Monday, May 31, 2010

Jamaat-e-Islami Hind condemns the attack on humanitarian aid

Attack on “Gaza Freedom Flotilla” is shocking, Illegal and a cold-blooded murder.

Killing of innocent civilians and Peace loving activist who were asleep in the night by the Israeli forces is Shocking. They were travelling with humanitarian Aid in the International Sea and with prior information to the world, therefore this attack is barbaric and a Cold blooded murder.
We strongly condemn the Killing of innocent human beings and are with Huwaida Arraf, an activist and Co-founder of International Solidarity Movement and all the Peace loving People on the board. May Almighty Allah help them.
We demand that a case be registered in the International Court of law and Tuff action against the isareli army.
Nazar Mohammed Madu,
President,
Jamaat-e-Islami Hind Maharashtra.

Israel attack Humanitarian Aid Ship

For sailing with the Caravan
http://witnessgaza.com/
http://www.freegaza.org/

Israel attacks Gaza aid fleet

Israeli forces have attacked a flotilla of aid-carrying ships aiming to break the country's siege on Gaza.
At least 19 people were killed and dozens injured when troops intercepted the convoy of ships dubbed the Freedom Flotilla early on Monday, Israeli radio reported.
The flotilla was attacked in international waters, 65km off the Gaza coast.
Avital Leibovich, an Israeli military spokeswoman, confirmed that the attack took place in international waters, saying: "This happened in waters outside of Israeli territory, but we have the right to defend ourselves."
Footage from the flotilla's lead vessel, the Mavi Marmara, showed armed Israeli soldiers boarding the ship and helicopters flying overhead.
Al Jazeera's Jamal Elshayyal, on board the Mavi Marmara, said Israeli troops had used live ammunition during the operation.
he Israeli military said four soldiers had been wounded and claimed troops opened fire after "demonstrators onboard attacked the IDF Naval personnel with live fire and light weaponry including knives and clubs".

Free Gaza Movement, the organisers of the flotilla, however, said the troops opened fire as soon as they stormed the convoy.
Our correspondent said that a white surrender flag was raised from the ship and there was no live fire coming from the passengers.
Before losing communication with our correspondent, a voice in Hebrew was clearly heard saying: "Everyone shut up".
Israeli intervention
Earlier, the Israeli navy had contacted the captain of the Mavi Marmara, asking him to identify himself and say where the ship was headed.
Organisers of the flotilla carrying 10,000 tonnes of humanitarian aid then diverted their ships and slowed down to avoid a confrontation during the night.


They also issued all passengers life jackets and asked them to remain below deck.
Al Jazeera’s Ayman Mohyeldin, reporting from Jerusalem, said the Israeli action was surprising.
"All the images being shown from the activists on board those ships show clearly that they were civilians and peaceful in nature, with medical supplies on board. So it will surprise many in the international community to learn what could have possibly led to this type of confrontation," he said.
Meanwhile, Israeli police have been put on a heightened state of alert across the country to prevent any civil disturbances.
Sheikh Raed Salah,a leading member of the Islamic Movement who was on board the ship, was reported to have been seriously injured. He was being treated in Israel's Tal Hasharon hospital.
In Um Al Faham, the stronghold of the Islamic movement in Israel and the birth place of Salah, preparations for mass demonstrations were under way.
Protests
Condemnation has been quick to pour in after the Israeli action.
Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, officially declared a three-day state of mourning over Monday's deaths.
Turkey, Spain, Greece, Denmark and Sweden have all summoned the Israeli ambassador's in their respective countries to protest against the deadly assault
Shortly after, two Israeli naval vessels had flanked the flotilla on either side, but at a distance.
housands of Turkish protesters tried to storm the Israeli consulate in Istanbul soon after the news of the operation broke. The protesters shouted "Damn Israel" as police blocked them.

"(The interception on the convoy) is unacceptable ... Israel will have to endure the consequences of this behaviour," the Turkish foreign ministry said in a statement.
Ismail Haniya, the Hamas leader in Gaza, has also dubbed the Israeli action as "barbaric".
Hundreds of pro-Palestinian activists, including a Nobel laureate and several European legislators, were with the flotilla, aiming to reach Gaza in defiance of an Israeli embargo.
The convoy came from the UK, Ireland, Algeria, Kuwait, Greece and Turkey, and was comprised of about 700 people from 50 nationalities.
But Israel had said it would not allow the flotilla to reach the Gaza Strip and vowed to stop the six ships from reaching the coastal Palestinian territory.
The flotilla had set sail from a port in Cyprus on Sunday and aimed to reach Gaza by Monday morning.
Israel said the boats were embarking on "an act of provocation" against the Israeli military, rather than providing aid, and that it had issued warrants to prohibit their entrance to Gaza.
It asserted that the flotilla would be breaking international law by landing in Gaza, a claim the organisers rejected.
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/05/201053133047995359.html


For live news
http://www.cihanmedya.com/media_services/
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/05/201053133047995359.html
Isareli Deputy foreign minister statement
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/middle_east/10198873.stm

Jamaat-e-islami launches Multilingual Video Portal

Delhi: Jamaat-e-Islami hind, lanuched Multilingual Video website for spreading the teaching of Islam in Delhi.
Janab mohammed Jafar,Vice President of Jamaat-e-Islami Hind Inuagrated the website in the presence of many dignatories like Zafrul Islam Khan, editor Milli Gazzette.

http://www.islamic-videos.com/

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Arundhati punishment black spot in judicial history: Judge

Arundhati punishment black spot in judicial history: Judge


Maneesh Chhibber Posted online: Wed May 26 2010, 02:44 hrs

New Delhi : After taking on the Chief Justice of India and Supreme Court collegium for “blissfully remaining insensitive to public opinion/reaction”, Karnataka High Court Judge D V Shylendra Kumar has opened up once again: this time blasting the higher judiciary for refusing to be accountable to anyone and also for the “phenomenon of tyrannical and abusive exercise of the power for punishing people for contempt”.

Delivering the endowment lecture at SDM Law College, Mangalore, on Saturday, Kumar said the punishment awarded to author Arundhati Roy for contempt of court “will remain as a black spot in the judicial history of this country forever”.



“I am of the personal opinion that the day when Supreme Court punished Ms Arundhati Roy for contempt and sentenced her to undergo a day’s imprisonment and sent her to Tihar Jail in the case, was the darkest day in the history of the Indian judiciary. I, as a judge, through this expression, offer my personal regret and apology to Ms Arundhati Roy for the judicial tyranny let loose on her by the most improper use of the power to punish a person for committing contempt of court,” he said.



In his address, Kumar also said he was of the opinion that the power to punish people who have committed contempt of court proceedings and orders was a “very drastic power without even reasonable safeguards, but more disturbingly without adequate remedial measures at all”.



“If mistakes, errors or even illegalities are committed in the exercise of this power and this definitely happens when the power is abused at the level of superior courts in this country and of course becomes irreversible and without remedy when it happens at the highest level of the judicial system, abuse of judicial power is total and lack of judicial accountability perpetuates the abuse... It is high time members in the superior courts of this country exhibited greater awareness of the sense of judicial accountability required to be exhibited and adhered to while exercising the unruly power of punishing people for committing contempt of court,” he said.



The judge, who first hit the headlines for taking on the previous Chief Justice of India K G Balakrishnan over the issue of implementation of the Right to Information Act in the higher judiciary, called upon the legislature to get active in the wake of past experiences and to usher in suitable legislation to ensure that the power (of contempt) doesn’t “become tyrannical”.
http://www.indianexpress.com/story-print/623780/

Muslim youth's fake encounter: Govt notice

Muslim youth's fake encounter: Govt notice
New Delhi, May 26: The Supreme Court issued notice to the Uttar Pradesh Government on a petition alleging fake encounter killing of a Muslim 'paralytic' youth by the Mathura police.
The petitioner, Jhadmal, 71-year old father of deceased Mohd Shakeel, pleaded to the apex court to restrain the police from disposing of his son's body.
He alleged that during the last two months, 20 such fake encounters were carried by a Mathura SHO, who, he claimed, is close to the Mayawati government.
A vacation bench of Justices G S Singhvi and C K Prasad, while issuing notice to the UP's Additional Advocate General and others, posted the matter for further hearing to Wednesday.
The petitioner, through counsel D K Garg, submitted that his 28-year-old son, a resident of Rajasthan, suffered a road accident on November 24, 2009 in Jaipur which totally paralysed the right side of his body.
As the medical fraternity in Rajasthan gave up hope of his recovery, he was being taken to Haribans Charitable Hospital, Mathura, for treatment on May 15 by his brothers Aleem and Samaydeen in a motorcyle when they were intercepted by the police.
According to the petitioner, after intercepting them the cops demanded the trio to produce their driving licence. Even though Aleem and Samayadeen explained that they had left behind the licence at their house in Rajasthan's Bharatpur district, the cops forced them to fetch it and kept Saleem, a paraletic, in their custody as a security for their return, he submitted.
The deceased' father contended that on May 16, the family was shocked to read media reports that Saleem was killed in an encounter with Farha police after allegedly attempting to rob the Jundvai village pradhan, Pratap Singh, of his Bolero vehicle along with certain other criminals.
The petition said that immediately after the incident, about 20 pradhans of different panchayats in Rajasthan went to Farha and demanded the body but the police refused to hand it over insisting that they themselves will perform the last rites. It was also alleged that the police got the post-mortem report manipulated.
It urged the apex court to direct the UP Government to hand over the body to the family besides initiating action against guilty police officers.
-PTI
http://www.siasat.com/english/news/muslim-youths-fake-encounter-govt-notice

Monday, May 24, 2010

PM on Muslim issue and media

Was a Muslim journalist deliberately gagged when Door Darshan (DD) telecast resorted to go off the air at Indian Prime Minister's Press Conference?

Was a deliberate gag manufactured to silence Masoom Moradabai of Urdu newspaper Akhbar e Jadid, when he asked the most crucial question engaging the 200 million Indian Muslims as to how Prime Minister will act on the recommendations of Sachar Commission and Justice Ranganathan Misra Commission reports.

The Urdu journalist was the fifth journalist in the line to be given the chance to address the questions to the Prime Minister. However when he posed the sensitive question about Muslim plight, all of a sudden the DD telecast went dead. Can one imagine a national TV Channel to be so inefficient and callous about breakdown in its telecast of Prime Minister’s Press Conference, without some sanction from the authorities? Was the breakdown of the telecast was designed specially to shield the Prime Minister from replying to embarrassing questions about the abject failure of his government?
One can see the last flashes of Prime Minister's instant distress while the Muslim journalist reeled out the question on behalf of his Urdu newspaper, when the telecast went off the air. Later, TIMES NOW's Arnab cited one more gag by technical breakdown in the same Press Conference telecast when TIMES NOW representative posed a very uncomfortable question that Prime Minister probably would have found difficult to reply to.

These sequences will point to a possibility towards a deliberate policy by Indian Government that had arranged a rare public relations event of the current Prime Minister’s Press Conference, was to run away from public scrutiny on major issues by blanking out the very live telecast, when Prime Minister was supposed to reply. That is most reprehensive and Prime Minister should clear the air, by appearing to press again and respond to these two blocked out questions that Government is bound to reply in able to take the press and general public in confidence.
As it is Muslims are most worried that Indian National Congress under the leadership of Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is merely playing with the community and has no intention of giving an inch to Muslim’s rightful demands. The recent meeting of Muslim community leaders, including from Jamiat ul Ulama, Jamat e Islami, Majlis e Mushawarat and others with both, the Prime Minister and Sonia Gandhi is reported to be a dodging game that Congress is old past master of. Both leaders have been arrogant as if they would be doing a favour to the Muslim leaders by even giving them the time to press their demands and that should be the end of it.

India is a democracy, but the way the Prime Minister replied about a job given to him which is not yet complete and unless that is complete, he is not going to retire or resign. The TV channels were agog as to who was the ‘real’ authority that had given him the ‘job’ and apparently he was categorical about Congress Party, Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi not being in the picture, as far as his stay as PM is concerned. It will be a big gaffe, if a perception is formed by press and public that he was referring to an outside power that could have given him the ‘job’ and India’s democracy is just a sham.

Ghulam Muhammed, Mumbai
ghulammuhammed3@gmail.com
http://www.ghulammuhammed.blogspot.com/

TRPs of tv channels in india

exchange4media in collaboration with TAM Media Research has been bringing TELEPEDIA, a weekly synopsis of television viewing pattern across different genres, to our readers for over a year now. The offering has a new avatar in 2009. There are more channel genres that have been added and now the shares of not just C&S but also All and Digital audiences are available. Some others changes to simplify the information given are also made.


TELEPEDIA aims to provide a quick overview of the changes in TV viewing behaviour every week to enable well-informed debate.

Friday, May 21, 2010

The maulana and other stories

It is impossible to miss the message of the ‘miscommunication’ thanks to which Maulana Noor-ul-Huda was taken off an Emirates flight and thrown into Tihar Jail. What it communicates is that we should stop criticising Western security agencies for racial profiling and take a hard look at ourselves.

The maulana had told his son over the phone, “Jahaaz udhne wala hai,” meaning that the plane was about to take off. It was his misfortune to be seated beside a neurotic who took it to mean that the plane was about to explode. It was impossible for her to misunderstand him unless she had primed herself to do so — by looking upon his countenance, whose distinguishing feature is a flowing Maulana-esque beard.
This is not the first instance of a mainstream Indian being a little too eager to suspect Muslims of the worst not because of what they happen to be doing, but because of who they can’t help being. The police and the security agencies are routinely guilty of this fault, which became glaringly obvious after the Batla House ‘encounter’ in Delhi, when all the Muslims of the district of Azamgarh were pilloried.
It’s rather sad, because we are perhaps unique among nations in turning racial stereotyping into a joke. The Europeans do it all the time — ask the Poles — but their cultures are buffered by national borders. We make fun of each other at incredibly close quarters in every mohalla, and it has never hurt anyone because it is a cyclical game. Bengalis disparage Biharis, who make fun of Oriyas, who find Tamils laughable, who think Punjabis are weird, who believe that Bengalis are a hoot. Whoever you are, someone, somewhere, is laughing at you. There’s no way you can win, and no way you can lose. The even-handed culture of the game keeps it just that, and prevents it from turning into a simulacrum of war.
So, despite the well-meaning tut-tutting of Western commentators, we can confidently use stereotypes in every element of our culture. Our television and advertising are rife with them. And you can discover stereotypes of every culture, class and religion in the crowd scenes in Mario Miranda’s cartoons. No problem, we laugh, and carry on regardless.
But games which no one is supposed to win or lose are rare, fragile things. Their logic falls apart when one party begins to lose consistently. When the maulana failed to convince the police that he did God’s work, the whole Muslim community lost, yet again. They will never be able to recoup these losses because the culture of fun which forms the fabric of the game board is in tatters.
I don’t know if we’ll ever be able to stitch it together again. What I do know is that this week, I’m flying Emirates through Dubai and back. The very airline which Shahzad the Times Square bomber was also flying to Dubai. I’m taking EK 511, the same flight as the ill-starred Maulana. You meet exciting people on Dubai-bound Emirates flights these days. Not the maulana but the neurotic sitting next to him, for instance. I must remember to shave as closely as a Gillette model and keep my mouth shut until I get off the plane.

Pratik Kanjilal
Hindustan Times
22-05-2010

BMC's 'Hindutva' diktat upsets schools

MUMBAI: In what appears to be a medieval fatwa, the Sena-BJP-ruled BMC has sought to make it mandatory for the 150-odd missionary-run schools in the city to promote 'Hindutva traditions'. The municipal corporation's education committee will now write to the state education department seeking permission to enforce its widening list of demands.

The move has caused widespread anguish among both parents and the academic community, with experts pointing out that these diktats have no legal standing. The missionary schools have threatened to go to court if they are made to toe the parties' line.
On Tuesday, the saffron combine had proposed that these institutions allow their students to wear their 'Indian-ness' in the form of bindis and bangles. A day later, it hardened its stance, with demands like more holidays for Ganpati and Diwali, a corporators' quota in these schools similar to that given to MLAs, a school notice board prominently displaying the names of corporators in the education committee, and all communication to the BMC to be written in Marathi.
"While reviewing proposals from BMC-aided schools, we came across many missionary schools who had written to us in English. And many corporators observed that while these schools approach the BMC for aid, they do not adhere to Hindu traditions. If these missionaries come here to impart education, they should adhere to Hindu traditions as most of the students are Hindus. Why should they forbid girls from wearing bindis or bangles or even using mehendi? What is the need for such rigid discipline?" asked education committee chairperson Rukmini Kharatmol

After Facebook and Youtube, Pakistan blocks Twitter

ISLAMABAD: After blocking Facebook and Youtube, Pakistani authorities on Friday further widened the crackdown on websites with blasphemous contents by restricting access to popular social networking website Twitter.

Pakistani users were unable to log into Twitter after internet service providers blocked access to the site.
When users tried to log into site, there browsers displayed a message that said "this site is restricted."
Over the past two days, Pakistan telecommunication authority has blocked websites like Facebook and Youtube, citing "sacrilegious contents" on the websites as the reason for the action.
The crackdown began after the Lahore High Court issued an order for blocking Facebook over a page hosting a contest for blasphemous caricatures of Prophet Mohammad.
Over 450 URLs have been blocked so far by the authorities.
Pakistan telecommunication authority (PTA) on Thursday said that YouTube had been blocked due to "sacrilegious contents" but did not point to specific material on the website that prompted the authorities to block it.
The government acted against both Facebook and YouTube after it failed to persuade the websites to remove the "derogatory material," the statement said.

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Goa chargesheet is a wake-up call

The chargesheeting of 11 members of the Sanatan Sanstha for last October’s Goa bomb blast case by the National Investigation Agency recently should serve as a warning that particular religions should not be associated with acts of terror. This requirement is all the more important in a society which is rather proud of its democratic political system and credentials. Initially the idea had seemed preposterous to many that those born in the Hindu faith in this country would resort to terrorism. There was no ideological, political, or analytical basis for such a cosy belief to arise. Perhaps what can be said in the light of experience is that because there was so much reporting from around the world of a great number of Islamic people leaning toward extremist ideological tendencies at the present moment in history, and a good number of these engaging in terrorism to secure their political aims in several countries, it generally became easy to accept that fingers could be pointed at Muslims alone for terrorist acts. Evidence to the contrary was dispensed with. Sri Lanka’s LTTE were a Tamil but also Hindu outfit. But their strike zone was mainly Sri Lanka and their actions didn’t trouble much of the rest of the world. In any case, the LTTE advertised itself in overtly political — not religious — terms, unlike the jihadi outfits which proudly professed political Islam. The so-called Christian terrorism on account of its appeal in the name of the Catholic faith, of which Northern Ireland used to be cited as an example, was on the wane with the political accord signalling the closure of that streak of militant politics. On the other hand, Pakistan has established itself over the past quarter century as the hotbed of international terrorism of the overtly jihadist variety. Given the history, this fuelled the belief that the archetypal terrorist had to be Muslim.

The NIA’s probe into the Goa explosions leading up to the first judicial requirement of filing chargesheets should dispatch this notion for good. In any case, it is now established that it is Hindu far-right groups that conspired to arrange explosions at Malegaon in 2006, at the Macca Masjid in Hyderabad, and at the Ajmer sufi shrine subsequently. The attempt in these instances was to get Islamic outfits blamed to create an anti-Islamic spirit in society. Unlike what appears to be happening in Pakistan and certain other Muslim countries, it is not probable that Hindu groups in India professing extreme-right views leading up to terrorism can plausibly be looking to capture state power. If their aims can be said to be more modest, the tactical purpose that suits their enterprise is to discredit Muslims in India. This sits well with the general outlook of Hindutva-oriented groups in the country from the inception, the Hindu Mahasabha and the RSS being prime examples. Great socio-political upheavals represented by the destruction of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya and the Gujarat pogrom should have alerted us to the possibility of right-wing religious-oriented Hindus adopting extreme postures to promote their cause. Looking back, however, it can be said that this strand was obscured in the haze of the constant anti-India terrorism emanating from Pakistan.
Exposing the terrorist activities of extremist Hindu outfits goes to the credit of the Indian state and its instruments. There are no signs fortunately to suggest that the investigation is slack in cases where Hindu groups come under suspicion, or that the judiciary has been less than purposeful. This strengthens the society and the state in dealing with jihadist or any other variety of terrorism, whether the religious angle attaches to it or not.

नफरत और न्याय

ऐसा क्यों है कि अजमल कसाब और अफजल गुरु की फांसी के मुद्दे पर बात शुरू होती है, तो घृणा की लपटों से पूर

ा माहौल घिर जाता है, कुछ इस तरह कि तर्क शक्ति और विवेक के ठहरने की गुंजाइश ही नहीं रह जाती? इन दोषियों से नफरत के इजहार के लिए लोग न्याय और नीतियों से परे जाने के लिए तैयार दिखते हैं। कोई इस बात के लिए शर्मसार महसूस करता है कि ये दोनों अब तक जीवित क्यों हैं? कोई इस बात के लिए उतावला है कि किसी तरह उसे ही दोनों को मारने का मौका मिल जाए। यह सब सोचने और कहने वाले अपराधी नहीं हैं।
ये साधारण और मासूम लोग हैं, मेहनत करके रोजी-रोटी कमाने वाले पारिवारिक लोग, जो रोजमर्रा के जीवन में बेहद शांत रहते हैं। जो घर के सामने होने वाले छोटे-मोटे अन्याय को अनदेखा करते हैं और अपने साथ होने वाली ज्यादती को भी सहते हैं, उसका विरोध नहीं करते। ऐसे लोग भी कसाब और अफजल को लेकर बेहद आक्रामक रवैये का इजहार करते हैं, क्योंकि यह सबसे सुरक्षित किस्म की नफरत है। इसको व्यक्त करके वह किसी जोखिम में नहीं पड़ेंगे, बल्कि देशभक्त कहे जाएंगे। दरअसल इस नफरत में महंगाई को लेकर उनका असंतोष, भ्रष्ट नेताओं-अफसरों और शहर के अपराधियों को लेकर उनका गुस्सा शामिल है। जो असंतोष वह कहीं और न निकाल सके, अब इस रूप में निकाल रहे हैं, क्योंकि इसका उन्हें भरपूर मौका दिया जा रहा है।
भीतर की आग भड़काई जा रही है। रोजमर्रा की समस्याओं से भन्नाया उनका दिमाग अफजल और कसाब को गालियां देकर थोड़ा शांत हो रहा है। इसलिए ठहर कर सोचने की जरूरत है कि कहीं कसाब और अफजल के बहाने हमें मूल समस्याओं से भटकाया तो नहीं जा रहा है। क्या इन दोनों के खत्म हो जाने से आतंकवाद से छुटकारा मिल जाएगा? अफजल और कसाब तो मोहरा भर हैं, आतंकवाद का नेटवर्क तो बहुत व्यापक है। इसके खिलाफ लड़ाई सूझबूझ से लड़ी जा सकती है, प्रतिहिंसा से नहीं। इस संघर्ष में सरकार, विपक्ष और हरेक नागरिक की भागीदारी अपेक्षित है। आज देश का एक तबका कसाब और अफजल के बहाने अपने सिस्टम पर ही सवाल उठा रहा है। अगर अपनी व्यवस्था के प्रति भरोसा ही नहीं बचा तो फिर बचेगा क्या। कसाब और अफजल को लेकर न्यायपालिका ने अपना फैसला सुना दिया है, अब उसे अमल में लाने की जवाबदेही कार्यपालिका की है। समाज को धैर्य रखना चाहिए।

THE FATWA, JOB AND MUSLIM WOMEN

                                                                                                         MOONISA BUSHRA ABEDI



When I was a student at The University of Mumbai; doing my M.Sc in Nuclear Physics, after a Seminar; I was asked by a press reporter, as to why the number of Muslim women is so less in jobs? Well, I could rather have questioned him when the number of Muslim men itself is pathetically low in jobs, where to regret for the women? Still I referred to “unhealthy job conditions” as the deterrent for our women. And he had not only agreed to it, but also expressing concern over it held up the need to improve them. Presently as we notice, much water has flown under the bridge and the job conditions have deteriorated further, whereas the number of women in jobs; including Muslims; are increasing. Besides, there seems to be a policy to promote women by the employers against men.
It was surprising that Fatwa pertaining to the job of Muslim women was misunderstood once again. It was condemned, distorted, misquoted and interpreted out of context. We, at the first place, forget that Fatwa is issued in response to a question asked by anyone who seeks religious guidance and never as per the whims and fancies of the Ulema. Further they are to be issued in the light of authentic knowledge of Islam, even mentioning the sources with due accountability. Still the impression being created by the media is; as if the Ulema are simply eager to issue fatwa in order to restrict people’s freedom and depriving them of their fundamental rights especially women. And this they do to espouse their dominance over the Muslim society, which is simply a despicable allegation.
It can hardly be denied that Islam doesn’t approve of free mixing of the two sexes. During the prophets time also, the women have participated in the public affairs of the society with Hijab dignity and chastity. Whereas; the atmosphere at the workplaces today hardly needs to be commented upon. Ulema from Deoband have further clarified that Fatwa had been issued on 6th of April 2010 in response to a question asked by a women; willing to know whether she can work in a public or private institution? The fatwa reads as “the working in public or private institutions where she has to mix freely with the men, talking freely and boldly to them without Hijab; is prohibited for women” In fact no sensible person would oppose this. It would be proper to mention yet another Fatwa of Deoband stating “if it is inevitable for a woman to work then she can do so with Hijab avoiding free mixing with men and talking frankly and boldly to them. Further her income can not be used, even by her relatives, without her permission.” This is again perfectly compatible with Islamic spirit .To our surprise the fatwa has been branded as Talibanisque by one of the leading English dailies; which is misguiding and dangerously provocative .Later the matter was blown out of proportion by the media, targeting Ulema for suppressing Muslim women. The whole propaganda seems to instigate Muslim masses against Ulema and project the so called Islamic scholars and activists as the true representative of Muslims, endorsing their social eminence and imposing their un-Islamic views on Muslim community through excessive boosting.
It was disappointing to see some such intellectuals defending the right to work for Muslim women by citing the examples of Razia Sultana or the women rulers of Pakistan, Bangladesh and Turkey. Each of them though Muslim; was practically far away from Islam and can hardly be considered as the role model for Muslim women. One can’t off course deny the appointment of women in the ministry of second Caliph of Islam Hazrat Umer (RA). Nor can one deny the participation of women in the important decision making meetings called upon by the Prophet (PBUH) in his mosque at Medina. But which of these examples can justify the unhealthy atmosphere, vulgar behavior, immodest dressings, jazzy make ups, bold attitude, obscene free mixing and the party culture which has become inseparable component of the public and private institutions where the women have to work. Had the first wife of Prophet Hazrat Khadija ever involved with men freely during her trade which she carried out in partner ship with them? Or was there any scope for immodesty in the battle led by Prophets youngest wife Hazrat Aisha? In fact none of the evidences from the Islamic history can be used to justify what women is found to be involved in most of the occupations except for those concerned with education , health and other such inevitable and noble professions.
There are people who claim that fatwa will not have any impact at all on the society in general and Muslim women are not going to leave their jobs. Surely no women has been forced to leave the job; nor is any forced to wear Hijab but the one who sought the guidance in the light of Islamic injunctions has been provided with it, through Fatwa .Some demand that Fatwa should be according to the requirements of the present times , perhaps they forget that Islam has the strength to modify the priorities of the time itself; and has the capacity to in to provide a favorable atmosphere; in order to safeguard the human interests and ensure healthy development of the human society. It hardly leaves any scope for interpretation of its basic principles as per the vested interests. The instructions for Hijab are based clearly on the Quranic verses and can not be distorted to suit ones choice and benefit.
It is amusing to note that women like Avisha Kulkarni, the convener of the so called Desh Bhakti Andolan; has not only condemned the Fatwa but has threatened to launch a nationwide movement against Hijab for Muslim women on jobs. Out of sheer prejudice, unmindfully enough, she has disregarded completely the plight of working women, ignoring the steep rise in the rate of crime against women; which is the highest at their workplaces. The observant Muslim women do realize the true spirit of fatwa and are hardly influenced by any false propaganda against it. They are of the opinion that; the Andolan is needed to be launched against the atrocities on women and their sexual exploitation in various professions. Further they wish o ask the self acclaimed sympathizers of women; why they deny us the right to dress up modestly and uphold our dignity and self esteem through Hijab. That is provided to us by Islam as the foremost precautionary measure against sexual crimes. Moreover what steps are being taken to prevent these crimes except legislation of laws; which are proven to be almost ineffective without the safety measures to be taken by the women for themselves.
It is the high time for the Muslim intellectuals to guide the community to establish separate institutions for women. In order to provide them with better prospects to utilize their abilities and work with dignity, self esteem and better security. We wonder why they don’t avail us with these kind of facilities while in countries like Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States and Iran Muslim women are running their separate educational institutions and the hospitals ; managed absolutely by women. They have special courts for the women with female judges and lawyers. Women are operating their own branches in banks and even stock exchanges. They also enjoy separate shopping malls, beaches, restricted for women, and other places of entertainment. Why can’t we think and plan on these lines, for the development of Muslim women. So that they may be provided with the full fledged opportunity to apply their talent and can set the example for others. Lest they may realize that mixing with men is not essential at all for the development and growth of women instead they can achieve these goals in healthier way without it.

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Goa blast case: NIA files chargesheet against 11 accused

PANAJI: The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Monday filed charges in a court against 11 activists of a Hindu right wing organisation for the 2009 Diwali-eve blast that killed two people in Goa's Margao town.

The accused are facing charges of conspiring and collecting arms for waging a war against the state and mischief.
All 11 people named in the chargesheet are members of Hindu right wing organisation Sanatan Sanstha, whose members were also linked to several low-intensity explosions in Maharashtra some years back.
The chargesheet, numbering about 3,000 pages, was filed before Sessions Judge U.V. Bakre. The investigating agency also listed among the accused two Sanatan Sanstha members who were killed in the accidental blast that took place while they were ferrying explosives to a festival gathering in Margao, 35 km from here, Oct 16, 2009.
The two accused who died in the blast were Malgonda Patil and Yogesh Naik. The charge sheet names 250 witnesses, who are likely to be examined by the local court during the trial. Those named as accused include Vinay Talekar, Vinayak Patil, Dhananjay Ashtekar, all residents of Goa, and Dilip Mangaonkar, a resident of Maharashtra. They all are at present in judicial custody.
Other accused named in the charge sheet are Prashant Juvekar, Sarang Akolkar, Jayaprakash, Rudra Patil and Prashant Ashtekar, all residents of Maharashtra. They all are absconding. Giving details of the sequence of events before the blast, the NIA said that Ashtekar rigged 12 electronic detonator circuits in Pune and out of these he set aside five for the intended explosion in Goa.
The chargesheet said that a dry run was also carried out by the accused a couple of months before the Diwali-eve blast. The investigation into the Margao blast was initially conducted by a special investigation team (SIT) of Goa Police, but was later handed over to the NIA.
Apart from facing charges for waging war against the state, they have also been charged under the Explosive Substance Act and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act

Monday, May 17, 2010

'Why isn't the good in Islam reported?'

Ashutosh Shukla up with a senior cleric Maulana Hakim Mehmood Dariyabadi, general secretary of All India Ulema CouIn the midst of the Deoband controversy, the interpretation of the way of life in Islam and the righteous understanding of Islam has come under introspection and questioning. In the midst of taking stands, backing and criticising fatwas, DNA caught ncil, who recently held a press conference in defence of the Deoband fatwa and had even chided the media for irresponsible reporting.

In light of what has been reported, the way of life in Islam has taken a beating. Do you think there is a need for all sect leaders to come together to improve the portrayal of Islam?
Some people are working towards it. There are always forces trying to defame Islam and there is a guided effort towards it. Unfortunate, the media, too, supports such people. Positive things that people are doing in the community are not appreciated. We would want the media to be more supportive and co-operative.
What are these positive things that go unreported?Positive things like a movement within the community to get its members to not spend exorbitant amounts on marriages and celebrations considering many among us are poor. We are convincing members to pool in funds so that the poor too can


get married. Education among members has risen considerably after Babri Masjid. The media should commend the community on this. They are moving ahead even in the technical field, but all this goes unreported.
Your definition of purdah differs from that of people within the community who consider it patriarchal and draconian. Please comment...
ticularly What the Quran has said is what we read. There are certain ways in which women and men have to live. All women should use purdah, parMuslim women. In India, the culture of purdah exists in villages. So, it is not that we are saying something unusual. It is India's culture.
What do you have to say about criticism of the Deoband fatwa on observing the Prophet’s birthday and that eating crab and prawns is wrong?
Many Muslims eat crab and prawns. I do not know where the media got that from. With respect to the Prophet’s birthday, it is wrong to bring up such an issue around this time. They should have stayed united in such times. People should instead listen to what the Prophet said instead of just taking out a Julus in his name. Why remember him on one day? Why not 365 days?
With varied interpretations, what are other communities to understand and make out of Islam?
What is written in the Quran should be considered correct. The translation can now be read by all as it is easily available on the Web.Right now it is akin to salesmen selling curd saying their curd is sweeter than others. Only the buyer can decide which curd is the best. The best way to judge the true interpretation of Islam and the Quran is to sell it to the buyer. The one who has to buy it will decide which interpretation is correct and the best one.
Is there a conflict in the system of other communities to Islam?
I do not think there is any conflict. Even if there are different ways, Islam is very clear that no one should be harmed— even if they are non-Muslims. Neighbours are particularly given favour and priority in Islam. There are some who are not on the right path (terrorists) and what they do is wrong.

Saturday, May 15, 2010

'They put me in jail because I have a beard and run a madrassa'

Maulana Noor-ul-Huda, the respected Islamic scholar who was taken off an international flight, arrested and thrown into Tihar jail because a woman co-passenger misunderstood what he was saying, believes the police reacted to the way he looks and what he does, rather than to the facts of the situation.

“I had to spend a night in jail just because I have a long beard and I am from Deoband and I run a madrassa. More than the mobile phone conversation, it seems to me that my profile appeared suspicious to them,” Huda said. “I kept saying that I am a religious man who tries to make people better human beings, but it didn’t help.”
Huda was forced to get off Emirates flight EK511 en route to London via Dubai on Wednesday morning after the passenger in the seat next to his thought he was telling someone on his mobile that he was about to blow up the aircraft (udaane waala hoon).
Actually, the maulana was only telling his son that the aircraft would take off soon (udne waala hai).
Emerging from Tihar after being bailed today, Huda described what had happened. “I was talking to my son after settling in my seat. He asked me when I would be airborne. I replied, ‘Jahaaz udne waala hai’ (the plane is about to take off),” he said.
“After that, I switched off my phone and waited. After a while I began to wonder why we were not taking off. I also realized then that the woman sitting next to me was not in her seat,” Huda said.
According to the police, the woman, an NRI reportedly living in the US, had overheard Huda’s conversation, got out of her seat and told the crew that he was about to bomb the aircraft.
“Then some plane officials came and stood around my seat,” Huda said. “They asked for my papers and wanted to know whom I had been speaking to. They then told me to get off the plane, saying they would send me by the next flight. But then, the police arrested me. They should have understood the meaning of ‘udna’. What else was I supposed to say?”
Huda said the police had treated him well, but he had still suffered enormous mental torture. They had asked him why he was associated with a madrassa connected to the Deoband seminary, and why he had come to Delhi, he said.
Huda runs the Madrassa Dar-ul Uloom Farooqiya at Deoband in Saharanpur, UP, and was going to attend a conference in London. He is one of the 10 children of the respected Urdu ustad at Dar-ul-Uloom Deoband, Abdur Raheem Bastawi.
The police also called up Huda’s 18-year-old son Fazlullah, who had accompanied his father to Delhi and to the airport, and had made the call that created the confusion.
“The police should have set my father free after they had established he was a respected man who has never done anything illegal in his life,” Fazlullah said. “But instead, they arrested him and put him in prison. For what? We had never seen a jail before, never been to a court before. This is the first time this has happened to anyone in our family.”
Fazlullah said he had come to Delhi also to check out some coaching centres that teach English. “I am doing my Class 12 through the National Institute of Open Schooling. I wanted to look at some places that teach English. I want to do a B.Com,” he said.
Fazlullah said the police called him when he was at a friend’s home in Welcome Colony after dropping his father at the airport. “They told me there were some problems in Abbu’s documents, and he would be sent to London by another flight. But a few hours after that, Abbu’s phone was switched off. I was very tense.” According to the family, the police questioned Huda until 3 am on Thursday.
Qamar-ul-Huda, the younger brother of Noor-ul-Huda, said, “Just because the woman misunderstood the conversation between father and son, this problem was created. This is totally wrong. This is be-izzati. Because we wear a beard and a kurta, we are seen as being Osama (bin Laden).”
Khairullah, another of Huda’s brothers, said Huda keeps travelling across the world to deliver lectures, but has never faced a problem. “He is very tense. Our sister has not stopped crying since the time she heard this has happened,” said Khairullah.
Rehmatullah Noor, the eldest of Huda’s five children, said, “Kabhi socha bhi nahin tha aisa hoga.” (We had never imagined something like this would happen.)

Gujarat riots: SIT submits report to SC

The Special Investigation Team (SIT) on Friday submitted in the Supreme Court the final report on the results of its investigation into the role of 63 persons, including Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, in the Gulberg Society massacre case.

SIT chief R K Raghavan submitted the report to the apex court registry. The team had in an earlier hearing sought time for submitting the report as it wanted more time to question VHP International president Praveen Togadia and incorporate the information so received.
The probe team had started its investigation into the case after the Supreme Court in April 27, 2009 asked it to “look into” a complaint filed by ex-Congress MP Ehsan Jafri’s widow, Zakia, on the alleged collusion of the state machinery with rioters during the post-Godhra killings for almost two days.
The very order of the Supreme Court Bench led by Justice (retd) Arijit Pasayat to involve the SIT is now under challenge, and is being termed “illegal” by one of the accused, former BJP MLA Kalu Maliwad, who is represented by senior advocate Ram Jethmalani.
Jethmalani has consistently argued that the April 2009 order was passed without prior notice sent to any of the accused or without giving them an opportunity to be heard.
But this did not prevent the SIT from summoning Modi for a six-hour session of questioning on his alleged role in the killing of Jafri in 2002, who allegedly had made frantic calls for help to police and the Chief Minister.
Even the Gujarat government had joined the bandwagon, by complaining that it had not been taken into confidence and was not in possession of the SIT’s investigation reports. The state government was later supplied with the documents and had in turn filed an affidavit about how certain civil rights activists were tutoring witnesses, including Zakia, to lodge complaints against the state police.
The report also comes in the background of accusations of lapses and bias levelled against the SIT members in the investigation of the riots cases, and also the quitting of one state public prosecutor and the firing of another.
The SC is currently seized with demands for the reconstitution of the probe team.
WHILE the Mumbai CBI has sought permission to question Rajasthan inspector general of police (IGP) Rajeev Dasot in connection with the Sohrabuddin ‘encounter’ case, a CBI team has quizzed three other IPS officers from Rajasthan this week. The three IPS officers met with a CBI team, presently camping in Udaipur.
The CBI on Thursday sought permission from the Rajasthan director general of police (DGP) to question Dasot, presently the IGP for Kota, who was IGP Udaipur when the Sohrabuddin ‘encounter’ occurred. Then Udaipur SP Dinesh M N has already been arrested in this regard. “The CBI has sent a letter to our office and has intimated that they wanted to question an IPS officer,” Rajasthan DGP H C Meena said.
A CBI team has interviewed three other IPS officers, Hinglajdhan, who was as assistant SP in Udaipur and Bal Mukund Verma and Virendra Jhala, who were both additional SPs in 2005. Though CBI officials remained tightlipped about the investigation and the questioning of the IPS officers, sources maintained that they were only trying to get a clearer picture of the events that transpired before the 2005 Sohrabuddin encounter.
Incidentally, a team from the Gujarat CID (Crime) branch has been camping in Udaipur since the last week on the trail of four Rajasthan police personnel, an assistant sub-inspector of police, a head constable and two constables, in connection with the Tulsi Prajapati encounter case. It is believed that these four policemen had escorted Tulsi Prajapati to Ahmedabad for a court hearing and were returning when Prajapati allegedly tried to escape and was gunned down.
Senior Rajasthan police chiefs maintained that they were assisting the Gujarat police and the CBI as best as they could. A senior Rajasthan police officer stated that while all the IPS officers had met CBI sleuths without delay, the Udaipur police were assisting the Gujarat CID (Crime) branch in apprehending the four wanted policemen.

How TV failed to watch itself

ByArchna Shukla


Around two years ago, a senior executive from a TV audience research organisation told this writer that a leading broadcaster was seeking its help, to build influence in a certain market. This essentially meant installing audience measurement equipment (people meters) in houses identified by the broadcaster. Interestingly, this broadcaster was also a vociferous critic of the prevailing measurement system.

Whether the agency gave in to the broadcaster’s persistence is not known but the story sums up the pulls and pressures under which the television audience research business has been operating in India.

The government’s latest decision to constitute a committee to set up a transparent and effective TRP system in the country is a statement not on the efficacy of television viewership research agencies, but on the broadcast industry’s utter failure in resolving one of the many challenges confronting it.

For those who came in late, TRP, or television rating point, is the unit in which television viewership is measured. TRPs denote the percentage of viewers a programme or a channel gets during a particular time period.

It is strange that in the entire debate around television viewership measurement, fingers have only been pointed at the research agencies. Their TRPs have been held responsible for much of the malaise.

The general perception has been that in their blind chase for TRPs, television channels were churning out the kind of programming that will help them attract eyeballs, and in return, advertisers. News channels, which traditionally get lower viewership and hence, lower advertising, have been at the forefront of devising innovative ways of building healthy TRPs. The result has been programming that can hardly be described as responsible and tasteful. It was essentially the aggressive TRP-chase led by news channels that brought the debate of viewership measurement into public domain. Before this, TRP-bashing was essentially the industry’s internal time-pass.

... contd.

FOR THE RIGHT PRICE, YOU CAN GET THE SRI RAM SENE TO ORGANISE A RIOT ANYWHERE. AN EXPOSÉ

FOR THE RIGHT PRICE, YOU CAN GET THE SRI RAM SENE TO ORGANISE A RIOT ANYWHERE. AN EXPOSÉ BY PUSHP SHARMA. WRITTEN BY SANJANA. ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY K ASHISH

THERE ARE 133 videos that show up on YouTube when you search for “Mangalore pub attack”. Over 300,000 people have viewed the first video. Put in the same query on Google and 69,000 websites show up in a fraction of a second. On 24 January 2009, a group of 35-40 men barged into a pub in Mangalore and attacked young women as they enjoyed an afternoon drink. Amongst the attackers were members of Sri Ram Sene — a right-wing organisation that was relatively unknown at the time. The Sene cadres considered women drinking publicly as “indecent behaviour” and more importantly “an insult to Hindu culture and tradition”. Two days after the attack, as India marked 60 years of the Constitution coming into force, national television channels looped footage of women being slapped, beaten and chased out of the pub. (In a telling detail, the footage of the assault was available only because the Sene had informed journalists and photographers in Mangalore of their intended attack 30 minutes before they entered the pub.) The footage sparked outrage. News producers from French, Russian, German television channels despatched correspondents to ground zero. Even producers from The Oprah Winfrey Show called in asking for the footage. The Sene had burst onto the scene.

As an organisation, the Sene has always claimed for itself a radical Hindu identity. Its leaders position themselves as zealous custodians of “Hindu religion” and “culture”, its cadres as valiant foot soldiers. In their own words, they will not hesitate to assault people, vandalise property, destroy artistic expressions, separate mixed religion couples — in general, interfere violently — to implement their hardline Hindutva agenda. Their professional calling card is violence justified by a puritanical, spitfire morality.

A six-week undercover investigation by TEHELKA, however, reveals that even this violent, spitfire morality can be a hypocritical sham. Sri Ram Sene members are not just committed ideologues who are spontaneously willing to become violent law-breakers for a “cause”. That’s just one of their criminal and negative faces. They are also cynical lumpen that can be bought for a price. “Contract rioting” — thugs being handed out contracts or money to create riots — no longer needs to be a matter of mere speculation. TEHELKA’s investigation shows it is an alarming reality. Vandalism can be purchased; ‘cultural nationalism’ can go on sale. It’s all kosher in the “business” of outrage.





‘I cannot get involved directly, I have an image to maintain, I have a certain credibility in society. People look up to me as a man of principles, an idealist, a Hindutvawadi’



PRAMOD MUTHALIK, National President, Sri Ram Sene



To expose this aspect of the Sri Ram Sene, a TEHELKA journalist posing as an artist met Pramod Muthalik, the president of the Sri Ram Sene, with a proposal. Using the rationale that all controversy is good publicity, he asked Muthalik if the Sri Ram Sene would orchestrate a pre-paid, pre-meditated attack on his painting exhibition so that the resulting furore would spark public interest, catapult him to fame and help sell his paintings both in India and abroad by attracting higher bids at art auctions. (Never mind that the supposed paintings this furore might help sell evoked Hindu- Muslim amity, particularly Hindu-Muslim marriages — a phenomenon the Sene abhors.) In return, Muthalik and the Sene would regain the national stature they had achieved during the Mangalore pub attack, besides pocketing the agreed upon fee. Far from rejecting this proposal with horror and outrage, Muthalik readily connected the TEHELKA reporter to one Sene member after another — down a food chain that exposed a disturbingly entrenched criminal mindset, which is confident of fixing the system to abet it.



Before the story of what this food chain threw up, however, it might help to revisit the history of the Sri Ram Sene and its founder.



THE SRI Ram Sene was started in 2007 by Pramod Muthalik, who continues to be its National President. Born in Bagalkot in north Karnataka, Muthalik spent his formative years — he joined a shakha when he was 13 years old — with the Hindu right wing organisation, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). By 1996, his RSS seniors shifted Muthalik to its paramilitary wing, the Bajrang Dal. It took Muthalik less than a year to be named the Dal’s south India convener. People who knew him back then called him “ambitious, dedicated and sharp-tongued”. In his 23-year association with the RSS and its affiliate organisations, Muthalik had several brushes with the law, but despite being charged in numerous cases for provocative speech-making, the only significant time he has spent in jail is two months — a record he maintains till date.



Upset with the BJP’s failure to reward his Hindutva zeal with any political dividends, Muthalik severed ties with the RSS in 2004. He claims the RSS and its affiliate organisations are betraying the Hindu cause by not being hardline enough, and the BJP government in the state too is not helping him enough. Predictably then, extreme hardline Hindutva politics has been the cornerstone of the Sri Ram Sene since it was floated in 2007. Violence is the only way forward, says Muthalik. In 2008, attempting to enter political centre stage, Muthalik floated the Rashtriya Hindustan Sena — the political wing of the Sene — but failed miserably. None of the candidates fielded made a mark. While talking to TEHELKA, Muthalik admits on camera that his candidates lost the state Assembly elections because “we need money, religion and thugs to succeed. We didn’t know that. Today’s political situation is a wretched one.”





MOB FOR HIRE The attack on Mangalore’s Amnesia Pub (above) in 2009 by Bajrang Dal, Sri Ram Sene and others brought the SRS to national prominence; Sene national vice-president Prasad Attavar (below)



Resolving to return to electoral politics after establishing himself more stridently, Muthalik and the Sene launched a series of plans to strengthen its “Hindu” identity. Though the organisation is most strongly rooted in the coastal Karnataka region and pockets of north Karnataka, their activities have not been limited to these regions. On August 24, 2008, in Delhi, a few Sene members barged into an art exhibition organised by SAHMAT an NGO, and destroyed several MF Husain paintings, leaving behind a clutch of pamphlets denouncing Husain’s attempts to hurt Hindu pride. A month later in September, speaking at a public event in Mangalore, Muthalik referred to the Bengaluru bomb blasts that had taken place a week earlier and declared 700 Sene members were being trained to carry out suicide attacks. “We have no more patience. Tit for tat is the only mantra before us to save Hinduism,” he had announced. “If centres of religious importance for Hindus are targeted, twice the number of religious centres of the opposite party will be smashed. If Hindu girls are exploited by the members of other religions, double the number of girls from other religions will be targeted.”



Months later, in January 2009, the Karnataka police arrested nine people in connection with bomb blasts that exploded in Hubli during the state Assembly elections. The kingpin, Nagaraj Jambagi, was a Sene member and a close Muthalik associate — a fact Muthalik himself had admitted to at the time. In July 2009, Jambagi was murdered while serving time in Bagalokot Jail.



During the Mangalore pub attack, minutes before he was arrested for inciting his cadres, Muthalik had asked newspersons gathered at the scene why everybody was making such a big issue of the attacks. “We took steps to protect our Hindu culture and punished girls who were attempting to destroy that tradition by going to pubs. We will not tolerate anybody who steps out of this code of decency,” he said then.



This Muthalik-prescribed code of “decency” is still being enforced in several ways in coastal Karnataka. In Mangalore, Sene cadres walked into a Hindu wedding celebration on July 15, 2009, and assaulted a Muslim guest for attending the event. Muslim boys, in fact, are often beaten up across the region merely for talking to Hindu girls. And they have whipped up anxiety and anger about a derisive concept called “Love Jihad”— a conspiracy allegedly evolved by Muslim boys to convert Hindu girls to Islam through proposals of marriage — through vicious attacks and propaganda.



As part of the investigation then, the TEHELKA journalist posing as an artist declared his forthcoming exhibition would be on positive images of “Love Jihad”. But it did not seem to bother Muthalik — or any of the Sene members TEHELKA met — that their help was being sought to boost sales of paintings on a theme they claimed to ideologically oppose. For a man who frequently talks of how he does not have a single bank account in his name and depends entirely on public contributions, Muthalik’s easy acceptance of the proposal is a telling comment in many ways.





‘Sri Ram Sene has a very good team in place, whatever you want we will deliver. We have a setting for everything. There is only one problem — money problem’



KUMAR, Sri Ram Sene member, Mangalore



Here is how the story unfurled once TEHELKA met with Muthalik.



TEHELKA FIRST met with Muthalik at the Sene office in Hubli. Before laying out the proposal of a preengineered attack on the art exhibition, a cash donation of Rs 10,000 is offered to Muthalik — “Hindutva ke liye hum bhi kuch karen (We want to do our bit for Hindutva).” Muthalik immediately reaches for the money and puts it in his pocket, without even a token refusal.



Over the course of the conversation, a detailed proposal is suggested that could potentially be a mutually beneficial proposition. Muthalik betrays no surprise or shock — not even when the reporter suggests that the art exhibition should be organised in a Muslim-dominated area in Bengaluru for the impact of the attack to be maximised. Muthalik’s only response to the suggestion is — “Yes, we can do it. In Mangalore as well.” The acceptance and the suggestion of Mangalore, another city where the attack can be staged, are instantaneous. Within the next five minutes, Muthalik offers to depute the task of coordination and suggests taking the discussion forward to two Sene leaders — Vasantkumar Bhavani, the President of the Bengaluru city unit, and Prasad Attavar, the Sene vice-president, who is based out of Mangalore.



(Though the conversations are in Hindi, the transcripts have been translated into English here for the purpose of the story.)



TEHELKA: I’ll take leave sir, what I want is to gain popularity and if I get popularity my business will improve. If you say then I…just tell me a time limit… these many boys will be there…this much for advo…meaning that of lawyers…we will not even complain… because that is our understanding… but sir, it is that whatever you say that amount of advance I will leave with you, then I say to you that now it has all come to you, and sir now do the job…



MUTHALIK: Can do it in Mangalore, Bangalore…



TEHELKA: I can get more popularity in the Shivaji Nagar area of Bangalore… because that whole area is theirs…the Muslims. If you give one statement in the press and 10 of your workers reach there…we will shut it down…what is it to us? But at least we will get popularity.



MUTHALIK: Yes, that can be done...



TEHELKA: So sir, just tell me straight up…or tell me to come after two or four days….tell me for certain that ‘This is my expense… you do this much…’ so sir, I’ll complete it and plan it all out…



MUTHALIK: What I’m telling you, our president there…



TEHELKA: of Bangalore?



MUTHALIK: Of Bangalore…he is also very strong…on speaking to him…all three of us — you, me and him — will sit and plan out what is to be done…then we will do it…definitely do it



The hour long conversation is peppered with choice abuses and a vitriolic diatribe against Muslims and their “plans to divide the country”. Love jihad, Muthalik tells TEHELKA, is the Muslims’ way of conquering over Hindus, by increasing their own population. Muslims, he continues, pursue Hindu Brahmin or Jain girls so that their children can inherit their brains and be intellectually sharp to help them in their mission.



According to him, this calculated strategy by Muslims was taking place across the country with increasing frequency. When TEHELKA asks him why Hindu boys were not engaging in a similar counteractivity, Muthalik said the Sri Ram Sene was now inspiring Hindu boys to pursue Muslim girls.





‘I worked in the RSS first in 1996, then the Bajrang Dal. I was in the main team that attacked the Mangalore pub. But my name is not there in the police case, I was never arrested’



SUDHIR PUJARI, Sri Ram Sene member, Mangalore



Over this conversation, TEHELKA repeated its proposal several times — opportunities were given to Muthalik to decline the offer of money. But Muthalik offers to brief other Sene associates, who will play definitive roles in the execution of the plan, and connect them with TEHELKA. The date for the next meeting is fixed and personal phone numbers are exchanged. Muthalik asks TEHELKA to return a week later.



He is categorical that, as the National President of the Sene, he is conscious of the trouble he will be in if he is caught planning details of the operation, so he says he will talk over specifics with his associates Prasad Attavar, Vasanthkumar Bhavani and Jeetesh and then put them on to TEHELKA. Throughout there is no ambiguity that Muthalik heads the chain of command and that the final decisionmaking power rests with him.



DESPITE MUTHALIK’S intervention, connecting with Prasad Attavar, the National Vice-President of Sri Ram Sene, was no easy task. He treats almost everyone with suspicion and consequently never answers any of his mobile phones. Therefore, it took TEHELKA several days to catch up with him. Considered to be a close associate of Muthalik, Attavar is credited with leading the Sene to notoriety in Mangalore. Having been with the Sri Ram Sene since its inception in 2007, Attavar exercises tremendous control over the Sene cadres. In Mangalore, Attavar runs a security agency in partnership with another Sene member. Unlike several others, he is not dependent on the Sene for financial stability. In January 2009, Attavar openly claimed responsibility for the Mangalore pub attack. When another TEHELKA reporter had contacted him for a story at the time, Attavar had even claimed responsibility for planning the attack. He had called the media to the spot himself, he said. Days later, Attavar and 27 others, including Muthalik, were arrested for their role in the pub attack. A week later, when a Mangalore city magistrate granted them bail, Attavar and the others were accorded a hero’s welcome.





PUBLIC LOSS The charred remains of a bus vandalised after Attavar’s arrest in the wake of the pub attack



HATE-MONGERS Muthalik and other Sene members display propaganda material against ‘Love Jihad’

When contact was finally made with Attavar, a Sene cadre called Jeetesh was sent to take TEHELKA to a nondescript hotel in Mangalore for the meeting. A few minutes into the conversation, it became evident that Attavar was evading arrest — a warrant had been issued against him. The police had charged him with executing the orders of an underworld don, Ravi Pujari. Pujari is rumoured to have worked with Mumbai gangster Chhota Rajan, and later with Dawood Ibrahim, before establishing his own empire. Besides having interests in the tourism and hospitality sector, Pujari allegedly also has interests in Karnataka’s real estate industry. As Pujari’s associate, Attavar has been accused of threatening businessmen and builders in Karnataka’s coastal region as part of an extortion racket that is controlled from outside India.



Having been briefed by Muthalik, Attavar is completely aware of the TEHELKA reporter’s proposal from the first moment of conversation. His suggestions therefore are concrete and to the point. He offers a choice of organising the exhibition (and the attack) outside Karnataka as well. “We can do it in Mumbai, Kolkata or Orissa as well,” he says.



When TEHELKA suggests the impact of the planned attack against the artist would be enhanced considerably if an engineered threat could be issued by his associate, Ravi Pujari, Attavar agrees it is doable — thereby confirming his proximity with the don.



A minute later, he talks how the police need to be taken into confidence: they have to be “set”. Additionally, the boys who will participate in the attack have to be from outside Mangalore, he says.



TEHELKA: We don’t have to go to the police, neither do we have to do a case… so if a case is filed it won’t stand because there is no party in front… we people will not identify…



ATTAVAR: That setting with the department I’ll do….





‘I will tell you how much money is needed. It will be like the Mangalore pub attack, even better. You will get full national media coverage, I assure you. I’ll do all the setting for you’



PRASAD ATTAVAR, National Vice-President, Sri Ram Sene



Six days after this meeting with TEHELKA, Attavar was arrested by the Mangalore police, taken to Mangalore Jail and then remanded to judicial custody. He was placed in Bellary Jail — considered to be one of Karnataka’s high-security prisons. Throughout, however, Attavar continued to maintain contact with TEHELKA and TEHELKA managed to meet with Attavar both in the Mangalore and Bellary jails. At the meeting in Mangalore Jail, when TEHELKA asked if Rs 50 lakh would be enough to organise the riots in two different cities, Attavar’s answer is inconclusive. He asks for more time to return with a final figure. “I will calculate the final amount and let you know,” is all he will finally agree to. The discussion revolves around the final amount — there is no opposition to the proposal at all.



PRASAD: What all is to be done…does arrangement for hotel need to be done?



TEHELKA: No that I’ll do…your input will only be the team and the rest…



TEHELKA: We need to create a riot…we have to have violence…50 lakh is being spent on two cities..



PRASAD: In Mangalore …



TEHELKA: Yes about 200 workers should be there…at the time of the exhibition…



PRASAD: Yes…



At Bellary Jail, a mere payment of Rs 2,500 to some wardens and SN Hullur, the Superintendent at Bellary Jail is sufficient to set up a meeting with Attavar in a separate discussion room. (So much for the norms of a high-security jail). At this meeting, Attavar says he has no money and asks the TEHELKA reporter for some money to tide him over. The reporter gives him Rs 3,000. After this meeting in the jail, Attavar frequently texted TEHELKA asking the reporter to call back. Alarmingly, both accessibility and mobile connectivity within a high security prison seemed easy for Attavar. His advocate, Sanjay Solanki later told TEHELKA that Attavar’s access to mobile phones was possible as Superintendent SN Hullur had been handsomely paid. (TEHELKA has not corroborated this independently.)



AFEW DAYS after the meeting with Muthalik, TEHELKA also connected with Vasantkumar Bhavani, the Bengaluru city unit head of the Sri Ram Sene. Bhavani is the Sene’s de facto public relations man. He is fluent in English and Hindi and lives in Bengaluru. Immediately after the pub attacks in Mangalore, Bhavani had travelled from one television studio to another, staunchly defending the Sene’s action and its ideology. In one memorable live interview, when a women’s rights activist challenged the Sene’s ideology by saying alcohol had long been a part of Hindu traditions, Bhavani’s specious rebuttal silenced her completely: “Go ask your grandmother to drink alcohol. I will buy her a drink myself.” The sheer ridiculousness of Bhavani’s arguments coupled with his vehemence made him a hot favourite with most media channels at the time.



A realtor by profession, Bhavani is considerably wealthy and, like Attavar, does not depend on the Sene to back him financially. Ask him for the numerical strength of Sene cadres in Bengaluru and there are no answers forthcoming. “Even Pramod [Muthalik] does not ask me that question. Dealing with numbers is unnecessary. My boys will be in trouble if the police realises our true strength,” he says. (In February this year, when the Sene announced its usual opposition to Valentine’s Day celebrations, the police rounded up 400 men as part of its preventive arrests.)





RECALL FACTOR Sri Ram Sene members deface posters and paintings of MF Husain at an exhibition organised by SAHMAT in Delhi in 2008

Photo: SHAILENDRA PANDEY

A fortnight before TEHELKA met with Bhavani, he had led a Sene protest in Bengaluru against Muthalik’s humiliation. (In an unfortunate incident that mirrored their own intolerant politics, Muthalik’s face had been blackened by members of the Karnataka State Youth Congress during a television debate on Valentine’s Day celebrations. Bhavani and several others had been arrested during the Sene’s counter-protests.)



In his conversation with TEHELKA, the talk revolves cynically around the specifics of the planned attack in Bengaluru and how its impact can best be maximised. Here’s what Bhavani suggests:



BHAVANI: You know Ravindra Kalashetra, right?



TEHELKA: Yes, Yes...



BHAVANI: Behind it is an open stage.



TEHELKA: How many people can that accommodate?



BHAVANI: Two thousand...



TEHELKA: Two thousand... but is that communally sensitive?



BHAVANI: It is also communally sensitive... the market is also close by from there…



TEHELKA: City market?



BHAVANI: City market...





‘I was charged under IPC Section 307, half murder, for the Kasargod clash. I killed two or three people with a sword. They attacked two of our men, so we got two of theirs’



JEETESH, Udupi unit head, Sri Ram Sene



TEHELKA: Yes, there’s a Muslim area there...



BHAVANI: That is why that place is very good for you... the scope there is much better than in Shivaji Nagar because in the close by areas the Muslim population is very high.



TEHELKA: Yes, in city market it is... but the area there is mostly commercial?



BHAVANI: It suits to what you have in mind...



TEHELKA: It suits the profile that we have...



BHAVANI: It suits that better than Shivaji Nagar... Shivaji Nagar is a remote area whereas this is more suitable it suits your purpose.



TEHELKA: If it is done in Shivaji Nagar it will look like there is not much educated class there so why do it there... if it is done in city market.



BHAVANI: This is matching your idea and your concept... because illiterates will not come and watch your gallery... who will watch it are your upper class... middle class.



TEHELKA: Elite class...



BHAVANI: It will mostly be the upper class... so upper class... if you keep it in Shivaji Nagar, who will come and watch it... it will look preplanned to everybody...



TEHELKA: Hmmm...



BHAVANI: If done in Shivaji Nagar... if looked at from a different direction it seems right... but it will not get much publicity...



TEHELKA: Yes people might think... that it is an under-table alliance



BHAVANI: Could look like that….



Having secured an agreement on the venue, a discussion on dates follows. Referring to the calendar on his phone, Bhavani politely asks us for our preference — weekdays or weekends? — before suggesting weekends himself. More people are likely to attend art exhibitions on weekends, he says. Venue and dates out of the way, Bhavani methodically moves on to plan the protest itself. When TEHELKA asks if inaugurating the exhibition by a Muslim community leader or politician will raise the octane of the event and attack, Bhavani not only approves, he has suggestions of his own:



TEHELKA: In this programme, Vasant, I need public beating for sure, because as your trademark is and I want to call a Muslim leader for the inauguration, so some people from the Muslim community will be there... there is Prof Hujra at IIM.



BHAVANI: Why don’t you call Mumtaj Ali...



TEHELKA: Who...



BHAVANI: Mumtaj Ali Khan...



TEHELKA: Who is he?



BHAVANI: The minister of Waqf board... now.



TEHELKA: From Karnataka?



BHAVANI: Yes.



TEHELKA: He will come... How old would Mumtaj Ali be?



TEHELKA: Above 50...



TEHELKA: 50-plus... Is he an MLC or MLA?



BHAVANI: Being an MLC... he is a backdoor entry... he is a minister... Huj committee or Waqf Board...



TEHELKA: Apart from him, wasn’t there another one who became Rail Minister…



BHAVANI: CK Jaffar...



TEHELKA: Jaffar Sharief...



BHAVANI: He is too old now...



Bhavani also asserts that other preparations are necessary as well. Ominously, for instance, an ambulance at the venue:



BHAVANI: Like if you keep Husain’s name itself it will be good... will make it popular.



TEHELKA: No, if we keep Husain, I will not get the ‘mileage’, instead he will get the ‘mileage’...





‘If we can agree on an amount, then I will talk to my boss, Muthalik. He gives us the green signal for action but the screen script is all ready with him. You think about your offer’



VASANTKUMAR BHAVANI, Ram Sene head, Bengaluru



BHAVANI: Mileage will go to him... I cannot give assurance for this... how much damage you will bear... there will be damage... but how much that I cannot guarantee... because our boys are very ferocious boys... they don’t look left or right...



TEHELKA: If it is to be done, it is to be done...



BHAVANI: Done... I cannot avoid them also because they will get annoyed with me then... if the leader is ferocious, the followers will also be ferocious... this much I want to tell you... there will be damage, but how mach I cannot say...



TEHELKA: Can there be public beatings...



VASANT: Can be done... whoever they find there... because our boys do all this also...



TEHELKA: If there is a crowd, they cannot control themselves, right?



BHAVANI: No, usually they can’t...



TEHELKA: Will we have to keep an ambulance ready?



BHAVANI: Absolutely... that can also happen... after all, they are my boys... if they take any task in hand... then... you have to tell them... you have to make them understand... more cases will add on... already there are lots of pending cases... try and control... only target whatever is on display...



TEHELKA: Do damage...



BHAVANI: Do damage... do not touch the people...



TEHELKA: But they usually don’t listen



BHAVANI: I’ll make them understand this much, but I can’t ensure... there is someone or the other... who damage whatever comes in front... such lunatics they are...



TEHELKA: That means I need to keep an ambulance ready in advance... should keep that in mind...



There is further evidence of the Sene’s preparedness and calculated approach to protests and destructive violence. While discussing the aftermath of the attacks, when TEHELKA offers to not file cases against the Sene, Bhavani turns down the suggestion. If cases aren’t filed against the attackers, people will suspect that the attack has been pre-engineered, he says. It doesn’t matter if they are hauled to court, Bhavani reassures. They are prepared to deal with such conditions and TEHELKA would be handed instructions by them on how to deal with the legalities and fallout once the attack has proven successful.



TEHELKA: From our side in this gallery programme... whatever riot happens inside the art gallery, we are not going to register a case... when there is no rival party...



VASANT: You will have to register a case...



(A discussion follows this assertion on how Attavar, Bhavani’s counterpart in the group, suggests a different approach)



TEHELKA: So a case needs to be registered?



VASANT: You will have to file it… if there is a wrongdoing, a case has to be filed...



TEHELKA: Don’t you think it’s going to be very complicated then?



VASANT: It has to be complicated then only the purpose will be solved... once inside the water, whats the point of fearing the depth...



TEHELKA: Ok, whatever you say... but coming to court regularly, standing there... for any man it will be a very difficult task to come 3,000 km to attend the court cases...



VASANT: We will give you a way out of that... once this turns out to be a success, I will sit and explain it to you... what is to done, how it needs to be done...



TEHELKA: Set any of the local lawyers who gets the date extended... will keep on happening…



VASANT: I will tell you... I will explain it to you... I will explain to you what has to be done and how it has to be done...



TEHELKA: Ok.



VASANT: But you have to be mentally prepared...



Minutes later, Bhavani proceeds to discuss the “fees” with TEHELKA.



“Give me a figure so I can take the discussion forward with sir [Muthalik],” Bhavani says. The TEHELKA reporter writes Rs 70 lakh on a sheet of paper and pushes it towards Bhavani. His immediate response is to ask how much has been offered to Attavar, the Sene National vice-president and the pointperson in Mangalore. (Though the figure written by the reporter on paper is not visible on camera, the offer is corroborated on camera in a later conversation with Muthalik.) When he is informed that the same amount was offered to Attavar too, Bhavani dismisses it saying, “Attavar will never settle for this amount.” Bhavani then insists that TEHELKA should also set aside money to pay off the police:



TEHELKA: They told me two lines... separate for organisation (SRS)... separate for the workers... so I said five lakh for the organisation... so they said they will see... on the level of the workers, if there is a case then fair enough, we will give Rs 50,000 to each worker... some will go to him and some can be used in the case... if 10 boys come then five lakh... what he suggested... what your dealings are with the organisation, you discuss with Muthalikji himself... as for the boys... that I will give you... the arrangement with the police... that also I will do... will have to be done...



BHAVANI: The police will also be managed... without that, it cannot be done...



TEHELKA: I agree, so the money is going in three phases... separately for the organisation... separately for the workers... and separately for the police?



BHAVANI: Separately for the police...



Yet another discussion follows on the modes of payment. The TEHELKA reporter asks if the fee for the riot can be paid by cheque instead of cash. Bhavani refuses categorically. The business of outrage obviously cannot be transacted through legal financial instruments.



THE METHODICAL approach with which these Sri Ram Sene functionaries approached TEHELKA’s proposal could be an indication of the organisation’s engagement with similar activities in the past. At the very least, it exposes the Sene’s adroitness in dealing with the law and the police — and the loopholes it slips through whenever it engages in violence.



TEHELKA’s conversations with Sri Ram Sene cadres in Udupi and Mangalore reaffirmed this very strongly. After TEHELKA spoke with Attavar, Jeetesh — the head of the Sene’s Udupi unit — agreed to introduce TEHELKA to Sene cadres who would ultimately execute the attack. Kumar and Sudhir Poojari, two such cadres, spoke freely of their involvement in earlier Sene attacks, including the infamous pub attack on January 24, 2009. All three — Jeetesh, Poojari and Kumar — had evaded police arrest despite having been part of the pub attack. All three had also spent several years with the RSS and Bajrang Dal before joining the Sri Ram Sene.



A minute into the conversation, Kumar and Poojari brag about how they gave the police the slip. Kumar also talks of his involvement in a previous incident that left eight Muslims injured. “They had to be admitted in the hospital,” he says, “after we attacked them.”





SAFFRON GETS PINK Sri Ram Sene members check out the pink undergarments gifted to them as a mark of protest against their attack on women at a Mangalore pub

Photo: KPN

Jeetesh has several similar stories. A day earlier, in his meeting with TEHELKA, Jeetesh talked openly of an incident in 2007 when he and two others had attacked a church where they believed coerced conversions were taking place. According to him, three or four pastors were hospitalised after the attack, while Jeetesh and his cohorts were handed jail terms. A few minutes later, he recounts an even more gruesome incident. Jeetesh, then a resident of Kasargod in Kerala and a member of the Bajrang Dal, was involved in an attack on a mosque. In a calm voice, he tells TEHELKA about how he attacked a maulvi with a sword. The maulvi died and Jeetesh was charged with murder. After four months in jail, he was bailed out, he says. Throughout that period, he says he was supported by the Bajrang Dal with lawyers at hand to handle his bail applications. Once he was released, Jeetesh moved to Udupi. A few years later, when Muthalik started the Sri Ram Sene, he joined him. The conversation constantly hovers around a hatred for Muslims and Christians and their plans to take over the world.



As his comfort level increased, Jeetesh also shared another important piece of information. In 2006, along with 100 others, Jeetesh says he participated in an arms training camp organised by the Sri Ram Sene. The firearms they used at the camp were largely unlicensed, he said, but refused to volunteer any further details.



A day later, he accompanied TEHELKA to meet with Attavar, the Sene vice president, and plan the specifics of the proposed attack in Mangalore.



AFTER THE meetings with Attavar and Bhavani, where they agree to organise attacks in Bengaluru, Mangalore or Mysore, TEHELKA met with Muthalik again. The only issue left to clinch was the amount. While discussions with Attavar (inside Mangalore Jail) had pegged the cost between Rs 50 to 60 lakh, the negotiation with Bhavani had been for Rs 70 lakh. TEHELKA asks Muthalik if these sums are agreeable to him.



TEHELKA: Sir, is it ok if we remain in touch over the phone with Prasadji? Because, sir, I refrain from calling over the phone...



MUTHALIK: Yes ...yes...



TEHELKA: Well with... Prasadji... fine... but I just wanted to confirm with you, maybe Sharmaji won’t appreciate it, but I wanted to have clarity about money... because I was told Rs 60 lakh for three locations.



MUTHALIK: Haaan.



TEHELKA: Rs 60 lakh... it’s ok from your side?



MUTHALIK: Who told you about it?



TEHELKA: Vasantji had told...



MUTHALIK: Yes... yes.



TEHELKA: So I decided to confirm once again...



MUTHALIK: Yes... yes... I can’t tell about the money... it’s their job only they can do it...



As the story goes to press, Attavar and his advocate Sanjay Solanki have continued to be in touch about the modalities and fees for planning the attack. In the last conversation, Solanki told TEHELKA that Attavar’s bail application pending with the Karnataka High Court would be accepted. Solanki categorically mentions that they will try and manage the judicial process and have already committed Rs 1.5 lakh to that process (TEHELKA has not corroborated this independently — this could be a wild claim for all we know). Advocate Solanki also assured TEHELKA that a conversation with Attavar — which would clinch the deal and close on the final terms of payment — would be possible very soon.



Needless to say, TEHELKA did not pursue the discussion

Everybody loves a bad fatwa

Everybody loves a bad fatwa


Everybody loves a bad fatwa. And why not? It fills column space for newpapers; It brings in viewers for Television channels; it plays into the image of Muslims as a backward community for communalists; and it gives activists a chance to reinforce their secular credentials. Never mind that this fatwa will not change the lives of millions of Muslims and text of the fatwa could be not what has been reported or maybe the said fatwa doesn't even exist.
Fatwa is nothing but a religious opinion from a religious scholar to a question asked by a Muslim on a particular situation that he or she may be facing at the time or might face in future and doesn't know what should be an appropriate way to act in light of Islamic teachings. A mufti then issues a fatwa or opinion based on his understanding of the question and Islam. Just as different medical doctors will have a difference of opinion regarding a diagnosis and treatment plan, it is common for different muftis to give different opinion for the same question.
Media circus
Frontpage of The Times of India, Delhi Edition, May 11, 2010
At least once every year, on a slow news day, some enterprising journalist finds a fatwa that will fit the stereotype about Muslims being backward or Muslim scholars being ignorant or out of touch with the real world or all of the above reasons, and will publish a news story based on this 'prized' fatwa. Let's take the example of the fatwa issued by Darul Uloom Deoband that is making the round in news cycles this week.
The fatwa in question was issued more than a month ago and one can ask the question, why is there a sudden interest by the media in this particular fatwa? A fatwa that is only a sentence long has had numerous newspaper column space and hours of airtime devoted to it. The media bosses have decided that it is an important fatwa because it has all the right keywords to keep the attention of readers & viewers, and therefore will keep a flow of revenue coming in.

One has to question the motive of the major media regarding the publicizing of a fatwa. There is more to this than meets the eye when the Indian media that is obsessed with breaking news and exclusives these days picks up a fatwa that was issued more than a month ago. Within 24 hours of this news being flashed on NDTV on May 11th, 2010, all major media networks of India had reported it. And every new report had added information that was not even there. Let's look at the fatwa first.
Sestion number 21031 ((http://darulifta-deoband.org/viewfatwa.jsp?ID=21031) to Darul Ifta (house of fatwas) of Darul Uloom Deoband asked by someone in India states: “Asalamu-Alikum: Can muslim women in india do Govt. or Pvt. Jobs? Shall their salary be Halal or Haram or Prohibited?” Answer published on April 4th, 2010 simply answers it as: “It is unlawful for Muslim women to do job in government or private institutions where men and women work together and women have to talk with [to] men frankly and without veil.”
Headlines
Now let's look at some of the headlines of news reports about this fatwa:
Fatwa against working Muslim women: NDTV
Fatwa to working Muslim women: Don't talk to male colleagues: NDTV
Women's earnings haram, says Deoband: The Times of India [Print edition]
Deoband fatwa: It's illegal for women to work, support family: The Times of India [Online]
Don't talk to male colleagues: Darul Uloom's fatwa to all working women: DNA
Muslim women can't work: Deoband: Samay Live
Darul Uloom says Muslim women can't work in public: India Today
Now, fatwa against working women: Indian Express

Women Working with Men Un-Islamic: Deoband: Outlook

Fatwa against men-women proximity at workplace: Zee News
In case you ever wondered why there isnt a successful supermarket tabloid in India, here is your answer. There is no need for one because major media houses in India do that job very well.

Fatwa-checking
Now let's look at the fatwa again. It doesn't talk about a woman's earnings being haram or unlawful, Islamically speaking. It also not talking about whether women can work or not, rather it is a learned scholar giving his opinion that Islamically it will be unlawful for a Muslim women only if she is in a job that will require her to speak to men "frankly and without veil." I am not sure what mufti sahib meant with the "speaking frankly" phrase, but there is no ruling saying women cannot work or that their earning is haram. This did not stop media houses from publishing news report after news report with sensational headlines that had nothing to do the with the original fatwa.
A simple fact-checking, if Indian media had that system, would have clarified the matter and this fatwa would have remained a non-news. However, this was not to be. Why should anyone bother with minor annoyance when there are pages and airtime to be filled without impunity.
Television channels went a step further and dug up old fatwas dating back to 2005 and 2006 to run on the screens when they were talking about this issue. It is anyone's guess what issues those fatwas displayed on-screen would have dealt with. We can't blame readers and viewers when they see a conspiracy in all this.
Tabassum Khan who is an Assistant Professor of Media and Cultural Studies at the University of California, Riverside argues that the media jumps on these issues because "It further tatters the already tarnished image of the Muslims." And when there is not enough facts to go around they simply add fiction to make it sound more interesting.
Fatwas, good or bad, have only limited public appeal and influence. Sadia Khanam, a journalist with The Eastern Post in Kolkata, says, "I don't encounter many situations where I need to seek the guidance of a fatwa." And maybe it will sound strange to journalists with a very low image of Muslim women, Khanam adds, "It depends on my personal understanding to decide which fatwa can be held correct and followed."
And Sadia is not alone in this, Tabassum Khan has done extensive research on the Muslim youth of New Delhi and she says that "The women paid little attention [to fatwas], but among the young men there were a few who gave importance to these fatwas. But they were isolated and few and far in between in numbers."
So, why are major media houses ready to give up prime space and time for a fatwa that the majority of Muslims pay little attention to? "Mainstream media has no stake in the image of Muslims. They are in the business of enforcing and perpetuating stereotypes. So, if a maulvi works to tatter the already tarnished image, they are the first to give him importance and project his view as the view of the entire community," explains Khan.

Measured response
Darul Uloom Deoband did the right thing by issuing a denial but the damage had already been done. So how should Muslims respond in situations like these? First of all, those who are activists, community leaders, and commentators, and first lines of contact for these journalists who are seeking them for opinions, need to pay more attention to the story. They need to realize that they don't need to respond to all media queries. If they do decide to respond, even if it is going to be along predictable lines, they need to see the source of the story. In this case, it would have been to see the original fatwa.
For half an hour, Shazia Ilmi, Sadia Dehlvi, and Kamal Farooqui debated on this topic on Sagarika Ghose's program "Face The Nation" on CNN-IBN on Wednesday. Strangely, none of them had actually even read the original fatwa. Based on other hearsay news reports, this only served the purpose of keeping untainted the image of Muslims as a monolith community out-of-touch-with-the-modern-world, and women who need to be rescued. Of course, interest of Muslim women is the least of the concerns of the Indian media who are competing for all-important ratings.
One thing is clear that Muslims have no say or control over the media's actions, but that doesn't mean that they have to be passive. Polite but firm emails should be sent to reporters and their editors. Muslim community organizations should send a letter on their official letter-heads to the editors and seek meetings with the editorial staff. In these meetings, examples of serious lapses by media when reporting on issues related to Muslims should be brought to their attention.

Media is not a one-way street and they don't exist in vacuum. In this day and age, readers and viewers have much more power than anyone would like to acknowledge. This power should be used to demand correct and factual coverage. At the same time Muslims need to take these kinds of episodes as opportunity to engage with their non-Muslim colleagues and friends to explain Islam and Muslim practices.
Muslim religious leadership is not above criticism but they need to be engaged to develop a new kind of thinking that takes what Islam has to offer and apply it to the modern world. Religious scholars need to offer solutions to the problems associated with modern life without dragging the whole community to a medieval view of the religion and the world. For this to happen both university-educated and madrasa-educated Muslims need to interact and engage each other.

As Prof. Tabassum Khan rightly states, "It is important for middle-class Muslims to become more vocal and not let uninformed and biased opinions be representative of the community."
http://twocircles.net/2010may13/everybody_loves_bad_fatwa.html