Our history was written by the British who wanted to instill divisions between Hindus and Muslims. In our history books mention is only made of destruction of Hindu temples by the Muslim invaders, but the other part of the story, the giving of grants by local Muslim rulers for building Hindu temples and celebration of Hindu festivals has been suppressed and omitted.
"A glimpse into official British records will show how this policy of Divide to Rule was taking shape. The Secretary of State Wood in a letter to Lord Elgin [Governor General Canada (1847-54) and India (1862-63)] said: 'We have maintained our power in India by playing off one part (Hindus) against the other (Muslims) and we must continue to do so. Do all you can, therefore to prevent all having a common feeling.'
George Francis Hamilton, Secretary of State of India wrote to Curzon, 'I think the real danger to our rule in India not now, but say 50 years hence is the gradual adoption and extension of Western ideas of agitation organization and if we could break educated Indians into two sections holding widely different views, we should, by such a division, strengthen our position against the subtle and continuous attack which the spread of education must make upon our system of government. We should so plan educational text-books that the differences between community and community are further strengthened (Hamilton to Curzon, 26th March 1886).
Cross informed the Governor-General, Dufferin, that 'This division of religious feeling is greatly to our advantage and I look for some good as a result of your Committee of Inquiry on Indian Education and on teaching material' (Cross to Dufferin, 14 January, 1887).
Thus under a definite policy the Indian history text-books were so falsified and distorted as to give an impression that the medieval period of Indian history was full of atrocities committed by Muslim rulers on their Hindu subject and the Hindus had to suffer terrible indignities under Islamic rule. There were no common factors in social, political or economic life.
It is high time that our history be corrected and our children be taught that Hindus and Muslims were living peacefully and on good terms with each other for centuries before the British came to India and particularly before the 1857 mutiny.
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