The Forgotten Hindu History of Pakistan (1 Viewer)

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Loss of physical geography is also a loss of cultural narrative memory.
This geographic-cultural preface in a way provides the backdrop because history and geography are inseparable. Geography dictates and directs and shapes history. And history alters maps. Which is why geography is also memory. And loss of physical geography is also loss of memory...civilisational, cultural, traditional and most importantly, it is loss of narrative memory.

In that sense, the forgotten Hindu History of Pakistan, in one line, can be couched as a loss of the narrative memory of Bharatavarsha because we have almost permanently lost that substantial geography, and therefore substantial narrative memory. This is a subject actually enough to fill an entire volume. But to be clear, when we use the word "Pakistan," it also includes Afghanistan and Bangladesh. And when we say, "Hindu history," it also includes Jain, Buddhist, Sikh and all other offshoots of Sanatana Dharma. In sketching out this forgotten history, we can divide it into a few broad categories for the sake of convenience.

1. Civilisational and cultural

2. Sacred or religious

3. People in the sense of eminent personalities that emerged from this region.

4. Commercial or business centres

5. Educational

 

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When we recall the famous quote that history is just an agglomeration of the biographies of eminent people, the statement needs to be quantified so that we can get a true picture of the moral and the ethical aspects of history. Indeed there is no better yardstick to judge the national character of a country than the kind of people it regards as heroes. Because he is relatively contemporary, how would we judge Germany if it continued to regard Adolf Hitler as a hero? On the contrary, the fact that he is still considered a national shame and a taboo also throws equal light on the national character of Germany.

When we apply the same principle for example, to Pakistan and innumerable mosques in the Bharatavarsha that has survived, who are celebrated as heroes in these realms? Muhammad bin Qasim, Mahmud of Ghazni, Muhammad Ghori, Timur, Babar, Aurangzeb and Tipu. The striking feature common to all these "heroes" is the fact that not only did they did not build anything of value but savagely annihilated painstaking works of lasting value, built over centuries.

Magnitude of the Loss​

Therefore, when we study the forgotten Hindu history of Pakistan, what are the kind of people we encounter? A short list suffices. Maharshi Panini, Acharya Chanakya, Ashvaghosha, Nagasena (author of the famous Milindapanha), Vasubandhu, Jivaka (Gautama Buddha’s physician), and Charaka. These were civilisation-builders and not merely eminent people who had attained excellence in their respective domains. It is beyond the scope of this series to elaborate their contributions to the Sanatana culture and civilisation.

But on a larger point, for centuries on end, the Afghanistan-Pakistan region --i.e., the Northwestern region--was a great centre of Sama Veda and Atharva Veda learning. So when we say Northwestern, we also ask: north west of what? The obvious answer: northwest of Bharatavarsha. Today, only one branch of the Atharva Veda remains in the remaining area of Bharatavarsha. All the other eight branches have vanished because they had been preserved in this region. Equally, the Jaimini branch of the Sama Veda was preserved in Sindh and Gujarat. According to some estimates, there were about one thousand branches of the Sama Veda – only three have survived today.

Indeed, for centuries, the Sindh and the Northwestern region had vibrant contact with Kashmir, which was looked upon as the land blessed by Saraswati herself. Kashmir's enduring fame as one of the greatest centres of Sanskrit is too well-known to be repeated. Fragments of the surviving literature and other artefacts from the original Sindh mention many poets, writers and scholars hailing from Kashmir. However, almost no literary work composed in (the original) Sindh itself survives today. But from just what is available, we get a huge list of five hundred-plus scholars, poets, etc of the highest standard who lived and flourished in Sindh. Scores of Dharmashastras and other legal treatises were composed in this region but we don't have any record of them whatsoever.

Think about it. Maharshi Panini didn’t just write his magnificent grammar, the Asthadhyayi, overnight. He toiled patiently and diligently built upon a long and ancient Parampara or tradition. He also mentions a big list of geographical locations of ancient India. A measure of the perennial nature of his foundational work can be had in the countless praise that British researchers heaped upon him. For example, Alexander Cunningham's superb work on the ancient and medieval geography of India mentions in so many words that Panini was both inevitable and indispensable for any work on ancient India. Yet we have Romila Thapar and her gang which casually dismisses Panini with an arrogance that's truly incredible.


Maharshi Panini divides the geography of Bharatavarsha into two major categories: all places to the east of the Sindhu River and to the west of it. Needless, the names of the majority of places on this other side of the Sindhu are gone forever, replaced by unpronounceable names.
Lahore for example, was a great and renowned centre of Sanskrit learning even during the pre-independence period. One of the legendary Sanskrit scholars and a Jnanapith Awardee, Padmabhushan, Vidyavachaspati, Professor Satyavrat Sastri's antecedents are from Lahore.


It might sound unbelievable now, but even in the early years of independence, the Arya Samaj had made Lahore as one of its more powerful and active hubs.


Shiva Murti Artefact from the Pala Period
Even if we claim--as numerous Hindus do--that all these are ancient histories and we should "move on" and focus on the "present" and the "future," here is a fairly contemporary account. Of the fate of Kashmir. Until Article 370 was scrapped, this was the story of Kashmir: a no-holds-barred civilisational assault lasting for nearly a century. Remember that Kashmir was not part of the India that was lost in 1947 to Pakistan. The question that logically arises is this: why did Hindus lose it? The answer is the same...the same narrative that continues to play out on the streets of Delhi even as I write this: because the Muslim leadership of that period felt unsafe in a country where Hindus were majority.


Think about the Hindu temples in Kashmir over the last seventy-plus years. Where are these temples in Kashmir today? What about the fate of those temples that were left unmolested? Why aren't new temples getting built there? Why and how does the sacred Shankaracharya Hill acquire an abomination called Takht-e-Suleiman? The underlying point in all such questions is really simple: if Hindus cannot--or are not allowed to--perform something as fundamental as Puja, they're destroyed in ways our imagination cannot even fathom.


Pakistan is only as recent as 70 years, less than a drop in the ocean of time. And the memory of its Hindu past is almost completely erased.

 

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he terminal Battle of Talikota, one of the most disconsolate melancholies in world history reveals this barbaric facet. It was the climax of at least two centuries of hostilities between the grand Vijayanagara Empire and the ragtag crew known as the Bahamani kingdom. Yet, when Hampi fell at last to the cruel sword of a determined coalition united by nothing but Islamic fanaticism, what was the need to so thoroughly pulverise every symbol, monument, temple, tradition, and ways of life rooted in and inspired by Sanatana Dharma? It could have been a military victory, a theme so familiar in Hindu political and military history. The opponent could have made the Hindu king submit to and acknowledge the supremacy of the victor while allowing him and his citizens to retain their culture. When we visit Hampi even today, we can barely form, let alone fathom, a mental image of the geographical swathe it encompassed.

This is the true meaning of lost geographies and forgotten Hindu history.
Likewise, the Pancha-Nada Kshetra or Punjab, one of the cradles of Sanatana civilisation and culture has largely unrecognisable names today. Then there is the other vital aspect that continues to hide in plain sight: the name of the very region from which foreigners derived the name “India”: Sindh. Needless, the entire region of Sindh was pocketed by Pakistan in 1947. And anything that can even remotely be called Hindu has been wiped out there with clinical nonchalance before our own eyes.

 

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When we view it from this distance in both space and time, it’s truly incredible when we recall the fact that there was something known was the Grand Trading Route, or simply, The Grand Route (not to be confused with the Grand Trunk Road) in Northern India. To sketch but the barest outline of this Grand Route, here is the expanse it spanned: the Grand Route was the commercial and cultural artery that encompassed the whole of Asia: from the Caspian Sea to the borders of China; from Bahlika (Balkh) to Pataliputra (Patna). These memorable words of that colossal scholar, Dr. Moti Chandra on the subject evokes within us an admiration that is so profound that it is almost philosophical:

When we think of ancient routes of which our rulers, pilgrims, wanderers and merchants made use then we will have to forget about our modern roads passing through smiling fields on both sides, villages, towns and cities.




Even though organised, merchants were subject to many dangers. These travellers were not merely traders but were also carriers of Indian culture. It is remarkable that in spite of manifold difficulties caravans kept this route open for trade and commerce and the peaceful expansion of Indian culture to far off countries.

And so, when we use terms like Brihadbharata (Greater India), we must not be blind to or forget the fact that this was not a mere theoretical conception but was actually attained through a highly refined application of Sanatana cultural genius. It was these merchants and traders who played a substantial role in creating it. A sublime Sanatana conquest attained through the method of cultural persuasion. For example, if we take away the Ramayana, countries like Indonesia will be devoid of their national motifs. A starker contrast cannot be found: when America boasted in the late 1980s and early 1990s that it had defeated the USSR by forcing it towards bankruptcy, the native Sanatana consciousness finds it repellent: on the other hand, a 100% Muslim country like Indonesia has named its national airline after the vehicle of Mahavishnu. This sort of conquest--if that word can be applied--is the Sanatana way: Eternal. Everlasting. Evoking the majestic imagery of the Akshaya Vata Vriksha.


The immortal genius Chanakya-Kautilya mentions an important commercial sector in the aforementioned Grand Route. He calls it the Haimavat-Patha. But in a more contemporary idiom, we can call it the Balkh-Takshashila Sector. In passing, we can refer the interested reader to undertake further research on Kautilya’s division of the Haimavat-Patha into three sectors:

1. The Bactrian

2. Hindukush

3. Indian (i.e. mainland India, post-1947)

In general, some of the great and bustling business centers on the Grand Route included the following:


1. Pushkalavati or Peshawar: Now in Pakistan

2. Takshashila: Almost nothing remains of its former glory as one of the world's greatest educational centres and business hubs.

3. Mulasthana: Apart from being a preeminent Tirtha-Kshetra, Mulasthana was also a thriving business centre. Now in Pakistan.


4. Haarahoora or Herat: It was a starting point on the Grand Route from where trading caravans proceeded towards Baluchistan and Sindh. Now in Afghanistan.

5. Kohat: This was an intermediate business city en route from Herat to Baluchistan and had a thriving market. Its brave Hindu population comprising barely six percent in the 1920s was brutally massacred and ejected during the Khilafat genocide of Hindus.
6. The entire region of Sindh: The commercial importance of Sindh does not need repetition here. Needless, the entire region is in Pakistan.

7. Lahore: Same as Sindh.

8. Karachi or Loharani: Same as Sindh and Lahore.

9. Kapisa or Kapisi: It was historically known as a flourishing centre of wine export. For a long time, Kapisa was also a renowned melting pot of art: primarily, the Gandhara and the Mathura school of art. Now it languishes in Afghanistan.

Needless, this is just a partial list but sufficiently indicative of the magnitude of the permanent loss. Almost nothing survives of the glorious Sanatana past of this ample region. One wonders if even the word "loss" fully and accurately describes the phenomenon. Perhaps the word, "annihilation" is more appropriate.


This among others is one of the surest ways to get a proper perspective when we study the history of Islamic invasions of Bharatavarsha.

 

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The first place to start examining the various facets and ramifications of this memory loss is with the oldest surviving literary and spiritual work: the Rg Veda. Let’s look at a beautiful verse:


इमं मे गङगे यमुने सरस्वति शुतुद्रि सतेमं सचता परुष्ण्या |असिक्न्या मरुद्व्र्धे वितस्तयार्जीकीये शर्णुह्यासुषोमया ||तुष्टामया प्रथमं यातवे सजूः सुसर्त्वा रसयाश्वेत्या तया |तवं सिन्धो कुभया गोमतीं कृमुं मेहत्न्वा सरथं याभिरीयसे ||

This beautiful verse composed at least seven thousand years ago, lists twenty rivers. Two questions arise. The first is that in the Vedic rituals and routine Pujas performed even today, this verse is chanted indicating the preservation of this memory in human and textual form. The second is more important: of the twenty rivers listed, how many are in India today, either partially or fully?

In no particular order, we have partially lost the following rivers to Pakistan:

1. Indus (Sindhu)

2. Raavi (Iravati or Parushni)

3. Sutlej (Shutudri)

4. Jhelum (Vitasta)

5. Chenab (Asikni).

In other words, together, these five rivers constitute the ancient and hallowed region known as the Panchanada Kshetra or Punjab, large parts of which are now in Pakistan.

Then we have the river today known as Zhob in Baluchistan, which was known as याव्यवति (Yavyavati) in the Vedic period. The Gomati river now known as Gomal is located near the Rehman Dheri in Pakistan. The river Kubha is now in Kabul; indeed, the name Kabul is itself derived from "Kubha." The river Krumu is now in the Kurram district of Pakistan. All these name changes constitute a critical civilisational point as we shall see.

At a high level, we can look at a brief list of the fifty-six Deshas mentioned in the Mahasankalpa
Of these fifty-six Deshas, we have permanently lost the following to Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh:

1. Parts of the Vanga Desha (Bengal) to Bangladesh

2. The original Gurjara-Saurashtra region included the renowned Shaktipeeta, Hingulaja: this is the renowned Hingjlaj Mata which is near-totally lost its original Sanatana character and is today located in the Balochistan province.

3. Kambhoja: At various points in its protracted history, this region lay between (undivided) Punjab and to the South of the Balkh or Bahlika or Bactria. Now, except for a small part in Punjab, the entire region is no longer part of Bharatavarsha.

4. Saakala or Sagala, now known as Sialkot, is in Pakistan.

5. Vahlika or Bahlika or Bactria or Balkh is in Afghanistan.

6. Vakranta or Makran lies in Baluchistan.

7. ShIlahatta or Sylhet is in Bangladesh.

8. Kekaya is in Afghanistan

9. Madra is in Pakistan

10.Sauvira: Parts of this region include today’s Multan.

11.Mulasthana: Or Multan. This sacred pilgrimage site of Sanatana Dharma where the magnificent Aditya Temple stood for centuries was one of the first cities to be attacked by Muhammad bin Qasim. The Aditya Temple itself was burnt to the ground in the 9th or 10th century. Not coincidentally, Multan is home to the largest concentration of Sufi monuments in one place.

12. Saindhava. Parts of this region are in Sindh, Pakistan.
The twelve places listed so far provides a representative idea of the nature and impact of the aforementioned memory loss. Apart from the fifty-six Deshas, the other well-known method of classifying our ancient geography was the well-known Shodasha Mahajanapadas or the 16 Great Republics of the Buddhist and early Mauryan period, which roughly correspond to the fifty-six Deshas. Of these, we have permanently lost six: Kambhoja, Gandhara, Pushkalavati (nothing remains of it today, except a mound that lies about 28 kilometres from Peshawar), Kekaya and Madra

 

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The Permanent Loss of our Tirtha-Kshetras​

Perhaps the most devastating of all losses is the permanent loss of our Tirtha-Kshetras or spaces of Sanatana pilgrimage. Again, let's look at a brief list.

1. Aapagaa: This was a famous Tirtha on the banks of the Sindhu river. Now it’s in Sialkot and quite obviously, is no longer a Tritha. In fact, until I did research for this series, I had no idea such a place even existed.


2. Arjikiya: This is the Rg Vedic river in the Nadi Sukta. It is now in Haro in Khyber Pakhtunwa.

3. Bhiimaayaa-Sthanam: Now called Takht-i-Bahai in Peshawar.

4. Devika: This is now located near Multan though it is hard to pinpoint the exact location.


5. Gomati: The same Gomal river in Afghanistan.

6. Hlaadin: This Tirtha was once in the Kekaya Desha, and is now in Afghanistan.

7. Iravati: Parts of this famous Vedic river are now in Lahore.

8. Krumu: As we noted earlier, this is now called Kurram, in Pakistan.


9. Kuba: The Rg Vedic river from which the name Kabul is derived. Now in Afghanistan.

10. Mujawat: This is a mountainous region, the renowned Mujawat Parvata where the Soma plant grew in abundance, and was used in Vedic rituals. This is now in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region.

The number of such sacred Tirtha-Kshetras that we have permanently lost is easily in hundreds when we consider the fact that the total area of Pakistan and Bangladesh includes thirty-three percent of the landmass of undivided India.

The loss of these substantial number of Tirtha-Kshetras is not an ordinary loss. It is a fundamental civilisational, cultural, and most importantly, a spiritual loss. And it throws an extremely important light to truly understand the forgotten Hindu history of Pakistan.

So what is the picture we get, today, when we think of all these lost sacred places? This is the picture: it is the total absence of any kind sanctity—sanctity for a higher spiritual yearning, the timeless Sanatana ideal, and sanctity towards our Devatas who no longer inhabit these sites. Even at a mundane level, there is absolutely no reverence for something as basic as nature in these places.


We can consider a very routine illustration to drive home this point deeper: the Panchangam or the Hindu calendar/almanac. Apart from giving details about things like Tithi, Muhurat, etc, the Panchangam also provides important geographical details, specifically, about festivals, celebrations, Utsavs, etc conducted at various Tirtha-Kshetras across Bharatavarsha. Why for example, does the Mysore Panchangam give such elaborate details about Kashi, Prayag, Gaya, Ayodhya, Mathura, etc? At some point in the past, our Panchangams would have included similar details about Hindu Tirtha-Kshetras which are now located in Pakistan. The logical question thus arises: have these places in Pakistan and Afghanistan remained as Tirtha-Kshetras today? And what has been the civilisational, cultural and human cost of this permanent loss spread over so many agonising centuries?


These are questions Hindus must ask themselves because the cost of this neglect has been the decimation of Sanatana civilisation itself in these regions.

 

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How Kohat was Entirely Cleansed of its Hindu Population: The Tragic Finale​

the story of the Kohat Genocide of Hindus begins about a year earlier, that is, 1923 CE. In a Jamait-ul-Ulema Conference held in Kakinada on 29 December 1923. The conference heralded a short-lived but heinous era of communal riots from 1923-26. The Kohat Genocide of Hindus was perhaps the most savage of them all.
And you guessed it correctly. Today, Kohat is part of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (formerly, the North-West Frontier Province) in Pakistan. It is just over 300 Kms from Srinagar and about 750 Kms from Delhi. Barely a century ago, it was densely populated by Hindus and Sikhs.
The earliest recorded history of Kohat traces its founder to a Buddhist king named Raja Kohat. Today, the only surviving traces of Kohat’s remote Buddhist past is a road carved into the hill to the north of the Muhammadzai village, about eight kilometres to the west of Kohat; that, and the ruined Adh-i-Samut fort named after another Buddhist king, Adh. After a lull of several centuries, we hear Kohat again, mentioned in barbarian Babur’s Baburnama. Like scores of similar alien Muslim invaders, he proudly mentions how he invaded, destroyed and plundered Kohat after first capturing Purushapura (Peshawar) in 1505 CE. The next significant mention of Kohat occurs in the mid 18th century when the short-lived but brutal Durrani Empire absorbed it.

Next, the lionlike Maharaja Ranjit Singh wrested it from Pir Muhammad in 1834 A.D. The debt of gratitude that Sanatana civilization owes to Lion Ranjit Singh is incalculable when we recall the fact that he reconquered and reestablished Sanatana civilization all the way in the badlands of Afghanistan after nearly five hundred years! Unfortunately, Ranjit Singh’s vast empire crumbled after his demise and by 1849, Kohat passed into British hands.

Fast forward seventy-five years. 1924 CE. The Hindus formed a measly six percent of Kohat’s total population. The remaining population was entirely Muslim. But Kohat’s Hindus of those days were made of sturdier stuff unlike the Ishwar=Allah, Meera=Mary, Krishna=Christ “Hindus” of today. As long as Ranjit Singh was alive, as long as the indomitable Sikh force guarded Kohat, both Hindus and Sikhs were safe in Kohat. And the courage he had instilled in them had deep, powerful roots.

After Ranjit Singh’s death and the British takeover, the Hindus of Kohat had to face on a daily basis what the Hindus of Pakistan continue to face since 1947: forced conversions to Islam, depopulation, abduction and rape of women and young girls. But the Hindus did not give up, did not convert, did not abandon their ancestral Karma Bhoomi. They formed the Sanatan Dharma Sabha, registered at Kohat, to safeguard and preserve their Dharma.

September 9, 1924 would savagely change that.

Sometime in August 1924, a local “Moslem news-sheet” published an “offensive anti-Hindu poem.” Jiwan Das, the Secretary of the Sanatan Dharma Sabha retorted by distributing “a pamphlet which was calculated to wound Muslim religious susceptibilities.” But the Hindu community quickly realized what they were up against: how do you beat the odds of 6 to 94? So, on 2 September, they passed a resolution requesting pardon.

This was precisely what the Muslim leadership wanted.

The fanatical Maulvi Ahmad Gul approached the Superintendent of Police and threatened “consequences.” Jiwan Das was arrested and had to stay in custody before he could pay up a bond of ₹ 10,000 (in those days). On 8 September, Jiwan Das was released on bail.

The Muslim leadership was now completely incensed.

The local mosque instantly swung into action. It drummed up thousands of the Faithful and to cut a long story short, an oath[ii] of Talaq was taken by this rabid collective. Here’s how it read:

[the Muslims] solemnly decided that they would either die next morning or arrive at some decision; that their wives stood divorced to them, and that they would not be afraid of death or imprisonment. This particular oath-taking had a very sinister meaning amongst the frontier people…

And here is what happened[iii] next:

On the 9th a crowd of about 1,500 men came in an ugly mood to interview the Deputy Com- missioner, and seeing that crowd he and the Superintendent of Police made arrangements to post the entire available force of the City Police in the streets…

But the Kohat Hindus had seen the writing on the wall even before the cops could act. After all, they had generational experience in such matters, dating back to hundreds of years. Even as the cops were frantically trying to erect preventive measures, the rabid Muslim mobs had already struck. Let’s hear it from[iv] Acharya R.C. Majumdar.

On the morning of 9 September, 1924, the Muslims looted and burnt all the shops of the Hindus. On the night of 10 September the Muslims made a number of breaches in the mud walls of the city, and committed wholesale plunder and incendiarism…Before noon, there were widespread fires in Hindu quarters.

The scale, intensity, and extent of Muslim mob violence in Kohat was so unprecedented and incomparable to anything that had happened in the past that it shook even the Imperial British Government. The Kohat Deputy Commissioner and Brigade Commander almost gave up citing helplessness against this level of determined mob barbarism. This is how Mohandas Gandhi described[v] it:

The Muslim fury knew no bounds. Destruction of life and property, in which the Constabulary freely partook…was general…Even the Khilafat volunteers, whose duty it was to protect the Hindus, and regard them as their own kith and kin, neglected their duty, and not only joined in the loot but also took part in the previous incitement.
It was the first ever genocide of Hindus on this scale. All Hindu and Sikh shops and establishments and majority of their homes were destroyed and burnt. Temples and Gurudwaras were desecrated, the Murtis vandalized and wrecked. It was a bloodbath that left more than a thousand Hindu and Sikh dead bodies in its wake.
This was followed by what always follows any massacre of Hindus: mass exodus and depopulation of the geography of Hindus. The local authorities escorted the surviving Hindus and Sikhs first to the cantonment and then sent them[vi] off to Rawalpindi “apprehending that there was a grave danger of wholesale slaughter of Hindus.”
That was the entire Hindu and Sikh population of Kohat: about 3500 people not counting the slain. They never returned to Kohat.
Guess where Rawalpindi is today?
If the Kohat Genocide of Hindus was macabre, what followed it was perverse. It was political and communal necrophilia committed shamelessly by the Father – Son – Holy Ghost trio on the dead bodies of these unfortunate Kohat Hindus.
Let’s first consider the Holy Ghost, alias Mohandas Gandhi who had by 1924, become the unchallengeable dictator of the Indian National Congress. As a student of history, the more I study, the more my conviction grows that there was only one Mard in the Indian National Congress who could mock, scold, and challenge dictator Gandhi: Sarojini Naidu. Here’s how she admonished him[vii] for Kohat in a letter:
Nothing is likely to be achieved by lecturing on or teaching about peace. You should take some effective steps to stop the riot.
Gandhi was indeed ashamed. But what did he do to atone for it? He declared[viii] to Sarojini Naidu:
I must find out an effective remedy…had I not been instrumental in bringing into being the vast energy of the people? I must find a remedy if the energy proved self destructive.
You can almost touch the sheer self-righteous egotism in these words. But more importantly, note that there is not a single word of condemnation of the Muslim fanaticism that led to the Kohat Hindu Genocide!
And what was Gandhi’s “remedy?” You guessed it correctly. He announced a 21-day fast starting on 17 September 1924. And where did he start this fast? At the sprawling home of the selfsame Muhammad Ali of the bigoted brothers, they of the Khilafat infamy. All it took was just four days to show the world that it was a farce not a fast. Let’s read Acharya R.C. Majumdar[ix] again:
How far Gandhi’s fast had any salutary effect on the communal relations may be judged by the fact that four days after Gandhi began his fast there was a serious communal riot at Shahjahanpur in which the military had to intervene and 9 were killed and about 100 injured. On October 8, when Gandhi broke his fast, there were serious communal riots at Allahabad, Kanchrapara near Calcutta, and at Sagar and Jubbulpore in C.P.
As incident after sickening incident demonstrates, the delusional world of Mohandas Gandhi admitted no illuminating ray of reality.
Next we turn to the Father alias Bade Nawab alias Motilal Nehru. The role he played in gorging over the Hindu dead bodies of Kohat is truly appalling. He moved a resolution in the Congress with serpent-tongued sinisterness best described[x] again by Acharya R.C. Majumdar:
Motilal Nehru [said] : “in Kohat a tragedy has taken place the like of which has not been known in India…” but scrupulously avoided casting any blame on any party, merely observing that “this is not the time for us to apportion the blame upon the parties concerned,” though more than three months had passed since the incident. The Congress resolution…urged the Musalmans of Kohat to assure their Hindu brethren of full protection of their lives and property and invite them to return, advised the refugees not to return except upon any such invitation, and asked everybody to suspend judgement…”
That was how Kohat was entirely cleansed of even its meagre Hindu population.

Postscript
The Genocide of Hindus at Kohat would eerily repeat itself all over again sixty-five years later in the summer of 1989 in Kashmir. This time, the genocide and forced displacement of Kashmiri Hindus was on an industrial scale. Scripted, produced, directed, and executed with clinical brutality by the state Government in “independent” India. Back then, it was the necrophile Motilal Nehru who indirectly warned the displaced Kohat Hindus to never return to their ancestral Karma Bhoomi. In 1989, it was his great grandson Rajiv Gandhi who inherited the selfsame gene of necrophilia.

Meanwhile, we wait perhaps in vain that Hindus will learn from history.