AN EASY SOLUTION
Altaf Husain Hali Panipati (1837–1914) was a man of revolutionary thinking. He started a reform movement in Urdu literature and heavily criticized the tradition of classical Urdu poetry. He claimed that Urdu poetry had become mainly exaggeration, romanticism, and fanciful imagination, while it should be meaningful. As an example, he produced the Musaddas, also called “Madd-o-Jazr-e-Islam,” a very famous long poem written in 1987.
This criticism greatly angered those who took pride in Urdu poetry and considered it their glory. Hostile articles began to appear against Hali. The newspaper Oudh Punch of Lucknow often wrote about him in the worst possible manner, using titles such as:
Abtar hamare hamlon se haali ka haal hai
Maidan Panipat ki tarah paimaal hai
Shattered by our assaults is Hali’s very state,
Trampled like Panipat’s field beneath the weight.
Hali never responded to these abusive attacks. He silently continued his work. After a few years, his critics grew tired and fell silent. Someone asked Hali how his opponents had finally quietened down. In reply, without naming anyone, he recited this verse:
Kya poochhte ho kyun kar sab nukta cheen hue chup
Sab kuch kaha unhon ne par hum ne dam na maara
Why wonder now that every critic’s voice fell still?
They spoke their piece—yet we remained unmoved, unheard.
The easiest and most effective reply to false opposition is to give no reply at all. False opposition is always baseless; it is destined to collapse on its own. To respond to it is like extending its life. If one remains patient, it will one day fall like a rootless tree. It can never long survive on God’s earth.
The greatest killer of falsehood is time. Wait for time, and you will see that it destroys the mischief far more completely than any effort you could make to destroy it yourself.
This method is not confined to a single situation. In whatever matter the strategy of silent patience is adopted, it ultimately proves effective.
Some Christians youth wrote in black letters on Delhi’s bridges and walls the phrase in English: “Jesus is coming soon.” Afterwards, some Hindu youths, stirred by a spirit of retaliation, added words everywhere so that the phrase read: “Jesus is coming soon to become Hindu.” The construction of the sentence itself showed that this was not the work of educated Hindus, for grammatically correct English would be: “To become a Hindu.”
If a similar incident had taken place with Muslims, at once a certain superficial class of people would have begun shouting that it was an insult to the Prophet, an affront to Muslim feelings, and a challenge to their religious honour. Then some Muslim youths would have been provoked into retaliation, and soon the city would have descended into Hindu–Muslim riots. After that, so-called Muslim leaders would have issued statements proving the incompetence of the administration. Relief funds would be opened, and some would begin to claim credit for services to the community. Hot headlines would be printed in Urdu newspapers, increasing their circulation. And as for the Muslim masses, their share would be nothing but further ruin.
But the Christians took no notice of this “provocative act.” The result was that the whole incident simply became a non-event.
On the morning of 19 February 1990, I stood near the Oberoi Hotel flyover in New Delhi, looking at the writing on its walls. On the wide road below, traffic rushed past on both sides. No one had the time to stop and read the words painted on the bridge. The writing remained there merely as a meaningless mark, waiting for rain and wind to erase it—before anyone even read it or absorbed any impression from it.
Any “provocation” so empty of substance, yet responded to with anger and violence, shows beyond doubt that those who react in this way are the most foolish of all fools.
