"India is great in many ways but its greatest uniqueness lies in the fact that it is a confluence of almost all the world's religions and, for that reason, a potential model for universal brotherhood," says Padma Bhushan award winner Maulana Abdul Karim Parekh.

The 79-year-old pacifist of this city ensconced in the heart of the country has this singular talisman to offer to everyone who seeks his counsel for furthering the cause of communal harmony.

"The 60th Independence Day of the world's most populous secular democracy is the right occasion to renew our pledge to the noble cause," he says. 

Insisting that the common will for peace and amity alone can serve as effective bulwark against rabble-rousers within and without the country, the Maulana told IANS that all those concerned about unity must strive together to consolidate this common will.

The widely travelled author of over 20 seminal books, who has lost his Eyesight and of late lives on a pacemaker, still keeps abreast of happenings in the world via TV news and newspapers read out to him by aides. He has also engaged a writer to complete a few more books on hand and keeps sending letters to friends on his pet theme.

The worth of all the work that the highly respected Maulana has done becomes more striking when one realizes that he has hardly had any formal education.

"My poor father could not send me to school beyond primary second grade but I would satisfy my penchant for reading on oil-stained scraps of newspapers thrown around eateries," he recalled.

Born in village Kanseoni of Akola district in Maharashtra where his father had migrated from Gujarat, Abdul would snatch time and energy off his daylong drudgery in fuel-wood shops to pore over the holy Quran besides many other books in Hindi, Marathi and Gujarati.

Acquiring proficiency over the three languages besides Arabic and Urdu and a working knowledge of English and Sanskrit, the self-taught Parekh wrote 'Lugatul Qur'an' (dictionary of Qur'an) at the age of 25 followed by 'Tarjuman-e-Qur'an' (translation of Qur'an in easily understandable Hindi, Urdu and Marathi) and Dars-e-Qur'an (discourses and commentaries on Qur'an).

'Vigyan Yug Mein Islam Dharam' (Islam in modern age), 'Aurat Ki Tauheen' (Insult to womanhood), Behnon Ki Najaat (security of women) and Gau Raksha aur Hindustani Musalman (Cow protection and Indian Muslims) are some other books he wrote besides giving over 2,000 discourses on Islam and universal brotherhood all over the world.

The Indian government recognized the self-made Maulana's catholic writings and lifelong efforts for communal harmony in 2001 with the conferment of Padma Bhushan on him.

While writing books and attending seminars, Parekh Saheb, as he became known, also established himself as a successful timber merchant of central India. This enabled him to lend support to Farooq Nakkash, a poor kafan-maker (kafan is a cloth used to wrap a dead body) of Nagpur to publish his Urdu translation of Mahabharat from Sanskrit.

His perpetual quest for communal harmony won him several friends. The quest also took the Maulana to almost all the past presidents and prime ministers of India as also the successive leaders of the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) as interlocutor during times of communal strife in the country.

The partition of the country - the Maulana insists it was partition of Muslims rather than that of India - did leave him heart-broken like many others who strove for Hindu-Muslim amity and undivided India.

He however says that while re-unification of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh "could be our 'ultimate ideal', we must strive for harmony between the two major communities in India and between the three countries.

"Pakistan was created by those who neither understood nor respected Islam," the Maulana says and tells Muslims in Pakistan that their counterparts in India are far better off than them.

Parekh Saheb's regret is that he is unable to participate in the initiative for people-to-people contact between the two countries because of his sightlessness and crippled body.  

August 11, 2007

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