When Rajesh Kumar, a 25-year old medical doctor and peace activist from Hyderabad, Sindh, wrote a blog post on how Hindus celebrate Holi in Pakistan, he never expected it to go viral.
It all started when a friend working at a Pakistani newspaper asked him to write on the topic. Rajesh Kumar enthusiastically wrote the piece but there was no response from the editors. So he shared the piece with friends, including at the cross-border youth peace group Aaghaz-e-Dosti.
AeD posted the article, titled “Celebrating Holi – A step towards Progressive and Tolerant Pakistan!” on their blog and social media feeds on March 24, the day Holi was celebrated across the region. Since then the post has been shared multiple times, including by several mainstream media websites and blogs. Clearly, people are hungry for such viewpoints.
Holi, 2016: Om Parkash Suthar, Rajesh Kumar, Babar Qureshi, and Abdul Manan at Lahooti Music Aashram, Hyderabad.
Rajesh Kumar writes that the two “rather bothersome” questions that people frequently ask him when he travels abroad, to the USA as well as India, are: “How are you treated as a minority in Pakistan?” and “How does your community celebrate its religious festivals?”
His response: “I am treated just like anyone else; one of their own. But if one were to believe the media, then we (Pakistani Hindus) are victims of religious extremism, Intolerance, religious discrimination, forceful religious conversion, brutal killings and part of the largest migration in human history.”
Despite various issues, he wrote, his community celebrates all its festivals — Dewali, Holi, Thadri, Raksha Bandhan – “with full zeal and zest with our fellow countrymen.”
Pakistani Hindus, living mostly in Sindh, constitute around two percent of the country’s 200 million population. They include business people, educationists, and philanthropists.
Holi, the festival of colours and love, writes Dr Kumar, Is “not only an ancient Hindu religious festival but a cultural and spring festival which has become popular with non-Hindus in many parts of South Asia, as well as people of other communities outside Asia. This festival signifies the victory of good over evil, the arrival of spring, end of winter, and for many a festive day to meet others, play and laugh, forget and forgive, and repair broken relationships, and is also celebrated as a thanksgiving for a good harvest. Revelers spray coloured powder and water on each other, dance, and distribute sweets during Holi celebrations.”
Rajesh Kumar: I will not lose hope for a better Pakistan for all, the land where I was born and that’s the land where I wish to die. Photo at Holi celebration party in Hyderabad recently.
People in Pakistan have traditionally lived peacefully together but the rise of intolerance and religious extremism has “deeply affected the peace and beautiful harmony of Sindh and Pakistan,” he writes.
He recalls the terror two years ago when mobs in Larkana ransacked and burnt down a temple and a Dharamshala, a day before Holi. The marauding mobs, armed with sticks, created an atmosphere of terror for the Hindu community. Hindus closed their business and locked themselves up in their homes with their families. They did not celebrate Holi that year out of fear of the extremists.
“But while there are some evil people, there are many good people as well,” says Dr Kumar, appreciating Muslim who called Hindus to celebrate Holi with them at their homes. “Extremism is not the essence of any religion. It can happen anytime and anywhere.”
He says he has never felt discriminated against on the basis of his religion. His Muslim friends celebrate Holi and other joyous occasions with him, while he celebrates Eid with them. “I believe that the only thing which separates us from each other is the borders which we make in our mind,” he writes, quoting Nelson Mandela: “No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite”.
He writes that because Hindu cultural festivals were not holidays in Pakistan, he would be unable to attend events in temples and community halls due to exams.
“But now, I feel happy and proud to share that the Government of Pakistan has started considering Hindus and other minorities as equal citizens of Pakistan, and Pakistan’s federal parliament passed a non-binding resolution calling for the country to observe Hindu and Christian holidays, i.e Diwali, Holi and Easter.”
He lauds the Sindh Government for being the first to announce a public holiday throughout the province for Holi. “It’s really a commendable step towards a positive Pakistan, which shows it’s a tolerant country, where people of any religion can celebrate their festivals with full freedom.”
He points out that this is in line with the vision of Pakistan’s founding Father, Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah who in his speech of 11 August 1947 said,
At the Taj Mahal during a visit to India: But Pakistan is my country.
“You are free; you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or to any other place of worship in this state of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion, caste or creed that has nothing to do with the business of the state. We are starting with this fundamental principle that we are all citizens, and equal citizens, of one state.”
“Holi is the epitome of love and a peace connector,” writes Dr Kumar. It brings together people across backgrounds, caste, color, creed or nationalities. Human beings need to look for similarities between each other rather than differences, as he says – and If you open your heart you will see peace connectors everywhere, in food, festivals, traditions, history or customs. As he points out, it’s high time that we teach our children to treat everyone as human beings and respect religious differences. “Only then we can move on with head held high and to make Pakistan a better place to live for all.”
He ends his blog by wishing “that the colors of Holi spread the message of Peace and Happiness around the Globe.”
Dr Kumar graduated from the Liaquat University of Medical and Health Sciences (LUHMS), Jamshoro, in January 2014. He is currently doing his MCPS (Member of Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons) degree in Psychiatry at Sir Cowasjee Jehangir Institute of Psychiatry at LUHMS. He ends his blogpost:
“Proud to be a Sindhi and proud to be a Pakistani J Pakistan Zindabad!”
— aka
Festivals were always meant to unite people across different barriers created by we humans like caste, creed, color, religion, society and livlihood standard. Good to hear that festivals are still doing the job of uniting us no matter whether it is Pakistan or India.