Mir Jafar, posted by Ranu

Today I will shed some light on Mir Jafar. For a very long time, when Mom was upset with us, she’d say you descendants of Mir Jafar, how can you be any better.

At that time I was seven or perhaps eight years old. It somehow did not awaken my natural curiosity. I thought probably this man was evil and lived near my grandparents home.

In other words I paid no attention. As time passed my brain started mulling inside, telling me it’s worth finding out who this character is.

First thing that aroused my attention was to open the encyclopedia. I looked up, ‘Mir Jafar.’

Lo and behold there was this character in bold English letters, Mir Muhammad Ja’far Khan( 1691- died February 5, 1765 ( Bengal India). He was the first Bengal ruler from 1757 to 1760; 1763 to 1765. Under British influence he helped to defeat the Mughal rule in India. He was an Arab by birth. He helped his brother-in-law, General Ali Vardi Khan, to seize the the government of Bengal in 1740.

His crooked ambition led him to conspire with others to depose the grandson of Ali Vardi khan, who I introduced as Mir Jafar’s brother-in-law in the previous paragraph.

In 1757 he( Mir Jafar) assured Robert Clive, British Governor of Madras, now known as Chennai, that he would enter into an alliance with the British to exclude the French from Bengal and pay 50,000 pounds to the East India Company for the European inhabitants of Calcutta (now Kolkata), he’d make the deal if the British supported his bid to be the ruler of Bengal.

He made a few other promises to convince the British, who themselves were sitting pretty on our home soil, India at that time.

I get the picture, my question is Mir Jafar was a traitor, he was an Arab by birth. We are Bengalis at least this is what we are told. We have nothing to do with Mir Jafar, so why would Mom call us Mir Jafar’s descendants?

Besides we were innocent kids trying our best in school, hoping to get a worthy enough job. Now I see what we were labeled as is untrue. Would you not agree with me? Too bad Mom passed away a long time ago, I lost my chance to tell Mom, as far as History goes, we had nothing to do with that man.

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Blogging 101, Day Eleven: Make a prompt personal

Today’s assignment: Publish a post based on your own, personalized take on a blogging prompt.

Daring greatly : It takes courage and vulnerability, to, “dare greatly.” For this week’s inspiration, explore the significance of sincerity,vulnerability, and courage in your writing.

My quest for recognition came in the latter part of 2011. At this time I dared to register in an online course, which seemed to cater to the needs of Pakistanis. It was all about the great Poet and Philosopher, Allama Iqbal. I read two verses of one of his poems and went looking for more. The saying I believe is true,”Seek and ye shall find.”

I read this on the cover of a book belonging to my eldest brother.My brother pointed out the lines to me and said,Ranu read the lines and tell me what it means, I was about nine years old then I told him from my nine year old mind, “look for it and you shall find it.”

At that time my brother smiled and said,”I can see there is hope for you.”

That was then but this is now. I registered for the course. I could sense I wasn’t received well by the participants because I was a Bengali , in their mind I am a traitor, the reason I was an East Pakistani and we are noted for separating from West Pakistan, and have conveniently carved out a country named Bangladesh for ourselves,. I knew they hated me, why was I blamed I had no part in it, the politicians in their own interest did the damage. Let’s come to what’s happening now at this moment i.e same situation with different players.

This year a new group of Pakistanis have joined the course, I quickly told on the blog I was from Bengal. Well the attitude towards me did not change.

In our course we get a lesson every week, we are required to read and answer one question from the four given. The participants are encouraged to write their comment on the reply by each participant. This is where it got interesting, the Pakistanis left their comment on everyone’s reply, except mine. Can this be some kind of oversight or was it done deliberately. Well I think the latter makes more sense than the former.

In this connection I’d admit two Pakistanis wrote their comment, One is an O level student who seems to have some humanity in him , the other one has studied in the US  I assume this may be the reason.

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Blogging 101, Day : Eleven, Personal prompt: Tunnel vision

Day Eleven: Make a Prompt Personal

Today’s assignment : Publish a post based on your own, personalized take on a blogging prompt. My favorite prompt right now is:

Tunnel Vision: these two words immediately reminds me of narrow mindedness, just like retinitis pigmentosa, it’s an incurable disease, while the latter is an eye disease that eventually causes blindness to the patient with this symptom. The former  plays with the mind and  makes it blind.

We make up our mind about things based on generalization.

In my case when they find out  I am a  ‘Bengali’  they  immediately associate it with the word ‘traitor’. How did this thought come to  their minds?

History tells us there was a certain man named ‘Mir Jafar’ was   a Bengali who jeopardized the fate of the people of his country by trading secrets. He did it because of his selfish interest. Mir Jafar was a traitor , hence all Bengalis are traitors.

It seems my being a  Bengali, is a terrible thing. They will discriminate me just because of of this.  It is becoming difficult for me to endure it.

I find  solace thinking , I can do something which makes me happy,  Blogging is one of them. Here everyone is sincere eager to help when I need it , will never ignore me because I am a Bengali.

I had the most pleasant experience a few days ago, I wrote to Michele I was unable to do Day Ten  assignment, I did not understand how it can be done. I found a detailed explanation in my reply box, how to do it. It certainly made my day.

Although in my reply I thanked blogger, Azhar Youssef, yet I felt it is not enough.

I came to the conclusion, not everyone is narrow minded, there are a lot of them who are broad minded, which makes our world pretty special.

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