By Kashif-ul-Huda, TwoCircles.net,
Liberal Muslims, Muslims who claim to be liberal thereby distinguishing themselves from the rest of the Muslim population. I like to call them “Muslibs” because they are neither fully Muslim nor fully liberal.
Liberal Muslims can play an important role of reformers in the community and also act as a bridge in the communication gap that exists between Muslims and the larger Indian population. But unfortunately they remain cut off from the general Muslim population and they appear in media only to serve a specific purpose.
They are the ones whom “mainstream media” turn to get response to the stories that it has run concerning Islam or Muslims. Muslibs fashion themselves as experts on Islam while priding themselves as non-practicing or cultural Muslims. They claim and rightly so that they have a right to speak about Islam too but very rarely they appear to defend Islam or Muslims. Most of the time their appearance on TV or articles and opinions in mainstream media is to find fault with the Muslims. By doing this they serve a useful purpose for the mainstream media.
Let’s take the example of “triple talaq” or the issue of saying talaq three times in one sitting. Granted that this is a controversial practice and is not acceptable in many Muslim countries yet Deobandi scholars and All India Muslim Personal Law Board has refused to budge on this issue. Muslibs have spent considerable time arguing over this and whenever a new fatwa or incidents comes to light, it gives Muslibs the opportunity to repeat what they have said so many times before.
A search in google news archive ( between Jan 2009 and Dec 2010 for Indian publications) for keywords divorce and Muslim returned 1260 news items while for same time period and search on divorce and Hindu returned 261. If the divorce rate among Muslims were indeed five times higher than Hindus then this would justify the coverage. Lack of data on divorce rate has not prevented Muslibs in joining the media’s jihad on talaq.
Most of Muslibs writing in major media is about oppression of women, criticizing fatwas and also critical of what they claim to be wrong interpretation of Islam by the religious scholars. Rarely Muslibs have written about female feoticide, dowry deaths, and educating girl child- all issues that ulema have spoken about. For the same period as above a search in google news archive for Muslims and feoticide gave only 13 links. Muslibs are not interested in these topics, though these affect more Muslims than triple talaq, may be because they cannot really criticize ulema for these issues and shift the blame to them?
We have to admit that ulema have deep roots in the community and they are respected by the general Muslim population while on the other hand Muslibs cannot claim to have more than a handful of followers. The reason is simple- general Muslims do not identify with Muslibs because they don’t live amongst them and they have given very little to the Muslim community. Muslibs insistence on them being non-practicing or cultural Muslim also acts as a hindrance to their acceptance by the general Muslim population.
Muslibs always love to lock horns with the ulema on the interpretation of Islam. But by insisting that their interpretation of Islam is the correct one aren’t Muslibs indulging in the same conservatism that they so despise? Shouldn’t they be liberal to the true meaning of the word and allow for different interpretations of Islam. By preaching their own version of Islam and insisting that theirs is the right understanding of Islam are they not being same as sectarian ulema and madaris that insist that they are the only ones on the right path?
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Closer Look is a monthly column by TwoCircles.net editor Kashif-ul-Huda. For publication permissions please contact [email protected].