THE RELENTLESS MARCH OF DOGMA-JP Sharma

Commenting on the extraordinary development of a religious institution ( Lal Masjid and its Jamia Hafsa seminary) in Pakistan’s capital city seeking to order the local populace to observe the Islamic mores of conduct and morality, Pakistani human rights activist I A Rehman highlighted (Dawn 5 April 2007) the basic problem with which rulers of Pakistan have been trying to grapple ever since the creation of the state.

“Within yards of the avenue in the capital where the concrete symbols of all the organs of the state are guarded by large contingents of gendarmerie, some lathi-wielding female students take the law into their hands, and announce their assumption of authority to detain and punish the ‘sinners’, and a pathetic-looking state apparatus sues for forgiveness. This is Pakistan after seven years of stability, economic progress, genuine democracy, suppression of obscurantism and enlightened moderation…”

Rehman asserts that the development is only yet another stage in the evolution of the Theory of Two Sovereignties which has been gradually gathering strength in Pakistan. According to Rehman the Theory postulates that “every Pakistani Muslim has a right and a duty to bring his fellow-beings under a regime he thinks his belief prescribes even if this involves a defiance of the state-made (that is, man-made) laws and rules”.

GENESIS OF THE PROBLEM

Rehman argues that the seeds of the problem were contained in the politics which led to the creation of Pakistan. The demand for a separate homeland for the Muslims of India was plainly based on religion. The leaders who whipped up communal frenzy to gather support for their project did not spend much time elaborating the constitutional features of the new country they were trying to create. Most of the slogans raised during the 1945-46 elections explained the idea of Pakistan only in religious terms. Throughout its history the use of highly emotive Islamic slogans (e,g, Pakistan ka matlab kya; La Ilah Illillah ) by the religion based parties/groups for mobilizing the faithful has been a constant feature of politics in Pakistan.
Jinnah was by no means a staunch Muslim. It appears that having used the appeal of Islam for securing support of his co-religionists, he quickly realized the dangers of creating an Islam dominated state and sought to put the new state on a safer course with his famous Constituent Assembly speech of August 11, 1947, declaring that all citizens of Pakistan will be equal regardless of their religious affiliation. Jinnah did not live long enough to steer Pakistan in its early years. Most Pakistanis paid homage to Jinnah as the Father of the Nation but Jinnah’s lone speech, which went completely against the tenor of the Pakistan movement stood little chance of finding acceptance by the large body of the fired up soldiers of Islam. The Objectives Resolution passed by the Constituent Assembly in March 1949 sought to please the Islamists by declaring that “principles of democracy, freedom, equality, tolerance and social justice as enunciated by Islam” shall be fully observed and ..” the Muslims shall be enabled to order their lives in the individual and collective spheres in accordance with the teachings and requirements of the Holy Quran and the Sunnah”. The Resolution simultaneously sought to assure the minorities that everyone
“.. shall be guaranteed fundamental rights including equality of status, of opportunity and before law, social, economic and political justice, and freedom of thought, expression, belief, faith, worship and association, subject to law and public morality; and
“… adequate provision shall be made for the minorities to profess and practice their religions and develop their cultures;” and,.
“….. adequate provision shall be made to safeguard the legitimate interests of minorities and backward and depressed classes;..”
THE DILEMMA OF CONSTITUTION MAKERS
The Objectives Resolution aptly illustrates the dilemma faced by the constitution makers of Pakistan. Produced by politicians still swearing loyalty to the departed Jinnah, and possibly not to wanting to upset the western progenitors of Pakistan, the Resolution attempted to reconcile the utterly contradictory demands of Islam and secularism although the language used made the primacy of Islam quite apparent. In actual practice, however, Islam unquestionably predominated and the provisions in favour of the minorities remained only pious, ornamental, paper declarations.
WHAT THE MINORITIES ACTUALLY GOT
A direct consequence of the overarching position accorded to Islam was the power and prestige accruing to those who could authoritatively spell out the "teachings and requirements of Islam as set out in the Holy Quran and the Sunnah;” Experts in the Islamic field, the ulema, were in plentiful supply and lost no opportunity of practising their art. To press for the observance of Islamic injunctions in matters of governance, the Ulema of different schools organized themselves into political groupings with their respective agenda. Prominent among such parties were the Jamaat-e-Islami (led by Maulana Abul Ala Maududi, widely regarded as the greatest modern ideologue of Islamic fundamentalism), the Jamiat-ul- Ulema Islam, (JUI) led by Mufti Mahmood, representing ulema of the Deobandi school, and Jamiat-ul Ulema Pakistan (JUP) representing the Barelvi School of ulemas. There were some minor religious parties also.
HINDU-SIKHS
Even though Pakistan was not formally declared an Islamic state until 1956, Islamism was on the march right from the beginning. Islam does not look kindly on dissent and treats unbelievers harshly. The passions roused by the Partition and the widespread violence and misery that followed in its wake naturally took their toll on the Hindu-Sikh minorities who could find safety of life, liberty and honour only beyond the borders of Pakistan. The Population of Hindus and Sikhs estimated to range around 15-25% in 1947 fell quickly coming down to about 1.5% by the 1990’s.
CHRISTIANS
Christians had a relatively comfortable time in Pakistan’s early years. This was due to several factors. Christians of Punjab and Sind had vigorously supported the demand for Pakistan. Christian journalists like Pothan Joseph had been particularly helpful to the Muslim League. The influence of Pakistan’s western benefactors must have also counted. Again, Islam regards Christians and Jews as ahle-kitab (people of the Book) and places them in a class higher than the unbelievers.
With the growth of pro-Palestine and anti-American feelings in Pakistan the local Christian community also started feeling the heat. But it was the notorious blasphemy laws enacted under Zia-ul-Haq regime that made the life of Christians miserable. Christians and churches too became targets of attack. As the fundamentalist organizations gathered strength such attacks became more frequent..
AHMADIS
It was not only the religious minorities that were subjected to persecution. Minority sects among the Muslims too became victims of the puritan zealots. The first such group to suffer were the Qadianis or Ahmedis. Founded by Mirza Ghulam Ahmed of Qadian (a small town in Gurdaspur district of Indian Punjab) in 1889, the sect propagated a milder version of Islam and won many adherents from the ranks of educated Muslims. Pakistan’s first Foreign Minister Zafarullah Khan and Nobel Laureate Professor Abdus Salam were both Ahmadis as also were many of Pakistan’s 1965 war heroes. In 1953 a fundamentalist group called Majlis-e-Ahrar-e-Islam raised the demand that Ahmadis be declared to be non-Muslims as they believed in the Prophethood of Mirza Ghulam Ahmed. Other Mullahs led by Jamat-e-Islami’s Maulana Abul Ala Maududi supported the demand. Fierce anti-Qadiani riots broke out in Lahore in which could be quelled only after the declaration of Martial Law. The Mullas however kept their agitation alive and there were countrywide anti Ahmadi riots in 1974. P M Z A Bhutto who led the PPP government, bought peace by enacting a law declaring Ahmadis as Non Muslims. More stringent anti Ahmadi laws were enacted under Zia ul Haq’s Islamization programme.
SHIAS
Hostility between the Sunnis and the Shias, the two major sects of Muslims, originating with the dispute regarding the succession after the death of Prophet Mohammed had been continuing throughout Islamic history. With Khomeini’s successful revolution in Shiite Iran in 1979 the Shia Sunni rivalry received a big boost. Sunni dominated Pakistan, where Saudi Arabia was a big player, became the theatre where the policies of the patrons of the two sides led to persistent violent sectarian clashes. The Shias suffered not only because they were in a weak minority but also because of the blatantly partisan attitude of the Pakistan government
DISPENSATION OF JUSTICE
IA Rehman’s article vividly describes the situation obtaining in Pakistan after the enactment of the blasphemy laws;
”During the latter half of the eighties a new idea for enforcing amr-bil-ma’aroof wa nahi-anil-munkir was introduced to Pakistan’s conservative lobby after the insertion of the blasphemy provision into the Penal Code. According to the groups dominant in Pakistan, apostasy is punishable with death and any Muslim is supposed to be free to act as the prosecutor, the judge and the executioner although no law permits this. This view was confirmed when a judge reprimanded a person for only accusing a man of blasphemy and not killing him.”The case of a non-Muslim does not fall in the category of apostasy and yet it has been assumed that a Pakistani Muslim has a right to execute a non-Muslim as well as a fellow Muslim by declaring him guilty of blasphemy. The state has been guilty of criminal inaction and silence over the actions taken by individuals under cover of belief. Zafar Iqbal died in jail in circumstances that suggested murder, the killer of Naimat Ahmar was lionised in prison, a blasphemy accused was killed in a Lahore prison, another was lynched by a mob in Gujranwala, and a third was killed by the policeman who was supposed to protect the wretch from the mob and take him to a lock-up……”
PROGRESSIVE RISE IN THE INFLUENCE OF ISLAM IN JUDICIAL SYSTEM
During the 1950’s the Constitution attached comparatively greater weight to protection of people’s fundamental rights as against the requirement of no law being repugnant to Islam. As the years went by the Islamic sentiment kept getting strengthened. An important step in the modification of the judicial system was the setting up of the Council of Islamic Ideology which was authorized to decide whether any law was repugnant to Islam and to recommend corrective measures. Zia-ul Haq lifted the movement to a higher level by setting up Sharia Courts although his plan to enact the 9th Amendment which sought to make the injunctions of Islam the supreme law of the land and source of guidance for legislation and policy making could not be put into practice before his death. Yet another attempt to introduce amr- bil- ma’aroof wa nahi- anil- munkir (the authority to prescribe what is right and to forbid what is wrong) into the Constitution was made in 1998 by the Islamist democratically elected Prime Minister Nawaz Sharief while another Islamist, Rafiq Tarar ,was holding the office of the President of Pakistan. Commanding a huge majority in the National Assembly, Nawaz Sharief could get the 15th Amendment Bill passed by the Lower House but the Senate rejected the Bill. The MMA led NWFP government has been trying to introduce the same laws by its proposed HASBA Bill.

RELENTLESS MARCH OF DOGMA –II

Current reports in the English press in Pakistan reflect considerable concern over the growing Talibanization of Pakistan. In its editorial of 25 May 2007 The Daily Times lamented the people’s failure to realize that Pakistan is losing territory to the Talibanization wave which having won the Tribal areas is now threatening the settled areas and even Islamabad. Blaming the military for nurturing the Taliban in pursuit of their policy of “strategic depth” the editorial observes ..
“ Much before “strategic depth” came to grief, these military leaders allowed the city of Karachi to be taken over repeatedly by the local “Taliban” trained in the seminaries there. Pakistan could not “deal” with the Taliban; it could only surrender to them. The seminaries that trained the Taliban leaders of Kandahar and prepared their minds were in Pakistan.”

PERSECUTION FOR BELIEF

The worry over the impending Talibanization seems to be restricted to the liberal segments of the Pakistani “civil society” who wish to preserve their available freedoms in mundane matters of dress, appearance, eating, drinking, entertainment or the other innocent pleasures of life. It is not known how numerically large this segment is or how strong is their commitment to the cause of liberalism. There are of course some well known fearless crusaders for human rights and freedoms but they seem to be in a microscopic minority.

The Pakistani press and political leadership routinely seek to convince the world that except for the Mullahs, Pakistani people are by and large secular and broadminded in their outlook as evidenced by the fact that the religion based parties have never achieved any significant success in any election. Equally common is the prescription of democracy to meet the looming Talibanization threat. Both these facile propositions seem to proceed from the desire to avoid a discussion of the real cause perhaps because that would involve treading on dangerous ground. The stark truth is that irrespective of the character of the government, legislation in Pakistan on matters of faith has moved only in one direction--- becoming more and more harsh and oppressive for those who happened to subscribe to beliefs other than those approved by the dominant majority. Appropriation by the Islamic vigilantes of the authority to enforce the sharia or to punish the errant Muslims for acts deemed to be forbidden by Islam is only a higher stage in the progression which started with the Objectives Resolution, led to the enactment of blasphemy laws, setting up of Sharia courts and the growing clout of the devout clerics and their followers.

RELIGION RELATED OFFENCES AND ATTITUDES OF THE JUDICIARY

Besides the constitutional changes declaring Pakistan to be an Islamic State, Islam being declared as the state religion, debarring members of the minority communities from holding high offices etc. many new laws were put on the statute book which in effect negated the so called guarantees to minorities and resulted in their persecution for their beliefs and practices. The most glaring examples of such laws are the provisions in the Pakistan Penal Code dealing with “Offences relating to religion” viz. sections 295-B (Defiling ,etc. of copy of Holy Quran ), 295-C ( Use of derogatory remarks etc. in respect of the Holy Prophet) , 298-A (Use of derogatory remarks, etc. in respect of holy personages ), 298-B (Misuse of epithet, descriptions and titles, etc. reserved for certain holy personages or places), and 298 –C (Person of Qadiani group, etc, calling himself a Muslim or preaching or propagating his faith). While sections 295-B, 295-C and 298-A are of general applicability, sections 298-B, 298-C are specifically applicable to Ahmadis/Lahoris. Anybody accused of having committed any of the offences dealt with in the above sections can be arrested without warrant and held without bail. Blaspheming the Prophet carries an obligatory death sentence. The vast sweep of the offences makes accusation quite easy and defending against accusation extremely difficult. Section 298-C for example prescribes that “ Any person of the Qadiani ….. who directly or indirectly, poses himself as a Muslim, or calls, or refers to, his faith as Islam, …… or in any manner whatsoever outrages the religious feelings of Muslims….…shall be punished...”

The Islamic fervour is shared by many judges and is reflected in their judgments. In 2000, a judge of the Lahore High Court is reported to have publicly stated that anyone accused of blasphemy should be killed on the spot by Muslims as a religious obligation and that there was no need for any legal proceedings in such cases.(The statement was later reportedly retracted)

THE SUPRA LEGAL ZEALOTS

The situation is compounded by the courts and defence lawyers being threatened by Muslim zealots. In fact a High Court Judge who courageously acquitted two Christians accused of blasphemy ended up being assassinated. For those accused of blasphemy, acquittal by court is not the end of the story. Mullahs are quick to issue fatwas enjoining the killing of alleged blasphemers even after their acquittal by courts. And to cap it all the state refuses to interfere. According to The Daily Times (27 May 2007) --..

“ …..The man who scared everyone off the Sangla Hill crime is Lahore’s most powerful cleric and the government literally whimpers obsequiously when confronting him. In Karachi, the judge who threw a number of Shia in jail for possessing a classical account of their imams, could have been beaten up by the clergy waiting outside if he had let them go. Blasphemy is no vent for private grievances; it is a crime of a religious state that no ruler has the guts to eliminate…”
CAN DEMOCRACY BE THE SOLUTION
While the military is rightly blamed for being largely responsible for the present situation it does not appear that restoration of democracy will bring secularism or at least arrest the trend towards Talibanization. Leaving aside the chaotic period 1949-58 during which the bureaucrats ruled the country under a democratic façade, Pakistan has had a few spells of democracy--- normal democracy under ZA Bhutto (1972-77): and limited democracy (with military oversight) under Benazir Bhutto (1988-90) and (1993-96) and Nawaz Sharief (1990-93) and (1997-99). None of these democratically elected leaders could be accused of having promoted secularism or done anything to check the propagation of hate. During the ZA Bhutto watch the Ahmadis were legally declared non-Muslims: Benazir Bhutto presided over the creation of the Taliban: and Nawaz Sharief (in addition to having the Supreme Court stormed by his goons) almost succeeded with his 15th Amendment of the Constitution seeking to make the Holy Quran and Sunnah the supreme law of the land and directing the government to enforce amr bil ma’roof wa nahi anil munkar (prescribing what is right and forbidding what is wrong).

NO MORE THE LUNATIC FRINGE

Two unmistakable and constant features of Pakistan’s polity have been---(a) the vigorous hold of Islam on the masses and (b) the resort to Islam by Pakistan’s rulers to mobilize support for their purposes. Having been constantly fed the Islamic diet from the press, platform, pulpit and schools (government run or the deeni kind), the desire for Talibanization of the Muslim society has come to be shared by increasing sections of the Pakistani Muslims. Again to quote the Daily Times (02 June 2007)
…. “There is a lot of confusion in Pakistan over understanding the nature of violence in the country. What the Taliban want in the Tribal Areas is articulated in the mosques of the big cities in the settled areas. At any given time in Lahore, for instance, you will hear demands for the setting up of precisely the kind of governance demanded by the Taliban and implemented in the tribal areas. Most of us think that this kind of worldview in Lahore comes from fringe elements, but on close examination more and more people are embracing this discourse as their key to replacing the present “America-enslaved” system.”

Obviously it will require much more than the replacement of Musharraf with a civilian politician at the head of Pakistan government to pull the country back from the brink of the abyss.

THE DARUL ULOOM ANTI- TERRORISM CONFERENCE-II

THE DARUL ULOOM ANTI- TERRORISM CONFERENCE-II

THE ISLAMIST NEWSPEAK
JP Sharma
The most interesting part of the Anti-Terrorism Declaration issued by the Conference hosted by Darul Uloom, Deoband is the enunciation of the virtues of Islam contained in the opening paragraph of the Declaration. Those having some knowledge of Islam’s scriptures and history could easily be left wondering whether this part of the declaration was a satirical interpolation by some mischievous elements. However a visit to the Darul Uloom website is enough to establish the genuineness of the opening paragraph like the rest of the Declaration.
SOME DIFFICULT QUESTIONS
Darul Uloom Deoband is unquestionably the most prestigious institution of Islamic learning in India, something like Cairo’s AL AZHAR. However the sweeping claims that the Declaration makes in favour of Islam happen to be so blatantly contrary to well known facts that they can not be passed over as just the clerics’ rhetorical flourishes. What are these known facts forming such a serious challenge to the credibility of this part of the Declaration? These include (just to mention a few)—the actual treatment of non-Muslims and minority Islamic sects by the State as well as the non state practitioners of Islam, the historical experience of non- Muslims who were subjected to invasions by Muslim conquerors, views expressed by authoritative theoreticians of Islam, the injunctions in the holy Quran, and Sunnah etc. This is a vast field but for reasons of space, the discussion here will be confined only to the most significant points.
CLAIMS MADE IN THE DECLARATION

The Declaration claims that (i) Islam is the religion of “mercy for all humanity”, the “fountainhead of peace, tranquility, security (ii) Islam makes no differentiation between human beings on the grounds of caste and creed, (iii) “ Islam has taught its followers to treat all mankind with equality, mercy tolerance, justice”. (iv) Islam sternly condemns all kinds of oppression, violence and terrorism”.(Emphasis added)
ISLAM AS PRACTICED BY MUSLIMS
The first difficulty in accepting the Deoband Declaration arises when one sees Islam in actual operation. The leaders (Osama bin Laden, Ayman Al Zawahiri, Khalid Sheikh Mohammad etc.) and the constituents groups (Al Qaida, Markaz Dawa Al Irshad , Lashkar-e- Toiba, Jaish- e -Mohammad, Harkat ul Mujahideen etc) of the International Islamic Front for Jihad, and also smaller groups and individual followers across the Islamic world, all claiming to be the true representatives of Islam, have long been using terrorism and violence as the instruments of Jihad against the perceived enemies of Islam including Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists etc. The laws and regulations enacted and enforced by the Governments of Muslim majority countries led by Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan, Sudan etc. do not even remotely suggest “treatment of all mankind with equality, mercy, tolerance, justice”. The notorious blasphemy laws of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan are a thorough rejection of the commonly perceived notions of equality, justice or mercy.
TESTIMONY OF DEMOGRAPHY
One incontrovertible piece of evidence against the Deoband Maulanas’ proclamation of the compassionate, egalitarian, and just nature of Islam is provided by the steady decline in the population of non- conformists in Muslim majority countries. As is well known the population of Hindus and Sikhs in what is now known as the Islamic Republic of Pakistan which was about 20% of the total in 1947 has come down to about 1%. The continuing slaughter of Hindus was again confirmed by the murder of Jagdish Kumar, a factory worker in Karachi, by a, crowd of Muslims in the presence of policemen on 8 April 2008. The Christians who had enthusiastically supported the demand for creation of Pakistan have also been victims of persecution by Islamic zealots. The Ahmadis (Remember Zafrullah Khan the first Foreign Minister of Pakistan?) have not only been declared to be non –Muslims but are liable to be imprisoned just for claiming to be Muslims. Even the minority Islamic sect of Shias (who are in power in adjacent Iran and whose leader Khomeini heralded the Islamic revolution in Iran) have been fighting a bloody but losing war against the majority Sunnis, some of whom want the Shias too to be declared non –Muslims. Nor is the decimation of religious minorities confined only to Pakistan. In what was earlier known as East Pakistan and now known as the Islamic Republic of Bangladesh the population of Hindus has come down from about 30% to about 9%. Even in the Muslim ruled state of Jammu and Kashmir within the secular Republic of India a systematic programme of religious cleansing has resulted in the Kashmir valley having been purged substantially of the Hindu Pundits. The same pattern can be seen almost all over the Islamic world.

INDIA’S EXPERIENCE OF ISLAMIC CONQUERORS
Islam first came to India in the shape of Arab invasions of Sind around the time of Caliph Umar (634-644 AD). The first 500 years saw invasions by Muhammad Bin Qasim, Mahmood Ghazanavi, etc. culminating in the conquest of Delhi by Shahabuddin Ghori in 1192. India remained under Muslim rule till the deposition of Bahadur Shah Zafar by the British in 1857. Beginning with the defeat of Dahir’s forces at Debal in 712 AD Muslim victories were usually followed by slaughter of defeated troops and Hindu civilians, rape of Hindu women, enslavement and forcible conversion of Hindu men, women and children, destruction of temples, and imposition of religion based penal taxes like the jaziya. A Muslim slayer of Hindus was exalted as a Ghazi. Many Muslim victors delighted in erecting towers made of skulls of the vanquished Hindus. The “History of India as told by Its Own Historians” by Eliot and Dawson gives umpteen quotations from the writings of the court historians of various Islamic rulers to provide graphic details of the atrocities perpetrated following each victory. According to Will Durant "The Islamic conquest of India is probably the bloodiest story in history”. The fact that none of the famous Hindu temples has survived Muslim rule in north India, the ruins of the Martand Temple in Kashmir, the still standing carved columns (taken from destroyed Hindu and Jain temples) of the Quwwat-ul-Islam mosque in the Qutub Minar complex , Mehrauli, the ruins of the burnt down Nalanda university in Bihar etc. etc. are not shining examples of the peacefulness, mercifulness and universal egalitarianism of Islam. The slaughters, the towers of skulls, the caravans of slaves, the harems full of captured women, have all receded, away from public memory, into the dark pages of history but the grand mosques standing majestically over the sites where the holiest Hindu shrines once stood at Mathura and Varanasi, continue to proclaim loudly the utter untruth of the Maulanas’ protestations.

The experience of the old Persian and Egyptian civilizations and of European countries invaded by Muslims was not much different either. In its attempt to bring as much of the world as possible under the domain of Islam, the sword of Islam dealt with infidels in east and west with equal ferocity. The poet philosopher Allama Iqbal, who still continues to have many admirers in India, extolled the role of Islam’s sword in several of his poems;

“teghon ke sae men ham pal kar jawan huey hain
khanjar hilal ka hai qaumi nishan hamara”
(Tarana-I-Milli)
“par tere naam par talwaar uthaee kisne…
………………………………………………….
“kaat kar rakh diye kuffaar ke lashkar kisne”
(Shikwa)

VIEWS OF AUTHORITATIVE ISLAMIC SCHOLARS

The claims of the Deoband Maulanas are also in contradiction of the writings of some of the most highly regarded scholars of Islam. For example the classical Muslim jurist al-Mawardi explains the Islamic rules for infidels taken prisoner during jihad campaigns:
“As for the captives, the amir [ruler] has the choice of taking the most beneficial action of four possibilities: the first to put them to death by cutting their necks; the second, to enslave them and apply the laws of slavery regarding their sale and manumission; the third, to ransom them in exchange for goods or prisoners; and fourth, to show favor to them and pardon them. Allah, may he be exalted, says, 'When you encounter those [infidels] who deny [the Truth=Islam] then strike [their] necks' (Qur'an sura 47, verse 4)”....Abu’l-Hasan al-Mawardi, al-Ahkam as-Sultaniyyah." [The Laws of Islamic Governance, trans. by Dr. Asadullah Yate, (London), Ta-Ha Publishers Ltd., 1996, p. 192.
EVIDENCE OF THE HOLY QUR’AN AND SUNNAH
According to the Holy Qur’an, those who do not believe in Allah, His Prophet and the Last Day will go to Hell to be roasted there in Fire forever. Allah has also commanded the believers to fight the unbelievers till Allah’s religion prevails everywhere. There are hundreds of Ayats in Quran containing such injunctions. A few samples are reproduced below;


2:161” Those who reject Faith,
And die rejecting
On them is Allah’s curse,
And the curse of angels,
And of all mankind;”

8:39.” And fight them on
Until there is no more
Persecution or oppression,
And religion becomes
Allah’s in its entirety ”

8:67. “It is not fitting
For a Prophet
That he should have
Prisoners of war until
He has thoroughly subdued
The land. ”

9:5. “ But when the forbidden months
Are past, then fight and slay
The Pagans wherever you find them,
And seize them, beleaguer them,
And lie in wait for them
In every stratagem (of war), ”
…………
9;29 “ Fight those who believe not
In Allah nor the Last Day,
Nor hold that forbidden
By Allah and His Messenger,
Of Truth, (even if they are)
Of the People of the Book,
Until they pay the jizyah
With willing submission,
And feel themselves subdued”

98;6 “ Those who reject(Truth),
Among the People of the Book
And among the Polytheists,
Will be in hell-fire,
To dwell therein (forever),
They are the worst
Of creatures”

[The Holy Qur’an Translation by Abdullah Yusuf Ali, Published by GOODWORD BOOKS,1,Nizamuddin West Market, New Delhi 110013]

The record of the sayings and the doings of the Prophet, the Hadis (or Sunnah) is believed to have authority equal to that of the Quran.” The Prophet was the interpreter of the Qura’an and its living example.” A study of the Hadis reveals that the Prophet dealt with his opponents not with compassion but with ruthlessness. The killing, instigated by the Prophet, of poetess Asma while suckling her child in her bed, and of Abu Afak a poet more than one hundred years of age, both for having written seditious poetry, are not examples of Islam’s mercy. The Prophet’s dealing with Jewish tribes of Madina area was not kind either. The beheading of the entire male population of some 600-700 of Banu Qurayza tribe after their unconditional surrender is a prime example of Islam’s brutality.

WHY THE FALSE CLAIMS?

It is not that the venerable Maulanas who had assembled at Deoband and issued the Declaration were unaware of the falsehood of the claims they were making. Being among the front rank leaders of the Faith, and aware of the bad name that Islam was getting due to the actions of the Jihadi terrorists, they sought to serve the cause of Islam by using the Qur’an sanctioned practice of Taqiyya (dissimulation) used by many Islamic scholars and clerics as a tactic of outwitting opponents, avoiding straightforward debate or deflecting criticism by using obfuscation. The Maulanas’ effort has apparently had some success also.

THE ISLAMIST NEWSPEAK

Some readers may recall that among the many devices that the totalitarian state visualized in George Orwell’s novel “1984”, used to control the thinking of the subject population was the evolution and use of a new language called newspeak in which old words like peace, freedom or equality took on totally different new meanings. The use of the words mercy, peace, justice, security, equality, tolerance, oppression, violence etc. in the opening paragraph of the Deoband Declaration appears to be the Islamist version of newspeak.

The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi

INDIA’S DEFENCE AGAINST TERROR

INDIA’S DEFENCE AGAINST TERROR
J P Sharma
The deadly spate of terrorist blasts in Bangalore, and Ahmedabad and the timely discovery of cars laden with bomb making materials averting a repeat performance in Surat have once again turned the spotlight on the threat to the security of Indian citizens and the economic prosperity of the country. More than 500 people have lost their lives in terrorist attacks during the last three years. Not one of these cases has been successfully investigated. The media is quick to pin the blame on “Intelligence Failure”. Central and state security agencies often blame each other. The Government of India routinely issues statements condemning the attacks, praising the spirit of inhabitants of the hit town, reiterating its resolve to bring the offenders to book, announcing compensation to victims, some VIPs visit the affected areas and then it is business as usual. The same pattern keeps on being repeated with sickening regularity. Is there any hope of any better performance?

The fact that our preventive and detective agencies have not been successful in preventing terrorist attacks nor in getting adequate proof against the alleged perpetrators of the attacks makes it clear that our capabilities to prevent and detect terrorist attacks are severely inadequate. We have been facing terrorism for almost two decades now and should have known what needs to be done. Who is responsible for keeping our security agencies in such a woeful state? And what does the government propose to do beyond mouthing the usual platitudes? It is time that these questions are asked and our rulers made to answer.
KARGIL REVIEW REPORT
The GC Saxena Committee which examined the question of upgrading the intelligence capabilities of the country in the aftermath of the Kargil War had recommended quite a few measures including substantial augmentation of the manpower available to the Intelligence Bureau. Only a fraction of the required addition has materialized. Another was the creation of two new wings—a Multi Agency Centre whose job would be to collect and coordinate terrorism related information and the Joint Task Force on Intelligence which was to pass on the information to the state governments in real time. According to Dr. Ajai Sahni Executive Director of the Institute for Conflict Management “both MAC and JTFI remain under-staffed, under-equipped and ineffective, with even basic issues relating to recruitment and administration unsettled. Their principal objective, the creation of a national terrorism database, has made little progress. The JTFI was also given the responsibility of upgrading counter-terrorism capabilities in the State Police Forces, as part of its mandate to improve intelligence gathering across the country, but no actual programme of training or capacity enhancement has been initiated.” The reasons for this lackadaisical manner of dealing with a matter so vital to the security of the country are yet to be explained.
If this is the state of the premier intelligence agency of the country, the conditions prevailing in the state police forces could well be imagined. The police –population ratio in India stands at half of the UN norms. And much of the available manpower is deployed in providing protection to the VVIPS, VIPs and their relations and on making arrangements for their smooth travel. Special laws, terrorism countering agencies, training, equipment etc. can all wait.

POTA AND ITS SUCCESSORS

The NDA Government had enacted a special law –Prevention of Terrorism Act in 2002 giving the police the authority to detain suspects upto 180 days and making confessions made to police officers admissible as evidence during trial. The law was opposed by some political parties, civil and human rights activists groups on the ground that the law had been misused against the minorities. The first act of the UPA government on coming to power in 2004 was to repeal POTA. Since then no special law calculated specifically to curb terrorism has been enacted.
In November 2006, during the conference of the police chiefs of India, the Director Intelligence Bureau had mooted a proposal to enact a special law to deal with terrorism stressing that the existing laws had been found to be inadequate to deal with the emerging situation. Although both the Home Minister and the Prime minister expressed grave concern at the multi faceted and growing threat of Terrorism, DIB’s proposal, based on inputs from the government agencies responsible for countering the threat of terrorism, was summarily rejected by the Prime Minister Man Mohan Singh saying that the existing laws were quite adequate for the purpose. The proposal was not considered fit even for being taken up for further examination. Of course the Prime Minister declared emphatically that his Government stood “firmly committed to enforcing ‘zero tolerance to terrorism’ within the framework of our existing legal system”.For good measure the Prime Minister added that “certain and swift punishment” was an effective deterrent to potential wrongdoers, and that which was why the judiciary had a vital role in ensuring that cases related to terrorism were tried “expeditiously” and offenders brought to justice without undue delay. The question one would like to ask is” Where exactly is that blessed land in which there is “the zero tolerance” to terrorism and the “certain and swift punishment” of wrong doers? Certainly not India, may be in the dream world of the PM.
In the following period, several experts have suggested the creation of a central agency to collect, coordinate and disseminate intelligence and also to investigate cases involving terrorism. Nothing has so far been done largely on the pretext that law and order was a state subject under the constitution and it is only with the consent of the states that any such agency could be created. What message does the Government’s refusal to take strong measures against terrorism send to the terrorist network?
FORMULATION OF A PROPER ANTI- TERROR MECHANISM
The first requirement for formulation of an adequate anti –terror mechanism is for the planners to have a fairly accurate idea of the problem. Our difficulty seems to lie in our failure to comprehend fully the problem facing us. Some of our experts while good at tracing the origin of the terrorist groups and their links with their local and foreign patrons and supporters seem to argue that the acts of terrorism against Indian targets are the work of a few misguided Indian Islamists seeking revenge for the perceived anti Islam actions of the Indian state e.g. maintaining close relations with Israel or supporting the anti Islam actions of USA in Afghanistan or Iraq or the biased/unfair treatment of Muslims by Indian security agencies/Courts. Of course the two unfailing sources of Muslim anger, always to be quoted , remain the demolition of Babri Masjid and the post Godhra anti Muslim riots in Gujarat. This is the line the secularist media and the NGOs, the civil libertarians, human rights activists and many other well funded quarters who hold almost a monopoly in the Indian media keep pushing. The leading foreign journals like Time also hold the majority Hindus guilty of atrocities on the poor Muslims. Blatant lies constantly repeated by politicians, print and electronic media are bound at some stage to be believed as the truth.
For understanding our problem, we have to start with understanding the reasons for the creation of Pakistan as the homeland for Muslims of undivided India, the religion of Islam and the duty it prescribes for its followers living in a state not governed according to the laws of Islam. Unless our experts invest their time and energy in acquiring a reasonably sound grounding in the teachings of the Quran, and the Hadith, the concepts of Darul Harb and Darul Islam, the obligations of Jihad and the Islamic view of treaty obligations etc. their expertise on dealing with jihadi terrorism will remain superficial. How many of our experts have seriously studied the Quran, the Hadith or Brigadier S K Malik’s book “the Quranic Concept of War” of which Gen Zia ul Haq contributed the Foreword. How many understand the implications of the verse which says “I will strike terror into the hearts of unbelievers”?

Let there be no mistake, we are in the midst of a war launched by Pakistan with the object of dismembering India. After more than fifteen years of fighting the Pakistan launched proxy war and having suffered the repeated Pakistan inspired attacks on the symbols of our state’s power,places of worship, railways and buses, markets full of shoppers, and even on our Parliament ,we declared at Havana that Pakistan too was a victim of terror and agreed to set up a joint mechanism with Pakistan to counter the problem of terrorism !!! There could be no sane explanation of such behaviour other than the obvious i.e. we were acting on the instructions of USA. We could perhaps follow USA’s advice also if it had been successful in turning Pakistan away from being the epicenter of global jihad. But after spending over 10 billions of US taxpayers’ money the US is nowhere nearer achieving its objective than it was in 2001 .
Pakistan’s undeclared war against India is being fought on several fronts. Subversion of the loyalties of Indian Muslims by heightening the feelings of victimhood, having a separate and supervening identity as members of the Umma and infiltration of foreign Muslims into India are important prongs of this war. Madrassas, mosques and maulanas who propagate that Islam is the only true religion and the entire earth belongs to Islam are all soldiers in this quiet war. The flood of petrodollars provides the wherewithal for enabling the enemies to carry on their offensive. What counter measures have we taken? We are afraid of speaking the truth for fear of damaging our secular credentials. Our government even though knocked repeatedly by Jaipur, Kabul, Bangalore, Ahmedabad, Surat, Chennai still believes in carrying on the “peace process” and adding to the “Confidence Building Measures” hoping that Pakistan will become a peaceful neighbour. What else can be expected from a government composed of parties whose blinkered eyes can see nothing beyond Muslim votes as the only means of retaining power.
This nation has been quietly absorbing bloody blow after blow for the last two decades. Let our rulers understand that even a worm can sometimes turn. (The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi