PM Modi should have first visited a mosque in India: AIMPLB

All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) on Monday said Prime Minister Narendra Modi could have chosen to visit a mosque in the country before visiting a mosque in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). It charged the basic tenets of the Constitution like secularism, justice, freedom, equality and fraternity are being compromised with and efforts are on to convert India from a secular state to one based on a particular religion.

"Before visiting a mosque in some other country, it would have been better if Modi had visited a masjid in India," AIMPLB Working General Secretary Maulana Mohammad Wali Rehmani said at a press conference here. 

He was asked to comment on Modi's yesterday visit to the historic Sheikh Zayed Grand mosque at Abu Dhabi in UAE where the Prime Minister is on a two-day visit. The Sheikh Zayed Grand mosque is the world's third largest. "After the change of power at the Centre, attempts are being made to promote a particular religion at the cost of secularism," Rehmani alleged.

"In order to protect the secular fabric of the country, a "Deen aur Dastoor Bachav Tehrik" (Save Faith and Constitution Movement) was launched today," he said.

He said the Sachar Committee has clearly established that Muslims in the country are backward educationally as well as economically as compared to other segments but no effort has been made by the present government to ameliorate their condition.