By IANS
Hyderabad : Pressure is mounting on Muslims leaders to quit government-run organisations in protest against ‘indiscriminate’ arrests of youths from the minority community in the wake of the Aug 25 twin blasts in the city.
The reported ‘arrests’ of about 40 Muslim youths and the police’s failure to produce them in courts have angered a section of the community. Many are demanding that Muslim leaders who backed Andhra Pradesh’s ruling Congress party in the 2004 assembly elections intervene and also quit as heads of government-run organisations.
A group of women relatives of some arrested youths late Monday staged a sit-in at the residence of eminent religious scholar Moulana Hameeduddin Auqil Hussami, who is the convenor of the Muslim United Front, an umbrella of various Muslim parties, ncluding Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM).
The burqa-clad women wanted the Moulana to intervene as he and other leaders of the front had actively campaigned for the Congress in the last assembly elections. But the Moulana, who is one of the most respected Islamic scholars, said he was helpless as his own madrassa Darul Uloom Hyderabad was raided by the police after the blasts.
The near-simultaneous blasts at the Lumbini Park and Gokul Chat, a famous eatery, claimed 44 lives and injured 54. The blasts occurred nearly 100 days after an explosion at the historic Mecca Masjid here, which killed nine people.
In an attempt to pacify the agitators, the Moulana tried to talk on phone to senior police officials and even a Muslim minister and to protest over the arrests but in vain.
About this the Moulana remarked that the Congress government was as bad as the previous Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government in New Delhi. “This government is termed as pro-poor but it is anti-Muslim. It is targeting Muslims merely on suspicion,” he said.
He announced the United Action Committee would soon make a representation to the government seeking justice. “If we fail to get justice, we will launch a protest. I am ready to face bullets in this struggle,” he said.
The action committee, comprising various Muslim political, social and religious organisations, was formed a few years ago to represent to the government on issues of Muslim interests.
The Moulana demanded that the police immediately release the innocents, or if anybody was charged he should be immediately produced in the court.
The mothers and sisters of the arrested youths, who staged sit-in till late in the evening, also demanded that the Moulana’s son-in-law, Raheemuddin Ansari, quit as chairman of the Andhra Pradesh Urdu Academy.
Pressure is also mounting on Hafiz Peer Shabbir Ahmed to resign as chairman of the Andhra Pradesh State Haj Committee. Ahmed is also the president of the state unit of Jamiatul Ulema, a religious group.
Meanwhile, the police raided Al-Mahadal Alal-Islami, a famous institute of Islamic learning, in Shaheennagar neighbourhood in the Muslim-majority old city. The policemen, who were looking for a suspected Bangladeshi, sought details of the present and past students.
The institute is run by Moulana Khalid Saifullah Rahmani, a prominent Islamic scholar. The policemen gathered details of three former students who had come from Tripura and Assam.
Muslims constitute 35 per cent of nearly six million population of Greater Hyderabad. They are an overwhelming majority in the old city.