Bengali filmmaker and TMC’s MLA from Barrackpur, North 24 Parganas, Raj Chakraborty has recently stirred up a debate by visiting the Ajmer Dargah, a Sufi tomb in Ajmer, Rajasthan, with his actress wife Subhashree Ganguly and toddler, Yuvaan Chakraborty.

On Sunday, March 27, the movie-marker cum politician took to his social media to share that a certain Kashif bhai had taken the family to the Islamic tomb, describing it as a “soul-enriching experience”. He also shared a collage of pictures featuring his star wife and kid from the trip. In these pictures, while Subhashree was seen covering her head with a dupatta, Chakraborty and even their young son were sporting a skull cap in few pictures.

This struck a little odd to many netizens; even Saif Ali Khan’s famous son Taimur Ali Khan, who has been a favourite of the paparazzi since his birth, has not been seen in a skull cap as far as we know. And here, a celebrity child from a Bengali Hindu family was wearing a skull cap. This led to a variety of comments on social media, and Chakraborty didn’t take a liking to the ongoing back and forth about his Ajmer visit. 

According to a report published in the Times of India, the TMC leader said, “I am shocked to see how people’s culture, mentality have degraded these days. They even didn’t spare Yuvaan. Being a Bengali, I am a secular person and will never entertain those who see religion as a weapon of hatred. I visit all the religious places. I don’t have to justify what I will do. Just think of it. Those who have created these memes are simply mentally disturbed. Otherwise, they would have spared a little kid.”

Here, we are compelled to wonder, if Chakraborty believes that his trip to Ajmer Dargah was a religious visit, why was his Bengali Brahmin wife obligated to take off every sign of religiosity belonging to Hindu Dharma that she otherwise wears during her religious or other travels. Also, why Chakraborty would think that people are ‘attacking’ his adorable toddler, when they are actually questioning the parents who are responsible for developing right sanskars in children, is puzzling.

He also claims that being a Bengali, he is ‘secular’. It is only a particular set of Hindus who are so confused that they mix religious beliefs with a socio-political ideology, prioritizing the ideology over their religion. What kind of mental gymnastics do such Hindus have to perform to forget the simple fact that Abrahamic religions condemn core Dharmic beliefs like karma, atma, rebirth and moksha as heresy, and murti puja as paganism / jahiliyyah – an unpardonable sin?

How many Muslims or Christians visit places of worship of other religions with the same sense of sacredness? If any Hindu wants to visit Ajmer dargah, overlooking the dark history of Moinuddin Chishti, they should treat it strictly like a tourist trip and stop issuing sermons on how ‘secular’ they are.

Chakraborty didn’t clarify if he knows about the dark history of the destination he visited, believing it to be a religious place where he could seek blessings. Lack of historical knowledge, or feigned ignorance, comes naturally to such Hindu secularists.

When it comes to film personalities in Bengal, they are aware that a big chunk of their fans lives on the other side of the eastern border of the state; hence, the Bengali Hindu film stars have to try harder to appease them. In addition, he is from TMC, a political party infamous for pandering to Islamists; his need to woo that demography becomes even more desperate and dire.

However, Raj Chakraborty and his wife are not the only Hindus who have visited the Ajmer Sharif Dargah and paid homage at the Islamic shrine. Every year numerous Hindus visit the shrine to seek blessings at a place that has an atrocious history, and politicians across all parties frequent the place. 

In 1992, Ajmer became the background of the serial gang rape and blackmailing of Hindu girls, one of the most prominent cases of coerced sexual exploitation in the country. It had victimized hundreds of young Hindu girls studying in schools and colleges – many were minors. A local paper ‘Navjyoti’ broke the news and published the story about the Hindu school students being blackmailed by local Muslim gangs.

However, the police stalled the investigation in this case in interest of ‘maintaining communal harmony’ as the main accused, Farooq Chishti belonged to the Khadims (traditional caretaker family) of Ajmer Sharif Dargah and was president of the Indian Youth Congress, Ajmer. Though eighteen offenders were produced at the court, only eight among them were convicted and even their sentences were reduced by Supreme Court.

“The accused were in a position of influence, both socially and financially, which made it even more difficult to persuade the girls to come forward and depose,” stated retired Rajasthan D.G.P. Omendra Bhardwaj.

Access to news was not easy during those times, and people relied on the staid and censored Samachar telecast on Doordarshan. Hence, the majority of Hindus across Bharat stay oblivious to the shameful horror of Ajmer and turn up to bow at the Islamic shrine every day.