively screened)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lA0qEm831No

Just yesterday a muslim US citizen acquantance of mine was saying that there should be no criticism of religion in US as its a secular society.
I pointed it out to him that in US you are free to criticize who ever you want to, Just cause you bully others into silence elsewhere doesnt mean that the rest of the world doesnt see throught it.
It was india with its alleged freedom of speech where their bullying led to banning of Rushdies book(the one which referred to the prophet changing his mind later and concocting being possessed) prior to any khomeini fatwa.