India is the birthplace of four major world religions -- Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism, and Jainism. It is home to the world's third largest Muslim population, a diverse community of sects that includes Sufis, Shia, and Bohra. Roughly three per cent of India's citizens are Christian, and notably, Christians are the religious majority in three of India's 29 states, she said.
The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has claimed responsibility for two suicide bombings targeting Shia processions in Karachi and Lahore that claimed 16 lives on Tuesday.Taliban spokesman Azam Tariq told reporters in the lawless North Waziristan tribal region on Wednesday that the two attacks on Tuesday were aimed against security personnel because "they serve the United States's interests".
Curfew was imposed in some areas of Srinagar on Wednesday to prevent a scheduled Muharram procession.Curfew was imposed in Kothibagh, Ram Munshibagh, Maisuma, Kralkhud and Shaheed Gunj police station areas on Wednesday morning.The procession, carried out by members of the Shia community on the eighth day of the Muharram month, has not been allowed since the eruption of militancy in Kashmir in the early 1990s.
Head of the Dawoodi Bohra sub-sect of Islam Dr Snyedna Mohammad Burhanuddin is carried by followers after offering prayers in Ahmedabad late on Tuesday. The Dawoodi Bohras are a sub-sect of the Ismaeli Shia Islam, which is based in India.
Zehra Cyclewala is a leading figure in the reformist movement against the tyranny of Syedna Burhanuddin, the head-priest (dai-e-mutlaq) of the Daudi Bohra Ismaili Shia sect. In a conversation with Yoginder Sikand, she relates the story of her decades-long personal struggle against priestly tyranny
Curfew-like restrictions were imposed in Srinagar city on Sunday to prevent people from taking out Muharram processions to mark the eighth day of the 10-day mourning period.
Yogi Sikand chronicles the voices for change in one of India's richest and most progressive Muslim sects-- the Dawoodi Bohras.
The apex court had on July 11 sought a report on the mediation process and said that a day-to-day hearing might commence from July 25 if the court decides to conclude the mediation proceedings.
Say hello to a fresh bunch of hotties, who we hope to see a lot mor ein the coming years.
The Haqqani network is planning to target the United States-led North Atlantic Treaty Organisation forces in Afghanistan from its new bases in the Kurram agency.
We invited readers to share their college recommendations to the Class of 2010 -- the colleges with the best teachers, facilities, study programmes. Here we present the responses we recieved for colleges in Uttar Pradesh.
Shia cleric Maulana Kalbe Jawwad, naib imam of Idgah and member of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board, Maulana Khalid Rasheed Firangimahli, the main pujari of the Ram Janambhoomi temple in Ayodhya, Acharya Satyendra Das Mahraj, and Mahant of Janki Ghat in Ayodhya, Janmey Sharan, have asked people respect the verdict of the court and maintain communal harmony
Vanessa Kirby is sure to be nominated for the Best Actress Oscar award, and Frances McDormand of Nomadland will give her a healthy competition, feels Aseem Chhabra.
The Geneva agreement is a signal, which at least Saudi Arabia and Israel are so reading, that normalisation of relations between US and Iran is not merely about the nuclear fuel cycle, says K C Singh.
A suicide bomber rammed an explosives-laden pick-up truck into a hospital being built by the minority Shia community at Hangu in northwest Pakistan on Friday, killing 15 people and injuring 10 others.
Pakistani intelligence agencies have warned that the local Taliban, the Jandullah group and other banned militant groups have plans to target foreigners, embassies and Shia clerics and worship places in major cities in Pakistan, including capital Islamabad.
"The creation of the cells is aimed at coordinating the banned group's activities in the area ranging from the southern port city of Karachi to Waziristan in the restive tribal belt bordering Afghanistan," the Express Tribune newspaper quoted its sources in Kohat, Hangu, Peshawar and Lahore as saying.
"The visit of Obama will not benefit the country in anyway and linking it with progress is baseless," Jawwad said.
A suicide attack on a procession organised by Shia students and subsequent firing by protesters at Quetta in southwest Pakistan on Friday killed over 50 people and injured more than 100 others, hours after two terrorist attacks left as many persons dead in the northwest.
'Nobody knows what they teach in madrasas.' 'If we do not adapt to the ways of the modern world, how will we progress as a community?' 'How will these children compete in the modern world?'
Prominent Muslim cleric Maulana Kalbe Sadiq has said BJP's prime ministerial nominee Narendra Modi's past can be ignored if he changes himself.
The Art of Living founder said that he was involved as a mediator in the RamTemple dispute of his own will and would visit Ayodhya on November 16 to meet all stakeholders.
Hussaini Tigers, an organisation of Shia youths, on Friday urged the All India Muslim Personal Law Board not to approach the Supreme Court against the Allahabad high court verdict on Ayodhya title suits and instead let the matter end here for good.
Muslim clerics and scholars have welcomed the capital punishment awarded to the Mumbai terror attack convict Ajmal Amir Kasab saying the court verdict has reiterated the faith of all countrymen in Indian judicial system.
Unless the Taliban goofs up in a big way, which seems highly unlikely, we are looking at a regime that will be around for quite a long while and present a level of governance that the puppets of the richest and most advanced countries failed to provide, predicts Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
The Bharatiya Janata Party will tone down its rhetoric on Article 370 and unveil a development-based vision for the voters of Jammu and Kashmir, where the five-phase long assembly elections are due in November-December.
In the petition, the government stated that the act violates "Articles 14, 21, and 25 of the Constitution of India" and is violative of the basic structure principle of secularism as well.
The agency filed the prosecution complaint under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act before a special court in Mumbai and said Naik's "inflammatory speeches and lectures have inspired and incited a number of Muslim youths in India to commit unlawful activities and terrorist acts."
The colour of Azaadi cannot be green. The minorities would not accept it and it would mean the de-linking of Jammu and Ladakh from the valley.
Here's a look at actors and how much profit their films made compared to their salaries in a list compiled by Forbes magazine.
The Taliban on Wednesday claimed responsibility for the suicide attack on a Muharram procession of Pakistani Shia Muslims here that killed 43 people and threatened to carry out more such strikes within 10 days.
'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
A former official of Pakistan's foreign office with links to the Shia group Tehrik-e-Islami has been detained by security agencies for his alleged connections with militants who carried out a suicide attack on a mosque in Rawalpindi frequented by military personnel.
If there is one thing the argumentative Indian will accept as ineluctable fact, it is this: Sachin Tendulkar is god.
The protest outside the NRG stadium against Prime Minister Narendra Damodardas Modi's visit at the NRG Stadium was seemingly irrepressible, displaying signs saying 'Free Kashmir', '8 million people caged', 'Go back Modi' -- and worse.
The decision, they said, has given new hope to Muslim women.
'First they will say Kashmiris are not good enough to be Indians, then it will be Muslims are not good enough to be Indians, then they will start a conflict within Hindus that Dalits are not Indians'
At least 25 people, including two children, were killed and over 50 injured when a suspected suicide bomber struck a religious gathering in Dera Ghazi Khan town in Pakistan's Punjab province on Thursday.
Shekhar Kapur's segment in New York, I Love You -- 12 short films celebrating the energy of the city, stands out above all the other works.
Terrorists on Friday targeted a bus carrying a group of people to a Shia religious procession as well as a hospital in Karachi, killing at least 22 people and injuring over 50, in the latest in a wave of attacks across the country.The explosion targeting the bus occurred on Shahrah-e-Quaideen, a key thoroughfare in the city, at 3.05 pm local time.Provincial Health Minister Sagheer Ahmed said 12 people were killed and 50 injured in the attack.
