Contriving to bring religion into sport
THE ARTICLE (“From Moeen Ali to Ranji: Hindu-Muslim in cricketing diaspora”, POST, August 08-12) by Saeed Naqvi refers.
Why am I not surprised that this man contrives to bring religion into sports too? After all, many of us are more than aware that some people have to filter everything through their religious perspective.
So the Sikh cricketers are of no significance? For the record, India and Pakistan have nothing to do with each other; only in the mind of some Muslims in India the notion exists that these two countries are hyphenated and always have to be mentioned together.
However, some of this man’s outrageous claims cannot go unchallenged. Brahmins never accepted indenture. For them, to cross the black waters (Kala pani) was a sin because useless action was a sin. But the Brahmin was sorely missed for religious rituals during birth, death, marriage. To make up for this shortfall, the community conferred the title of “Maharaj” on the most educated and one of “light skin”, says the man.
It is a Muslim myth that Brahmins are of light skin.
As for “Kala pani”, well Motilal Nehru was a Brahmin but travelled overseas all the time. So did Bal Gangadhar Tilak. Mahadev Govind Ranade, another famous Brahmin, a scholar, judge and social reformer, decried the practice of discouraging people from travelling overseas. And so on and so on. The Kala pani drivel was superstitious nonsense – and for the most conservative and ignorant.
Furthermore, he should check the records on Indian indentured labourers at the British National Archives. According to them, “before 1840 a large proportion of the labourers were so-called ‘hill coolies’, aboriginal people from the plains of the Ganges. Later many others signed indentured labour contracts, including Hindus, Brahmins, high castes, agriculturists, artisans, Mussulmans, low castes and Christians.”
So what of all the African, Coloured and non-Muslim Indian activists? Among Indians we had people such as Monty Naicker, Dr Goonam, Frene Ginwala, J N Singh and his wife Radhi Singh, George Swepersadh, Phyllis Naidoo?
SANU SINGH Reservoir Hills