Tirunelveli, TN:
As regard the All-India Arya Samaj Conference at Meenakshipuram on Jan 1, the following are the facts : Those Dalits who had voluntarily embraced Islam in Feb. 1981 continue to be Muslims even today. They had learnt the basic tenets of the faith and are very firm In their convictions.
They have sent their boys and girls to Muslim institutions for study, where they are brought up as equals with other Muslim children. There existed some enmity between Dalits who embraced Islam and those who did not at Meenakshipuram. This enmity was engineered by Vishwa Hindu Parishad. It encouraged the quarrel between brothers. Fortunately this enmity came to a grinding halt after the Puliangudi riots. When they saw that all other Hindus are united in attacking the Dalits, they got united. They realised their folly once for all and both Muslims and non-Muslims, who are all brothers, again began to live peacefully and amicably. This is the situation even today. RSS and their bandwagon could not tolerate such a cordial atmosphere and began to play their dirty tricks. By organising the All-India Arya Samaj Conference in that tiny, sleepy village, they began to shower favours on non-Muslim ‘Harijans’. Money flowed like water. Clothes and other materials followed. Some thatched huts were turned into tiled roof hutments. With all these preliminaries, the Arya Samaj convened its All-India conference near Meenakshipuram and the one-day meeting and procession at Kaliamman temple at Meenakshipuram itself.
The Arya Samaj tried its best to get hold of at least a few persons among the Muslims there for reconversion into Hinduism. They could not get even a single person. Because, these people did not become Muslims for money or any pecuniary benefits. They joined Islam as per their conviction, and secured social status. This they are enjoying for the last two years. That is why Arya Samaj people miserably failed in this aspect. Then they switched over to other game. They caught hold of a few people in the surrounding area who are badly in need of money. These persons were asked to proclaim that they joined Islam in 1981 and now they are returning to Hinduism. This is the tamasha that took place at Meenakshipuram. Nobody went back from Islam in Meenakshipuram in the course of last two years. This fact can be verified by anybody through any honest means. Not only that. The brotherly relationship between Muslims and non- Muslims among the villagers there could not be broken even after the Arya Samaj conference. Eighty percent of the villagers there are Muslims even now. By the way, one interesting thing came to light. Some people wanted to know why Arya Samaj is very particular about the reconversion here and the publicity about that in the “national press”. One amazing truth came to light. These Arya Samagists from Delhi and Hyderabad had collected huge amount of money both from abroad and India, assuring their donors that they will reconvert all the people in Meenakshipuram back to . Hinduism. With this false promise they collected money and held the tamasha. When they could not achieve their object, they gathered some paid agents from neighbouring villages and did the rope-trick. RSS people are not very particular about Hinduism or reconversion but only about the “news” of reconversion. To them Hinduism is a business. They saw to it that this “news” item appeared in all the newspapers. In that they succeed. All correspondents and editors mostly being Brahmins, readily obliged. These newspaper cuttings were sent to all the donors for their mental satisfaction. This is what happened at Meenakshipuram. But who is there to publish the truth?
