Alif Lam Ha (reading right to left)

Om Shanti Mandiram

Dear Dr. Nagar:

During our last visit to your home, you talked to us about your current research endeavor on Omkara Mandhata, a sacred island garlanded by the holy rivers Kaveri and Narmada, named so beautifully by you as "A Paradise for Pilgrims." You also showed us a satellite image of the island on which the Nature has carved the sacred symbol Om. This picture clearly displays the image of Om in the best possible manner.

While I was immersed in immeasurable joy and wonder, I got a divine vision of Allah right on it! If we rotate the image just 90° clockwise, we are able to see alif, lam, ha”all three components of the name of Allah in writing.

All this regenerated immense faith in my heart toward the Great Power operating high above all of us. I kept on wondering that no matter how we turn and view the great creation of God, we see the same Power pervading throughout the universe, a power which is named by various people in various ways. However, He is one and the same.

I say so because of my unwavering faith in equality of all religions and universality of the Supreme Being. There cannot be any doubt in the "oneness" of the God Almighty. There is only one universe and therefore there can be only one Creator. There are times when followers of one religion or the other, because of their emotional attachment, pride, or politics, may try to claim superiority of their beliefs over others. However, beneath the shallowness of their emotions, pride, or politics, one can easily see prevailing truth of His universality, His Oneness.

Let us refer to Quran. It says: Kul huvallah ahad, i.e. Allah is One. He is Infinite. He is Indivisible. He cannot be viewed in fragments. That well-known prayer (hymn and song) which Sarlaji and I have brooded upon and shared so many times, declares in the most emphatic terms that God is Eternal, Whole, Endless and Beginningless.

If so, where is the scope for difference and divergence, conflict and chaos?

How sincerely I wish people in our Homeland Bharat, i.e. Hindustan realize this fundamental truth deep and well. Then all this hatred and violence in the name of religion toward our own kith and kin shall disappear totally from our Holy Land.

With profound respects,

Hatim Taj

Columbia Missouri

May 4, 2002.