A fatwa against terror

For our media, the only good news is bad news. What else can explain the relative unimportance given to a development that could have significant, lasting impact on the world?

I am referring to a fatwa issued on May 31 by the Islamic seminary Darul-Uloom in Deoband.

The word fatwa, ever since the one issued against Salman Rushdie, has taken on sinister connotations reinforced by eccentric pronouncements from obscure clerics all over the world, including India.

But this is different. It’s the first issued by an influential body against terrorism. Signed by the seminary’s grand mufti, Habibur Rehman, the fatwa says in part, ‘Islam is a religion of Peace and Harmony.

In Islam, creating social discord, breach of peace, rioting, bloodshed, pillage or plunder and killing of innocent persons anywhere in the world are all considered most inhuman  crimes…The Quran clearly states that the killing of even one innocent person is equivalent to massacre of all humankind, because it’s like opening the floodgates that creates a situation beyond anyone’s control…’

The fatwa has come as a culmination of what seems like a campaign against terror by Darur-Uloom which denounced terrorism in February this year.

And it has been ratified by other important Muslim bodies like Jamaat-e-Islami Hind, Jamiat-Ulema-E-Hind, Nadwatul Ulama Lucknow and the All India Muslim Personal Law Board.

Of even more importance is the fact that the edict has come from Deoband. The Darul-Uloom is a 150-year-old institute controlling thousands of smaller Islamic seminaries in India.

It also has a wide degree of influence across the Muslim world; after the Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Darul is considered the most important centre of Islamic theology.

The seminary has had a reputation for being radical, so much so that the Taliban and other jihadi outfits are said to have followed its teachings.

Will the Taliban and the other outfits that have been the main advocates of terrorism around the world now consider a change in attitude and method.

Or will they take shelter behind words, saying that they are waging jihad, not terror? That the lives that they take are not ‘innocent’? And the violence they unleash is not ‘unjust’? We can only wait and see.

Whatever happens, something has already taken place right here in our country: the most influential Indian Muslim organisations have publicly distanced themselves from terrorism and are saying, “Look, don’t equate Muslims with violence and Islam with terrorism.”

If we care to listen — and the media bothers to report — Muslim voices are saying other things which now seem to be forming a pattern. In late April, the Darul-Uloom issued a fatwa against cow slaughter.

This came in response to a query from a Muzaffar Nagar farmer asking whether Islam permits cow slaughter, trading in cows, bulls and calves and the use of their skin for business.

A three-member committee, after studying the question, came to the conclusion that although Islam allows beef-eating, the Shariat disallows anything that goes against the law of the land.

And since cow slaughter, beef-eating and trading in cowhide has been banned in India, these activities therefore are haram.

If the media hasn’t highlighted these developments, why haven’t politicians who make an issue of even non-issues? Why haven’t they talked about the many representations made by Muslim bodies to scrap Haj subsidies? The most recent one was made by a group of MPs led by Rajya Sabha deputy chairperson K Rehman Khan who met the PM and also conveyed similar views of five state Haj committees as well as Imam Ahmed Bukhari of Delhi’s Jama Masjid.

Obviously the Sangh Parivar would like all this to be kept quiet as it takes away their main anti-Muslim ammunition.

But why don’t other political parties talk about it? Is it because these are positive steps and, like news, politics is only about things that are negative?

Guiding force
The Darul-Uloom is a 150-year-old institute controlling smaller Islamic seminaries in India