In an interesting podcast, Dr Omar Ali, a Pakistan origin blogger validated what Indians were otherwise taking as a joke for the past few years. The netizens on several occasions have highlighted the stark similarity between the statements delivered by Congress party leaders and Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan.
From belittling Veer Savarkar to constantly attacking the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) or blaming ‘Hindutva’ for everything, the two have been singing the same tunes of late.
Turns out, our neighbour actually gets ideas from the Congress party and it was after all not a joke but a harsh reality.
The Brown Pundit blog
Dr Omar Ali in his popular blog ‘Brown Pundits’ has touched upon various topics from Kashmir to the Aryan debate to even interviewing BJP spokespeople such as Shazia Ilmi.
Ali who generally interviews people on his podcast, this time took the hot seat himself to answer questions on ‘Pakistan-myths and realities.’ Interviewed by guest blogger Maneesh Taneja, Ali spoke about the ideology of Pakistan, India-Pakistan partition, why the army rules Pakistan, how the India-Pakistan thing is likely to evolve and more.
‘The confession’
It is amidst this candid conversation that Ali revealed that Pakistan actually takes clues from the ‘Liberal’ Indian establishment to attack India and create anti-India, anti-Hindu narratives.
Around 14 minutes into the interview, Taneja asks Ali about Pakistan’s perception of Gandhi and Nehru.
“They are looked at as Hindu leaders and if portrayed as someone who tried to be inclusive, they are brushed off as clever two-faced people fooling the Muslims,” said Ali revealing that calling Hindus double faced is extremely common in Pakistani discourse. However, this is where it gets interesting.
Taneja then moves on to ask Ali about Veer Savarkar and BR Ambedkar to which Ali says, “Savarkar is not even found in Pakistan’s conversations. It is also only now that he is mentioned as proto-fascist which they have started to pick up from Indians.”
“It is mainly on social media or the ones who go to study abroad with Indian students who come from the liberal side and regard Savarkar as Hitler’s prodigy. So these things we (Pakistanis) have picked up from you guys,” said Ali further.
Talking about Imran Khan attacking India over Savarkar and Hindutva, Ali said, “We are not the movers in this propaganda. This narrative of fascism and nazism comes from India and it just becomes convenient for us to pick it up and amplify.”
Well, Ali is not wrong at all. “While the Nazis hate was directed at the Jews, the RSS directs it towards the Muslims and to a lesser extent towards the Christians. They believe that India is exclusive for Hindus and others are not equal citizens,” Imran Khan had said at the United Nations General Assembly last year.
Surprisingly, in April 2019, the Congress IT Cell head had shared a morphed image of Adolf Hitler to compare him to Narendra Modi.
Pakistan and their ‘copy paste’ agenda
It is almost embarrassing to find our neighboring enemy country responsible for bloody terrorism on our land, follow the suit of Indian opposition to attack us on domestic as well as global platforms.
Pakistan’s PM while delivering a speech at UNGA this year, in no different language had said, “The hate-filled ‘Hindutva’ ideology, propagated by the fascist RSS-BJP regime, has unleashed a reign of fear and violence against India’s 200 million-strong Muslim community.”
This was turned into a ‘top quote’ by the Associated Press of Pakistan for their digital platform.
Khan on Kashmir matter in July had said, “We can tell India that we (Pakistan) have been waiting for a long time to coexist as civilised neighbours…but what to do? The ideology of (the) RSS has come in between.”
“The feeling of love, brotherhood that exists amongst you all is being ruined by the people of BJP and RSS. Your composite culture was attacked, your brotherhood was attacked and they weakened you before snatching your statehood. You can see for yourself that the Union territory’s economy, tourism, business are badly hurt,” was yet another statement, not by Khan, but Congress leader Rahul Gandhi.
In fact, the Pakistani PM on some occasions has even quoted the Congress leaders to validate his attack on the RSS and BJP. Here is one such example.
Mr @RahulGandhi madam @priyankagandhi very proud moment for you and your @INCIndia leaders and karyakartas PM of terrorist state Pakistan @ImranKhanPTI targetting India with statements made by you Congressis@ippatel @ShefVaidya @TajinderBagga @ashokepandit @AskAnshul pic.twitter.com/azSo0WgKBQ
— Ramesh Solanki🇮🇳 (@Rajput_Ramesh) September 27, 2019
So when Ali mentioned that Pakistan now simply speaks the language used by the Indian opposition to attack India, he was not entirely wrong.
Same script-same statement
We had reported earlier of several instances when Imran Khan picked up rants from the Congress party.
Imran Khan has always maintained that the abrogation of Article 370 was illegal and has vehemently opposed the move. He had also appealed to the international bodies to meddle in Indian internal affairs.
Interestingly, the Congress party has also had the same stand on the matter. In a resolution adopted by the Congress Working Committee on the 6th of August, 2019, the party had claimed that ‘every principle of Constitutional law, States’ rights, Parliamentary procedure and democratic governance was violated’ during the abrogation of Article 370.
Imran Khan had claimed that two million ‘Indian Muslims’ have been ‘stripped of citizenship’, a blatant, baseless lie. The Congress party, too, has opposed the NRC tooth and nail.
Khan in 2020 had also managed to pin the blame of the Delhi anti-CAA riots and farmers’ protest on the RSS/BJP ideology.
While we kept making our observations, the Pakistan origin blogger confirmed the shared template used by the Indian opposition and Pakistan PM Imran Khan to get at India on global platforms.
