In India, a ‘Hindu’ mosque aims to heal divisions

KOLKATA, India (RNS) — Last Eid, 49-year-old Partha Sarathi Basu added a fresh coat of paint to the Amanati Mosque in the Barasat district of Bengal, 15 miles north of Kolkata in eastern India.

For Basu, the refurbished mosque with its arched gate and two light gray minarets in a Hindu-majority neighborhood isn’t just a shrine to Allah — it’s been part of his family’s identity for more than 50 years. 

“This place means everything to us,” said Basu. He welcomed Muslim worshippers for their Friday jumah prayers in his starched white tunic with a red dot on his forehead symbolizing his Hindu faith. 

Basu’s tolerance comes from his family’s long tradition of cultural preservation. 

In the aftermath of the 1964 anti-Hindu riots in Bangladesh (formerly East Pakistan) that resulted in waves of Bengali Hindu refugees crossing over into India, Basu’s grandfather swapped his family property in Bangladesh’s Khulna City with a 15-acre plot owned by a Muslim landlord in Barasat. 

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As the Basu family settled into their new life in India, they discovered a centuries-old mosque on this land even though property documents made no mention of the structure. 

“The former owners said we could demolish it, but my grandmother felt a strong connection to the mosque and began lighting a lamp there every evening,” Basu said. 

Basu’s grandmother was a staunch believer in Shah Amanat, an 18th-century Sufi Muslim saint in Bangladesh whose appeals to peace drew thousands of followers across the Indian subcontinent. The family decided to name their mosque after him.

A few years later, when some members of their family were attacked by Muslim radicals in Bangladesh, Basu’s grandfather, inspired by Amanat’s teachings, decided to promote religious harmony in India. Choosing love over hate, he cleaned up the mosque and then sent out invites to Muslims in neighboring villages to attend prayers at their family property. 

“My grandfather always said you can’t be a religious person if you hurt another religion,” Basu said. “He passed on these lessons to my father and got him involved gradually.” 

Basu’s father, Dipak, who used to run a small kerosene dealership, built the roof of the mosque and cemented the floors. Then he called a maulana, a Muslim scholar, to bless the structure. The dip in the use of kerosene those days didn’t deter him from pouring his savings into the mosque’s upkeep.

“The whole place was in ruin; there were thick shrubs and snake skins all around,” Basu said. He used to mop the floor of the mosque himself until five years ago. 

An imam was brought in to lead prayers, and devotees of all kinds — Hindus, Muslims and Christians — began turning up slowly to pray and light incense sticks under a sacred tree on the premises. 

“Some people said boycott this Hindu mosque,” said Maulana Akhtar Ali, the imam of the mosque. “But we decided not to allow any political agenda into our religious site.”

Ali believes the mosque represents not only Kolkata’s long-standing cultural syncretism but also an answer to the growing intolerance in India toward religious pluralism. 

During a campaign rally last April, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that if the Congress Party opposing him was voted into power, it would distribute citizens’ property, land and gold among Muslims. 

Basu said he does not take what politicians say seriously. He believes a monument of faith can be in the custody of anyone who leads through love. Over the last five years, he’s taken on the mosque’s care as a “personal project.” 

“My struggle is against fundamentalism of any kind, be it Hindu or Islamic,” Basu said. “That’s why our mosque is open to devotees of all castes and religions.” 

Michelle Joseph, a Christian devotee who’s been a big follower of Shah Amanat’s teachings in South Asia, travels every month from Kolkata to pray at the Barasat Mosque. 

“When I light candles here, I feel a surge of energy that I don’t find elsewhere,” Joseph said. “Maybe we’re all searching for a religion that promotes humanism and compassion.” 

Basu says that for him, India’s Constitution is his religion. True to its tenets, he performs puja, a Hindu offering ritual, at his family altar every day. During the month of Ramadan, observed by Muslims, Basu fasts from food, drink and sexual activity between dawn and sunset. 

On Eid this year, he adorned his mosque with decorative lights and prepared a feast of curried yellow peas and vermicelli pudding for Hindu and Muslim worshippers. 

Eid also reminds Basu of the time when his family sheltered Muslims after Hindu extremists demolished the 16th-century Babri Mosque in Ayodhya in 1992. Resulting Hindu-Muslim riots killed more than 2,000 people across India, mostly Muslims. 

“There was fear all around and we were trying our best to restore communal peace,” Basu said. “The mosque reminded people that religious bigotry can never win over love.” 

Today, a massive Hindu temple sits on the Babri Mosque site, and anti-Muslim sentiment has become normalized in public discourse with a brand of Hindu nationalism in Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party. 

A board with the name of Amanati Mosque and three words under it — “Prabhuke Pronam Koro,” or “Pray to the Universal God” — is a constant reminder that this place was and remains a refuge for all. 

Basu and his father aim to not let religious bigotry seep into their personal lives. They decided that any bride in their family would have to first stop at the mosque to pray and ask for the imam’s blessings; a baby’s first rice-feeding ceremony (a Hindu rite of passage) would have to be blessed by the imam; and after death, the body should be taken to the mosque first before its Hindu cremation. 

Papia, Basu’s wife, who comes from a traditional Hindu family of Lord Krishna worshippers, wasn’t prepared for this approach to inclusion when she first moved in. 

“I found it strange how all sacred occasions began and ended at the mosque and not temple for them,” she said. “But now I feel sacred spaces must be used to resolve conflicts.” 

Despite their best efforts, Basu and his father have regularly faced online threats, as well as taunts, name-calling and warnings from religious fundamentalists. 

Hindus have told him to raze the mosque, while Muslims have told him to convert to Islam. 

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“We fully understand how difficult it is to run a structure like this, but this is what we need in the divided world today,” said Arun Bhowmik, a local councillor at the Barasat Municipality. 

For Basu and his family, the dream is to heal divisions that have set communities apart in India. 

“This isn’t just a mosque for us,” he said. “It’s a pilgrimage center where pilgrims can wander around with no fixed destination in mind or gain some kind of spiritual benefit.”