From Pahalgam to Australia’s Bondi Beach to Bangladesh’s Mymensingh City, the world has witnessed heart-wrenching horror. Everywhere, one pattern emerges, articulated with chilling precision. With the same ruthless design, terror was unleashed in its cruelest form upon those to whom the attackers believed they were delivering “justice” in its purest sense. A deep perplexity overwhelms me today as I struggle to understand how humankind, the finest creation of the Supreme; has descended to such depths. No answer seems sufficient to satisfy our quest to comprehend the true roots of such hostility. Yet one truth remains undeniable: a wild outcry is rising across nations, and its deafening echo is registering as a protest far and wide.
Has the God in whose name the blood of the innocent is spilled gone into hiding? If one listens closely, one is sure to hear the sobs of that very God; the God we believe created us all. Convincingly, the reason behind such relentless hostility is a fundamental disagreement that emanates from a theology demanding the exclusion of those who do not sing its tune in chorus. It began at its inception, a bitter start marked by the destruction of all that existed around it. In later periods, as it spread across the world, stretching its hands far and wide, capturing lands and dominating communities, it emerged as a violent ideology. Thriving on dispelling, dismantling, pillaging and pillorying others, it advanced with force. Over the centuries, with meticulous precision, the chaos it unleashed caused rampant horror. All, it declared, was executed under the authorization of the spiritual principles it followed and propagated.
And what was that principle-the principle that demanded the extermination of all those who refused to yield? And what did it want this world to become? It sought a world stripped of the diversity that defines it today, confining its essence to a single religious doctrine that its propagators believed to be the holiest. It aimed to compel humankind on this tiny planet to follow its entrenched principles, while those who disagreed were deemed deserving of hell.
Of course, those who conceded and converted under the brutality of its tactics later descended into monstrosity. Generations passed and progressed. Then, one day, with complete diabolical outrage, it declared that the land it had lived in for centuries needed to be surgically sliced. India underwent a massive partition.
The reason behind such a vehement demand plunged a vast landmass like India into profound trauma. The hostility fueling this demand was so intense that India had to shed the blood of millions to ensure that the scissors of separation imposed by this thought were somehow enacted. Yet it did not end there. Its residue remained, systematically working to unleash chaos once again.
The stark reality now reveals its ugly head anew. This time, it rarely demands India’s immediate truncation. Instead, it is prepared to wait until a population armed with its hostile array of intellectual weaponry gains numerical dominance. Large-scale disruption becomes possible only when this population grows sufficiently to reach a competitive position alongside other faiths. Another strategy it applied across the world was the mass migration of its people. Individuals were deliberately encouraged to infiltrate countries where their demographic representation was minimal. They employed every means to reach the shores of nations whose laws welcomed them with open arms. Over time, these strategies of deliberate asylum-seeking, under the pretext of vulnerability to cruelty, became increasingly calculated and sinister.
As their numbers grew, even reaching the lower double digits, their confidence within host countries increased, despite their status as refugees. Today, Europe bitterly witnesses intense street violence involving refugees for whom the free world once stood unsuspecting and compassionate. This conflict is expanding in unexpected ways. Native populations now see this not merely as a challenge, but as an irrevocable mistake they unintentionally introduced into their own societies. Predictably, a serious dilemma haunts us: how long will it take for refugees to subjugate host lands socially, culturally, and even economically?
India’s condition is arguably more vulnerable. India’s plural framework, while a strength, also presents a vast surface for disruptive mindsets to exploit. Yet, time and again, the country revives its cultural munificence, principally striving to reinstate its enduring values of inclusion. This moral vision was articulated by thinkers such as Swami Vivekananda, who enlightened the West with these ideals.
In 1893, the saint from India spoke to the world of a land that had sheltered the persecuted and refugees of all religions and all nations. He also explained in detail the spiritual philosophy practiced in India. In culmination, he delivered one of the most spiritually transformative messages to a world that, until then, had been deeply enmeshed in bigoted religious dogmas; dogmas that divided humanity and confined its thought within the darkness of narrow religious bargaining.
On one occasion, Vivekananda drew an analogy to explain why religions must shed acrimonious philosophies that cause social disruption. According to him, religious pluralism is a harmonious social arrangement which, through cultural diversity, resembles a beautiful garden filled with different kinds of flowers. He repeatedly affirms, with firm conviction, that diversity within a social structure preserves its harmony.
When people attempt to impose a particular religion on the rest of the world, they not only disturb this harmony but also expose the weaknesses and vulnerabilities of their own faith. Vivekananda addresses this issue with subtle sarcasm. Religions, he argues, should be like a shop selling caps: every customer chooses one according to the size of his head. If the shop offers caps of only one size, the shopkeeper provides no real choice. The visitor is left discouraged, forced to select a cap that does not fit him. This natural human tendency to seek variety in matters of faith, Vivekananda suggests, is the true challenge faced by religions that resist pluralism.
Where does this resistance emerge from? It clearly arises from the ingrained belief that one’s own faith is superior, while all others are viewed as adulterated and fundamentally inferior. India’s civilizational growth epitomized its character as an inclusive assemblage of faiths. Regardless of their origins or ideological beliefs, India, as Swami Vivekananda proclaimed, served as an asylum not only for the persecuted but even for the predator.
It welcomed all with unbiased equanimity and understanding, a tradition that continued for centuries, largely undisputed and uninterrupted. However, the estrangement that the country later experienced from those to whom it had offered refuge, people who had flourished for generations through its resources and acceptance, proved alarmingly contemptuous. The West, too, is beginning to sense this reality with equal severity today. From Pahalgam to Bondi to Mymensingh and beyond, this estrangement is expressing its savagery as a grim response to the world that once accommodated it.