The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1929-02-14
SCORES DIE AS
AFGHAN.HINDU
FEUD FLAMES
Terror Reigns in Bombay,
With Religious Fury
FIaring High.
NATIVES FLEEING CITY
Pathan Colony Accused of
Stealing Children to 1
Be Sacrificed.
BY WILLIAM PHILIP SIMMS
Scripps- Howard Foreign editor


Scripps Howard Foreign editor
WASHINGTON, Feb. II. AL
ready the count is 100 dead and 700
wounded and still the Pathan-
Hindu vendetta RACES in the streets
of Bombay.
Desperately the British masters
of India are trying to put down the
miniature war, but it still is going
on. Terror reigns in the great In
dian ocean seaport and natives are
fleeing the city.
What is it all about2 Daily for
more than week the cables have
been telling Of the outbreak. Why
all the shooting?
The HinduS, of course, everybody
knows. OF midas 300 O00,0O0 In
habitantS, about 220,000,000 belong
to the Hindu faith, one of the most
ancient of all religions, being found
ed on the Vedas, or collection Of
scriptures by different sages of dir
ferent erss.
Formerly, Hinduism was almost
pure nature Worship--not for tire
sake of nature itself, but because
nature is q manifestation Of the
divine. HinduS worshiped the
dawn, fire, water. ETC.. because there
was something of the divine In
them,
Faith Goes to Seed
For several hundred years, how
ever, Hinduism has run down, or
gone to seed. The ignorant masses
have allowed all sorts of abuses to
creep into their faith and the Wild
est superstitionS have become part
of it.
The Patlans are a tribe of A.
ghans, at home in the wild noun
famous country along the Afghanis-
tan-Indian border. There are per-
hapS a million of them.
Some say the Afghans are de-
Scended from the soldiers of Alex
ander the Great. Others that their
ancestors were slaves sent into the
mountains by King Nebuchadnezzar
of biblical fame. But the Afghans
themselves claim to be descended
from none other than Afghans.
grandson of King Saul, or that they
are the lineal descendants of Abra-
nam and Hagar through their son
Ishmael, and, therefore, Jewish.
Be that as it may, the Afghans are
as roud as Lucifer and among them
the proudeSt are the PathanS. They
are to Afghanistan what the Ken
lucky mountaineers, tall, straight,
pure of blood and sure of eye, are to
the Blue Grass state. They would
rather fight than eat and feuds
never cease among them.
Child Has Feud Spirit
It is said that travellers once
stopped at hut by an Afghan way.
side to doctor a sick Pathan woman
when there entered a small boy,
perhaps 8 years of age. Giving the
strangers a quick glance, he calmly
reached for a sort of squirrel rife
hanging from a peg in the wall.
Mother" the lad asked in all
seriousness, shall I kill these peo-'
pie for your"
With pride in her eyes for her
baby Sharpshooter, the mother ex-'
planned that her son was the last,
surviving male Of the line, and up-g
on him, by the law of his clan, lay
the duty Of killing off the enemy.
During the World war, many Pa
than men joined up with the Brit
ish in India to be sent to the bat
tlefields of France. There they
fought like demons and died like
heroes, believing their reward would
come when they rose again on judg-
ment day, as it says in the Koran.
Believe In Jesus
For the Pathans are Moslems and
believe Jesus will come TO earth on
that last day, embrace all Islam
and put mankind through its final
test of crossing the bridge which
is finer than a hair and sharper
than sword" and from which un-
believers will fall into hell and the
faithful go on to glory. +
It happens that small colony Of
these Afghans live in Bombay,
about 1000 miles south of the
rugged mountain home of their
fathers. And as Hindus and Mo-
hammedans never have gotten
along we'll together in India, the
naughty Pathan breed, which nat
urally despises the more servile
natives, never has mixed with them.
Recently rumor started that the
Pathans we're stealing Hindu chill
dren to immune as sacrificial Offer
ings in the foundations of the bridge
at Baroda. That was enough.
Bands of Hindus, catching individ-.
uals or small groups of Pathans off
guard, killed them outright. The
Pathans retaliated. The mobs grew