'The way discrimination against Muslims has become almost normalised is very upsetting.'
Amid the row over the proposed Islamic Centre near Ground Zero and the earlier plan by a Florida-based Pastor to burn the Quran, an Indian American interfaith advisor to the United States President on Saturday said Muslims in the country are now more scared than they were in the days after 9/11. "When the faces of intolerance show themselves, the forces of inclusiveness in America go into action," he said.
The cleric was taken into custody on Sunday night based on reports of suspicious activities in the past.
With the notion that tough anti-terror laws of both the UK and the US may be responsible for alienating young Muslims the world over, we in India need to ponder over it too, for Muslims make at least 15 per cent of our population.
Rohith Vemula's suicide exposes all of us as a nation, argues Syed Firdaus Ashraf.
In a memorandum submitted to Manipur Governor Anusuiya Uikey, the 21 opposition MPs who signed the document demanded urgent rehabilitation and resettlement of the affected people to bring peace and harmony to the state.
'Islam says the person who has been hurt has the right to pardon the accused. So don't ask me on whether I will pardon Narendra Modi or not. Go and ask this question to Gujarati Muslims who have been hurt.' 'Secular and non-secular is not an issue for Muslims. The day Muslims become strong, the non-secular guys will become secular. And if Muslims are weak, the same secular guys will cut the throats of Muslims.' 'The secular character of India can never be finished. India is secular by its nature. Whoever comes to power, he will have to become secular to rule,' Shia cleric Maulana Kalbe Jawad Naqvi tells Syed Firdaus Ashraf/Rediff.com
Prime Minister Khan said his government was keen to bring the perpetrators of the 2008 Mumbai attack to book, asserting that it was in the interest of Pakistan.
A Muslim woman's hijab was allegedly ripped off in the United States by a man who she claimed beat her "like an animal" and repeatedly stepped on her head, prompting calls for a hate crime probe.
"I have practically grown up in the organisation. I respect and accept their decision," Sharma said after she was asked about the BJP's action against her.
Addressing a joint press conference after a meeting of 26 opposition parties in Bengaluru, Kharge said, "This was a very important meeting to save democracy and the Constitution in the interest of the people of the country."
The governor's move has been welcomed by a large segment of the Indian-American community who were opposing the bill.
The commissioner said the conduct of the official was 'bizarre' and 'unpardonable' and 'goes against the grain of our pluralistic society'.
Lalu claimed that the BJP wants to disturb communal harmony in society to hide the real issues that people are facing.
In a stinging attack on Narendra Modi, Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party was trying to hoodwink Muslims by talking of apology after "having allowed their carnage" in 2002 and dismissed as "baseless propaganda" Gujarat chief minister's development claims.
The Delhi police has provided security to suspended Bharatiya Janata Party spokesperson Nupur Sharma and her family after an FIR was registered on a complaint that she was getting death threats over her controversial remarks on Prophet Mohammed, officials said on Tuesday.
Bihar's first Muslim woman minister Perween Amanullah on Tuesday resigned from the chief minister Nitish Kumar cabinet and the party Janata Dal-United, citing dissatisfaction from the present system. She was working as the state's social welfare minister
China on Saturday maintained silence on India's abstention at the voting at the UNHRC on the human rights situation in Xinjiang
Godhra is one of the 14 seats which the AIMIM is contesting in the next month's elections to the 182-member Gujarat assembly.
The opposition on Tuesday termed as an 'election jumla' the women's reservation bill brought by the government with many leaders raising questions over the proposed legislation, contending it doesn't account for reservation for OBC communities and that it will be effective at the earliest by the 2029 Lok Sabha polls.
On Easter, April 9, 10,000 BJP workers are being assigned to visit the houses of 100,000 Christian families. Plans are afoot to visit the homes of Muslims on Eid.
In announcing the appointments, Obama said, "Our nation will be well-served by the skill and dedication these men and women bring to their new roles. I look forward to working with them in the months and years ahead."
The UPA has 112 members in the Upper House and the NDA 93. One seat is vacant.
World over, pluralism is in retreat. Luckily for us, Indian pluralism and its consequent tolerance of diversity is rooted in our basic values. As long as we remain faithful to these values and keep our institutions in good health, the Indian miracle of last 75 years is likely to last centuries, asserts Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Party sources claimed that many BJP MLAs and MPs are upset over the chosen candidates, with the party symbol withheld on eight seats due to dispute over ticket distribution.
In renaming TRS and repositioning it as a 'national' party, KCR is also eyeing a pole position in opposition politics ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
The two Indian Americans on the White House inter-faith council, Eboo Patel, a Muslim, and Anju Bhargava, a Hindu, have strongly endorsed United States President Barack Obama's support for the proposed mosque cum community and Islamic cultural center near Ground Zero in New York, saying it was a constitutional issue with regard to freedom of religion that had to be protected zealously
The BJP leadership knows it can't boast of governance in the state as the Bommai government has little to show. So, the game plan is to project Modi, who will reiterate how important it is for a state to have the same party ruling in power at the Centre, observes Ramesh Menon.
Incisive Editor, brilliant scholar on Islam, and now BJP leader, M J Akbar is at his intellectual best when he dissects the Muslim world and its problems, and offers up a solution from his unique perspective, as he did in this recent speech at the 10th R N Kao Memorial Lecture in New Delhi.
Unlike Israeli company NSO, whose sale of Pegasus cyber tech grabbed worldwide attention, and other manufacturers of offensive-cyber products, Cellebrite operates in a grey area between security exports and civilian ones.
There is only one perpetrator, Hamas. It is a terrorist organisation. It is obscene to argue that until the Palestinian question is solved, anybody has the right to use terrorism as an instrument of policy, argues Shekhar Gupta.
'Muslims in India have been suffering in many ways. Yet, they are proud Indians and love India as much as any other Indian community.'
Generations of Indians don't quite grasp that there would barely be an India had it not been for the Sardar whose steadfastness and guile stitched together that which had been united only in philosophy and spirituality and sometimes not even then -- for thousands of years. A fascinating excerpt from Hindol Sengupta's The Man Who Saved India, Sardar Patel and His Idea of India.
'It was Dr B R Ambedkar's foresight which saved us from some marauding state political leaders who could have indirectly disfranchised large sections of our population as we see some attempts even now,' says V Balachandran.
The JD-U leader has been critical of his party's decision to support the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill in Parliament, and it has now become a law following its passage in both Houses.
Religious freedom and related human rights in India are under ongoing threat, the US Commission for International Religious Freedom alleged on Tuesday in an unusual year-end update of the status of its assessment of religious freedom in the country.
India on Friday said rights of people in China's Xinjiang region should be "respected and guaranteed".
More than 60 per cent followers of Mehdi Masroor Biswas, the Bengaluru-based executive, who was running a pro-Islamic State Twitter account, were non-Muslims and a majority of his Muslim followers were from western countries, particularly the United Kingdom, Home Minister Rajnath Singh said on Monday.
After a spirited eight-hour debate in which 60 members participated, the Lok Sabha passed the Constitution (128th Amendment) Bill, with 454 members voting in favour and two against it.
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