Why Audrey Trushke is a Holocaust denier.

 An article by Audrey Trushke in the Wire states

The many who condemn Aurangzeb cannot be swayed

how does she know? Is this a 'documented historical fact'? No. It is what she thinks should happen for her own book to have any significance. But if it should happen then it does happen. Such is Trushke's historiographical logic. 

because they base their ideas on an ideology of India as a Hindu nation, in which Muslim rulers are inherently illegitimate, rather than on documented historical facts.

We can generate many such statements by replacing 'Aurangzeb' with the name of any Despot who belonged to a minority Religion and who attempted to impose that Religion by coercive means on those of the majority community. 

Thus an admirer of James II may write 'the many who condemn the last Stuart King cannot be swayed because they base their ideas on an ideology of England as a Protestant nation in which Catholic rulers are inherently illegitimate, rather than on documented facts'. Since Britain still has a stipulation that the Monarch must not belong to the Catholic faith it must be the case that de jure and de facto illegitimacy did in fact arise from confessional status without need for any further stipulation or qualification. 

Trushke is not English. She is American. Her country has a stipulation that the President must be born in America and be an American citizen. The rule of George III was considered illegitimate. America has offered no apology for putting Loyalists to flight after their Revolution. It remains the case that legitimacy arises from a stipulation re. the accident of birth. Had Obama really been foreign born, he would have had to quit his office. It would have been illegal to tender allegiance to him.   

Trushke does not understand that India is a Democracy. Since it is overwhelmingly Hindu, a Muslim despot is reviled just as James II was reviled by the English because of his choice of Religion and George III was reviled by the Americans for being essentially a foreigner. 

She writes-

'Aurangzeb is controversial not so much because of India’s past but rather because of India’s present.

This is false. Events in his own life-time gave rise to this legacy of bitterness. Democratic politics greatly revived it. For the last hundred years, he was hated by Hindus but admired by Muslims because he represented the notion that Islam should be supreme on the sub-continent. Pakistan and Bangladesh are Islamic Republics where Aurangzeb is held up as a hero- a 'mard-e-momin'. India is a Hindu majority country now ruled by a Hindu Nationalist Party which reviles Aurangzeb. What used to be Aurangzeb road has been renamed Dr. APJ Kalam road. Incidentally, it is not just Hindus, Sikhs too hate Aurangzeb. 

Twenty-first-century India is plagued by religious-based conflict, especially between Hindus and Muslims,

Nonsense! That conflict ended in 1947. Muslims were either evicted from Hindu majority areas or they were cowed and stripped of previous constitutional protections or entitlements- e.g. reserved seats.  

India’s religious majority and its largest religious minority, respectively. As the minority, Indian Muslim communities are in the weaker position.

D'uh!  

They are often demonised as anti-national, less Indian than Hindus and tend to bear the brunt of religious-based clashes in terms of the loss of human life and livelihood.

The situation of Hindus in Pakistan or Bangladesh is worse. But this can change very easily. It is notable that there were no mass protests from Muslims in Delhi at the renaming of Aurangzeb road.  Trushke who suggested renaming Prithviraj Road was greeted with hatred and derision. 

The fact is, nationalist Muslims- like President Kalam- are not demonized whereas seditious or terroristic Muslims are incarcerated or hanged. But this is equally true of other countries which are faced with a problem of Islamic militants. 

Trushke is either very stupid or else she is seeking to provoke controversy so as to advance her own career. 

She writes- 

As a historian, I strive to accurately reconstruct and understand the past.

But historians don't seek to stir up controversy by saying 'rename Prithviraj road'. They publish in learned journals and avoid giving offense to Nationalist or Religious sensibilities by focusing on dry-as-dust details of a factual kind- e.g. the proper dating or interpretation of a particular manuscript.  

This agenda puts me at odds with Aurangzeb’s modern detractors on several counts.

Trushke is pretending that learned scholars are attacking her. Some have taken the trouble to expose her ignorance but the thing is too obvious to need much elaboration. 

 The fact is she has deliberately set out to provoke hot heads of no great educational attainment so as to pretend that she herself is an important figure. But she has failed. Americans understand that she is merely engaged in Hindu baiting. But America does not care about the Religion of a far away people who represent no threat to them. Trushke should switch to Holocaust denial if she wants to gain notoriety in her own country. Since Trushke's historiography is based on saying 'if x should have been done, then x was done' we are entitled to borrow her own logic to say she is a Holocaust denier. This agenda puts her at odds with Hitler's modern detractors on several counts. However, because she is boring and stupid nobody has noticed or said anything. Sad.