Indian Muslim Observer

By Tariq A. Al-Maeena

Caught between cries of the human rights violations of guest workers and corruption riddled civil servants, one group of Samaritans has been somewhat squeezed out of print space. There are far more urgent problems as the press would have us believe, but to some that is just not fair.

The following is a plea from one such Samaritan whose mission all along has been to help the underprivileged, who happen to be the four-legged ones. She contends that not enough coverage has been given to the protection of the rights of animals in the Kingdom. She writes:

“Good evening Mr. Tariq, I have to apologize for bothering you with what may not be considered by some to be a major issue. I have been helping, feeding and rescuing animals from the street for 33 years now.

“I am usually a low profile person operating and managing my rescue center with only the help of my husband. I cannot have peace and joy when I see cats of all sizes on top of garbage dumpsters, kittens thrown in the garbage, or left to die a slow death under the scorching sun.

“I am a converted Muslim. I have read the Hadiths and Qur’an in French. One of the most profound messages I have kept from my reading is that there is nothing wrong in giving a bowl of water and a plate of food to hungry animals. Unfortunately, I encountered a nasty Saudi neighbor who filed a complaint with the Municipality and sent the police to summon my husband to the station and made him sign an undertaking not to feed animals from the streets.

“Can you please explain to me this ‘strange law’ of the land, the cradle of Islam, that allows and gives people the right to bully someone who is trying to do goodness in this harsh environment. We have no official animal rescue centers here like those that exist in the West. To my knowledge, there are only a few Saudi ladies and some expatriates including ourselves who rescue distressed animals that other Saudi families no longer want after having purchased them at great cost from pet shops.

“They buy them small and cute and then eventually abandon them to starve in the streets. My husband and I catch such animals whenever we can to treat their wounds and nurse them back to health. They are very badly abused by the environment, the outdoors and the lack of nourishment. Some are in such bad shape that treating them and having them recover is purely God’s miracle.

“Now we have a rude and intolerant person that is supposedly a good Muslim, praying religiously five times a day, coming to dictate to us with the blessings of city officials, how we have to ignore the miseries and suffering of animals, which are God’s creation too.

“Is it just and fair? For 33 long years, we have helped many of these animals cope with rampant cruelty from some people of this Islamic land. We only ask them to leave us in peace to continue our merciful deeds. We only ask God Almighty to help us to help them. We do not need any rewards or recognition from society. Could you please pass our message to those people who only talk of compassion in public and yet become vicious and merciless when they encounter true humane behavior from their neighbor.

“My hope in writing this letter to you is that you can write an article to educate such people in this religious society that animals are also part of God’s creations and God’s Kingdom. Thank you for taking your time to read my letter and I hope that you do consider this to be a matter of importance in this selfish world. Respect and care for animals has to be taught in schools at an early age. This is what’s being done in the West. Sincerely, Yvonne A., a faithful reader.”

Some may consider Yvonne’s pleas to be trivial in today’s world. They may argue that there are far more pressing issues to be addressed than the plight of four-legged felines. In the process they may be forgetting that the mercy of Islam extends beyond human beings to all living creations of God.

It is prohibited in Islam to treat an animal cruelly, or to kill it unless it is needed for food or if it is endangering your life. The Qur’an tells us that “there is not an animal on earth, nor a bird that flies on its wings, but they are communities like you,” and according to an established Hadith when the Prophet (peace be upon him) was asked if Allah rewarded acts of charity to animals, he replied: “Yes, there is a reward for acts of charity to every beast alive. Whoever is merciful even to a sparrow, Allah will be merciful to him on the Day of Judgment.”

As Muslims, it is our duty to be merciful with all living creatures. In the process, we should reward individuals such as Yvonne and others who seek to find comfort for abandoned animals with compassion and understanding and not shower them with distress and intolerance.

[The author can be reached at talmaeena@aol.com. Follow him on Twitter @talmaeena.]

(Courtesy: Saudi Gazette)

Thirty emerging religious leaders from across the globe are coming together to learn about the latest techniques in conflict resolution and peacemaking.

IMO News Service

Madison, New Jersey: Drew University’s Center on Religion, Culture & Conflict (CRCC) will host the first Drew Institute on Religion and Conflict Resolution this June to train 30 Jewish, Christian and Muslim leaders from around the world in religious conflict transformation and peacemaking.

Through a series of seminars, workshops and other activities led by scholars and senior religious leaders with expertise in the field, this unique program will allow up-and-coming lay and clerical leaders to live and engage with each other as they study for three weeks on Drew’s campus.

“Through the intensive training they receive, these emerging leaders will be better equipped both to challenge radical religious leaders and manifest a positive alternative influence on their congregations, constituencies, and communities with regard to building positive relationships with other communities,” said Director of the CRCC and Professor of Comparative Religion, Chris Taylor.

The Drew Institute on Religion and Conflict Resolution will run from June 10, 2013 through July 3, 2013 and will focus on training Christian, Jewish, and Muslim religious leaders, including both clergy and lay leaders -- both male and female - -from Egypt, Indonesia, Israel, Pakistan and Nigeria. The participating countries were selected based on the recurrence of communal religious conflict and the presence of religious leaders with vital experience in the field of conflict resolution.

Some participants include: Nardine Nashaat, a peace activist from Cairo, Egypt; Nerlian Gogali, founder of Institute Mosintuwu, a women’s grassroots peace movement in Indonesia; Samson Auta, Interfaith Mediation Centre (IMC) Coordinator for the Northwest region of Nigeria; Yael Gidanyan, board chair of the Interfaith Encounter Association in Israel; and Muhammad Raghib Hussain, principal of the Jamia Naeemia, the largest moderate madrassa in Lahore, Pakistan, whose father was assassinated for opposing the Taliban.

The Drew CRCC continues to work closely with local partners in each of these countries to identify participants and plan the structure and content of the Institute. Drew will host the Summer Institute for three consecutive years, thanks to a $300,000 grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. By 2016, Drew University aims to have 18 trained leaders from each country who will establish a global network of young religious peacemakers.

About the CRCC

Drew’s Center on Religion, Culture & Conflict focuses critical scholarly attention on the complex ways in which cultures and religions interact, especially in moments of crisis and conflict. The CRCC seeks to encourage and facilitate scholarly understanding of and conversation about the most problematic, and often tragic, intersections where religions and cultures meet.

The CRCC supports a number of projects and initiatives, including: hosting distinguished visiting scholars; sponsoring lectures, symposia, and roundtable discussions to promote scholarship and it supports promising model projects to enhance inter-religious and cross-cultural understanding.

For details, contact:

Cara Townsend
Telephone: 973-408-3227
Email: ctownsend@drew.edu

Not a person living anywhere in the Gulf region would be safe from exposure in the event Iran’s nuclear facilities are bombed

By Tariq A. Al Maeena

It’s no secret that Israel has been trying to enlist the United States by proxy to join in on in its aggressive stance towards Iran. And it is indeed not helpful that Iran has not been entirely forthcoming about its nuclear plans. Neither has Israel for that matter, but that point is rarely brought up on the international stage for reasons that escape me.

There are also those living in the Gulf who have been lulled into a false sense of invincibility against the elements when it comes to the blowing up of the environment. They believe they would remain unscathed from such an attack in their backyards, one that would undoubtedly discharge dangerous elements into the atmosphere that once released would be difficult to control.

A pre-emptive strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities poses great dangers not just to the Iranian nuclear machinery but to the whole region. This was a critical assessment by Wade Stone who argued that prevailing climatic conditions would help the nuclear fallout from such a strike to eventually move over to encompass the entire Gulf region.

As he explains it, “every spring and summer, during a period of low pressure over the Gulf, powerful winds known as the shamals and sharqi, sweep down from the north and north east into Saudi Arabia, whipping up ever more grains of sand as they head south and south west across the Arabian Desert. Frequently, these sandstorms become gargantuan in size; hundreds of metres high and kilometres wide and in length of dense roiling particulate, choking the lungs of those exposed, blocking out the sun completely and, by the time they are over, burying whole towns...”

He contends through careful analysis that these winds ‘generally take a semi-circular route, heading back out to the southern Gulf and the remaining Gulf states. Indeed, on an annual basis all of the Gulf states combined, the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, suffer through literally hundreds of such sand and dust storms.

And since such winds originate from Iran and elsewhere on its downwards spiral, in the event that Iran’s nuclear sites were to be bombed, the nuclear fallout from such an event would be extreme. “Millions would die within a decade or two of some form of radiation-induced cancer. And since a significant portion of that nuclear fallout would end up either immediately or over the course of the next weeks and months in the Arabian Desert, where the winds, year after year, would gather it up along with the particles of sand and dust into gigantic roiling irradiated storms (remember, hundreds of such sand and dust storms annually), not a person living anywhere in the Gulf region would be safe from exposure. The Gulf, too, would soon be so irradiated and toxic and lifeless that it might as well be renamed the New Dead Sea.”

Israel’s game has been very apparent for quite some time. There should be no Arab or Islamic state powerful enough to challenge its illegal expansion and annexation policies. It was through its Aipac-funded lawmakers in the US government that Iraq became the bogeyman and the purveyor of weapons of mass destruction. Now it is Iran’s turn, and Israel will not let up. And such a game has also found takers among big businesses who see profit in every war or conflict.

Michel Chossudovsky, an award-winning author, Professor of Economics at the University of Ottawa and founder and director of the Centre for Research on Globalisation (CRG), Montreal has asserted in his newly released book titled, Towards A World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War, that nuclear war has become a multibillion dollar undertaking, which fills the pockets of US defence contractors. He terms it as an outright ‘privatisation of nuclear war’.

He contends that the Pentagon’s mission is one of ‘world conquest’ and a key tool towards such grand designs is ‘a media campaign which grants it legitimacy in the eyes of public opinion. A good versus evil dichotomy prevails. The perpetrators of war are presented as the victims. Public opinion is misled.’ Through such devious methods, he argues that ‘the international community has endorsed nuclear war in the name of world peace. Making the world safer is the justification for launching a military operation which could potentially result in a nuclear holocaust.’

Commenting on Professor Chossudovsky’s arguments, Denis Halliday, former assistant Secretary General of the United Nations stated that “in a world where engineered, pre-emptive, or more fashionably humanitarian wars of aggression have become the norm, this challenging book may be our final wake-up call”.

Ellen Brown, author of Web of Debt and president of the Public Banking Institute was blunter. “Iran is being targeted with nuclear weapons as part of a war agenda built on distortions and lies for the purpose of private profit. The real aims are oil, financial hegemony and global control. The price could be nuclear holocaust. When weapons become the hottest export of the world’s only superpower, and diplomats work as salesmen for the defence industry, the whole world is recklessly endangered.”

Such alarm should not be casually dismissed. Friedrich Nietzsche once said, ‘In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule.’ Let us hope that such is not the case for the sake of the entire region.

[Tariq A. Al Maeenais a Saudi socio-political commentator. He lives in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.  You can follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/@talmaeena]

(Courtesy: Gulf News)

By Dr. Abdul Ruff

Dictatorial US led western world wants to decide the fate of the humanity according to their whims and fancies. With a series of terror wars on Islam, they want to change the world into one that hates Islam.

When the anti-Islamic western powers jointly enacted the Arab Spring in Arab world, they obviously had one major agenda: to destabilize Islamic regimes and replace with capitalist anti-Islamic rulers.

Turmoil brought down regimes starting with ... and Egypt where hypocritical regimes fell. However, things did not work that way and Islamist parties have gained prominence everywhere. Now the same western powers and their media lords are deeply worried.

Now the same western powers and their disappointed media nuts seek to replace them with pro- west regimes and working towards destabilizing the Islamist regimes by using the opposition and pro-west elements .

This is happening in Egypt where president Mohammed Morsi is facing stiff opposition from these west inspired anti-Islamic elements,

Egypt

A ruling by Egypt's Supreme Constitutional Court ruled that the nation's Islamist-dominated legislature and constitutional panel were illegally elected, dealing a serious blow to the legal basis of the Islamists' legitimate hold on power.

The ruling deepens the political instability that has gripped the country since the overthrow of authoritarian leader Hosni Mubarak two years ago. The ruling by highest court in the country the says that the legislature's upper house, the only one currently sitting, would not be dissolved until the parliament's lower chamber is elected later this year or early in 2014. The constitutional panel has already dissolved after completing the charter.

The ruling comes ahead of the scheduled climax on June 30 — the president's first anniversary in office — of a campaign by anti-government protesters to collect 15 million signatures of Egyptians who want to see President Morsi go. When elections were held in early 2012, over 70 percent of the seats were won by Islamists.

Ruling is likely to prolong the polarizing political transition that followed Mubarak's overthrow. Rival political groups disagree not just on policies and the future course of the nation but on the legitimacy of the basic institutions of government.

Mohammad Morsi, elected nearly a year ago, tried to reinstate parliament's lower chamber just days after he came to office on June 30 but eventually bowed to the court ruling and backed down. In both rulings on parliament's two chambers, the court contended that political parties that fielded candidates for the third of seats set aside for independent candidates, as allowed by the election law, amounted to a breach of the principle of fairness.

The president's supporters that the judiciary is filled with Mubarak loyalists determined to derail the nation's political process. Of the chamber's 270 members, 180 are elected with the other 90 being appointed by the president, Morsi.

Turkey

Premier of Turkey Tayyip Erdogan is facing the biggest challenge during his 10-year rule from some demonstrators who protest against demolition of a park. The protest started five days ago aimed at saving a city center park in Istanbul from shopping-center developers who had been backed by the government.

The nationwide demonstration was triggered after the police broke up a peaceful sit-in against the demolition on Friday. Some protesters were injured and at least 63 people detained during raid, according to Istanbul Governor's Office. Special police forces rushed to the scene and used tear gas and high-pressured water gun to disperse the protesters. Police used tear gas on protesters in Ankara but the clashes were relatively minor compared with major violence in Turkey's biggest cities on the previous two days. At least seven policemen were injured, including one seriously, during the clashes.

The angry protesters demanded Erdogan to step down, calling his government the "fascist" government during their protests in Istanbul and other cities. Police eventually withdrew from central Taksim Square early on Saturday evening.

Erdogan has called on demonstrators to end their protest, saying the government would press ahead with the redevelopment plans about Gezi Park.

Prime Minister Erdogan accused Turkey's main secular opposition party of stirring a wave of anti-government protests, as tens of thousands regrouped in Istanbul and Ankara after a lull and trouble flared again in the capital.

Calling the protesters "a few looters", Erdogan said he would press ahead with redeveloping Istanbul's Taksim Square, a project which provoked the demonstrations that have widened into a broader show of defiance against his Islamist-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP).

Erdogan singled out the Republican People's Party (CHP) - set up in 1924 by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk who founded Turkey's modern secular state - for attack over a dispute he described as ideological. "We think that the main opposition party which is making resistance calls on every street is provoking these protests," Erdogan said on Turkish television.

Turkey's fiercest anti-government unrest for years erupted when trees were torn down at a park in Taksim Square under governmentplans to construct a new mosque and rebuild a replica Ottoman-era barracks. "This reaction is no longer about the ripping out 12 trees. This is based on ideology," said Erdogan, whose conservative vision for the nation has angered more liberal Turks. Referring to the planned mosque, he added: "Obviously I will not ask for permission for this from the head of CHP or a few looters."
The atmosphere was more festive with some chanting for Erdogan to resign and others singing and dancing. There was little obvious police presence.

On Sunday rain appeared to keep the crowds away from Taksim Square initially, but this did not dampen the spirit of the protesters whose numbers later swelled. "We will stay until the end," said Akin, who works in motor trade and has been in Taksim for the past four days. "We are not leaving. The only answer now is for this government to fall. We are tired of this oppressive government constantly putting pressure on us."

There were more than 90 separate demonstrations around the country on Friday and Saturday, officials said. More than 1,000 people have been injured in Istanbul and several hundred more in Ankara, according to medical staff.

The ferocity of the police response in Istanbul shocked Turks, as well as tourists caught up in the unrest in one of the world's most visited destinations. It has drawn rebukes from the United States, European Union and international rights groups.

Helicopters fired tear gas canisters into residential neighbourhoods and police used teargas to try to smoke people out of buildings. Footage on YouTube showed one protester being hit by an armoured police truck as it charged a barricade.

Erdogan has overseen a transformation in Turkey during his decade in power, turning its once crisis-prone economy into the fastest-growing in Europe. "We have carried Turkey into a new era... If they call someone who is a servant of his country, then I have nothing to say to them," he said.

Among Turks in general Erdogan remains by far the most popular politician, but critics point to what they see as his authoritarianism and religiously conservative meddling in private lives in the secular republic. Tighter restrictions on alcohol sales and warnings against public displays of affection in recent weeks have also provoked protests. Concern that government policy is allowing Turkey to be dragged into the conflict in neighbouring Syria by the West has also led to peaceful demonstrations.

Islamist government’s pro-Islam reforms have upset both anti-Islamic elements in Turkey as well as their sponsors from the West.

The opposite parties have fuelled the crisis in order to revive the anti-Islamic tendencies in the society.

[Dr. Abdul Ruffis Specialist on State Terrorism; Chancellor-Founder of Center for International Affairs (CIA); Independent Analyst; Chronicler of Foreign occupations & Freedom movements (Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Xinjiang, Chechnya, etc.). He is also former university Teacher. He can be contacted at abdulruff_jnu@yahoo.com]

By Kaleem Kawaja

On Monday, June 3, 2013, prominent Suni Cleric Imam Shaikh Qardawi who lives in Qatar and whose TV program and website is very popular in the Middle-East, threw all caution to winds and discarded neutrality in the Sunni-Shia conflict and appealed to Sunnis to go all out to annihilate Shias in the region.

He asked able-bodied Sunnis to come together and join the Sunni side in the current civil war in Syria with the intent of killing Shias. Qardawi labeled Hizbollah of Lebanon, that is composed mostly of Shias, as a party of devils and liars who have deceived Muslims and whom Sunnis must fight and destroy. Qardawi also alleged that the Islamic Republic of Iran has lied to and deceived the Muslim Ummah.

At the same time Hassan Nasrollah of Hizbollah who has already sent his troops into Syria to kill the Sunni rebels there has declared that his objective in the region is the same as that of the Alawaite Syrian President Assad, which is to annihilate Sunnis. Inside Syria it is no more rebels against the Syrian government. It is an open sectarian civil war between Sunnis and Shias. On one side are the Sunnis of Syria supported by the Sunni majority countries of Saudi Arabia, UAE, and other Sunnis, versus Shias on the other side supported by the Syrian govt, Hezbollah of Lebanon, the Shias of Syria and Lebanon, the Alawaites and Iran.

This open bitter Sunni-Shia war has come about 25 yeas following the eight year Iraq vs Iran war of 1980s, which too was a Shia-Sunni war. The Christians of Lebanon and Iraq are supporting the Shias in the entire region. Both Shias led by Iran - an oil-rich state, and Sunnis led by Saudi Arabia and UAE - another conglomeration of oil rich states, are pouring in huge fortunes and resources to buy arms from US, UK, Russia, China etc. Thus the wealth of rich Muslim countries is ending up in the coffers of non-Muslim countries and they are laughing all the way to the bank.

In this internecine and bloody conflict the Sunnias and Shias are trying to inflict maximum damage on each other, while their common enemy, Israel and the Jews are luaughing away. They are laughing because their two worst enemies are killing and destroying each other and are sowing seeds of hatred between the two halves of the global Muslim community. This hatred coupled with violence will build much hostility and bitterness among Sunnis and Shia that may last at least a decade if not more.

This Sunni-Shia war may end up creating hatred, violence and bitterness among the Sunnis and Shias in South Asian countries (Pakistan, Bangladesh, India) and may even lead to violence among them, that may also take a long time to remove.

So for the next ten years Israel is safe in occupying the lands of Palestinians with no one to make a serious objection. Just as at the end of the Iraq-Iran war both countries became weak and easy prey to the enemies of Islam, the current bitter and bloody fighting will result in an overall much weakened Ummah. In the same timeframe Israel and the Jews will become stronger and the unquestioned super-power of the Middle-East.

This is how we Muslims are again harming ourselves and will again be reduced to being at the mercy of others, even as Allah has gifted us with the huge wealth of oil and energy resources. And this is how the enemies of Muslims easily divide the Muslims on a global scale and exploit our lands and resources. It has happened so many times and is happening again infront of our eyes.

[Kaleem Kawajais a community activist based at Washington DC. He can be contacted at kaleemkawaja@gmail.com]

Taqwaa Advisory is setting up a Rs.250 crore real estate fund to give Indian Muslims a Shariah investment option

By Liau Y-Sing& Yudith Ho

Kuala Lumpur/Jakarta: Indian Islamic property and stock funds are starting to give the world’s third largest Muslim population Shariah investment options in a nation where banking in line with the Koran’s tenets is prohibited.

Taqwaa Advisory and Shariah Investment Solutions Pvt. Ltd, a Mumbai-based consultancy, is setting up the Rs.250 crore fund on behalf of a company backed by the Kerala government, director Shariq Nisar said in an interview on Wednesday. Secura Investment Management (India) Pvt. Ltd manages the country’s only other such real estate vehicle. India has two Shariah equity funds and BSE Ltd, the stock exchange operator, introduced a new Islamic share index on 2 May.

India hasn’t made any progress on allowing Islamic banking since the central bank formed a committee to look at the issue in 2005, while no sukuk have been issued in the country due to a lack of legal recognition. The South Asian nation that has the highest sovereign bond yields among the 10 major Asian emerging markets is unlikely to introduce legislation in the near term as such a move may anger the 81% Hindu majority, according to Kuala Lumpur-based consultancy Amanah Capital Group Ltd.

“Islamic finance is in a nascent stage in India and definitely any new product will create more awareness and opportunity,” Taqwaa’s Nisar said. “There’s a lack of awareness and interest, which will take some time to be removed.”

Expert panel

The fund will be run by Al Barakah Financial Services Ltd, whose shareholders include Kerala State Industrial Development Corporation Ltd, which is owned by the state government, Nisar said. The vehicle will invest mainly in commercial real estate in the southern Indian state, he said.

In 2008, a 13-member panel of experts led by Raghuram Rajan, a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund and now the top adviser in India’s finance ministry, recommended that the country allow banking that complies with Islam’s ban on interest. The government did not take any action, and central bank governor D. Subbarao said this month that Shariah-compliant banking is inconsistent with the nation’s laws.

“At this point in time, the Indian constitution restricts any regulation or law which favours any religion,” Abas A. Jalil, chief executive officer at Amanah Capital, said in a 28 May e-mail. “We don’t foresee any amendment to regulate Islamic banking to be put in place in the near future.”

Political barrier

India’s 10-year sovereign bonds yield 7.15%, well ahead of 5.97% in Indonesia, the next highest in the region, data compiled by Bloomberg show.
Other countries with minority Muslim populations have taken steps to develop Shariah-compliant finance. Singapore introduced laws in 2006 to give sukuk equal tax treatment, while the UK did the same in its 2007 budget.

“The challenge is that every time India tries to offer Islamic banking, the tendency is to politicize this product,” Raj Mohamad, managing director at consulting company Five Pillars Pte, said in an interview from Singapore on Wednesday. “India should look at non-traditional Islamic finance markets and see how they have done it.”

Most Indian Muslims want basic Shariah banking products such as mortgages, rather than sophisticated investment options, according to H. Abdur Raqeeb, the general secretary for the Indian Centre for Islamic Finance in New Delhi.

Muslims by and large are not very rich in this country, he said in a 15 May interview. Less than 1% of Muslims are in the capital market.

Stock funds

Internationally, an increasing amount of Shariah-compliant financial assets has buoyed demand for sukuk, with worldwide sales reaching a record $46.5 billion last year. Issuance has risen 7% so far in 2013 to $18 billion, data compiled by Bloomberg show.

Taurus Asset Management Co. Ltd. says it established India’s first Islamic stock investment vehicle in 2009. The Taurus Ethical Fund has Rs.22.04 crore of assets, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. In 2011, Tata Asset Management Ltd switched the Tata Select Equity Fund to the Shariah-compliant Tata Ethical Fund, which had Rs.103 crore of assets as of 30 April.
The average yield on Islamic debt rose 10 basis points, or 0.1 percentage point, to 3.38% on Wednesday, the HSBC/Nasdaq Dubai US Dollar Sukuk Index shows. Borrowing costs have climbed 57 basis points this year, after reaching a record low of 2.67% in January. The yield premium over the London interbank offered rate, or Libor, widened five basis points to 181.

‘More awareness’

Shariah-compliant bonds returned 0.5% this year, according to the HSBC/Nasdaq gauge, while emerging-market notes lost 3%, JPMorgan Chase and Co.’s EMBI Global Index shows.

Some 13% of India’s 1.2 billion people are Muslim, according to the CIA World Factbook, the third-biggest population behind Indonesia and Pakistan. Those two countries have 209.6 trillion rupiah and 837 billion Pakistani rupees of Islamic banking assets, the latest central bank data show. In Malaysia, a global pioneer in Shariah-compliant finance, holdings total 399 billion ringgit.

“With a huge Muslim population getting more awareness about Shariah-compliant products, Indian Muslims’ preference for Islamic solutions will rise,” Mohammed Sohail, chief executive officer at Topline Securities Ltd in Karachi, said in an e-mail on Wednesday. Many Asian and Middle East countries can introduce Islamic products to tap the Indian market.

(Courtesy: LiveMint)

By Shuriah Niazi

Estimates show that Muslims account for the majority of prisoners in Indian jails

New Delhi: Sent behind bars for minor offences, Muslims make up the majority of inmates in Indian prisons, a phenomenon blamed for the lack of education in the sizable minority.

“We (Muslims) call us a minority community,” MP Sultan Ahmad, who served as Union Minister of State from Trinamool Congress party, told OnIslam.net.

“But in prisons we’re in majority. This is an unfortunate situation for the nation as well as the society.”

Estimates show that Muslims account for the majority of prisoners in Indian jails.

In West Bengal state, almost 50 percent of jail inmates are Muslims, although they account for only 25 percent of general population.

In Maharashtra, Muslims make up nearly third of jail inmates, while they make one-fourth in Uttar Pradesh.

Besides the states of Jammu and Kashmir, Puducherry and Sikkim, there are disproportionate numbers of Muslims behind bars in almost all other states.

According to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Muslims made up about 21 percent of jail inmates in India in 2011.

“The issue was raised when I was with the Prime Minister Office (PMO) during the tenure of Rajiv Gandhi as prime minister,” said National Commission for Minorities Chairman Wajahat Habibullah.

“However, so far no study has been done to ascertain the causes behind discrepancy between the populations of Muslims in society and in prison.”

According to information obtained under Right to Information (RTI) Act, out of 1,222 under trial in Alipur Central Jail as of December 2011, 530 were Muslims.

Similarly, out of 2,200 under trial in UP’s Ghazaibad jail, 530 were Muslims. Data received from other prisons of states are equally disquieting.

There are some 140 million Muslims in Hindu-majority India, the world's third-largest Muslim population after those of Indonesia and Pakistan.

Minor Offences

Officials note that many Indian Muslims are sent behind bars for minor offences.

“Most of the Muslims are jailed on petty charges,” Union Minister for Minorities Affairs K. Rehman Khan told OnIslam.net.

“They don’t get any legal assistance or advice nor are they aware that they are entitled to get free legal assistance. They don’t have any political power or backing.”

A study conducted last year by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) revealed bias against Muslims by the police, the administration and the judiciary.

Most of the prisoners included in the study had no connection with the terrorism or organized crimes.

Most of Muslim prisoners (71.9 percent) were embroiled in petty disputes. The percentage of those landing behind bars for the first time on minor charges was 75.5.

“About 90 percent of Muslims in jails are facing charges like illicit liquor trade, theft, loot etc. The percentage of those facing serious charges is quite low,” said Lucknow District Jail Superintendent D.R. Maurya.

A study conducted by TISS on jails in Maharashtra found that 58 percent of Muslims were either illiterate or had received education only up to elementary level.

The study showed that 43.6 percent of prisoners were not in a position to hire a lawyer and 61 percent were not aware that there was an NGO in the jail from which they could seek assistance.

Backwardness

Community leaders and officials have blamed lack of education for the rising numbers of Muslims in Indian jails.

“There is lack of education and backwardness in the Muslim society,” Maulana Mahmood Madani, general secretary of Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind, told OnIslam.net.

“The Sachar Committee has conceded that the situation of Muslims is even worse that dalits (considered to be most unprivileged and backward in the society),” he said, referring to a committee appointed in 2005 by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to compile a report on the socio-economic situation of Indian Muslims.

Indian Muslims have complained decades of social and economic neglect and oppression as well as being discriminated against in all walks of life.

Official figures reveal Muslims log lower educational levels and higher unemployment rates than the Hindu majority and other minorities like Christians and Sikhs.

They account for less than seven percent of public service employees, only five percent of railways workers, around four percent of banking employees and there are only 29,000 Muslims in India's 1.3 million-strong military.

The Sachar committee has released a number of recommendations to improve the conditions of Muslims, including setting up educational facilities, modernization of madrasahs, creation of job opportunities and steps to increase the community's representation in public services.

But Manisha Sethi of Jamia Teachers Solidarity Association (JTSA) says that unsympathetic judges and a bail system that favors only the rich have contributed in the rising number of Muslims in Indian jails.

This is despite the fact that there is a provision under sections 436 and 436 A of the Indian Penal Code that if a person has served half of the maximum jail term prescribed under law for an offence as under trial then he is entitled for bail on personal bond.

“Madhya Pradesh’s BJP government is very harsh towards the Muslims,” said Aslam Sher Khan, a former Olympian Hockey player and former Union Minister.

“The government incarcerates maximum number of Muslims and, ironically, tries to garner political mileage by shedding crocodile tears in the name of their backwardness and poverty.”

Former chief minister of Madhya Pradesh and national general secretary of Congress Digvijay Singh blames the government for the phenomenon.

“If the Muslims feel helpless in the face of police atrocities, then it is the weakness of the Congress party.”

But Ajay Vishnoi, Minorities Welfare Minister of Madhya Pradesh, says efforts are ongoing to improve conditions of Indian Muslims.

“Things don’t change overnight,” he said.

“But our efforts are yielding positive results and the change is coming slowly.

“Poverty and illiteracy are the main reasons behind a community taking to crime. When these problems will be solved, a drastic change will be visible.”

(Courtesy: OnIslam.net)

By Pervez Bari

Bhopal: The Bharatiya Janata Party ruled Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has said that often, the Union Government does not take states into confidence for policymaking regarding internal security issues. The Centre wants to deprive states of their rights.

At the same time, the Union Government is also interfering with federal structure, which is ultra-vires to the spirit to the Constitution. It is need of the hour that the Union Government think in the national interest rising above political considerations and work shoulder-to-shoulder with state governments in campaigns against terrorism and naxalism.

Chouhan was addressing Chief Ministers’ conference on internal security in New Delhi on Wednesday. The conference was chaired by Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh. Union Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde, Finance Minister P. Chidambaram, Minister of State in PMO Narayan Sami, Chief Ministers of states, Madhya Pradesh Home Minister Umashankar Gupta, Chief Secretary R. Parasuram, DGP Nandan Dube and senior officers of Union and State Governments were present on the occasion, an official spokesman said.

He opposed the idea of National Counter Terrorism Centre, (NCTC), saying that States should get their due rights and Central Government should trust the State Governments. He said that with NIA in existence there is no need for NCTC. He was of the view that instead of NCTC, SCTC will be more affective in tackling issues like terrorism and naxalism. He also questioned the viability of scraping strict laws like TADA and POTA for political reasons. He questioned the seriousness of the Central Government in tackling these serious issues.

Chouhan said that the country is facing twin challenge of left wing extremism and terrorism, which is undermining democracy and Constitution continuously. The dastardly carnage committed by left wing extremists was a blow to democratic system of India. He said that situation of chaos and uncertainty is prevailing in Naxal-prone areas due to lack of strong will-power and differences between the Union Government and its party over line of action. He said that there is no place for violence in democracy and it needs to be dealt with sternly. Those indulging in violence should not be spared. Situation needs to be viewed with seriousness.

Speaking for tribals, Chouhan said that because of Forest Conservation Act and the Wildlife Protection Act tribals living in forests are not able to earn their livelihood plus lack of development activities in the tribal areas has led to unemployment. He said that providing employment to the unemployed tribal youths in tribal areas will help in dealing with naxalism. He also called for providing skill development programmes which will increase the employment opportunities among the youths. He said that there is need to develop infrastructure, road connectivity and educating youths to curb naxal activities.

He said that the Central Government has curtailed down the amount from Rs.100 crore to Rs.23 crore for modernisation of police force in the state. Also for 2012-13 under modernisation scheme Central and State share has been reduced to 60:40 ratio which was earlier 75:25 ratio. From internal security point of view for effective action against terrorist activities and organised crime, the Madhya Pradesh State Assembly has sent “Madhya Pradesh Terrorist and Disruptive Activities and Organised Crime Control Bill 2010” to the Centre for sanction which has not been approved till date. He said that special concerted efforts have been made for effective control of organised crime network and checking circulation of faking currency, wild life related offences and interstate drug trafficking by constituting special task force in the state. Providing security to women and preventing crimes against them is on our priority list.

[Pervez Bariis a senior Journalist based at Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh. He is associated with IndianMuslimObserver.com as Bureau Chief (Madhya Pradesh). He can be contacted at pervezbari@yahoo.co.in]

By Nilofar Suhrawardy

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) decided to postpone its proposed countrywide agitation against the failure of the ruling coalition at the eleventh hour. The BJP had planned to launch the weeklong protest from May 27, asking its activists and supporters to court arrest. However, the BJP backtracked on its plan following the Maoists’ attack on a Congress party convoy in Bastar, Chattisgarh, killing several top leaders of the state. The BJP condemned the attack and postponed its agitation.

Perhaps, the BJP had erred in assuming that its agitation would draw massive support, but when reality dawned on it, the party was compelled to fall back on Chattisgarh incident as an excuse and postpone its agitation.

The reason of this self-confidence in the BJP was based on in its perception that by creating the bogey of Muslim appeasement by the Congress-led UPA government, it has succeeded once again in polarizing the Hindu community in its favor.

The BJP has recently also targeted Uttar Pradesh (UP) government led by the Samajwadi Party (SP) on this issue. There is no denying that to attract Muslim vote, various parties have in the past repeatedly made false promises and assurances to the community. But if Muslims had really been appeased in India, the so-called secular parties would have been left without any political card to woo the country’s largest minority community. There would not have been any bias against the Muslim community in the country. They would not be considered as second-class citizens by Hindu hard-liners. Doubts and speculations would not have been there over their constitutional rights, including that of equality, the freedom of speech and pursuing their religious duties.

Of course, it would be incorrect to assume that each and every Indian Muslim is a victim to such prejudices and biases. It would be equally wrong to blame all Hindus for being biased against Muslims.

However, had the BJP leaders not started objecting to what they described as “Muslim appeasement” policy of the UPA government, the issue may not have been deliberated upon. True, the UPA government has promised to address certain grievances of the Muslim community. Now, the big question is whether the government has taken any action to remove and/or at least reduce the same? If some effort has genuinely been made, why should it be viewed as “Muslim appeasement”?

It is surprising that several political leaders have raised objections to even considering and proposing action to mitigate sufferings of Indian Muslims. What does this indicate? Does not this imply that they do not want Muslims to prosper like any other community? It is indeed stunning that suggestions and proposals made to address challenges facing Muslims in secular-India should be viewed as a means to “appease” them. Well, if these problems are not seriously taken care of, it will prove to be a very dangerous, anti-secular approach of the federal and state governments. Ignoring the plight of the Muslim community or sometimes rather perpetuating it would imply that politicians in power are more concerned about appeasing anti-Muslim extremists. They are more concerned about not annoying them than addressing problems facing Muslims.

The Congress-led UPA government has recently proposed to take some corrective measures for the welfare of the Muslim community. These include providing justice to innocent Muslims who have been wrongfully detained as “terrorists.” So, if the government is considering setting up fast-track courts to look into these cases, why is the BJP agitated about it? Why the BJP leaders are calling it appeasement? Would the BJP prefer innocents Muslims to continue languishing in jails for no fault of theirs?

This policy cannot be described as that of appeasing Muslims. It aims to provide justice to them, which all citizens are constitutionally entitled to. The BJP is apparently bent on using this communal card with hope of winning support of the majority community. If parliamentary polls were not around the corner, the BJP would not have targeted a non-existent policy by trying to whip up communal passions.

(Courtesy: Arab News)

By Alka Pande

Lucknow: It has not been happy news for the Samajwadi Party on the Muslim vote bank front in recent times.

There have been more than 20 cases of communal clashes and riots after its government stormed back to power mostly on the strength of the community’s support. A middle level Muslim police officer died after being attacked by supporters of an MLA close to the party’s leadership not long ago and the government was seen sympathetic to him. BJP leader Varun Gandhi got a clean chit from the court in the communal hate speech case after all witnesses turned hostile mysteriously. There have been talks of connivance of the state government in his acquittal.

Not long ago there was the mysterious death of Khalid Mujahid, an accused in the serial bomb blasts of 2007 in police custody. Of course, the government has not lived up to its promise of withdrawing terror charges slapped on Muslim youths by the earlier dispensation.

Surely, the community is losing faith in the Akhilesh Yadav government. It is no more willing to buy platitudes from SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav. The latter should be worried since he is targeting more than 50 seats in the parliamentary elections and without the Muslim support he won’t reach even half the number. In that case his prime ministerial ambition goes for a toss.

No wonder, the party is in the damage control mode. Last week, the ruling party announced the names of its three Muslim candidates, who were nominated in place of candidates from other castes. The government accorded the state minister status to a cleric Mohammad Tauqeer Raza Khan, who had been involved in various controversies. For the record, Khan had contested the last assembly against the SP candidate. Earlier, the party has cleared hefty compensation to the family of the dead Muslim police officer and secured a job for a family member in the Home department. It has also declared a new holiday in the name of Khwaja Muinuddin Chishti.

Are all these efforts enough to make the Muslims happy? Not quite.

“A large segment of the Muslim population understands that the SP is only misleading the whole community. The ruling party is not talking about education, poverty, housing and other such issues of the Muslim population. The fact is that all the schemes are aimed at garnering votes. Since its inception the government is playing the appeasement politics and it has touched its peak now,” says BJP spokesperson Vijay Bahadur Pathak.

The government has launched a couple of schemes providing money for Muslim girls’ education. Promptness has been displayed in the distribution of laptops and tablets first in the schools dominated by Muslim students. But there are no schemes for the general welfare and uplift of the community. Worse, the government was not able to spend more than 50 per cent of the last year’s budget under the minority welfare head.

Only recently SP minister Azam Khan claimed that the previous government—BSP’s—diverted major portions of the Minority Welfare fund to parks and memorials. Yet, the government appears reluctant in making a move against any of the accused in the parks and memorial scam case, despite getting the report of an inquiry conducted by the Lokayukta indicting the Mayawati government.

“The fact is there has been no solid move by the government so far for the welfare of the minorities. The help has not come in any concrete form. They are in fact fooling the Muslims,” says social activist Sandeep Pandey, who had been confronting the government on making the Nimesh Commission report public.

The Nimesh Commission was formed under the Mayawati government after the arrest of Khalid Mujahid, an accused in the serial bomb blasts in courts in Lucknow and Faizabad in 2007. The commission submitted its report in November last.

“If the Nimesh Commission report was made public (it challenges Khalid’s arrest from Barabanki in 2007 and indicates his innocence), it would have reopened the case and Khalid might have been saved,” Pandey argues. Incidentally, the post mortem report of Khalid has mentioned the cause of death as ‘uncertain’. Treading carefully on the issue the government is though trying to get it proved that the death was a natural one, confirm sources.

Whatever the development, the community’s anger over the issue is not likely to subside immediately. An influential section of the community, which is also close to the SP,, however, prefers to shift the blame somewhere else.

“The government is making decisions relating to Muslim welfare but the bureaucracy is not implementing them. For example, the case of the release of Khalid Mujahid and Tariq Qasmi, Sajjadur Rehman and Mohmmed Akhtar, was not pursued properly in the court and the result is in front of everyone,” says Maulana Khalid Rashid Farangi Mahali.

“But the problem is that the common man cannot differentiate between the government decisions and their implementation by the bureaucracy. Hence, if the schemes that have been announced are not fulfilled, it will be the ruling party which will face the music,” he adds. He says there is still time for the party to rectify the situation.

Some members say the biggest issue for minorities at the moment is reservation. “SP has said that the party is helpless as it requires constitutional amendment. But it has promised to support the Bill in this regard if it is tabled during the monsoon session. The stand of the political parties on the Bill will expose their faces. That will be their litmus test on Muslim issues and the community is closely watching,” one of the members said.

(Courtesy: FirstPost.com)

Why M. K. Jha was posted as Faizabad Police Chief at this time?

By Syed Mansoor Agha

The Uttar Pradesh Government has as last moved Manoj Kumar Jha out of Faizabad transferred him to PAC. Jha was posted as Additional Superintended Police Faizabad (city) at the time of mysterious death of Mujahid Qasmi on 16th May 2013 May, 2013 while he was being taken to Lucknow in police escort from Faizabad after a hearing in a cooked terror related case. Mr. Jha was the man behind the arrest of Tariq Qasmi and Khalid Mujahid in 2007.

The notorious police officer, favorite of BSP regime was posted as Additional SP of Special Task Force (STF) of U.P. Police in Lucknow range. It was he who framed Tariq Qasmi and Khalid Mujahid in bomb blast cases of Lucknow, Faizabad and Varanasi court compounds on 23 Nov 2007 and get them picked clandestinely from their native places. Qasmi was abducted in the morning of 12th Dec, 2007 when he was on his way to Srai Meer in Azamgarh from his village Sammopur on his motorcycle. Khalid Mujahid was picked up in the day light from his the market of Madiyahu’s town in District Jaunpur on Dec 7, 2007. But Special Task Force under Mr. Jha showed them arrested from near Barabanki Railway Station with explosives including RDX on 22nd Dec, 2007.

Mr. Jha was under the cloud from the very beginning, as tremendous evidences emerged in public of his wrong doing. Justice BD Nimesh report in the Barabanki fake case put the seal on the evidences confirming that both were picked up several days ahead of their purported arrest from Barabanki.

Mayawati Government, which instituted Nimesh probe, was also under pressure to act against the erring cope. She transferred Jha from STF and posted him as Additional S.P. (Crime) of her native district Gautambudh Nagar in Oct, 2011.

Since SP has promised to do justice with the accused but remained reluctant and took the plea that it will wait till Nimesh Commission gave its report. Commission submitted the report in August 2012, but was kept under wraps. For quite some time SP Government was under heavy pressure to public the report and act accordingly. Strangely SP Government transferred Mr. Jha from Gautambudh Nagar to Faizabad as Additional SP (City) where a case was pending against Khalid and Mujahid. The place is in vicinity of Lucknow, Varanasi and Barabanki, where other cases are being herd. The question, whether he was assigned some special task in Faizabad regarding these cases or he manipulated his transfer to for a mission, need to be answered?

An FIR was filed after Khalid’s mysterious against 42 police officers for their role in the wrongful arrest and killing of Khalid Mujahid. Mr. Jha is also named as accused in the FIR. On 18th May 2013 a massive protest march was taken out in the city. The protesters submitted a memorandum to the Divisional Commissioner of Faizabad demanding action against Mr. Jha for his role in the case. Demand of action and registering an FIR against the Additional Superintendent Police, naturally would not have been going well and have naturally frowned him.

It is alleged that Mr. Jha played a role from behind to call a meeting of District Bar Association which condemned the protest march and passed an un-ethical resolution to bar the membership of three advocates —- Shakeelur Rehman, Nadeem Ahmed and Saleem Ahmed who represented Khalid and Tariq in the case pending in the Faizabad Court. The trio had also helped in registering the FIR against police personals and participated in the protest march with several other advocates, mostly from minority community. DBA has already cancelled the membership of Mr. Jamal Ahmad in in 2008, when he filed papers for contesting Khalid’s case. After DBA meeting, the lawyers came to the compound where we used to sit and damaged furniture and name plates. Saleem Ahmad was attacked.

Now Mr. Jha is being indicated for this ugly incidence, as the office of Tariq’s advocates was ransacked in the presence of Police under him and Mr Saleem Ahmad was brutally attacked. Police did not act to protect the person of advocate Saleem and the property of Jamal Ahmad. Mr. Saleem was deeply injured and had to be admitted in the emergency ward of the district hospital.

After the incidence, Mr. Jamal has expressed apprehension of further attack and has demanded security from the police. The apprehension is genuine as Advocate Shahid Azmi was shot dead in day light who was defense lawyer of Muslim youths languishing in jails in fake terror cases.

It is strange that SP Government did not take immediate action against Jha even after filing the FIR and allowed him to continue as head of City Police. Demand of his suspension was also fell on the deaf ears. However leaders and sympathizers of SP Government are regularly trying to give an impression that action is being taken to full fill the promise to free innocent Muslim youths from the jails. Stern action must be taken against erring police personals who have made mockery of law and misused their official position to make the lives of innocent families hell. The plea of adverse effect on Police morale is rubbish. The administration is required to protect the innocents and not the law breakers.

[Syed Mansoor Aghais General Secretary, Forum for Civil Rights, New Delhi. He can be contacted at syyedagha@hotmail.com]

By Rushdi Siddiqui

What is the most valuable commodity in the world? Gold? Oil? Dollar? Diamonds? No, none of the above.

All respectable jurisdictions have laws against  its misuse.

One of the leading futurists said: “Power is no longer money in the hands of few, but information in the hands of many.”

We now live in a hyper-connected world, hence, the question becomes: is access to the internet,  a vast universe of information (overload), a right or privilege?

To communicate, is a right or privilege?

To connect with people, is it a right or privilege?

In the last column, I raised and discussed the need for Islamic finance to connect with the social media, from Twitter to Linkedin to FaceBook, as their potential customers, Muslim youth and those with aligned value system, are ‘residing and working’ there.

Today, I would like to raise the issue of another avenue for Islamic financial institution sponsorship dollars/dirhams and internet access.

Sponsorship

Islamic financial institutions, from banks, takaful operators, asset management firms, management/Shariah consultant firms and so on, have been sponsoring events in Dubai (IIFF), Malaysia (KLIFF), Bahrain (MEGA), London (Euromoney), etc., for decades.

During the pre-credit crisis time period, it seemed there was one/two Islamic finance events per week globally, for building brand awareness, product launches, etc. Islamic institutions were flush with cash for their marketing budgets, and conference organisers were happy to oblige to put on a ‘show.’ But, one by-product of the ‘over-conferenced’ environment was a push back to organisers as quality became sub-par and networking was with familiar faces.

[Some of the sponsors won awards at the sponsored Islamic finance conference, but that is topic for another day].

In hindsight, it’s difficult to gage the effectiveness of the sponsorship moneys on metrics for brand/product goodwill translating into actual customers. In an Islamic overbanked market, some would say destructive competition, like Dubai or Malaysia, it’s difficult to state unequivocally the marketing/PR spent resulted in more customers and increased margins in the medium term.

In the post credit-crisis environment, the pendulum has swung to the other end of the spectrum, hence, fewer Islamic finance conferences, but more educational/community based seminars from the likes of the Islamic finance team at Thomson Reuters.

Naming rights

Islamic banks have begun to think outside the box and comfort zone to (1) create brand awareness to new/another set of customers (2) who pay less attention to the traditional channels of [retail] reach. This is a major break-through for the Murabaha centric banks.

One of the areas where the marketing seems to have expanded is possible the outgrowth of the Ramadan Tents sponsorship during the fasting month in Dubai. For example, Noor Islamic was the first Islamic bank to have its name on a Dubai metro station.

Hotel Internet access

It’s well accepted Dubai is tourism, trade and commerce hub of the Middle East. It’s well accepted the Dubai hosts the largest number of conferences on finance, technology, construction/realty, food, fashion/arts, etc., in the Middle East. It’s well accepted Dubai has the largest number of hotels, from one to seven stars, in the Middle East. It’s well accepted the Dubai International Airport/Terminal Three is the busiest, destination or connection, in the Middle East.

Now, with millions of people visiting Dubai, for business or leisure, one of the biggest complaints is not breakfast should be included in the hotel room rates (it should), but the cost of accessing the Internet, especially when paying top dollar per night.

The challenge (‘costly’ Internet access) presents a wonderful opportunity for Islamic banks, Takaful operators, and even Dubai Financial Market, an Islamic stock exchange, to sponsorship Internet access at [the better] hotels. The goodwill will be directed not towards the hotel (directly), but by sponsoring Islamic financial institution.

The hotel guests become potential clients, partners, and provide business development opportunities, or may even provide valuable feedback.

Furthermore, they become a brand ambassador for the bank, via word of mouth ‘endorsement,’ as every-time access Internet in room, have to (endure) the commercial about the bank. For example, on Emirates airlines, one views the commercials, luxury brand, hotel, or financial institutions, before being able to watch a movie on ICE.

For the hotel, it may result in repeat customers and referrals to colleagues and families without incurring marketing costs.

Conclusion

Islamic financial institutions need to think outside the box on not only marketing, but also expanding their customer base.

‘Traditional thinking is all about “what is”

Future thinking will also need to be about what can be.’
— Edward De Bono

Internet access is a right and Islamic banks should lead the charge.

[Rushdi Siddiquiis Co-Founder and Managing Director of Azka Capital, a private equity advisory firm focused on halal industry initiatives, and an Advisor to Thomson Reuters on Islamic finance and the halal industry.]

(Courtesy: Khaleej Times)

By Matovu Abdallah Twaha

Dubai: Muslims have been advised against change in their lifestyle, particularly on use of water and food.

The warning during the Friday sermon comes two days after marking the World Environment Day (June 5), which was marked under the theme “Think. Eat. Save”, and barely 30 days to the beginning of fasting in the Holy Month of Ramadan.

The Muslim clerics told their followers that life should be lived by following a middle course in everything. “What goes beyond is excess and Allah loves not extravagance.”

An Imam at Al Majaz mosque narrated that the message of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) passed by one of his disciples, Saad, when he was performing ablutions, said, “What is this extravagance?” Saad said, “Can there be any extravagance in ablutions?” the Prophet (PBUH) said, “Yes, even if you are on the banks of a flowing river.”

Regarding food and other lifestyle, the Imam said that the extravagance is “seen while buying things he has no need of and increase in the consumption of food, more than he needs. Thus he hurts himself and disregards our Prophet’s (PBUH) instructions.”

While marking the World Environment Day, the Abu Dhabi Environment Agency (EAD) organised a number of activities to increase the community’s awareness on the environmental impact of the food choices and encourage public to make wise decisions while buying their groceries and cooking their meals in order to waste as little food as possible.

According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), 1.3 billion tonnes of food are wasted every year.

Quoting a 2011 report by the Centre of Waste Management - Abu Dhabi (CWM), the Director of Environmental Outreach Division, EAD, Fozeya Ibrahim Al Mahmoud, said, “Around 39 per cent of the Emirate’s municipal solid waste is organic material.”

(Courtesy: The Gulf Today)

An envoy from Sunni Islam's highest seat of learning, Al-Azhar in Cairo, raised the prospect of restoring ties with the Vatican on Friday but called on Pope Francis to take "a step forward" by declaring that Islam is a peaceful religion.

"The problems that we had were not with the Vatican but with the former pope. Now the doors of Al-Azhar are open," Mahmoud Abdel Gawad, diplomatic envoy to the grand imam of Al-Azhar, Ahmed al-Tayyeb, told Italian daily Il Messaggero in Cairo.

"Francis is a new pope. We are expecting a step forward from him. If in one of his addresses he were to declare that Islam is a peaceful religion, that Muslims are not looking for war or violence, that would be progress in itself," he said.

A ceremony in March in which Pope Francis washed the feet of young inmates in Rome, including a Muslim girl, was "a gesture that was very, very much appreciated" by Al-Azhar, Gawad said.

He said that if Francis were to accept an invitation from Coptic Orthodox Pope Tawadros II to visit Egypt, he could also visit Al-Azhar. "At that point, relations and dialogue would be restored immediately," he was quoted as saying.

But Gawad ruled out the prospect of talks between the leaders of the world's three main monotheistic religions mentioned in Vatican circles, saying Al-Azhar "will not take part in any meeting with Israelis."

In 2006, then pope Benedict XVI sparked fury across the Muslim world when he recounted an anecdote in which the Muslim Prophet Mohammed was described as a warmonger who spread evil teachings.

(Courtesy: Global Times)

By Uri Avnery

During the Spanish civil war of 1936, a news story reported the deaths of 82 Moroccans, 53 Italians, 48 Russians, 34 Germans, 17 Englishmen, 13 Americans and eight Frenchmen. Also one Spaniard.

“Serves him right,” people in Madrid commented, “Why did he interfere?”

Similar things could now be said about the civil war in Syria. Shiites from all over the Muslim world stream into Syria to help Bashar Assad’s dictatorship to survive, while Sunnis from many countries hasten there to support the rebels.

The implications of this go well beyond the bloody Syrian struggle. It is a historic revolution, region-wide and perhaps world-wide.
Nationalism and the nation-state

After World War I, the victorious colonial empires carved up the territories of the vanquished Ottoman Empire among themselves. Since colonialism was out and self-determination was in, their new colonies were dressed up as independent nations (like Iraq) or as nations-to-be (like Syria).

European-style nationalism took hold of the new Arab nations. The ancient idea of the pan-Muslim Umma [community] was pushed away. The idea of a pan-Arab super-state, propagated by the Baath party and Egypt’s Gamal Abd-al-Nasser, was tried and failed. Syrian nationalism, Iraqi nationalism, Egyptian nationalism and, of course, Palestinian nationalism won.

It was a doubtful victory. A typical Syrian nationalist in Damascus was also a part of the Arab region, of the Muslim world and of the Sunni community – and the order of these diverse loyalties was never quite sorted out.

This was different in Europe, where the national loyalty was unchallenged. A modern German could also be a Bavarian and a Catholic, but he was first and foremost a German.

During the last decades, the victory of local nationalism in the Arab world seemed assured. After the short-lived United Arab Republic broke up in 1961 and Syrians proudly displayed their new Syrian passports, the future of the Arab nation-states looked rosy.

Not any more.

To understand the immense significance of the present upheaval one has to go back in history.

The ethnic-religious community

Two thousand years ago, the modern idea of “nation” was unthinkable. The prevalent collective structure was the ethnic-religious community. One belonged to a community that was not territorially defined. A Jewish man in Alexandria could marry a Jewess in Babylon, but not the Hellenic or Christian woman next door.

Under Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman emperors, all these dozens of sects enjoyed a wide autonomy, ruled by imams, priests and rabbis. This is still partly the case in most former Ottoman territories, including Israel. The Turks called these self-governing sects millets.

The German historian Oswald Spengler, in his monumental The Decline of the West, asserted that great cultures were like human beings – they are born, grow up and die of old age within a thousand years. Middle-Eastern culture, according to him, was born around 500 BC and died with the decay of the Muslim caliphate…

The Syrian civil war has united the Shi’is – from Lebanon to Iran – in defence of the Alawite semi-Shi’ah regime. The Sunnis from all over the place rally to the cause of the majority Sunnis. The Syrian Kurds have already created a de facto joint state with the Kurds in Iraq. The Druze, more dispersed and customarily more cautious, are awaiting their turn.

The events in Syria indicate a similar process. Throughout the region the ethno-religious community is coming back, the European-style nation-state is disintegrating.

The colonial powers created “artificial” states with no consideration to ethno-religious realities. In Iraq, Arab Sunnis and Shi’is and non-Arab Kurds were arbitrarily put together. In Syria, Sunnis, Shi’is, Alawites (an offshoot of the Shi’ah), Druze (another offshoot), Kurds and diverse Christian sects were put into one “national” pot and left to stew. In Lebanon the same was done, with even worse results. In Morocco and Algeria, Arabs and Berbers are put together.

Now the ethno-religious sects are uniting – against each other. The Syrian civil war has united the Shi’is – from Lebanon to Iran – in defence of the Alawite semi-Shi’ah regime. The Sunnis from all over the place rally to the cause of the majority Sunnis. The Syrian Kurds have already created a de facto joint state with the Kurds in Iraq. The Druze, more dispersed and customarily more cautious, are awaiting their turn.

In the Western world, the obsolescent nation-state is being superseded by supra-national regional confederations, like the European Union. In our region, we may be reverting to the ethno-religious sects.

A bloody future?

It is difficult to foresee how this will work out. The Ottoman millet system could function because there was the overall imperial rule of the sultan. But how could Shi’i Iran combine with the majority Shi’is in Iraq, the Shi’i community in south Lebanon and other Shi’i communities in a joint entity? What about the dozen Christian sects dispersed across many countries?

Some people believe that the only viable solution for Syria proper is the disintegration of the country into several sect-dominated states – a central Sunni state, an Alawite state, a Kurd state, a Druze state, etc.

Lebanon was also a part of Syria, until the French tore them apart in order to set up a Christian state. The French created several such little states, in order to break the back of Syrian nationalism. It did not work.

The difficulty of such a “solution” is illustrated by the situation of the Druze, who live in two unconnected territories – in south Lebanon and in the “Druze mountain” area in southern Syria. A smaller Druze community lives in Israel. (As a defencive strategy, the Druze in every country – including Israel – are patriots of that country.)

The disintegration of the existing states may be accompanied by wholesale massacres and ethnic cleansing, as happened when India broke apart and when Palestine was partitioned. It is not a happy prospect…

(Courtesy: RedressOnline.com)

A new study shows the United Kingdom may be an Islamic country within a generation. Some predict even sooner.

By Bob Taylor

Charlotte: Way back in 2003 an article in a British newspaper warned about a growing fear that the U.K. was on a fast track to becoming an Islamic nation. That was just ten years ago, and it seemed far fetched at the time. Now the British government has published a study with data that shows Islam will become the dominant religion within the next generation.

The concern in the 2003 article focused on the fact that Britain, and continental Europe for that matter, are becoming increasing secular while immigrant populations of devoted Muslims are growing.

The recent survey shows that while Christianity remains the dominant religion in the U.K. at over 50%, more than half the population if over the age of 50 and, for the first time, less than half the people under 25 consider themselves Christians.

Meanwhile, the Muslim population in Britain is growing so rapidly that Islam is predicted to overtake Christianity within the next 20 years. Combined with the growing secularization of native Britons, the Christian/Muslim ratio could tilt in favor of Islam even sooner than estimated.

Such a change could be a serious concern. When Islam becomes the dominant power in a society, Sharia law oftens follows and non-Muslims may be relegated to dhimmitude which means they are subjects of the Islamic state.

Already there are problems with Muslims taking to the streets of London and Paris on Fridays to observe prayers. Streets become jammed with faithful Muslims who create several blocks of traffic congestion. Though there are laws against such public gatherings, authorities usually look the other way.

In Stockholm, one district of the city now allows mosques to play Muslim calls to prayer.

The overall population of England and Wales increased by 3.7 million people from 2001 to 2011, but the number of people who said they are Christians declined by 4.1 million and 6.4 million said they had no religion at all. Meanwhile, the Muslim population grew by 1.2 million.

Such statistics do not tell the entire story, however. The decreasing number of native British Christians is alarmingly higher than first thought due to an increase of Christian immigrants which skewed the data.

In addition, Christians had the oldest age profile in 2011 while Muslims had the youngest among all primary religious groups. Almost half of Muslims in Britain are under 25 and nearly 90% are less than 50 years old.

Another important factor in the study showed that Muslims are more diverse than Christians. More than 2/3rds of the British Muslim population comes from Asia with another 10% reported as Black/African/Caribbean/Black British. Currently more than a million Muslims are from Pakistan and roughly 400,000 come from Bangladesh.

The problem is further complicated by the fact that Muslims have the lowest level of economic activity in the U.K. at 56%. Christians are at 60%, but there is another discrepancy in these figures. With the aging British population, the demographics for Christians are distorted because of retirement.

A professor of theology at Cambridge University, Fraser Watts, says that in many churches throughout Great Britain the bulk of the congregation is over 60. As Watts sees it, those numbers are so striking that Christians could become a minority within the next decade rather than the estimated 20 years.

While the Christian population declines, the evidence seems to show that younger Muslims are more devoted to their faith than their parents. In 2011 the name Muhammad was by far the most popular boy’s name in England and Wales by a wide margin. It should be noted that there are no less than 22 accepted ways to spell the name “Muhammad” and all were counted in the total.

According to David Coleman, a demographics professor at Oxford, the U.K. will undergo a major change in national identity that will impact them culturally, politically, economically and religiously when the white British population becomes a minority.

As Coleman put it, “The ethnic transformation implicit in current trends would be a major, unlooked for, and irreversible change in British society, unprecedented for at least a millennium.

Many observers believe the current trend is the result of unacceptable immigration policies. Others have opined for years that much of the problem is due to increasing secularization in British society.

Recent immigration problems in Sweden have raised concerns throughout Europe that the Islamic immigration situation is gaining momentum and could soon be out of control if something is not done soon to halt such influences.

Muslim extremists make no secret of the fact that their ultimate goal is to gain control over the non-Muslim world. Many Islamic analysts have warned of such consequences for decades.

In light of recent riots in Sweden and the current study in Great Britain, the question remains whether the alarm has been sounded or if is still being ignored.

(Courtesy: The Washington Times)

London: Miss World contestants will not wear bikinis when they vie for the pageant's crown in Indonesia this September to avoid causing offence in the world's most populous Muslim country.

Miss World organizers said the 137 women in the competition will instead wear one-piece swimwear, some of which will also have sarongs over the top.

"This is perfectly reasonable in a country that prefers one-piece swimwear," London-based Miss World Organization Chairwoman Julia Morley said on Thursday. Morley denied suggestions the decision to ditch bikinis was made after local complaints about the contest. However, reports in Indonesian newspapers said a number of conservative groups had taken issue with the staging of the contest, highlighting bikinis as a key objection.

The 63rd Miss World pageant will be held in Jakarta, the capital of a country where nearly 90 per cent of its 240 million people consider themselves to be Muslims.

The Jakarta Post reported on Monday that deputy tourism minister, Sapta Nirwandar, said the government had also asked Miss World to follow Indonesian tradition. "Some people in Indonesia still consider it taboo for women to wear bikinis and outfits that expose body parts," the paper quoted Nirwandar as saying on its website.

Over the past year other entertainment events have been disrupted in Indonesia due to threats by Muslim organizations. Pop star Lady Gaga was forced last year to pull out of a concert after a hardline Muslim group threatened to disrupt her show, saying her performances were immoral.

Last month veteran US rock band Aerosmith cancelled a concert in Jakarta citing security concerns. The 63rd Miss World pageant will be held on September 28 in Jakarta, the capital of a country where nearly 90 per cent of its 240 million people consider themselves to be Muslims.

The Miss World contest dates back to 1951 and during its first decade the outfits of contestants raised eyebrows and grabbed headlines while building a growing audience for its televised show.

(Courtesy: Reuters, June 8, 2013)

A quiet revolution is under way in rural areas outside the national electricity grid. Alternative energy sources are bringing new light and new opportunities to millions.

By Shahriar Sharif

Dhaka: For Laboni Akhter, a housewife in remote southeastern Kolapara upazila, it used to be a struggle each evening to keep her two daughters focused on school homework. Without electrical lighting, the girls had to study by the dim glow of a kerosene lantern.

Six months ago, she installed a solar panel on her tin-roofed home. It generates enough electricity to light three rooms.

"It's such a big relief! My daughters no longer complain and they now happily finish their homework every day," Akhter told Khabar South Asia, referring to her ninth and seventh graders Mamita and Moumita.

"It was a daily hassle before as I had to clean up the lantern, buy kerosene and above all, worry constantly about causing accidental fire."

Akhter is one of nearly 10 million people benefitting from a government programme launched a decade ago to provide alternative energy sources to remote areas cut off from the national electricity grid. It is being implemented by the state-run Infrastructure Development Company Limited (IDCOL).

Easy and affordable

The Solar Home System programme, launched in 2003 with assistance from the World Bank, seeks to reach some 20 million villagers by 2015. Authorities are confident they can reach that goal, though more than 40% of Bangladesh's population does not have access to electricity.

Their confidence stems largely because solar electricity is so easy to install and affordable for most rural residents.

Each consumer makes an initial payment of Taka 4,500 ($57.82) to obtain a panel, which lasts for 20 years, and a battery to operate it. After that, he or she must pay Taka 750 ($9.63) monthly for up to 36 months. One panel enables a user to light four bulbs and operate a black-and-white television.

"So far, we are harnessing 90MW electricity every day from 2.2m solar panels and we hope to generate 170MW by 2015," said Abul Kalam Azad, chairman of IDCOL. With 2,000 panels being installed every day, the goal seems achievable.

On May 12th, the programme reached the milestone of having installed 2m solar panels. At an event in Dhaka marking the achievement, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said the "increasing use of renewable energy would help ease poverty in the country through rural development and job creation".

Economic benefits

"We can already see the economic benefits spawned by this programme," Toufiq-e-Elahi Chowdhury, energy adviser to the prime minister, told Khabar. "Each year we are saving [Taka 9.3 billion] $120m from the import of kerosene because of its falling demand in villages."

That is a big sum for a country like Bangladesh, and the government can divert the money for rural infrastructure development, IDCOL Executive Director Mahmood Malik told Khabar.

"This would unleash job opportunities in rural areas and help the government's poverty alleviation efforts," he said. Encouraged by the programme's success, IDCOL has taken up new projects to provide biogas plants and improved cooking ovens in rural areas.

"Biogas not only relieves the users from buying and collecting firewood but more importantly, it helps the environment as rural people would not cut trees for cooking purposes," said Malik. So far, nearly 150,000 villagers are benefiting from biogas plants and IDCOL plans to reach 350,000 people by 2016.

(Courtesy: Khabar South Asia)

Dr Zaki was fired from his job for alerting the Saudi authorities to a new and unknown strain of viral infection

By Tariq A. Al Maeena

There is a new and deadly threat making its round in Saudi Arabia. It is the Mers, or the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus and what makes this virus an ominous threat is that the majority of those who had contracted the disease died from it.

Saudi Arabia seems to be ground zero for the new Mers coronavirus, as more than 80 per cent of the cases involved Saudis and residents in the Kingdom. The disease is a distant relative of Sars, the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome which created global concern back in 2003 when it was transmitted from animals to humans in Asia and killed some 800 people.

And not unlike Sars, the Mers virus causes an infection deep in the patient’s lungs, and infected patients end up suffering from a high fever, coughing and difficulty in breathing. Mers carries a stronger punch in that it also leads to rapid kidney failure.

Although the numbers of afflicted have been relatively small with some 40 confirmed cases so far, there is always an element of concern as four million Muslims from around the world had travelled to Saudi Arabia already this year to perform the pilgrimage known as Umrah, and public health experts are already worrying about whether the influx of pilgrims will lead to spreading Mers around the globe.

But the discovery of Mers carries a story behind it. The man behind it, Ali Mohamed Zaki, discovered the deadly pathogen last June at a microbiology lab at a private hospital in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

Zaki had been following up the case of a 60-year-old man who was admitted with a lung infection and died 18 days after symptoms started. When he couldn’t identify the virus, he sent a sample abroad to Ron Fouchier, a Dutch researcher who was able to sequence it. The report that came back was chilling. It was a coronavirus, one never seen before in humans.

He stated that he sent samples and clinical data to the Saudi health ministry, which did not act on his concerns. He also posted a warning on the international website on infectious disease reporting that had been used during the Sars outbreak - ProMED, which alerted doctors in the UK to reevaluate their diagnosis on the world’s second-known case. “It was a new kind,” Zaki said, worried about his own exposure to the virus. “I became afraid it could (spread) like Sars and I listed it on ProMed.”

Doctor Zaki is no stranger to discovering new viruses in Saudi Arabia. In 1994 he was the first specialist to correctly isolate and identify the dengue fever generators in Saudi Arabia. He found discovered another virus, a tick-borne virus that killed two people in 1995.

Rather than being honoured or felicitated for his ground-breaking discovery, Dr. Zaki was summarily summoned and fired from his job! His crime? To alert the pertinent authorities of a new and unknown strain of viral infection. As he states it, his discovery had upset officials at Saudi ministry of health. “They were very aggressive with me. They sent a team to investigate me,” he said. “And now they force the hospital administration to force me to resign.”

For whatever unexplained reasons, the ministry officials were upset at Zaki’s alerting international health organisations of a potentially fatal viral strain. “It was the president of the hospital that said they don’t want me to stay there anymore,” Zaki stated. “The hospital president told me - They are forcing me to fire you. If you come back, they will make big trouble for you and for our hospital.”

“I am not happy to be fired but I did the right thing for humanity,” Zaki said. “I don’t regret about anything.” Doctor Zaki was sent back to his home in Egypt. He said he will now assist the Egyptian government in the testing of sick people returning from the Hajj for possible infections of the MERS.

The Saudi deputy minister for public health at the health ministry, Ziad Memish justified the ministry’s displeasure with Dr. Zaki because he had “either intentionally or inadvertently not followed national established procedures”, forgetting to add that Dr. Zaki had indeed sent the same ministry samples of the virus to alert them.

Clearly upset of suggestions that the viral home base is Saudi Arabia, Ziad Memish is quick to point out that the virus could be found globally if it was being properly tested for. “If you ask why we’re picking up more cases in Saudi recently, it’s because we’re just looking harder and harder. We’re processing hundreds of samples a day from different parts of the country. So far we sampled 1,500 or 1,700 samples in the whole of the country. I don’t think any country in this world is doing that much testing. And I guess the more you look the more you’ll find. I would not be surprised if it’s in every other country in the globe.”

Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Diseases Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota bluntly refuted that argument by stating that, “Such a statement merely blames the rest of the world for the continued problems with transparency by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in responding to this public health crisis.”

This unfortunately has been the trend with some Saudi government officials who believe that being candid is giving away well-kept secrets. Better to bury their heads deep in the sand. They seem to forget that they live in a global village, and cannot isolate the Kingdom from the rest of the world.

[Tariq A. Al Maeenais a Saudi socio-political commentator. He lives in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/@talmaeena]

(Courtesy: Gulf News)

After finding the real culprits in the 2006 Malegaon blasts, the government has vowed to put an end to wrongful detentions.

By Akhtar Ali

Kolkata: Now that four Hindu extremists have been chargesheeted in a 2006 terror attack in the western town of Malegaon, a top Indian official has called the arrest and incarceration of Muslim youths in the case "extremely unfortunate" and vowed such errors will not be repeated.

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) filed a chargesheet on May 22nd in a special Mumbai court against four Hindu men for four serial blasts in Malegaon, Maharashtra on September 8th, 2006 that killed 38 Muslims.

"The government's decision to hand over the investigation to the NIA was a right move," Minister of State for Home Affairs R.P.N. Singh told Khabar South Asia. "It's extremely unfortunate that some innocent people were arrested and chargesheeted in the case. We will take all necessary actions to ensure that such [an] incident is not repeated in future."

The search for the culprits

According to the NIA chargesheet, Dhan Singh, Rajendra Chaudhary, Manohar Narwaria and Lokesh Sharma—ex-members of the Hindu extremist group Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) – planted the improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in the pre-dominantly Muslim town of Malegaon. All are now in police custody.

The document also lists Ramchandra Kalsangra and Sandeep Dange as absconders and masterminds behind the Malegaon bombing and several other blasts across the country.

The NIA alleges the Hindu activists manufactured the four bombs in Indore, Madhya Pradesh. They fit the bombs to bicycles and planted them at spots in Malegaon, including a cemetery next to a mosque. The bombs killed 38 people and injured more than 125 others on the Muslim holy night of Shab-e-Baraat.

Soon after, the Maharashtra Anti-Terror Squad (ATS) began rounding up Muslims as suspects.

The ATS chargesheeted 13 Muslim youths, claiming the case solved. It was then handed over to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which endorsed the findings. Four of the Muslims chargesheeted by the ATS and CBI absconded; nine were jailed.

RSS leader confesses to terror acts

The NIA, established after the 2008 Mumbai attacks to investigate national terrorist cases, was asked to probe the Malegaon case after Hindu activists were arrested by police in connection with other terror attacks in India.

In 2011, the arrested leader of the Rashtriya Swayamseyvak Sangh (RSS), Swami Aseemanand, confessed that he and other Hindu militants were involved in bombings at several Muslim religious sites, including in Malegaon.

Following that confession, seven of the Muslim youths were released on bail, after more than five years in jail. Two others were refused bail after being accused in another terror case.

The May 22nd chargesheeting of operatives from the right wing group has brought additional relief to the wrongly accused, though they have not yet been exonerated.

One of them, Noorul Huda, said his arrest by the ATS brought ignominy to his life.

"NIA has not given a clean chit to me officially, it's true," Huda told Khabar. "But after the Hindu activists have been chargesheeted in the case by the NIA, the whole country believes that I was innocent and ATS arrested me wrongfully."

Huda also complimented the NIA on a good job and said he would soon be honourably discharged from the case. "The NIA chargesheet has brought relief to my family," he said.

Former Malegaon MLA (Member of Legislative Assembly) and local Muslim community leader Rashid Shaikh reiterated that Muslim leaders had insisted all along that no Muslim group could be responsible for bombings targeting the Muslim community.

"Yet they arrested the innocent Muslim youths," Shaikh told Khabar. "Now the NIA chargesheet virtually declares that those arrested and jailed youths were innocent.

"We are also happy that the real culprits in the case have been nailed finally."

(Courtesy: Khabar South Asia)

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