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Malegan: Indian American Muslim Council
(IAMC), an advocacy group dedicated to safeguarding
India's pluralist and tolerant ethos, has applauded Harvard
University for dropping courses taught by Janata Party chief
Subramanian Swamy over his exercise of hate-speech and
demonstration of intolerance and bigotry, in an article for an
Indian publication named DNA.
In the article published in DNA on July 16, 2011, Dr. Swamy spewed
venom against Indian Muslims, by attempting to associate the
entire Muslim population with acts of terror and calling for
restraints on their freedom of religion, besides calling for
anti-Constitutional measures such as declaring India a "Hindu
Rashtra." The article also called for the destruction of 300
mosques as retribution for what Dr. Swamy perceives are goals of
"Islamic" terrorism.
"Mr. Swamy's extremist and hate-filled views can be gauged from
the fact that he has proposed various methods of profiling an
entire population of 150 million Indian Muslims as a solution to
the problem of terrorism in India," said Shaheen Khateeb,
President of IAMC, in a letter addressed to Harvard President Dr.
Drew Faust, expressing IAMC's profound appreciation for Harvard's
decision to drop courses taught by Dr. Swamy.
"History bears
witness that when such ideologies of hate have been allowed to be
propagated without corrective action it has led us to confront
various evils like slavery, genocide, systematic segregation,
extreme poverty, public humiliation and racism," the letter added.
"Dr. Swamy wrote in the article: "The first lesson to be learnt
from the recent history of Islamic terrorism against India and for
tackling terrorism in India is that the Hindu is the target and
that Muslims of India are being programmed by a slow reactive
process to become radical and thus slide into suicide against
Hindus. It is to undermine the Hindu psyche and create the fear of
civil war that terror attacks are organized."
"Besides this kind of
fear-mongering, Dr. Swamy sought to undermine the very basis of
India's Constitution, by calling for disenfranchisement of Muslims
who refuse to acknowledge their Hindu ancestry "with pride."
"While Dr. Swamy is entitled to his bigoted views, in his
individual capacity, his public pronouncements of hate against the
Muslim population, and attempts to sow the seeds of strife and
discord among people of different faiths cannot be allowed to go
unchecked. Harvard's decision to drop courses by Dr. Swamy, is in
keeping with Harvard's standing as an institution of higher
learning where the faculty and students are held to high standards
of responsible public behavior."
IAMC has called upon people of all faiths not to allow Dr. Swamy's
inflammatory rhetoric to adversely impact communal harmony and to
work towards strengthening India's pluralist society where people
of all faiths can live together on the basis of mutual respect and
peaceful coexistence.
Indian American Muslim Council is the largest advocacy
organization of Indian Muslims in the United States with 10
chapters across the nation.
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