भारतीय इतिहास के ६ स्वर्णिम पृष्ठ (वीर सावरकर - विदेशी आक्रान्ताओं पर विजय गाथा)

remain unmolested in return for the obligation of the Hindus—even if it were to tantalize the Hindu gullibility and simplicity? No! The Muslim armies battered the Temple to pieces once again, and outdid Mahumud of Ghazni in taking away the sacred idol and the slab inside this temple to Delhi and made them fit nicely into the pedestal for a masjid there. 434. Once again, when Hindu power was established in the region, Hindu temples rose up and once more, the Muslims like Sultan Ahmed Shah, ravaged the land with their usual religious ferocity and harassed the Hindus there with wholesale massacres, rapes, arson and other incendiary activities. Thousands of Hindus were taken prisoners and were sold as slaves in foreign countries. Somnath remained a heap of rubble, but the notorious masjid grew in importance. Besides the old masjids, which were preserved and raised to greater glory by the Hindu rulers, the Muslim rulers built taller and more spacious mosques. 435. It was this confused religious thought, the distorted sense of virtues and the blind religious tolerance, that culminated in the religious suicide of the Hindus. How many more incidents may one cite, which came off century-after-century at every place right from Kashimir to Rameshwaram, in the face of Muslim aggression? Still, one more instance may be narrated here to show the perversion of another virtue by the Hindus; generosity— misplaced genorosity! 435A. Siddharaj Jaysinh (1096-1143 A.D.) was a valiant king of Anhilwad in Gujarat. He had also a very keen sense of justice. But he was a Hindu king! He was deluded by the absolute values, without any regard to time, place or person of all the virtuous ideologies about justice and injustice, according to his own and the alien religion and especially generosity and large-heartedness! Once during his reign, there was some dispute between the Hindus and the Muslims near Cambay (Khambayat). Writes Muhammad Ufi—himself a Muslim writer—in his book Jami‘-ul- Hikayat. 436. “In the reign of King Jai Singh, there was a mosque and a minaret from which the summons to prayers was cried out. The fire-worshipers instigated an attack on the Musalmans, and the minaret was destroyed, the mosque burnt down and eighty Musalmans were killed...” A certain Muhammadan, a Khatib or a reader of the Khutba, by name Khatib ‘Ali’, escaped and fled to Nahrwala. None of the courtiers of the Rai paid any attention to him or rendered him any assistance. Having learnt that the Rai