Blasphemy

Romair

I think the Muslims are going through an identity crisis. Their lack of fundamentals, such as economic prosperity and helplessness in international affairs, while others, the West, China, India, who are galloping forward, have made the Muslims turn inwards. They are trying to find solace in their religion. In face of the other advancing civilizations, they cling more and more to their religion to find solace and protection from the reality of their misery. This sharp division between them and the rest of the world has become even more acute after 9/11.

This turning inwards to their religion for solace becomes dangerous when the educated and the middleclass see not much of an issue with the fanatics and the fundamentalists of their co-religionists. I see all around well-meaning Muslim men and women who have taken a u-turn, from out-going and liberal to praying five times and covering their heads. This is a dangerous sign, a trend that can bring those blinded by faith to power in Muslim countries with their extremely narrow interpretation of religion and social behavior. How to join the twentyfirst century and look forward unfettered by religion is the greatest challenge faced by the Muslims today. Unless there is economic freedom, prosperity and a hope for the future, the inwardness and clinging to the religion will doom the Muslims. Ruled by the fundamentalists, they will be relegated to the bottom of the totem pole for a long time to come, subject to manipulation and coercion by the rest of the world that has moved forward.

shiraz

re: the petition…check out other petitions…you need to revise this…so when the petitioner signs it goes not only to the president but simultaneously to others … you can select the various world bodies, human rights organizations, uno, pak ambassadors in the west, foreign office, etc…the idea is to make a roar…as I wrote omar…drops make oceans…and once you have revised it…post the link here on unplugged…and on other sites…

omar

``... and then there is someone who has come up with an idea of a petition on this !! ...``

guilty as charged!

...and to a degree i do share your skepticism...but one need not be a hard-nosed journo to understand that drops make oceans (and waves too)...every sane and willing person needs to do his/her bit to bring down this suffocating edifice that would otherwise spell doom...and in this collective effort…even a seemingly ineffective petition would count…

…personally…i have another simplistic and perhaps highly impractical solution for all that ails the country….end the army occupation of the country and let the chips falls where they may…only then any effective and far reaching civilian rebuilding process will begin…but as the poet said kaun jeeta hay teri zoolf kay sir honay tuk...and this minor poet learns not;)

rgds,

t

fuzair #64: ``if you are not with them, you are against them and they will hunt you down.``

I am not quite sure whether I fully agree with you or disagree with you, on this one. After all, the phrase, ``with us or against us`` was not coined by a political Islamic leader. Political Islam has its issues. Actually, the whole concept maybe an issue. But that doesn`t mean what it is, or has been, replacing was a smaller issue (as your argument states it to be).

In fact, the only thing that is holding political Islam back is lack of democracy. The moment real democracy arrives in Muslimistan, I think religious political parties will start winning big. This is generally true for poor countries, including India.

If something thrives in a democracy (politcal Islam) and something thrives in dictatorship (political secularism in Islamic countries), then one has to look at the issues in much more detail, then claiming the later to be inherently a better option than the former. If what you say is true, then political Islam should thrive in a dictatorship in Algeria, while the secularist generals should thrive in a democracy. Not the other way around. Same scenario in Iraq, and Turkey, and Iran and Egypt, and maybe someday in Pakistan, also.

You and I have prospered in political secularist systems. Hence we are bound to be biased in its favor. But the fact that political Islam appeals to the poorest of these countries, and thrives under a free democratic system, should be an indication that the majority was not, ``left alone`` by political secularism. After all, it did give political secularism a chance for decades. It is only now that it is turning to other options, like political Islam.

I think political Islam, is in its ascendency, in the Muslim world. Iraq being its next frontier (ironically with the unintentioned insistence of the USA). Should an Ayatollah rule a country. I don`t think so. But apparently, the citizens of the country consider him a better option than secular Saddam. Should Qazi Hussain rule Pakistan. I don`t think so. But there is a possibility that someday people of Pakistan may consider him a better option than more secular Benazir.

The Americans are now caught in a wierd dilemma. They allegedly want to introduce, ``democracy`` in the Muslim world. However, they now know fully well, from their Iraq experience, that democracy will result in anti-USA religious govts. being elected. Due to this, I wouldn`t be surprised if they may give up on, ``introducing`` democracy in these countries, soon.

What the Americans should do is to accept the ground realities, and try to engage with the religious parties in places like Iran, Iraq, Algeria etc. Rather than trying to discredit and destroy them. The secularists in Pakistan should accept these ground realities, also. Otherwise, I think they will fighting a politically losing battle soon in Pakistan. Much like the Americans are in the Middle East......

The more the secularists try to define the political debate along the lines of religion (in or out of politics), the more they are playing into the hands of the Islamists, because the Islamists will win that debate (actually they may not win the actual verbal debate, but they will win the elections based on it).

Ahmadzai #61,

``You have your answer from Kaurasack at # 44.``

I do ? How ? This is what he had written :

``Ahmadzai,

Indians and so am I are much more critical of India , but what Farzana writes is
rubbish, a baseless biased tantrum under the cloak of liberal agenda. It does more
harm to IMs` cause and image than good.``

How does this correlate to Farzana being hated since she is a dissenting Muslim ?
Surely Kaurasach can think that what she writes is rubbish and actually hurts
the cause of the Indian Muslim - that would be irrespective of her own religious
sensibilities.

In any case, it makes little sense to compare this with the people I mentioned,
where the readership runs into many millions.

It is the time to take solid steps to get rid of Mullahs in Pakistan.
I feel that there are a lot of liberal Pakistanis living all over the world. But they express their view only limited to their certain community consisting of like minded people. Chowk is a typical example of such a situation.

I think it is the time for all the liberals to step forward and try to spread the message. The appropriate way may be writing articles in newspapers, magazines etc. Imagine, how many chowkies can write something really good. Suppose, one article per month by each chowkie writer in some urdu newspaper. Imagine the amount of output we can produce. And in my opinion, writing in urdu newspapers is more important as it is the easiest way to convey the message to a common man.

#66 by temporal on April 14, 2004 8:26am PT

temporal

you will need to email me at arthurshiraz@yahoo.com because I have a few questions about what you proposed :)

better yet call me so I can give you a hug - on the phone ofcourse :)

Thanks

p.s. Romair what do you think of the Pen painting on the secularize pakistan movement`s website?

godot
``Their lack of fundamentals, such as economic prosperity and helplessness in international affairs, while others, the West, China, India, who are galloping forward, have made the Muslims turn inwards. ``

please explain..if the rest of the world were not ``galloping forward``, would the muslim be better off? in what way?

#38 plats8

Without a doubt M. J. Akbar is the leading political journalist in India. I would say his columns are must-read for anyone trying to get a handle on india. Farzana-ji has every right to say whatever comes to her mind, but please do not confuse her emotional ramblings with true commentary or analysis.


Here are Akbar`s latest outputs -- you can find them in most major indian papers and in his own publication - The Asian Age.

http://www.asianage.com

---

A green vote ripens
- By M.J. Akbar



1927 is chiefly remembered today for black-flag demonstrations by the Congress against a Commission led by a lawyer, Sir John Simon, which had come to India in the process of reviewing the controversial Government of India Act of 1919 which, among other things, gave separate representation to all three kinds of Christians (Indian, Anglo-Indian and European) and established the principle of ‘diarchy’, or division of power between communities. But it was a year of much excitement on various fronts. FICCI opened with 27 chambers of commerce and industry, forged by giants like G.D. Birla, Purshottamdas Thakurdas, Dinshaw Petit, Kasturbhai Lalbhai, M.C.T. Muttiah Chettiar. Commercial radio went on the air on 23 July through the Indian Broadcasting Company’s Mumbai service (typical of media, it folded up in 1930). One Indian, a Bengali naturally, Sharat Roy, reached the Arctic. Another, a South Indian naturally, Y. Subba Row discovered phosphocreatine at Harvard. (Don’t ask me what it means.) Madan Theatres became the first cinema chain with 85 halls and an American, Katherine Mayo, published Mother India which Gandhi famously dismissed as a drain inspector’s report. In December, the three memorable patriots, Ashfaqullah, Ram Prasad Bismil and Rajendra Lahiri were hanged for their part in the Kakori conspiracy case.

One of the most significant events that year was the introduction, on 1 February, of the Child Marriages Restraint Bill in the Legislative Assembly by Rai Sahib Haridas Sarda. It sought to prohibit the marriage of girls below 12 and boys below 15. Social legislation was in the air: women were enfranchised in the Central Provinces, and given the right to stand for elections in Punjab, Mumbai, Chennai and Assam. There was a predictable avalanche of protest from fundamentalists of all hues. The traditional Muslim leadership was in the forefront. Their call was familiar: Islam was in danger! A fatwa was signed by 74 leading ulema and 72,725 Muslims signed 707 petitions against the bill. But there was one Muslim leader in the Assembly who was not going to be bullied by this extreme. His name was Mohammad Ali Jinnah. Defending the Sarda Bill in the House, Jinnah said:

I cannot believe that there can be a divine sanction for such evil practices as are prevailing, and that we should, for a single minute, give our sanction to the continuance of these evil practices any longer. How can there be such a divine sanction to this cruel, horrible, disgraceful, inhuman practice that is prevailing in India?

He understood the power of orthodoxy, and appreciated that they might have their reasons for what they were doing. But, matching their passion with his own, he asked:

But are we going to be dragged down by this section for whom we have respect, whose feelings we appreciate, whose sentiments we regard; are we to be dragged down and are we to be prevented in the march of progress? In the name of humanity, I ask you.

More, and this is important:

And if we are going to allow ourselves to be influenced by the public opinion that can be created in the name of religion, when we know that religion has nothing whatsoever to do with the matter — I think we must have the courage to say: ``No, we are not going to be frightened by that``.

Jinnah may have become a secessionist by 1947, but he was never a fundamentalist. What he said some 75 years ago required conviction and courage, and remains relevant. Reform in a sense is as constant as form: changing mores will always attempt to alter jealously and zealously guarded tradition. Indian Muslims faced such a conflict in the second half of the 1980s when a Supreme Court judgment giving relief to an ageing woman from Bhopal, Shah Bano, became the line behind which conservative forces within the Muslim community took a stand. They argued that the Supreme Court of India, and by extension Parliament, had no right to interfere in any personal law of the Muslims.

This stand of the Indian conservatives had no particular religious merit. This is evident from the attitude of Muslim law to theft. The Holy Quran is very specific about theft. Verse 38 of Surah 5 (Al Maidah) says: ``As to the thief, male or female, cut off his or her hands: a punishment by way of example, from Allah, for their crime; and Allah is Exalted in Power, full of Wisdom.``

Such a relationship between crime and punishment was not unusual for its age. Thieves were crucified during the time of Christ and you could be hanged in Britain for stealing a sheep as late as in the 18th century. But even the fact that this verse is from the Quran has not prevented Muslim jurisprudence from softening the punishment for theft. There is therefore no validity, as Jinnah implied, in taking a rigid line on social legislation like child marriage and alimony: the law moves with the spirit of the time and the Quran always reinforces the quality of mercy in its verses. Fundamentalists who provoke passions with the cry that Islam is in danger when legislation is conceived to help women are not pro-Quran; they are merely anti-women. This is all the more reprehensible since Islam ended practices like the killing of the girl child and attempted to eliminate the enormous injustices done to women at the time when the Quran was revealed. Fundamentalists are a dangerous law unto themselves.

The Shah Bano case was a touchstone; and arguably the decline of the Congress began with the mistake made when the Supreme Court ruling was reversed under pressure from the fundamentalists, who used exactly the same tactics as had been used at the time of the Sarda Bill. The man who spoke up for reform in the Shah Bano controversy was a star on the treasury benches when Rajiv Gandhi was Prime Minister: Arif Mohammad Khan. A voluble advocate on the fundamentalist side was Syed Shahabuddin.

More than fifteen years after that decisive moment, Arif Khan has been driven away from the Congress and the fundamentalist Shahabuddin welcomed into it.

This is curious for at least two reasons. First, although Mrs Sonia Gandhi was not directly involved in politics, she did have a view on the Shah Bano case, and she was convinced that her husband was making a mistake by submitting to fundamentalists. Perhaps the answer is that she was an individual then and a politician now.

The irony is that compromise with extremists is poor politics as well. One of the slow but sure changes that is taking place in Indian politics is the maturing of the Muslim mood. The sense of helplessness in the 1950s turned into severe insecurity as riots intensified in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. Gujarat has not become what it has overnight: for more than a decade till the end of the 80s Ahmedabad was the scene of a daily haemorrhage of communal blood while Congress chief ministers looked helplessly away. Little has been more savage than the Bhagalpur riots that erupted in the last days of Rajiv Gandhi’s tenure; or more pernicious than the manner in which Moradabad and Meerut was handled by Congress governments in UP. This insecurity was multiplied in the inflammatory wars let loose by fundamentalists in the Shah Bano controversy, and then answered by their counterparts in the Ram Janmabhoomi movement. The destruction of the Babri mosque at Ayodhya in 1992 and the subsequent riots constituted the nadir.

But that tragedy became a wake-up call against the dangers of political religiosity. Change is slow and therefore imperceptible except to those who are changing, or to a sympathetic and acute outsider. Politicians who deposit their political fortunes in vote banks are neither sympathetic nor acute. But there was startling evidence of this change only recently, when Muslims in Uttar Pradesh laughed away a typical vote-bank tactic from Mulayam Singh Yadav, who offered them a break from work to say their prayers. (Some extreme provincial governments in Pakistan have made such breaks official so that no believer has the excuse not to pray.) A decade ago such a gesture might have been welcomed; today, clerics lead the way in laughing it off.

The one thing that I can say with certainty about the Muslim vote in the coming election is that there is an almost compulsive desire to reject any party that treats Muslims with patronising promises. The days when the Indian Muslim vote could be collected with beads and mirrors by the heroic conquistador are over. They have understood the power of democracy, and are enjoying it. Their vote will split, coolly, unemotionally, and go to the claimant with the best exchange rate. It will vary not only from state to state, but also from region to region within a state. In Andhra Pradesh for instance, the Muslims of Telangana could happily vote for separatists while Muslims of the coastal belt punch their machines for Chandrababu Naidu. In Uttar Pradesh, they will weigh the merits of candidates as much as parties, with their vote being split in four directions. Mulayam Singh Yadav is still likely to get the maximum share, but he is not getting exclusive rights. A substantial section of Lucknow’s Muslims will vote for Atal Behari Vajpayee. The Muslims of Akbarpur will vote by and large for Mayawati. A similar percentage of Muslims in Amethi will vote for Rahul Gandhi.

Since 1952, the past — partition, or riots, or Ayodhya — has shaped the Muslim vote, for understandable reasons. This is the first time that a substantial number of Muslims will vote for the future.

That is not change; that is sea-change.

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#53 by ijaz_gul

in india, with your demostrated ``strategic accumen``, you could have been the defense minister (like george), and you would not need a weird name like ijaz gul either, you could have used some nice name from one of the apostles ;-)

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Romair:
``In fact, the only thing that is holding political Islam back is lack of democracy. The moment real democracy arrives in Muslimistan, I think religious political parties will start winning big. This is generally true for poor countries, including India:
Wrong about India! I am not aware of any religious party with any significant support in India. I have pointed out before that the BJP is NOT a religious party. It is instead a party which plays the politics of reigious identity, much like Jinnah did with the Muslim League. There is a big difference between a communal party, which the BJP is, and a religious party. As far as I know the BJP has no religious agenda, it never talks about laws based on Manu Samriti or any other Hindu scriptures. It does not talk about bringing back the caste system, the Sati system, the rights of Hindus to marry as many times as they want and to repeal the divorce laws which are against the Hindu concept of marriage. It does play the hindu identity card when it comes to Babri masjid or the revision of Indian history to suit its agenda but that has got nothing to do with the hindu religion. Not being a religious party does not make it less dangerous than a party with a religious agenda, but let us not call a spade a shovel.
Incidentally, I have always wondered what exactly do you not like in secularism. Solitude in his post#63 has polstulated what might be considered an extreme version of secularism. Could you please indicate which of those specific clauses do you object to? That would help me and others understand your perspective. Thanks.

Godot:
``Actually, a better example is Algeria, another Muslim country...look what happened there...Pakistan needs to learn that lesson well...and quick.``
Not really! The military in Algeria, as well as in Turkey, is completely free of Islamists, which is not true of the Pakistani army. Even Musharraf, though not an islamist, is a moderate muslim who, when push comes to shove, has and will choose islamist parties over the secularist ones. A better parallel might be Egypt but even there I am not sure of the religious inclinations of the army leadership.

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godot
//...This turning inwards to their religion for solace becomes dangerous when the educated and the middleclass see not much of an issue with the fanatics and the fundamentalists of their co-religionists...//

It is dangerous indeed. But this is not because West, Chinese and whoever else are ``galloping ahead``. That`s just a convenient excuse. Even if nobody gallops ahead - muslims would keep doing what they are doing now.

I think the problem lies deep inside the community and group-pshyche. There is just too much of ``we-are-vicitms`` mentality. Everything is somebody else`s fault - West, Jews, chinese, hindus ...

There are also bizzare religious-cultural ideosyncracies among muslims. No intellecutal traditions of introspection and course correction. There is just too much emphasis on religion and on koran ..... and a completely irrational resistance towards modernity in general. Modern Education has never been favored in most muslim communities. Minds are closed ... muslims learn nothing and forget nothing - atleast that`s how it appears to an outside observer.

It is dangerous indeed.

Saminasha # 4

(What groups in Pakistan work in these issues? If anyone knows of the names of these orgs, please post them here so that Pak-Ams can send letters to the appropriate officials in a unified manner)

You may like to begin with Pak Army to change its Motto from ``Jihad for God`` to ``Defence of Pakistan borders``.