Varun's 'hate speech' generates heat in Pakistani blogsphere

Islamabad, March 23 (PTI) Indian politician Varun
Gandhi's alleged "anti-Muslim" speeches, for which the
Election Commission has directed him not to contest polls,
have fuelled a heated debate between Indian and Pakistani
netizens in the blogsphere.

Raza Rumi, the editor of the popular e-zine
PakTeaHouse, said Pakistan could well be Gandhi's next target
if he was elected in India's upcoming parliamentary polls.

"Varun Gandhi’s remarks on Muslims...concerns us as it
only exposes us to brigades of hatred, communalism and
violence across the border. If our jihadis or Islamists get
inordinate attention, then why should a bigoted idiot like the
young Gandhi not worry us?" Rumi wrote in a post.

"Imagine if by a stroke of misfortune he comes to
power, surely we are all set to be chopped off as we - the
Muslims - have 'scary' names; and that Pakistan would be the
next target once Narendra Modi-esque pogroms are completed
against Indian Muslims," Rumi added.

He wrote: "We in Pakistan are constantly being
demonised by the Indian mainstream media as a 'terrorist'
country and that we are a great threat to the 'secular',
shining India…The fissures in the secular Indian democracy get
even more evident when such speeches are delivered."

Gandhi, who is contesting Lok Sabha (Lower House of
Indian Parliament) elections from his mother Maneka Gandhi's
pocket borough of Pilibhit in India's northern state of Uttar
Pradesh, has been targeting the Muslim community in his
recent speeches.

Holding him guilty of violating Model Code of Conduct,
the Election Commission Sunday recommended to the BJP that it
should not nominate Varun as a candidate for the polls.

Another blogger, Yasser Hamdani posted the video of
Gandhi's speech on PakTeaHouse. "If Nehru could see this, he
would probably not be as blind to the religion and caste-based
ugliness of his constituents as he was when he refused to
recognise that there was some logic to Muslim grievances,"
Hamdani wrote.

"The real question is why does Baby Gandhi get scared
of Muslims at night… and most importantly are these Muslims
from NWFP?" he asked.

Amber, an Indian blogger, wondered why an article like
this was even posted on the e-zine. "Why this article is on
PeaTeaHouse is beyond comprehension. It has got nothing to do
with Pakistan and gives more media coverage to a politician
who is just about average..." he wrote in response to
Hamdani's post.

Hamdani did not take Amber's words kindly and wrote
back: "Yeah Amber... you don't have anything to do with
Pakistan either but you are on PakTeaHouse as well... I
thought I'd give you a reality check about your own country."

The war of words was joined in by many others.
Upadhyaya, an Indian blogger, explained. "... there's always a
tendency in India to dub any Hindu assertiveness as
communalism but Muslim assertive as secularism. I am not
amused by what you write because you pick up what you want to
showcase against. You don't know Islamists are eating away the
nation of India from within..."

The thread of comments was joined by saner voices like
Milind Kher and Dastagir. They said Hinduism has a wonderfully
tolerant ethos that has enabled many rich civilizations to
thrive in India. India has imparted a "delightfully Indian
flavour to Islam" without detracting from it in any way and
this was "very different from Hindutva", they said.

Hindutvavadis "are not Hindus, just like terrorists
are not Muslims", they added.

Another Indian known as "simply61" tried to cool
things in the blogsphere. "What Varun said was and is
unacceptable by any standards. One expected better from
someone who carries the Gandhi surname…..and aspires to be a
politician…The reason he is with the BJP and not the Congress
is this family feud and not ideological convictions," he
wrote.