[quote="Star Gazer":29kbpi7h]Interesting debate but raises many more questions in the same hypothetical context.
I fpr one would like to pose the folowing for discussion;
1) Cabinet Mission plan was rejected by the Congress, so who was responsible for rejecting the inclusion of muslims in powersharing, not like present times where the muslims are alloted a ministry for the minority which ofcourse can not go to a hindu, or becomes the president of india which ofcourse is only a symbolic head of government with no executive powers.
It was rejected by congress at that time as it would make centre too weak to govern which could have lead to division of india in 10-15 parts few years after independence. Your knowledge of india is quite superficial or atleast outdated to say Muslims can only become minorities minister. Muslims/ Christians have got almost all the portfolios in government in the past. Just remember Muslims of india are Indian first. I hope Muslims become prime minister of India that will be watershed moment for India. If barak obama can become president of US, there is no reason why Muslims and dalit can't become PM of India.
2) Dalits are more than 30% atleast and the word Dalit means 'Opressed' a name they have chosen for themselves after partition, because they feel opressed by the majority hindu, and are they able to look after themselves ? are they able to achieve the same standard of living as the rest of the hindus? So the argument that a larger minority can take care of itself becomes invalid to me atleast.
Condition of Dalits was extremely bad even before the partition. After independence government has done a lot or them. India is the largest welfare state in the world. Their condition has improved markedly in last 30 years. Hopefully in next 30 years their condition will be with par with other groups. Education is most important priority for Indian government right now. With proper education and huge reservation, there won't be any dalits in India in future.
3) India is unable to make peaceful relations with all of it's neighbors at present and arguing that they would not have had any problems with the neighbors had partition not taken palce is quite immature. Ofcourse indians will blame Pakistan for all their misery now just as they would have blamed China had india been united, so the mind set would not have changed.
I guess India has more or less peaceful relation with majority of her neighbors. Only country she has problem with is Pakistan. When Pakistan become democratic hopefully we will have better relations. Army is too powerful in Pakistan and some extremest elements in army and intelligence train ********* to commit massacre in India. Once that stops there is no reason to have bad relations with Pakistan. if there was no kargil misadventure by paki army things would have very different now.
4) As for the RSS claims that they are not anti muslims even the host could not help to intervene and comment on the issue, RSS would have been even more violent and I think the violence would have been much more gorry because if RSS feels threatened by 13% muslims imagine their fear of the 33%, and probably the united nations would have had to intervene each time.
Most of the bad blood between Hindus and Muslims were created by partition and politics of British fascists to divide India. Hindus and Muslims were living peacefully side by side for centuries. RSS was the result of such politics. RSS is not that what Pakistanis believe it to be but anyway, i agree that we are very different. I agree that if Pakistan and Bangladesh were inside India we would be much worse off. Most Indians think so too. Just some Indian Muslims and some right wing Hindus (RSS) or some naive people have soft corner for such ideas.
5) We should take note of the economic development of muslims in india and Pakistan. According to one study economic development among muslims in india is much lower and slower and not a single muslim has achieved the status of becoming a millionaire in the business field(SRK, AK and SK are in mivies please! ) whereas how many muslims have achieved that in Pakistan? innumerable!!
I think richest person in India is a Muslim.
In his introduction, WSJ reporter Yaroslav Trofimov writes:
The worlds richest Muslim entrepreneur defies conventional wisdom about Islamic tycoons: He doesnt hail from the Persian Gulf, he didnt make his money in petroleum, and he definitely doesnt wear his faith on his sleeve.
So Sobia, you need to update your info regarding India. Condition of Muslims in India was very poor even before partition. Most leadership, educated and ruling class moved to Pakistan leaving Indian Muslim without leadership. Nothing stops Muslim to succeed in India. They have to compete with Hindus and work and study hard.
6) As for looking after the minorities, Yeah sure! who can forget Babri mosque massacre and Gujarat gulletins, recent riots in Hyderabad, and many many more where each time it is muslime who get killed and investigations take three generations and then justice is served!
India is large and complex society. Having 2% minority (Pakistan) is quite different. These riots do tend to happen to evolving societies with such diverse groups and beliefs. Muslims and Hindus are very different. Just look at Lebanon, what happens in Muslims country with sizable minority even though they belong to abrahimic religion. regarding social and justice system we all wish it to be better than it is right now but you have to keep in mind India is relatively poor country. we all Indians believe in our capacity to make our motherland great. Great changes are happening in India and that will effect positively in our social and judicial system. Even now our legal system is much better than most Muslim countries. Just look at Modi being interrogated recently.
7) As for the question of reversing the history. Why stop at 63 years? lets go back and do it for 200-300 years lets come to a point where muslims were ruling india and wipe off the period of British rule from history? Can we do that? This is just as much a hypothetical question as any.