Stories Varied - A book of short stories

“I suppose, there can’t be any intellectual disagreement over it,” he said overwhelmed.

“I’m glad you’ve agreed; had you differed, I couldn’t have faulted,” she said and continued. “You may know that Hindus proclaim Lord Rama as maryada purushottama, an ideal man, and leave it at that but I understand that Muslim men not only consider Muhammad an exemplary man but also strive to emulate him. And from woman’s point of view that bothers me. Rama was not only monogamous but also vouched by the sanctity of marriage but Muhammad, besides being polygamous was not wedded to the idea of marriage. His dalliance with Mariyah in spite of a dozen living wives, including Ayesha the young thing, is illustrative of that.”

“No denying it from a woman’s POV,” he said admiringly.

“That’s not all,” she continued spiritedly, “my dharma and culture, never mind the aberrations, grant women social freedoms that I’ve come to enjoy. What’s more, the Hindu winds of social change are going to pickup by the year. But with burka and all, same is not the case with Islam, and what’s worse, Salafism is at pushing the umma into medieval Islamic times. Who knows, once I convert, if I’m compelled to move in the tent of a burka, where I would go then? Besides, my Muslim daughter would be a poor cousin of her otherwise Hindu sibling. Don’t I owe modernity to my posterity?”

“Of course, we do,” he said.

“So, you’re agreeing to disagree.”

“No, I’ve disagreed to agree with my religion,” he said smilingly, and continued in a serious tone. “I was struck by what I’ve read in Brihadaaranyaka Upanishad and by hearted some of the same, ‘since man created gods who are better than he: and also because, being mortal, he created immortals, it is his higher creation. Whoever knows this, comes to be in this, his higher creation’. After completing The Upanisads and Bhagvad-Gita, as I began reading the books you were reading, I could see my prophet in a new light and the Koran in its true context. Now I see Islam as an Arabic sectarian cult but not an egalitarian religion of the world, and that made me help my family to shed much of their Muslim overburden.”

“So,” she said.

“Gayatri weds Syed,” he said extending his hand.

“If Islam is another ‘ism’ of Hinduism in our sweet home,” she said holding back her hand.

“Imbibing the ideals of maryada purushottama,” he said taking her hand.

“And that will be our love jihad,” she said pressing his hand.