The right to religious freedom is embodied in the United Charter of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

It is a fundamental human right. Its history is as old as the history of mankind itself. From time immemorial people have revolted against the denial and suppression of this basic human right and have emerged victorious. History is replete with examples of the sad end of all those rulers, kings, emperors, conquerors, queens, presidents, prime ministers, army generals and even puppet regimes which have collapsed whenever the right of every man and woman to believe in and practice the religion of their liking and wisdom is not guaranteed to them. Persecution of people just because of their adherence to a particular religion has never ended in success or triumph for those monarchs and barbarians who have earned themselves infamy and insults in the annals of recorded accounts of civilizations. The conscious and practical enunciation of the sanctity of religious freedom as every man and womans birth right was first embodied in the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen on August 26, 1789, by the National Constituent Assembly of France during the time of the French Revolution. This draft was further modified and brought out as the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen of 1793. And coming to the latest emphasis on the inherent and irrefutable right of every human to believe in, profess and practice the faith they want to, we have the declaration very clearly pronounced in the UN Charter of Human Rights too. Clause 18 of the Charter states: Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance. Not just the UN, religious freedom is one of the main clauses in the constitutions of the USA, the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Australia, New Zealand and even in the constitutions of several countries of the Third World, like India, Indonesia, Philippines, the Arab-Afro Islamic bloc of nations and also in several other countries like Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Brunei Darr-es -Salaam, the Netherlands and the Scandinavian countries too. However, it is tragic to note that whereas this human right is guaranteed in the UN Charter of Human Rights and is very significantly marked in the constitutions of almost every country, it is not being implemented in honest and practical terms. Religious intolerance is very much there in some parts of the globe and is a cause of concern and insecurity to the whole international neighbourhood of nations. There is religious intolerance in India as evident in the upheavals centering on the Babri Mosque controversy and the extremist-dominated Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its militant wing known as the RSS. In fact the caste system of India is still predominantly in vogue and happens to clash against the so much touted democracy claims of the Indian governments following the exit of the British in 1947. The same kind of religious intolerance is plainly in focus in the Myanmar of the present day. Formerly known as Burma, Myanmars Rohingya Muslims are being massacred by the Rakhine Buddhists of that country under the very nose of the military junta. This has become a grave problem even for the UN, which refuses to bring it out into the open forums of its various assemblies and gatherings, for debate and resolution.

And the horror of horrors of the much propagandized civilized age of today is that the genocide of Rohingya Muslims in their own land (Myanmar/Burma) is being carried out by the Rakhine Buddhists, as a part of their ethnic cleansing. What this ethnic cleansing truly means only the Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi of Myanmar can answer rightly.

Even in the western countries religious intolerance is raising its tentacles as evinced in France where the wearing of the Hijab (Muslim veil) has been declared as void and null and against the laws of France by none other than the playboy president Sarkozi.

Martin Luther King of the USA fought against all such oppression and denial of the right to religion all along his lifetime in the 1950s and 1960s. And what happened to him? He was assassinated in broad daylight by a sniper reportedly hired for the purpose by none other than the then CIA chiefit is not even worthwhile mentioning his name here.

Religious intolerance against the Muslims of Southwest and Southeast Asia is also increasing in momentum in Australia of the present times. Even though the government of that continent is doing its very best to curb and curtail the octopus of hatred of man against man, woman against woman, child against child, merely on the basis of religious differences; the problem of religious intolerance and racism is on the surge in Australia. It is unbelievable but it is true.

And another sad facet of religious intolerance is fanaticism and zealotry, bigotry and militancy. All these raise their gargantuan heads and resort to an uncontrollable wave of unbridled violence as evidenced in the suicide bombings carried out first by the Irish Republican Army in Ireland and its militant wings; the Al-Qaida militants in Afghanistan and Pakistan; and the Ku-Klux-Klan of the US.

All this is deplorable and condemnable. All this is unjust and against the sanctity of life and living of mankind. Life is sacred and ones faith is even more sacred. This fact was realized even during the stone and bronze ages. It is also a historical fact of how the Egyptian Pharoah, Ramses perished, when he oppressed the Jews he happened to rule and it is also very prominently in the annals of recent history how Hitler also launched the organized and systematic elimination of Jews in Nazi Germany the main factor which led to the start of the 2nd World War in the previous century.

Man and woman were created as equals by the Creator we call God Almighty. They are different in physical and mental characteristics and form but equal in rights and rank. That is the fundamental precept of Divine Justice. It is ordained to be even in other animals as highlighted by nature and its environs from the most ancient times to the present modern era.

The US, ironically enough, claims to be the greatest champion of equality of man, democracy, civil liberty, human rights implementation and the inviolable right of every human individual to live in accordance with the tenets of the faith he/she professes and adheres to as an ideal code of conduct and beliefs.

Yet it is the US which is maligning and defaming itself by launching a tirade against the Muslims of America which has become all the more dominant after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Centers Twin Towers in New York and the Pentagon building.

As John Esposito, author of The Future of Islam recently told a reporter of the ABC News Network of the US: With mosque attacks in California, Wisconsin and Tennessee and the heated controversy over the Islamic Center near Ground Zero in New York, Islamophobia is now running rampant in the United States. "America has a significant Muslim problem, and I think that what we've seen now really shows the tip of the iceberg".

Esposito continues and elaborates thus: Thus, anyone with ties to Islam or who simply has brown skin is now under threat in this hostile climate. While Americans have every right to fear terrorism in a post-9/11 world, unleashing that fear through acts of violence and bigotry creates more problems than it solves.

It is also imperative to point out here that as religious freedom and religious tolerance are one of the main fundamental rights of each and every human so until and unless these rights are safeguarded and guaranteed there can be no real freedom of mankind, freedom of thought and expression, civil equality and fraternity which are the hallmarks of civil liberty and egalitarianism, there can be no real base or a solid foothold for true democracy in any country. Take the cases of all the military junta ruled states and ponder on the uprisings taking place in the dictatorial regimes of the world and one will agree to what has been stated here.

Let us close our case justifying and highlighting the significance of religious freedom and tolerance in societies especially the civilized societies the world over with what US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in her concluding speech at the closing session of the Istanbul Process a summit convened in Turkey less than two years ago was called to explore specific steps to combat intolerance, discrimination and violence on the basis of religion or belief.

The closed-door meeting, held on December 14, 2011, was the first of an ongoing series called "The Istanbul Process." Representatives came from 30 countries and international organizations, including Egypt, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.

It is worthwhile to reflect on Ms. Clintons actual words here: "We are working together to protect two fundamental freedoms -- the right to practice one's religion freely, and the right to express one's opinion without fear."

The Istanbul Process grew out of a resolution adopted by the United Nations Human Rights Council in March and then by the U.N. General Assembly in November.

Resolutions in the previous 10 years had supported legal measures restricting the "defamation of religions."

The more recent Resolution 16/18, however, broke with that tradition by calling for concrete, positive measures to combat religious intolerance rather than legal measures that restrict speech.

Again, let us concentrate on what Hillary Clinton summarized, so boldly and so clearly in her speech as it is the point that we have been endeavouring to drive home through this article. The US Secretary of State rightly said: "It is important that we recognize what we accomplished when this resolution ended 10 years of divisive debate where people were not listening to each other anymore. Now we are. We're talking."

Well, merely talking is not enough, as it is just the tip of the iceberg and the initiation of a process which must be launched where it needs to be launched. The call of the moment is implementing practical and extraordinary measures in order to defeat the menace of seething religious intolerance and the rising crest of waves fanning hate campaigns against the inalienable human right of religious freedom.