By RINA,
New Delhi: All India Tanzeem A’immah-e-Hind (AITAH), an organization of Imams of mosques in India, gave a reception to Ms Azra Zia, newly appointed political councilor (US Embassy in New Delhi), in charge of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
Speaking at the reception at Indian Council for Social Research Azra Zia said: “US President Barack Obama wants to improve relations with Muslims and Muslim countries.”
“US president wants not only to better US relations with Muslims and Muslim countries but that entire world should march jointly towards the future,” Ms Zia said. “Image of Islam is degenerating because of a limited number of emotional people. These elements should be confronted so that the whole world could see the peaceful Islam in action,” she said while assuring that the US does not like defamation of any religion.
Ms. ‘Azra Zia is a US citizen born in Bihar (India). She was recently appointed as political councilor by US President Barak Obama. AITAH also congratulated Ms. Farh Pandit who was appointed earlier by the US President as minorities’ in-charge for whole of Asia.
Most of the speakers at the welcome reception touched on issues of Indian Muslims, Kashmir and better relations with US. Their general impression was that ‘In the light of his views, Mr. Barak Obama is a good man but practical action is necessary to bring forth goodness.’ They showed respect for US presidents’ sentiments as verbalized his in Cairo speech.
Curiously, the issue of Madrasa modernization also came under discussion. Covering domestic and international issues, some of the participants also emphasized the need to modernize Madrasas and start teaching modern subjects in Madrasas, with the caveat that the identity of Islamic Madrasas and the religious education should not get hampered.
Some other participants, however, opined, “Allegations of terrorism against Islam should be stopped because Islam is a peace-loving religion.” They condemned any grouping formed to defame the religion of Islam.