This Fire Needs to Be Put Out

I also used to think that Modi's actions were not right. But now after seeing pan islamic conspiracy and terrorism against India and the oppressed Indian Muslims also joing those forces, I now tend to think Modi is a visionary. He saw things coming much before I saw and we will soon see more Modis in India. And America perhaps will see more Bush's.

Mr.z_ahmed, Modi's actions are not justified. He went through intense criticism by media and . Every Indian or most Hindu's openly condemned such brutal acts.

Let us call a spade a spade. Muslims can not tolerate non-believers doesn't matter whether those are Hindus and Christians. India had Hindu majority and they need to protect themselves from Muslim and Christian hegemony and violent fanatism. To do this Hindus will have to jettision their doctrine of tolerance and fight Muslims and Christians proactively everywhere (economy, trade, jobs, society). India and Paki will remain enemies for ever. terrorism of all kinds will rise in India, Paki and elsewhere. More blood will be shed. Let us accept all these as inevitable and work towards making ourselves stronger and dominating. Period.

Mr.Fareed, Please don't use the word "underrepresented".

muslims: stop sending your kids to madrassas, and listening to all that BS. ( i mean it), Hindus: start being so 'holier than thou', christians: stop converting every creature you see in india, sikhs: please stand up again

Fareed, Your analysis is incomplete as you miss a critical point. There is a sikh minority prime minister (inspite of the communities misgivings against the hindu majority) or an Indian Muslim who is the richest man in the land, even Tata is a minority. Heck, Mumbai's police chief is a Muslim, the top three Indian male movie stars are Muslims. The king maker of the ruling party is a Italian catholic.

The Indian constitution, laws and the rules are not discriminatory towards Muslims, they have not been for the last 60years, but you miss the elephant in the room when you fail to point out the communities apathy towards reformation and the total absence of credible muslim leaders.

Where is the Indian Muslim MLK or Obama?

Oh..they are editing Newsweek or making money on Wall Street or narrowly focusing on identity politics.

Indian Muslims need reformation and giants like your Father Mr.Zakharia. Mumbai needs more professionals like Mr.Karkare.

PS: My personal opinion. Emigres like us have chosen to tie our destiny with America. We have washed our hands off India and its problems. So we have lost the moral right and intellectual ability to make expert analysis as if we have our ears on the ground.

This is a terrible time to publish such an article which essentially suggests that there is a germ of truth to the terrorists demands. This is simply not the case Mr. Zakaria, and shame on you and your magazine for suggesting it. India's minority Muslim population does suffer structural discrimination, but Indian governments have gone too far out of their way to accommodate minority sentiments. India's problem is that it is a weak state when it comes to dealing with external and internal threats, airplane hijackings, terrorist attacks, and its own minorities. It's time to get tough, not capitulate.

Fareed I am optimistic about the rise of Indian muslims in the political domain. There is now a younger and more idealistic demographic in India and of Indian Muslims. Who could have thought that Prez Kalam would be the beloved of all Indians or Man Mohan Singh be the PM of India.

Fareed,
Which home does not have internal issues. India and Indians are fed up with being given the 'resiliant' label with expectation of not reacting. I think this incident will prove to be the last straw (atleast I hope), and THIS FIRE DOES NOT NEED TO BE PUT OUT.
You, given Pakistan's history, should not assume that Pakistani state agencies are not involved. In fact for me the simplest explaination is ISI's involvement in this incident. We know Pakistan has internal issues, but these cannot be used as an excuse to not aggresively take action on their internal groups (like L-e-T).
I do not think Indian Muslims are involved in this barbaric act, however disgruntled they might be.
Monty

Make up your mind Fareed. First we are supposed to truckle with the likes of these,engaging in your ''diplomacy''. Now it is to take up ''arms''. When did you become such a hawk? Before,or after Mumbai? Before,or after Obama was elected?[while personally I have no problems with dealing with the jihadists in the manner Zakaria suggests ,I cannot stand a hypocrite,of which Fareed is a first stripe member].

As an Indian Muslim, today I am an Indian and a Mumbaiker

One Jewish friend asked me the question: How many people have asked you to become a Jew? None, I had to answer. If Jews are the Zionists who are trying to take over the world, how come they are not on a conversion spree like us Muslims or Christians? Why do the ulema talk against family planning and contraception. Unfortunately it is the poor muslim population which gets saddled with a huge family which cannot be supported economically. We have to examine who has the real zionist agenda. I would like to tell Z-ahmed that Mir Mushtaq Ahmad, a veteran freedom fighter was elected from a Hindu majority constituency in Delhi and became its first Chief Executive Councillor. He was a Kashmiri too boot!!! Democracy is first and foremost about making a contribution to society.

z-Ahmed, OBL is a terrorist because he kills innocent people. The people in WTC were clearly innocent, unless you believe that kind of thing is right. Pakistan was supporting the Punjab millitancy in the same manner as it is supporting Kashmiri terror groups. I guess for you it is right too. Let us not forget that the Gujarat fire was lit by the burning of a train carrying Hindu pilgrims. ISI involvement in this incident which triggered off a sequence of events as in the later events was suspected. Modi has been crucified by the media and has been put through the judicial crusher. So far he has not been convicted. The constitution allows him to hold office and contest elections. OBL does not recognize the courts and legal system and hence the comparison is meaningless.

Fareed, Your analysis is incomplete as you miss a critical point. The constitution, laws and the rules are not discriminatory, they have not been for the last 60years, but where is the Indian Muslim MLK or Obama. Oh..............they are editing Newsweek or making money on Wall Street. I dont know why NRI opportunists like us raise a hue and cry and behave all concerned when we have chosen to take the easy road and tie our destiny with America. Indian Muslims and India needs self-less people and giants like your father and Karkare. We (NRIs) should really stop making patronizing comments when we have wasjed our hands off. We dont have that right anymore.

I am an Indian muslim too and I don't have a grouse against anybody. Indian muslims donot believe in handouts from anybody and are Indians first. There is no place on earth where muslims have enjoyed the benefit of democracy for 60 years. Some of the richest muslims in the world come from India and the most famous ones too! An ideal example of the generosity is seen in Kashmir. The state legislature there has powers to ratify laws of the Indian parliament if they are for implementation in the state. There is no other state whose legislature has these powers. Non-Kashmiri's cannot settle in Kashmir whereas Kashmiri's can settle anywhere in India. Kashmir gets outright grants for funding development which do not have to be paid back, even though tax collection is negligible. This funding is about 10 times what people in poorer provinces like Bihar get. The infrastructure and development on the Indian side is many times more than on the Pakistan occupied side and when the terrorists take away their gun Kashmiri's come out in large numbers to vote as they are doing now. Indian muslims may have a long way to go, but they are much better off than their Pakistani counterparts and muslims in many other parts of the world.

Very clever to put just the positive comments on the article above the fold concealing what most of the readers truly feel about this article. I am sure my comment is going to disappear.

hello

I am a no muslim indian american who fears for India and its democracy and am proud of its composite culture and its long history of resilence as a civilization. Part of a reason why it has survived a millenia of invasions and violence (and will survive in the future) is that it has produced men like Zakaria who think like a human being first and a muslim\hindu\sikh second. I do not feel the author leans to supporting islamic terrorism like anncrystal writes. On the contrary this is an objective review of the region's problem and solutions. I do not condone terrorism of any kind no matter what the reason and join other american indians and indians in hailing the heroes who fought the terrorists and laid their lives for the country. Yet I totally agree that indian muslims should be made to feel a welcome part ot this great nation. Any other way would only breed more resentment and create more such terrible men and terrible events.

Fareed,
I remember visiting the Gateway of India as a student on a field trip, we stood there watching the Taj with awe. Since then I have lived in many countries, I lived in Kano and there met muslims from different countries, africa, southeast asia, middle eastern muslims, wahabbi's,sunni's and shia's ismaili's, we broke bread had conversations and talked religion, they trying to convince me that I could be a good muslim and I tried to convince them to become christians, we never had any ill feelings when neither succeeded in convincing the other to change their faith. I read the Koran, the Hadith's and learnt that of Islam as it was originally conceptualised and was impressed, sadly watching muslims around the world made me adhere strongly to my christian faith and values. The failure of rich muslim nations in the middle east to take care of the jamaat ( the muslims) in palestine, in jordan, in lebanon, in egypt, in north african muslim nations.
I noticed the same kind of corruption in Nigeria where affluent muslims like Isiaka Rabiu, the Dantata's take money from Saudi Arabia and set up maddrassa's where the d'alibi (students of the koran) were taught to hate the Harnna(kafir's) all non muslims are kafir, these students roamed the streets on thursday and friday soliciting alms, they would wash the coins saying that they were collected from kafirs and had to be purified. The point I am making is that in every muslim country there exists a marginalised group of the poorest muslims, who have no access to education. (only koranic education taught by an underpaid imam who get paid from the zakat his mosque collects so he teaches these children hate, spews hate on fridays after the afternoon prayer) There are riot sin Nigeria every few years because a Imam urged the worshippers to go out and attack non believers. The problem is like any country the poor are used by polticians and religious leaders to fan hatred. So before you go about pointing that muslims in India are disenfranchised, marginalised, take a look at how Pakistan, Bangladesh, Egypt, and other hotbeds of hatred managed to create a perfect breeding ground for hatred.
I end with what I told my Nigerian friend Alhaji Usman "If Allah hates the unbelievers(kafirs) and does not want them to exist he does not need men to do this for him all he has to say is " cease to exist " and there will not be a kafir in the world, until them we occupy Allah's, God's world and have every right to exist as anyone else, and the hatred shown to me is hatred shown to G_D and no muslim anywhere has the right to abrogate G_d's power and arrogate it to themselves. Please appeal to all the Jahils and those still living in the Jahilya, that even though enlightenment has come to them, they rob others of G_d's light through their actions. Aye Musalmano! Musalman bano???