By TwoCircles.net Staff Reporter,
New Delhi: Several eminent religious leaders from different communities gave a united call here on Saturday to fight against the rise in communal violence in the country. At the joint press conference called by Jamaat-e-Islami Hind at Press Club of India, they asked both central and state governments to check communalism and hate campaign.
In the backdrop of rise in communal violence across the country, top religious leaders from major communities – Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs and Jains Saturday asked the government to take steps to check the phenomenon, even as Shankaracharya Swami Onkaranand came down heavily on BJP MP Sakshi Maharaj for terming the madrasas as “hub of terror”.
[Courtesy: JIH]
Shankaracharya said that “Sakshi Maharaj is ignorant about the role played by madrasas. Sakshi Maharaj is not a religious leader and he is spreading rumors.”
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP from Unnao Sakshi Maharaj a few weeks ago had stirred a hornet’s nest by calling madrasas as “hubs of terror and jihadis”.
Besides the Shankaracharya, the press conference was addressed by Mukhya Granthi Gurduwara Rakab Ganj Rajinder Singh, Jain cleric Lokesh Muni, Christian religious leader Father Dominic Emmanuel, Shia leader Maulana Jalal Haider and Amir Jamaat-e-Islami Hind Maulana Syed Jalaluddin Umari. The meet was oraganized by Jamaat.
Christian religious leader Fr Dominic Emmanuel expressed concern over RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat being allowed live coverage on country’s national news broadcaster Doordarshan and wanted to know whether people from other religions would be considered for such a privilege.
“We respect the prime minister (Narendra Modi),” he said but questioned the move of the national broadcaster in giving prime time to the leader of an organization which has a sectarian agenda.
As the PM was a former RSS pracharak, the organization was being appeased, the meet observed. The meet also expressed concern over use of technology to spread communalism. Fringe elements in recent times have used social media to spread canard and divisive ideologies.
National President of Jamaat-e-Islami Hind Maulana Umari said that for the country to prosper, social capital should be built and issues between the communities should be amicably resolved. The policy of divide and rule should end. Political parties blame each other for riots but reap electoral harvest, he said.
“India is a country of people with high religious sense and it is the responsibility of the elders and responsible people from across the communities that the social capital is not damaged. Jamaat people reached Uttrakhand to help the non-Muslim victims of the flood trying to set an example of communal harmony in the country,” he said.
Jain religious leader Lokesh Muni appealed to the media – both print and electronic – to help spread the message of secularism and peace among communities in the country. “Communalism weakens democracy and the nation. Jain community will always support the idea of peace and secularism,” he said.
Sikh Granthi Rajinder Singh expressed concern on how personal disputes among people and families are given communal color. Minor differences are given a communal color, he said.
A joint statement was released by the religious leaders at the end of the press conference, calling upon the people of the country to get united to take on the menace of communalism.
“If we want to save the nation from distrust, division, violence, hatred and communalism and if we want to promote the atmosphere of peace and tranquility, so that the nation may achieve progress and growth, then we will have to curb the evil tendencies of division, polarization, hostility and hatred. The peace loving people of the country will have to form effective and dynamic front against the forces spreading evil and disturbance,” read the statement.