Tag Archives: Indian Muslim Youth
How Not To Fight Terror/ISIS
10 Sunday Jul 2016
Citizens Menifesto, Guilt by Association, Indian Muslim Youth, ISIS, Islam, Politics, Politics of Condemnation, Religion, Terrorism
This isn't the first time. Nor will it be the last. Every single time a bomb goes off, or a Muslim man indulges in mass shooting, without fail the first thing you hear is: Why are Muslims silent? The demand for condemnations comes instantaneously: 9/11 and Paris, Akshardham and 26/11. Even at the time of Malegaon, Samjhauta and Mecca Masjid, in which Muslims were killed, and as investigations showed, the suspects were not Muslims.
While I appreciate Muslims condemning these brutal and inhuman acts, let me confess that I am wary of its politics. The politics of condemnation essentially means that each time we are being asked to prove our basic decency—as though somehow we are not moved by human tragedy. It hints at guilt by association unless we prove otherwise by shouting from the rooftops that we condemn bloodshed. Besides, it ignores the heterogeneous nature of Muslim communities.
The fact remains that Muslims in India and elsewhere have been condemning these acts continuously and spontaneously: fatwas have been issued against terrorism calling it un-Isl­amic; several conferences against terrorism has been organised by Muslim groups and ulema; and signature campaigns against ISIS have been carried out, and not just by 'moderate' but traditional and practising Muslims. But what has been the result: zero. Neither has it been able to stop acts of terror nor has it been able to persuade the masses that Muslims are against terrorism.
The question is: what should be done? At the cost of sounding a Muslim apologist, let me say: it is time to accept and understand that 'terrorism' is not just a 'Muslim-only' problem but a problem of a larger politics which cuts across the religious and ideological spectrum. So, instead of focusing on religious aspects, we should focus on the political asp­ects. Inherent in religion is the potential for both inspiring people to indulge in violent activities as well to fight for justice and peace.
Whether Islam is a religion of peace—or not—is not the issue; and little will be gained by quoting and counter-quoting texts and verses. The attraction that violent death—to oneself and to others—holds for some young men cannot be reduced to the promise of 72 virgins in jannat. Hold this view if you will, it won't solve the problem.
Unless we recognise and address the political aspects of terrorism, we will be beating around the bush. And the political reasons are quite complex and need to be dealt with carefully. Otherwise, in the name fighting terrorism, we might end up siding with ano­ther kind of terror. And this we have already witnessed in the framing of innocent Muslim youths in India in the name of a war on terror. We must not forget that a war, no matter how noble its intention, can't be suppressed with another war. It can only further displace, marginalise, terrorise and ruin people's lives. That should be avoided.
First published in Outlook Magazine.
Confessions of an Elite Muslim
Book Review, Elite Muslim, Hard News Magazine, Hasan Suroor, Indian Muslim Youth
Hasan suroor is a senior journalist turned columnist, whose writings and reports have appeared in The Hindu over the years. He has recently published a book that is interestingly titled, India's Muslim Spring: Why is Nobody Talking About It? The writer argues that, "far from flourishing, Muslim fundamentalism is actually dying a slow death" and the new generation of Muslim youth—both men and women­–are the real protagonists of this change. According to the author, Muslim youth today, unlike their parents, are thinking and working "beyond Mullahs and Marx." They are no longer stuck in the "Muslim first" or "Indian-first" debate.
He begins with these words, "Let me confess that this is not the book I set out to write. The book I had in mind was about the unchanging face of Muslim fundamentalism in India. But barely a few weeks into research, I discovered I was completely on the wrong track. The big story staring me in the face was quite the opposite–far from flourishing, Muslim fundamentalism was actually dying a slow death." He further adds, "As I travelled across the country and spoke to people, I found that over the past decade there had been a profound change in the Muslim mindset. Today's Indian Muslim, I discovered, was altogether a different species—educated, aware, wiser, less sectarian and more pragmatic…"
While anyone who closely works with the Muslim community would agree with the author on this, this is hardly anything new. Over the years, scholars and journalists have stated and established that Muslim fundamentalism is not a threat in India. Dipankar Gupta, noted sociologist and former Professor at JNU, notes in his detailed study, Justice Before Reconciliation: Negotiating a 'New Normal' in Post-Riot Mumbai and Ahmedabad (Routledge: 2011). According to Prof. Gupta, Muslim fundamentalism is not a threat as is often portrayed and perceived. At least, not yet. Hence, he suggests instead of spending energy on weaning Muslims from hard-line Wahabis, the attempt should be to provide them with quality schools "so that the young can lead a life with options other than being a labourer or poor technician when they grow up. This is also what most Muslims want." The study insists that Muslims want justice so that they can be reassured of their status as full citizens.
My issues, or rather concerns, with the author and the book under review are not that he is not saying anything new. In my view, the author should be lauded for his courage to revisit some of his long—held prejudices and second hand understanding of Indian Muslims in general and practicing Muslims in particular. My concerns hover around him being over-simplistic on crucial issues, elite in his perspective, lacking basic research, and not spending much time with the subject. Hence, the author is bound to ignore various important aspects about the changes occurring in Muslim societies in India, which the author has termed as 'India's Muslim Spring'; the book has ended up being a sort of a 'Confessional Document of an Elite Muslim.'
Let's begin with the most disturbing part of the book. While discussing prejudice and ignorance about Muslims, the author notes, "Barring the left, political parties of all hues have shamelessly exploited Hindu-Muslim differences to build their respective vote banks." This is only partially true about the Left as the experiences of Kerala and West Bengal would show. Going into a sermon mode, he adds, "While it is too easy to blame the politicians, ultimately it is for the two communities themselves to put the past behind them and embark on a more constructive course of engagement with each other, thus preventing politicians from exploiting their differences. Both communities need to reach out to each other by shedding their prejudices and showing greater understanding of each other's social and cultural practices." But he does not stop there; he comes up with a very 'pragmatic idea' of reaching out to each other and shedding their prejudices and showing greater understanding of each other's social and cultural practices.
The author suggests that "Muslims need to get out of their 'siege mentality' and stop seeing conspiracies everywhere. They also need to be pragmatic while pressing their demands. They must face up to the fact that they are in a minority and, like minorities anywhere in the world, they will face pressures. The way to deal with them is not through confrontation or by going into a sulk, but through accommodation and compromise. After all, it is they who stand to lose more in confrontation, as we have seen again and again as compared to the majority community. The Hindus, as the larger and stronger group—numerically, politically and economically—need to learn to be more magnanimous towards their fellow minority citizens." Later, he even goes on to say that, "Muslims have not only become more pragmatic in choosing their priorities, but are willing to compromise with the 'enemy', if it is in the best interests of the community. This is best illustrated by its attitude towards parties such as the BJP, which it once regarded as untouchables". And to substantiate his argument, the author heavily banks upon the news reports that suggested that in the 2013 Municipal Elections in Gujarat, ''Muslims voted with their feet for the BJP in several areas."
There are two issues here. Firstly, perhaps it would be highly immature to say that the author is putting forward the RSS's agenda. However, one wonders how the author's suggestion that Hindus being the majority, should act magnanimously towards Muslims and Muslims, being in minority, shouldn't confront them but adopt the approach of accommodation and compromise, is different from the Sangh's idea of reaching out. Notably, the Rashtriya Muslim Manch, an outfit floated by the RSS and working amongst Muslims in certain parts of northwest India, like Rajasthan and Haryana, is propagating similar kinds of ideas and suggestions. Moreover, the above 'pragmatic suggestions' of reaching out by the author are quite contradictory to what the Muslim youth are demanding and fighting for today— to live like and to be treated as equal citizens.
Secondly, the conclusion that Muslims voted for the 'BJP with their feet' in certain areas, is too early to draw, as there is hardly any actual data to support these claims. A recent short study (Raheel Dhattiwala: January 2014) published by The Hindu Centre for Politics and Public Policy throws some light on this phenomenon and examines it. The study ably establishes that there is a crucial distinction between supporting a political party in public and voting for it.
Another problem with his analysis is that the author indulges in too much mullah bashing. While I have no particular sympathies for mullahs, the point here is that it is always easy to blame mullahs for everything bad in Muslim society. A question that assumes importance in this context is the actual level of engagement of 'Secular/Liberal Muslims' with the Muslim masses, as poignantly asked by Aqeel Ahmed, a young Muslim graphic designer interviewed for the book, whose beard, according to the author's description, was "more Lenin than Imam Bukhari." "They only talk and criticise but don't do anything. Let them roll up their sleeves, dirty their hands…all they do is lecture from sidelines," said Ahmed.
Regarding the media, the author is absolutely right in saying that mainstream media largely ignored these changes in Muslim society. But one would like to know what Muslim Journalists (if they would like to identify themselves as such) were doing all these years. It is not that there were no Muslim journalists in mainstream media, but they chose to act indifferent to the existing bias in media about Muslims. I am saying this because of what we have seen over the few years, at least in the last five years. Whenever an alternative version is brought out by well meaning community media or civil rights activists, the mainstream media is, sooner or later, forced to take note. Unfortunately, analysis of the role played by new media and upcoming Muslim journalists in the uprising is also missing.
Similarly, and rightly so, while the author keeps praising the new generation of Muslims, what he forgets to recognise is that most of these men and women are the first generation of their families to have come this far. They hardly possess any cultural capital to flaunt like the author and they are also not from the well known Muslim areas of north India. In other words, they are not khandani musalmans. Hence, one of the crucial points of analysis that is missing in the book is that there is no analysis of the class and caste angle to this uprising.
Nevertheless, the book, despite its limitations, is a welcome addition in the ever-increasing literature on Indian Muslims. I sincerely hope that in the coming months and years, more and more people will join the list, travel to far-flung areas of the country and interact with ordinary Muslim youth, not just in well known places like Delhi Lucknow, Moradabad, Meerut, and Aligarh, but also in remote and far off areas of North-East, West Bengal and South India. After all, Urdu speaking North Indians do not define Indian Muslims.
Reprinted from Hard News Monthly, March 2014
What does it mean to be a Muslim in India today?
Communal Targeting, Indian Muslim Youth, Terrorism
Recently, Shanina K K, a journalist from Kerala, who worked with Tehelka news weekly and now works with Open magazine, received the Chameli Devi Award for being an outstanding woman journalist. While receiving the award she said, "See, I happen to be a Muslim, but I am not a terrorist." What made her say that and what was she trying to convey or explain? It means, as she explains, "If you belong to the minority community, they will also profile you. It is very difficult to prove that you are not a terrorist. It is equally difficult to prove that you are not a Maoist in our life and times."
Shahina has personal experience of it, so she must know. As most of us are aware, she has been falsely framed in under sections 506 and 149 of the Indian Penal Code, for 'intimidating' witnesses in the Abdul Nasir Madani case. Her only 'crime' was that she investigated the case of Kerala PDP leader Abdul Nasir Madani, who is an accused in the infamous Bangalore blasts case, and asked the question, "Why is this man still in Prison?" Madani had already spent 10 years in prison as an under-trail in the Coimbatore blast case of 1997 and who was later acquitted in 2007.
In fact, this writer has also had a similar personal experience, but thankfully, to a lesser degree of threat to his life during a fact finding visit of Giridih Jail in the state of Jharkhand, in July 2008. I was branded a Maoist along with two other friends, and illegally detained for five hours by Giridih Superintendent of Police, Murari Lal Meena who is now being promoted to the rank of DIG, Special Branch of the Jharkhand Police. He had also threatened to put us behind bars in the same prison without any hope of being bailed out for at least a year.
But this is not the story of some Shaina and Mahtab alone. This is a story, very typical of what happens to hundreds of Muslim youngsters who are arrested and tortured by the police with no evidence or on false charges. The testimonies published in two reports that have been released recently by ANHAD and Human Rights Watch show what it means to be a Muslim in India today. They are nothing short of spine chilling.
Nisar Ahmed, whose son Saqib Nisar is an accused in the 2008 bomb blast cases and who was arrested by Delhi Police after the infamous 'encounter' at Batla House says in HRW's report, "When I asked my son if he was tortured, he said, 'They are hardly going to treat me with love. They want to build the case… They used to make us memorize a story of the police version of the case. We were not allowed to sleep until we could recite the police version."
Another testimony reads, "In August 2010, Mohammed Salman, a 17-year-old held in Delhi's Tihar Jail in connection with bomb blasts in the capital, appeared in court with his head bandaged. Salman told the judge that two inmates had repeatedly slashed his face with a razor blade earlier that month. He said that the jail authorities "did nothing" to prevent the incident – international law prohibits the incarceration of children under 18 with adults – although he had twice requested transfer because he feared for his safety and when no action was taken against the attackers. He also accused guards of laughing and saying: "He is a terrorist and this is what should happen to him, anyway."
I also remember Ataur Rahman of Mumbai, in his mid-sixties, whom I met during the people's tribunal on the 'Atrocities Committed against Minorities in the Name of Fighting Terrorism' at Hyderabad in August 2008. At the tribunal he had told us, "My house was raided on July 20, 2006, by the anti-terrorism squad at around 9.30pm… they frisked our house and took three computers unlawfully and whisked me away to an unknown destination. For several days I was kept in illegal custody. I was then formally shown to be arrested on July 27, 2006, and an FIR was lodged against me… Me, my wife, my daughter and daughter-in-law were paraded before my arrested sons. We were abused and foulmouthed at by the police officers continuously. For all these days I was beaten up before my sons, similarly my sons were beaten up in front of me. The women of the family who were called up by the ATS daily were asked to drop their burqah before my arrested sons, and the sons were humiliated in front of the women folk by hurling abuses at them… The third day: I was again taken before my sons, who were handcuffed in the adjoining room. Here one officer… whom I can identify, beat me up and threatened me that the women in my family are outside and they will be stripped naked if I do not remove my clothes before my children and other police officers. Some other arrested accused were also brought there and I was stripped naked…"
There are hundreds of stories like this. Not only that, even if you are a non-Muslim and believe that Muslims have right not to be tortured, illegally detained and unnecessarily harassed, then you are doing a crime! Take the case of Vinod Yadav, a human rights' activist and friend of mine from Azamgarh. Vinod was very active after the 'encounter' at Batla House and declaration of Azamgarh as 'Nursery of Terror' by both security agencies and media houses. In October 2008, when a joint fact finding team of PUDR, APCR, Janhastakshep and NCHRO visited Azamgarh and to which I was part of, he played a major role in to carry out the fact finding. But that cost him a lot. Within a week of our visit, he was arrested on a flimsy charge of cheating along with another activist Sarfaraz Alam at Lucknow station as they arrived from Azamgarh. They were taken by the state police to a secret detention centre in Lucknow and severely beaten for two days for participating in rallies against abuse of Muslim suspects in the bombings. Vinod was repeatedly told… 'you are a Hindu and you are questioning the statements we make about Muslim boys and that is not good… You should not be seen with these Muslim people again, and if you don't understand this, the future will be bleak for you'.
To be a Muslim in India today is to be encounter-able, to be constantly suspected of being a terrorist, to be illegally detainable and severely tortured, to have the possibility of being killed without being questioned, no matter if one is a believer, agnostic or an atheist. Carrying a Muslim name deserves and qualifies for the above treatment!
Reprinted from Kafila.org, MARCH 21, 2011