By TCN News,
Kolkata: Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) today condemned terrorism of all sorts across the world and called Maharashtra government’s order of probe against Dr Zaik Naik as an attempt to bully Indian Muslims as a whole.
On Thursday Maharashtra government ordered investigation against Dr Zakir Naik’s public speeches as Bangladesh agency found during the investigation of last week’s Dhaka carnage that the alleged ISIS militants were following Dr Naik speeches.
“The Bjp – Shiv Sena led Government of Maharashtra is misusing its administrative powers in the name of enquiries and investigations to harass and bully moderate Muslim Organization”, Shahanshah Jehangir , National Secretary of IUML said in a statement released to media.
He also condemned terrorism and extremism of all thoughts, religion and expressed strongest condemnation and sadness for the terrorist attacks in Turkey, Baghdad, Dhaka and holy city of Medina.
Defending Dr Naik, he said, “Dr.Zakir Naik is a research scholar on Comparative Religion and not a Scholar to comment on Islamic Religious Issues. A large majority of Muslims have differences with various opinions of Dr.Zakir Naik. However it is also a fact that the Dr. Zakir Naik is well respected in many countries of the world, and has received Honors from the Governments of many Islamic countries too for his research on comparative Religion. That does not mean he was an inspiration for terrorist attacks in Dhaka or worldwide.”
Condemning government for initiating probe against his work he also said, “The question is not only of Dr Naik as an individual. It is the tendency and conspiracy to label as terrorist everything related to Indian Muslims and a larger conspiracy to level charges of terrorism against Indian Muslims and arrest them under false pretexts”.
He further said it is not a matter of an individual or a particular sect but Hindutva forces’ plan is to target and tarnish every school of thought of Islam, every religious leader irrespective of Salafi , Shia or Sunni school of thought and create an environment of mistrust between religious communities, fear and hate against Indian Muslims , so that this polarization helps the right Wing forces in the coming Uttar Pradesh elections and in their agenda to turn India into a Hindutva fascist state .
Sighting one such example, he said that in the recent past reputed Sunni Islamic Organization like the Raza Academy have been harassed without any reason. In Malda district of West Bengal, a protest was organized by the Sunni Islamic Organizations, against Blasphemy of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) by Kamlesh Tiwari and a minor scuffle broke out with the police but the Right Wing forces tried to paint it as terrorism and an inter – religious violence.
Taking on right wing leaders who often speak against Muslims, he said, “While the likes of Baba Ramdev, Yogi Adityanath, SadhviPrachi go scot free in spite of inciting violence against Indian Muslims, innocent people are being harassed”.