SELECTIONS FROM MAULANA’S DIARY

SELECTIONS FROM MAULANA’S DIARY PERSONAL EXPERIENCES January 3, 1986 Mr Bhika Ram (b. 1942) is an MLA in the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly. He came to our office this morning. He was accompanied by his colleague Nazrul Islam Sahib. We had a very fruitful discussion. Mr Bhika Ram said, “For me, the real teaching of religion is that all human beings should be equal. Let all kinds of inequality among human beings end and there should be no hatred between one person and another. He said that this is the teaching of Islam and if true Islam had been presented in this country, our country would have been an ideal one today. There would not have been all the conflicts that are visible now.” He wants to study Islam further in Hindi language. I gifted him the Hindi translation of Man, Know Thyself. I further asked Mr Bhika Ram to share any particular experience from his life. He said that thinking about all people while letting go of greed and personal gain, and thinking about the welfare of all is the secret of success. You give up greed, only then can you succeed. January 13, 1986 I was looking at a previous entry from my diary. It contained the following text with the date of November 2, 1979. I wrote this while I was in The Jamiat Building (Old Delhi): Today, Maulana Muhammad Shoaib Koti and Ghulam Nabi Shaheen Kashmiri had a discussion with me. Both of them accepted the political interpretation of Islam presented by Jamaat-e-Islami. I said that at this time, it does appear that the thinking of Jamaat-e-Islami is dominant in the Muslim world. But very soon the time will come, when this thought will give way and the ideology of Al-Risala movement will become the dominant thought in the Muslim world. You will find this very strange today. But, God willing, you will live to see this. Although I might be dead at that time. Then I said that the concern of Jamaat-e-Islami has only temporary value. It is not of lasting value. In the atmosphere of the political