This is a Story of a Revert Muslim previously named Nagaraja Rao and now Muhammad Umar Rao, Once an Orthodox Brahmin. Also click on the you tube links below to listen to his speech which talks the Truth about Hindu Gods and Islam.
After a severe hate for Muslims, Muhammad Umar Rao takes to reading the Vedas, Ramayana, Mahabharata and Quran to refute Muslims, and finds that a world he once knew im materializes.
God’s grace that I’m blessed with religion of God, I’m Mohammed Umar Rao from India, I embraced Islam 6 years back at the age of 18. I wanted to share my story with you all perhaps this would make a difference for non-Muslims to really think over to know what is the truth. I shared my story with two brothers, All praise and thanks be to God, they were convinced that my decision and choice is best, they started reading Quran and also embraced it few days back.
My Background
I come from a middle class orthodox Brahmin family; my parents worked in private firms (Mother: teacher, Father: textile engineer). My religious education was at my maternal uncle’s place, that’s how I became orthodox and my whole family education was always against Muslims, which was nailed in me deeply.
I was associated with RSS for few years; I always hated Muslims to the extent that in all public functions I wanted to give high volume for music sound boxes to ensure that the Adhaan [Call to Prayer] should not be heard at all. I used to go round the town visiting all temples to complete my worship everyday. I was liked, appreciated in family for being orthodox and encouraged to do more.
My Meeting with Islam
In the summer, my mother asked me to work for a Muslim business firm, which I disagreed, because from childhood I always hated Muslims. My mother stopped forcing me on this; I worked few summers with a non-Muslim so I was able to satisfy my parents. Later, I quit that part time job because I did not like the job and started concentrating more on studies aiming for a better job. Meantime, my mother, sisters worked 2 months in part time for this Muslim brother. They were highly impressed with him.
I always hated this person because I did not like the fact that my people were praising a Muslim whom I always hated. I was pushed and insulted for not being useful to the family, so I started working for the same Muslim brother though I hated him before going. After getting in his shop I started hating more because the non-Muslim employees of that shop embraced Islam, I took this challenge to teach him a lesson claiming my religion is true and from there, I started doing comparative study with whatever common sense which God had blessed me then.
By now, in the verge to know more about Islam, I started reading English translation of the Holy Quran (by Abdullah Yusuf Ali). This changed my entire student life; I was stuck with fear, doubts, I realized the fact that whatever I’m doing is wrong, my religion is all about imaginations/myths and false stories. I had many questions, doubts like where am I heading to, what should I do? What is my duty? Why has the message of truth not reached all of us? Many questions came to my mind and my entire student life went in this hunt of truth.
I started questioning my parents, people around that who has seen God almighty to paint /make images of God, all answered me that none has seen God which is so true as it is mentioned in many places in The Quran. Finally, some mythological stories broke my faith down. The stories of Ganesha, Chamundeswari, Ram, Sita etc. did not make sense to me. I could no longer imagine them as gods.
The 3 myths stories, which we use to believe broke my faith down, I would like to explain it here:
1. I was always use to do very Great shirk for Lord Ganesh who was my favorite (may Allah forgive it)
I started digging the origin of Ganesh who enjoyed my shirk, here it goes: he was created by “so called Goddess Paravthi” who is the wife of “so called Lord Shiva” ,one fine day Parvathi wanted to take bath and she creates this ganesh as her watch man giving him instruction as to not to allow anyone inside, ganesh is supposed to follow her orders at any given cost, ganesh agrees to this.
Now “so called Lord Shiva” comes home and finds this stranger standing at door, Shiva questions him, asks him to give way to get in but Ganesh do not allow Shiva as he was supposed to follow order of his mother Parvathi, “so called Lord Shiva” gets angry and chops the head of ganesh.
Now so called goddess comes out of bath and see that her son is killed,she gets angry and asks “so called Lord Shiva” to bring back his life,but “so called Lord Shiva” says he cannot do that but he gets head of elephant and gets the life for ganesh, so this is the origin of so called God Lord Ganesh.
I started questioning, why does goddess need bath? Goddess parvathi only wife of “so called Lord shiva” needs watchman while taking bath? Anyways,Lord Shiva who is creator of world can’t get life for which he killed ? how can such a god will resolve my problem ? If shiva did not know who comes to his home how will he know what happens to me in this world ?
If ganesh was not even able to save his own head, how can he protect me? Why should I belive and worship someone’s fancy story ?
2. I was born in mysore and schooling was in same city, after failing with above I was disappointed, but I always went by history, so there’s hill in mysore I thought this Goddess will help me defeat this Muslim, so went ahead to collect some points to score, “so called Goddess Chamundeswari :
there was a demon in Mysore known as Mahi Sha Sura , he gets boon from Brahma who is creator of entire world after demon impresses so called Brahma with his meditation for many years,
Brahma asks demon what boon he wants ? demon seeks boon that he must be strongest on world and must live forever, none existing can kill him , brahma agrees and blessed this boon. Now this demon starts troubling entire world which includes other “so called gods”, saints as well, now all so called gods council meets to get a resolution for this demon, brahma says he cannot take back the boon , now shiva gives a solution that , so called god Vishnu should become a girl, Shiva Vs Vishnu will have intercourse,therecomes the product “so called Goddess Chamundeswari , she kills him.
What a wild imagination ? so God can be fooled then ? so God can’t over power a demon ? what illogical belief we have.
I did same analysis with so called God Ram, he was unable to save his own wife ? how can he protect me ?
All these analysis made me realise God Almighty is high above our imagination and beyond our perception.
It made sense to come to this resolution after many years,that I’m created for a purpose with limited calliber,capcity, I can’t imagine or grasp Almighty God as I’ve limitation.
I had little knowledge of Vedas which I learnt from my uncle , Vedas do not have any such things as we believed in all this images/idols, so now I was wondering whether we are following our religion as it has to be followed , Vedas says idol worship is forbidden , says “Na Kasya Prathima Asthi”, no where in Vedas says/teaches us to worship idols,though its corrupted now but to some extent it has similar teachings as Quran like oneness of God.
When I questioned my parents that Vedas are against Idol Worship and why do we still practice it, my mother scolded me saying we are supposed to do it as our forefathers did it, the next day I read a verse in the Quran, Al-Baqarah (Chapter 2) which reads:
“When it is said to them: ‘Follow what God has sent down.’ They say: “Nay! We shall follow what we found our fathers following.” (Would they do that!) Even though their fathers did not understand anything nor were they guided?” (Quran 2:170)
…and:
“That was a nation who has passed away. They shall receive the reward of what they earned and you of what you earn. And you will not be asked of what they used to do.” (Quran 2:134)
When I read this I was shocked to see something which I just questioned my mother last night. This ayah (verse) hit me right deep inside. I slowly stopped worshipping idols, and stopped doing Pooja [Editor’s note: A Hindu ritual for prayer], since shirk (Polytheism) is the only sin which will never be forgiven. I started practicing the teachings of Islam in secret in the beginning. There were few [themes] from chapter Al-Baqarah (Chapter 2) which [mean that] There are few who accept Islam wherever it profits them and not whole heartedly [and that they] are hypocrites.
Also:
“This day, I have perfected your religion for you, completed My Favor upon you, and have chosen for you Islam as your religion.” (Quran 5:3)
I realized that for all the questions that I have in my mind, the answers are present in the Quran.
By grace of God, I started conveying message of God at my home with little knowledge I had, I wanted to complete my B.E. meantime, conveying the truth would make it easy in the long run for me and my family, but after my final year of diploma I was pushed to wall, then the time came where I had no choice but to quit my family, my sister also embraced Islam and she joined me. We had to live out of our house for more than a year without a job or regular source of income. All praise be to God, God made our ways easy to be firm on truth.
As God says in the Quran:
“Do people think that they will be left alone because they say: ‘We believe,’ and will not be tested.” (Quran 29:2)
Over a period, Alhamdulillah, God opened doors of opportunities for us, I had quit my previous job as I was unable to perform my five times prayer, All the opportunities that came my way were from the mechanical industry which demanded that I work in shift and compromise my prayer. After quitting that job/mechanical profession for 1+ year, I did not get any job where I can perform 5 times prayer, Grace of God, I started working as faculty for 2000 rupees for a year and now I’m blessed with a better Job. By the Grace of God, Almighty God has chosen us, there’s nothing more required.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbWVmnhxy1I&feature=results_video&playnext=1&list=PLC1DEC1D2953642DB
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4Z4yhTD-rM&feature=BFa&list=PLC1DEC1D2953642DB&lf=results_video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQyWEGZvRks&feature=BFa&list=PLC1DEC1D2953642DB&lf=results_video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rEKGAYaUl4&feature=BFa&list=PLC1DEC1D2953642DB&lf=results_video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iU_rnqhVotw&feature=BFa&list=PLC1DEC1D2953642DB&lf=results_video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqIoBe47OE0&feature=BFa&list=PLC1DEC1D2953642DB&lf=results_video
May Allah bestow best of Imaan and Islam to my Sister and me …Ameen
By Muhammed Umar Rao
O my dear Hindu Brothers and sisters, request you all to kindly have an open minded approach towards understanding the true way of life as we are all creatures of our creator and we shall return to him. As a human on this earth it is our duty to worship our creator not his creations.
knowthestraightpath 