ASSEMBLY POLL '98
COMMENTARY
SPECIALS
INTERVIEWS
CAPITAL BUZZ
REDIFF POLL
DEAR REDIFF
THE STATES
YEH HAI INDIA!
ELECTIONS '98
ARCHIVES

No clues still to 'raid' on Muslim scholar's house

Sharat Pradhan in Lucknow

The storm over the recent 'raid' by three unidentified men on the Rai Bareily home of the renowned Islamic scholar and president of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board, Maulana Syed Abul Hasan Ali Nadvi aka Ali Mian, has yet to abate, 10 days after the inexplicable incident.

Politicians, ever ready to sniff out a chance at deriving political mileage, have made a beeline for the sleepy village of Takiya Kalan, to convince him of their secular credentials.

Ali Mian's ancestral home in the remote Takiya Kalan village of Rae Bareli district, about 100 km from Lucknow, has traditionally been a quiet place, known only for the Islamic madrassas run by the father figure. Its tranquillity was, however, broken by a band of unknown miscreants who barged into the premises on the night of November 21, rummaged through his living room, only to depart empty handed within a matter of minutes and leaving behind a mysterious trail.

The only eyewitness to the incident, Abdul Rehman, the Maulana's caretaker, was as much at a loss to understand the motive behind the 'raid' as were the state police top brass who have failed to make any headway into the incident.

What seems to have intrigued all and sundry was the timing of the 'raid': it followed the Islamic cleric's outburst against the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Uttar Pradesh government's decision to make the recitation of Saraswati Vandana and Vande Mataram mandatory in all state-owned primary and secondary educational institutions.

The Maulana had even given a call to Muslims to withdraw their wards from such schools, in case the government chose to go ahead with the plan which, according to him, was "totally unIslamic and against the very essence of the Quran".

Ali Mian had made it loud and clear at a media conference at the Nadwa tul Ulema Darul Uloom, the Lucknow-based Islamic University that he heads as rector, that the question of following the government's order on a religious issue did not arise.

"The Prophet had even forbidden people from worshipping him, and had told his followers to worship none other than god, so how can any Muslim offer prayers to Saraswati or for that matter, the picture of 'Bharat Mata' or Motherland," he asked, justifying his stand.

While several Muslim leaders had given a similar call and a couple of muftis had even issued fatwas (edicts) to the same effect, it was the Maulana's word that made much difference with the Muslim community in general.

On the other hand, it also stirred a hornet's nest, as Hindu organisations found it "intolerable" and went about burning his effigies, while bodies like the RSS declared, "If anyone wishes to live in India, he must follow the Hindu culture."

Under such circumstances, following the 'raid', it was natural for Muslims to suspect the BJP government's hand in it. But then both Chief Minister Kalyan Singh and Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee (who was in the city on a day's visit recently) flatly denied any kind of involvement of a state or central government agency in the whole affair.

Even as the state government ordered a high-level probe into the 'raid' on Ali Mian's ancestral home and three IPS officers of the rank of director general of police have been detailed to personally carry out the investigations, the incident has left everyone puzzled and clueless.

The three officials, A K Sharan, additional director general of CID, Ajay Raj Sharma ADG (law and order) and Himanshu Kumar, ADG (intelligence) spent half a day quizzing people in and around the Maulana's house, but they have failed to reach anywhere.

That, however, has not stopped the leaders of different political parties from making a beeline for Ali Mian. SP chief Mulayam Singh, the BJP's ally Loktantrik Congress Party chief Naresh Agarwal, even state BJP chief Raj Nath Singh dutifully paid a visit to the Maulana.

But it was the Congressmen who were trying to make the most of the incident -- beginning with Pramod Tiwari, leader of the miniscule state Congress Legislature Party, others who followed included UP Congress chief Salman Khursheed, wife Louise Fernandes, former Union ministers C K Jaffer Sharief, Mohsina Kidwai and to top it all, veteran Narain Dutt Tiwari with a belated reaction from 10 Janpath.

In her letter delivered through Tiwari, Sonia Gandhi not only expressed regret over the incident, but also recalled her family's long association wit the Maulana. She lashed out at the BJP government for its "prima facie involvement in the whole affair."

This has lent much hope among UP Congressmen that the party would at long last "re-establish its secular credentials and surely cut some ice with the Muslims", whom it had virtually alienated on account of the party's passive role at the time of the demolition of the Babri Masjid.

Not surprisingly, perhaps, the party edged out the SP and came second, behind the BJP in the by-election to the Agra assembly seat held last week.

Vajpayee, during the course of his visit to Lucknow, met a couple of Muslim delegations who went over to express their resentment and anguish over the incident. "I can smell a rat in the whole affair," he told the media later. But whether anyone will ever be able to find the rat, is a question that begs an answer.

Tell us what you think of this report