The population of Parsi people in my village Rander was not very small. Rander's Zoroastrians were admired everywhere. A board on the slope of a kothi in Vadodara would always read: Hadvaid Falana, followed by the words in capital letters: 'Randerwala.' There is no hypocrisy in relation to Parsees. Vishwamitra was a sage and had sex with Rupali Maneka. Had daughter Shakuntala been accepted, Indian culture would have grown an inch higher! When a Parsi gentleman goes to enter a child's name in a primary school, the teacher asks: 'What to write father's name?' At once the Parsi gentleman, with some anger, uttered a screeching remark and said: 'I have come to see that he is the father of the child! Brother-in-law donkey! Got it?' Rishi Vishwamitra's 'moral defeat' was seen when such instances occurred. I always used to say this in my Gita lectures. The audience cheered. I used to love this lot of Parsi people. In doing so, I received a hundred-touch support from the words of the revolutionary Gandhiji, the respected Dada Dharmadhikari. Those words are memorable. Listen: 'Perspar samanti se kiye gaye sambhog ko main pap nahi manta.' I do not know a single Gandhian who understands such a revolutionary statement. Sadagat Ishwar Petlikar interviewed Vinobaji when he stayed in Ahmedabad during the Akhil Hind Bhudan Padyatra. Ishwar Petlikar had a stormy question: 'People who took a vow of celibacy before Mahatma Gandhi, there are instances where children are born to them too. Why does this happen? Vinobaji remained silent! This habit of amusement was also manifested during the crisis. A Parsi will never take a vow of celibacy. He accepted the original statement of Dada Dharmadhikari. When a Parsi elder falls in love with you, sweetly say: 'Khodaiji Tamone very much Tandorosti bakshe.' After receiving such a dua, one thinks that the Parsi people are interested in communal riots right? No, never. If a Parsi family comes to live in a village, the (Hindu) people of the village welcome them with love and call them with respect. The ease with which no one feels like fighting can be seen conquering all with love. If such noble people are lost from India, then the country will be weak. In the next 50-100 years, the number of Parsis will decrease and it will become necessary to keep any living Parsi in a museum. You may feel sad after reading some bitter facts. Now listen to the facts: 1. In 1881, the population of Parsis in India was 85 thousand. 2. There were only 71 thousand Parsis in India in 1991 (post partition). 3. Jahangir Patel, editor of 'Parsiana' magazine, gives information that only 218 Parsis were born in Mumbai in the year 1996 and 959 Parsis died. 4. In the month of January 1997 only 15 Parsis were born and 91 Parsis died in Mumbai. 5. If population erosion continues like this, after 150 years there will not be a single Parsi on earth. Why am I worried so much that no one can ask a question or even a Parsi? In response, it is said that Gandhi, who faced the white rulers in an 'Angry Young Man' mood in South Africa, kept only three images on the wall of his house: (1) Jesus Christ (2) Mahadev Govind Rande and (3) Dadabhai Navroji. This is from the year 1893. I read in an English magazine that some Parsis living in Paris speak only in Gujarati when they get together. A Parsi scholar from Surat told me something. A man asked a question to Venerable Vishnuprasad Trivedi, literate in Gujarati language: 'Sir! If you are not allowed to be born as a Hindu in your next birth, then in which community do you choose to be born?' Brahmin Shrestha Mu. Vishnubhai's reply was: 'If that happens, I prefer to be born as a Parsi.' I am fortunate to have the opportunity to pay my tribute to a noble businessman like Ratan Tata through this article! He was a Zoroastrian and the best noble Zoroastrian. At the back of the turban are the words uttered by Mahatma Gandhi in a speech he gave in London. It is a difficult situation to translate. what to do Not to be translated so as to know the excellence of Gandhiji's English prose. Listen: 'I am proud of my country, India for having produced the splendid Zorastrian stock, in numbers beneath contempt but in charity, perhaps unequaled certainly unsurpassed.' Nowhere else can you read such a tribute to the Parsi people in so few words. Ratan Tata will get the Bharat Ratna Award. All coms of the country are in support of that decision.}
Image Credit: (Divya-Bhaskar): Images/graphics belong to (Divya-Bhaskar).