April 1, 2002

Mr. Jeff Bruce,

Editor, The Dayton Daily News,

37 S. Ludlow St., Dayton, Ohio 45452

Dear Mr. Bruce:

Assistant Professor Laura M. Luehrmann’s article (that appeared in the March 27th edition of your paper on page 11A) in the guise of trying to provide a balanced assessment about ‘South Asia’s stability’ perpetuates a skewed characterization of India as a ‘Hindu-majority’ nation. This kind of characterization is true and should be an acceptable practice if all the nations are characterized by the majority religion followed by the citizens of that country. I had drawn your attention to this inconsistency before and would like to do that again. Pakistan is called ‘Islamic Republic of Pakistan’ by its constitution. It is a theocracy based on a religion, while the Republic of India is a secular nation. Unless the media, including the Dayton Daily News starts calling the United States of America as a Christian-majority nation or Italy as a Christian-majority nation, describing India as a ‘Hindu-majority’ nation smacks of either ignorance, bias or prejudice. or all the three. India, the birth place of three major religions, Hinduism, Sikhism and Buddhism has also provided home to people who follow Zarothostrianism, since 11th century, Christians, since the visit of St. Thomas and Jews since in about 70 AD.

Asst. Prof. Luehrmann’s assertion ‘A United Nations cease-fire in 1949 gave ...’ etc. is factually incorrect. The state of Jammu and Kashmir acceded to India according to the provisions of the India Independence Act of 1947 enacted by the British Parliament. The United Nations did not ‘give’ portions of Jammu and Kashmir to India and Pakistan. Pakistan through aggression has occupied a portion of Kashmir since 1947. It was India that took this illegal occupation of its territory to the United Nations. This fact of history was brought to yours and your Editorial Board’s attention by me early this year.

It is difficult to undersand as to why the Dayton Daily News persists in allowing such mischaracterization about India time and time again?

In an article by the Scripps Howard News Service writer Dale McFeatters, published by the DDN on Jan. 17th this year, had described the government as ‘...secular, pro-Western government....’ and the DDN Editorial Board had blindly approved this characterization. The same writer in a subsequent paragraph of the same article, quoting President Musharraf called Pakistan ‘...dynamic Islamic welfare state...’ etc. ‘Secular’ and ‘Islamic’ are not synonymous terms and one hardly needs to explain that to the editors of the Dayton Daily News. One hopes that the Dayton Daily News, in future, refrains from such mischaracterizations.

Harish Trivedi, Chairman, the India Foundation, Dayton, Ohio

937-433-4879, Fax:937-433-5748, e-mail:indiafound@earthlink.net