By IANS
Mumbai : The All India Ulema Council (AIUC) has decided to boycott Mumbai’s well-known industrialist family, the Godrejs, because it played host to Salman Rushdie, the Booker Prize winning controversial author of “Satanic Verses”.
The AIUC wrote to Godrej Group Chairman Adi Godrej Jan 15, demanding an “apology” for inviting Rushdie and entertaining him at the Godrej’s guest house at Juhu last week.
Adi and his wife Parameshwar Godrej hosted Rushdie during his visit to Mumbai.
“Rushdie has hurt the sentiments of the Muslim community and should not be allowed to enter the country,” Maulana Mehmood Daryabadi, general secretary of the AIUC, told IANS Wednesday.
The council, which had earlier called for a boycott of Gojdrej products, has now targeted the Godrej family after the council demand for an apology remained unanswered.
Daryabadi said Adi Godrej “did not bother to reply to our letter but he went to the media with wrong information that the issue has been resolved”.
Until the Godrej family apologises, the all-India boycott of the group and its products, and now the family, would continue, the AIUC said.
The AIUC said that Rushdie is slated to arrive in the city Thursday to join the celebration of film actor Riya Sen’s birthday that day.
Not just the AIUC, but the youth wing of the Sanmajwadi Party also is against Rushdie’s visit to Mumbai – his second in a fortnight. The Samajwadi Party youth wing is to hold a protest rally near the Mumbai Airport.