DANGER OF SENSATIONALIST CLAIMS

This letter from Suleman Nagdi appears in today's Leicester Mercury, responding to Manzoor Moghal's First Person column, published in the Mercury on 13 December (and posted in full on this blog).

Danger of sensationalist claims

I write in relation to the article 'Understanding the history of religious conflict' (Mailbox, December 13) by Manzoor Moghal.

Brother Manzoor makes certain claims; I ask from whose history is he writing from? If we learn anything from history, it's that history portrays nothing in a positive light, only that it reports what was depending on which side you were on. Both religion and race have played important and sometimes deeply interconnected roles in Indian history for that matter worldwide. Religion was used to justify both segregation and desegregation.

The writer makes a number of charges against the Deobandi school of thought which require closer examination. The link to the Taliban is an interesting one especially when the vast majority of Taliban foot soldiers as well as the leadership have never set foot in India, let alone Deoband. To simply associate orthodoxy in practice with violent extremism is a very dangerous claim. Most of Al Qaeda's ideology and origins are not in imperialist India but developments in Arabia and parts of Africa in the 20th century.

The author unfortunately makes the sensationalist claim that "Historically Islam and the West have been locked in conflict for centuries". He is locked in a mind-set. For example, nearly three million Muslims perished during the first and second world wars. The recent Remembrance Day commemorations reminded us of their efforts. Islam through science and the arts has contributed a great deal towards enriching the very societies we now live in.

In relation to the division of Islam with Hinduism and Sikhism, the writer is short-sighted because members of these three faiths have lived together, migrated together, worked together and celebrated together for centuries in the Asian sub-continent and Africa.

To do justice to the subject we need to create an unbiased approach at the same time recognising that alternative views exist, it is very easy to blame the "Wahabist founded Deobandi school of thought" or for that matter any other school of thought.

We are already aware that extremists in all their ugly disguises come from many sources, in many cases through vulnerability, be it mental health, environment, change of circumstances or a journey an individual takes. We should be spending our energy in creating an atmosphere of working together to root out extremism in whatever disguise it comes from rather than making sensationalist claims.

Suleman Nagdi, Leicester

UNDERSTANDING THE HISTORY OF RELIGIOUS CONFLICT

This is Manzoor Moghal's First Person column in today's Leicester Mercury:

Understanding the history of religious conflict 

A lack of knowledge will hinder peace efforts, believes Manzoor Moghal 

The extremists in the world of Islam spring from the school of thought that emerged in India after the Great Indian Mutiny of 1857 known to Indian Nationalists as the first war of Indian Independence. 

The Mughal Emperors of India who ruled for over 300 years mostly treated Hindus as equal partners in their governance of the country, which evolved a strong bond between their Hindu and Muslim subjects in their loyalty to the Emperors. 

The British systematically destroyed this pluralism and successfully used the strategy of divide and rule by pitching Muslims against Hindus and Sikhs and vice versa. 

After putting down the uprising they slaughtered thousands of Indian Muslims. As a consequence the Muslims became disillusioned with the whole concept of Pluralism and broadly divided into two groups. 

The Anglophile Sir Syed Ahmed Khan believed that the best way for the advancement of Muslims in India was for them to acquire Western education, and founded the Aligarh Anglo Mohammedan Oriental College later known as Aligarh Muslim University. 

The other group who were the followers of Shah Waliullah, a Wahabist founded the Deobandi school of thought in 1866 in Deoband. 

Their principle ethos was to create a pure Islamic society unadulterated by any Hindu and Western practices. They believed that it was the dilution of Islam with Hindu and Western values that had resulted in the demise of Muslim rule in India. 

It is from Deoband that Madrasahs across Pakistan and Afghanistan sprang up, teaching their extremist brand of Islam. From this erupted the repressive regime of the Taliban in 1996. Afghanistan then became the crucible for Al Qaeda who unleashed a most ferocious attack against the West in retaliation of their invasion of Muslim countries. 

Historically Islam and the West have been locked in conflict for centuries. The West continues its aggression by attacking and invading Muslim countries and treating Muslims as fiends because of the violent extremism from the likes of Al Qaida. Western foreign policy towards Muslim countries provides fertile breeding ground for violent Muslim extremism. American and European foreign policies in dealing with Muslim countries are seen by Muslims as deliberately provocative and anti-Islam. Unfortunately, Western actions backfire and continue to aggravate matters between the two opposing camps. 

Unless the phenomena of extremism is fully understood in its true historical contacts and genuine efforts are made for rapprochement between the two sides, there seems to be little hope of any solution.