take chances and must be made secure against this danger. Let us talk to him in absolute. He is just to listen and the science provides so many devices of communicating one’s thoughts to others at distant place.
Perhaps his intellect will revole against the idea of listening to an advice from a person who in his estimation occupies a very low position on the scale of intelligence. A Sikh counseling a Hindu! The very thought is repugnant to the Hindu. However, heavily he may discount, he can take my word for it that the advice tendered is sincere as well as sound. He should just free himself from a sentiment.
Whatever estimation you have of the Sikh brain, their brawns are undoubtedly worthy of your praise. You have been as generous in your praise of the Sikh arms as you have been abstemious in your recognition of the qualities of the Sikh head. If you have doubts refresh your memories with the utterances of your revered leaders like Pt. Madan Mohan Malaviya and the late Lala: Lajpat Rai. And these brawns served you on occasions too numerous to count or to forget. How you have expressed your gratitude for these services, I leave it to you to ponder. Do you sincerely believe that there will be no future occasion for you to look for help to the quarter from which it so often came? If so, you are sadly mistaken. Be not blind to facts. None need tell you how the Muslims as a nation are disposed towards you, for no fault of theirs, and, one might say, for no fault of yours as well, Suppose the Muslim had desired to lose his entity. The place for him in the Hindu hierarchy was the lowest, vz. that of the shudra. That too is an un- warranted conjecture for I have doubts if the Hindu lawgiver could envisage that place even tor the Muslim. You could not help it even if you wished otherwise. It was not an enviable status for the Muslim to choose. He decided, or to put it more correctly, you decided that he should keep aloof. He has been on the soil of the country for ages, but this age-long sojourn has not changed the stranger. He has never felt any sentimental attachment for the country. He chose not only the Prophet of Arabia, but also the desert civilization. It is the date tree and not the banyan for whose shade he yearns. You have been cursing him all these years for not marching along with you in your battle against the White Ruler. Not that he was a puppet in the hands of the alien ruler; not that he received favors and smiles from the Imperialist Master as you wrongly supposed. This psychological factor explains his political abstinence—the lack of attachment to the soil which he occupied as invader, as crusader as emperor and ultimately as a fellow subject. His patrimony lies elsewhere. Indian patriotism is simply non-existent in Muslim psycho- logical make-up. Now he has managed to muster strength to carve a state for himself. In the prevailing political atmosphere it is unthinkable that he can be resisted or will be resisted, It is almost a fait accompli in the new political dispensation. The apparent reason for his demand is the freedom from the yoke of the Hindu majority rule. Is that the only reason? Behind this he had links, however, remote or nebulous; the yearning to treat Pakistan as a jumping ground and with the end of the contiguous Muslim States to rebuild the Muslim Empire over the whole of India. Don’t feel annoyed when I tell you that every Muslim has a conviction that the Hindus area finished nation. And do you know what the Muslim prays for? The following Urdu couplet reflects faithfully the working of the Muslim mind: The Sikhs alone provided you with sturdy sentinels to watch the invasion gate of India. Surely you will need their services again in no distant future. Let them have the freedom to preserve and develop those qualities which have been inculcated for the benefit of all who become pray to anybody’s hurt and injustice. Should their natural virtue be made to attrophy for want of congenial atmosphere in the Muslim Raj if their demand is not conceded and they be reduced to political achhoots you will soon discover to your dismay that you did not play well and even betrayed your own welfare. Whatever name might be assigned to the war just over, India willy-nilly had to come in the sweep of this global conflagration irrespective of her political status. Defence of the country must of necessity have been everybody’s concern. The Martial Sikh nation which numerically represents 1’5 per cent of the total population of the country have not less than one-tenth of the responsibility towards India’s defence. We have not for- gotten the art of warfare that our ancestors practiced. Whereas titles and honors are awarded on political grounds, military awards are earned by velour and singular bravery on the battle ground. The large share of Victoria Crosses going to the Sikh Soldiers is a positive proof of his fighting efficiency. It is in the interest of India that the nation from whose ranks come warriors who without hesitation lay down their lives in the discharge of their duty towards the country’s defence should enjoy the cultural freedom so essential for the preservation of her national characteristics and virtues. To dry up this fount of strength is to endanger the safety of the country as a whole. The votaries of motherland should see that her dependable guardians do not suffer from emaciation. The Hindus are well advised to see beyond the envelope of false sentiments, They should put their weight not on the side of political mendicancy or thraldom for the Sikhs, but on the side of freedom. And all this at no cost to themselves, There are no hidden sinister designs underneath the Sikh demand, It is just a question of territorial realignment to render available to the Sikh nation a part of the soil where they can pursue their political life peacefully; where they can be masters of their own destiny and it imp- lies no wish on their part to be masters of other’s destiny) ; where they can turn their plough not as tenant slaves of Muslim Imperialists as the Nawab of Mamdot would very generally desire us to be, but as free owners. And this buffer Stare sandwitched in Hindu India and Muslim India will render service to both, absorbing political shocks of the one to the other. Now adieu! You have no sincere doubts as to the justness of our demand and indirectly it serves your ends as well. The Muslim friend has been tarrying since long to be explained as to why and how we propose to build our homeland in the Punjab. To reiterate in the plainest possible language, the demand is: A sovereign Sikh State if country’s partition is decided upon, an autonomous unit for the Sikhs if country remains united under a federal type of government, free from the curse of Muslim majority.
