Hindustan is a Secular Country. Hindusatan will be ???????

Moharram was on 28th of December. Central government declared official holiday on Moharram. Earlier it was not considered as a national holiday so the Muslim community got hurt and asked for the fair justice. Central government is quite sensible so they understood the matter and declared the holiday. Naturally they do not want any secular issue to be raised in the parliament. There was a loss of one working day but that is much lesser then the loss could be happened if the holiday was not declared.

India is a secular nation. So we do respect not just one but all the religion practiced by our fellow citizens. We enjoy more then 30 holidays in a year officially. Some people do criticize the system of holidays in India but I guess that they do not understand the motive behind the system.

I was born in a Jain family. I lived in a Hindu society in childhood. I hardly know any Muslim as in my class all were hindus and in my locality there was no single house of a Muslim. When I went to bazaar at that time I saw some Muslims. I had the feeling that they are different as they wear Burkha. Most of the things I learn about Muslims are from textbooks of social studies. I got to know about Prophet Mohammad and his principles. I got to know that like us they do a prayer which is named as Namaz. They performed it five times a day. And when teacher had declared- children tomorrow you have a holiday because of Idd-e-milad I got aware that it is a festival of Muslim community. I didn’t celebrate that day as such but I know that today there is a celebration in some families. The familiarity factors occur through these holidays. Today I can run my one hour FM show on Moharram. I know so many things about them but the basic familiarity comes from the school education and the holiday system particularly.

I feel that if the schools do not provide this basic education then the problems related to religions would be five times more then we are facing today. So the schools have biggest responsibility on their shoulders. We read in newspapers about the Madressa that they teach rigid things to their students. We have that impression in our mind that Madressas are not good for the society. May be they are. But it is not that Hindu society does not have such schools. Sarswati Vidya Mandir is a school run all over the India by Rashtriya Svayam Sevak Sangh (RSS). They did not consider holidays on Muslim or Christian festivals. The teachers were told to announce in advance to the students that we are Hindus so we do not celebrate these festivals and there will be no holiday for them. The most surprising thing is there are muslim students too studying in that school. May be they are less then five percent of all the students but so what? The school says that it is fine if they will not come on that day but there is no meaning to declare holiday for other students.

We have Education Board on the state and on the national level too. No body cares for such kind of problems. I feel if you do not teach the syllabus well then may be it is not harmful as they are not learning anything but if you teach them THIS then this is a crime. We need an authoritative body on schools and action should be taken on strict basis. If we did not do anything today the result which will come tomorrow will be hazardous.