India’s Muslims join other citizens in backing lockdown

New Delhi: Muslim scholars are coming out in the open asking members of the community not to assemble in mosques and support the government in its fight against Covid-19. These scholars, however, feel that there should not be any attempt to link the Muslim community as a whole with the incident which happened in the Nizamuddin area here in which hundreds of members of the Tablighi Jamaat (TJ), who were infected with coronavirus, participated in a Markaz and later housed in a mosque. This congregation later emerged as a major Covid-19 cluster.

Speaking to The Sunday Guardian, Ghulam Rasool Dehlvi, a scholar of Islamic studies and comparative religion, said: “Qur’an categorically commands the believers to “follow the law and order of the land” (Surah al-Nisa: 59). By disobeying the law of the land, TJ has brazenly violated the Qur’an, which it claims to preach.”

“Preaching and proselytizing is nothing exclusive to the TJ. Many other Islamic organisations, Christian, Jewish and other evangelical organisations, freely propagate their faiths in India. But what unsettled us is the TJ’s dubious approach towards ‘enforcing Allah’s Commandments’ in stark contradiction to the true Qur’anic exhortation of obeying the country’s law and order,” Dehlvi said.

Given the current atmosphere in the country (not limited to Covid-19 alone), said Dehlvi, strengthening national integration, though a huge task, is the need of the hour. “It is my earnest wish that all community leaders act as an effective tool to persuade one another to forget their differences and work towards strengthening national integration. If we fail to learn even in these days, we will have to face a bigger pandemic,” he added.

Maulana Arshad Madani, President of the Jamiat-Ulama-i- Hind, told The Sunday Guardian that he has been asking people of the Muslim community repeatedly to avoid congregation at mosques as social distancing is the need of the hour. “People should think about the gravity of the situation. Whenever they come across anyone having symptoms of Covid-19, he should visit the doctor on his own. Hiding in mosque is not going to solve the problem,” he said.
Madani, however, questioned the way a narrative is being built linking the Covid-19 outbreak with the Muslim community. “There is an effort to create an impression that the Muslim community is responsible for the corona outbreak in the country, which I think is very unfortunate. The entire world is going through tough times and this kind of blame game is not appropriate.”

Jamiat-Ulama-i- Hind, he said, has filed a petition in the Supreme Court, seeking direction to the Centre to stop dissemination of fake news pertaining to TJ congregation and take strict action against those spreading communal hatred and bigotry. The petition also alleges that such “demonisation of the entire Muslim community in India” was leading to violation of Article 21 of the Indian Constitution.

Asked to comment on irresponsible behavior of the Jamaatis, Madani said: “The Markaz activity keeps on happening all the time. This was not a new thing. Whatever happened at Nizamuddin was a disaster. As far as TJ members are concerned, they hardly know about the world and only talk about the religion. It was nadaani (foolishness) on their part to stay put in mosque. But why did the government not take any action when it was aware of the event?”
The Muslim scholars feel that the TJ members committed a grave error, but painting their act as a deliberate conspiracy is deplorable.

Many of them also argue that the way the incident was portrayed has led to many cases of harassment of Muslims across the country. However, they are unanimous that the community members must cooperate with the administration and should not treat the government as their enemy.