Grand Mufti Paints A Rosy Picture of Muslims’ Situation in India
Speaking to an Egyptian media outlet, Sheikh Abubakr Ahmad Musliyar said India’s Muslims live based on their Islamic beliefs and culture without any limitations.
They coexist with followers of other religions in India, he added, Al-Ahram daily reported.
Muslims build mosques and Islamic schools and recite Adhan (call to prayer) without anyone preventing them, he stated.
The cleric also said that in many of India’ states, teaching Islamic Sharia is recognized and Muslims are allowed to teach it in their religious schools.
According to Sheikh Abubakr Ahmad Musliyar, there is mutual respect between Indian authorities and Muslim scholars.
He went on to say that India’s Constitution guarantees religious freedom and followers of different faiths are free to live based on their beliefs and culture.
His remarks come while Muslims in India have been facing various problems, discriminations and injustices in recent years, especially after the coming to power of the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party.
The country has witnessed an alarming spike in anti-Muslim hate speech.
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In 2019, the Indian parliament amended its Citizenship Act, providing an accelerated pathway to Indian citizenship for persecuted religious minorities from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan. The UN Human Rights Office has called the amendment, which excludes Muslims, “fundamentally discriminatory.”
Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a whopping 12 states also criminalized conversion to Islam and Christianity, thus officially challenging the constitutionally-protected right to freedom of belief.
Also in 2019, Modi’s government revoked the constitution’s Article 370, which had given the Muslim-majority Jammu and Kashmir significant autonomy.
There has also been an increase in the demolition of Muslim properties in the name of removing illegal construction and a ban on wearing the hijab in classrooms in Karnataka when the BJP was in power in the southwestern Indian state.
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The government, however, denies the presence of minority abuse and alleges that its policies aim to benefit all Indians.
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