Prince Karim Al-Hussaini, Aga Khan IV, the 49th hereditary Imam of the Shia Ismaili Muslims, passed away in Lisbon at the age of 88 on Tuesday, February 4, 2025.
At the end of the day, for many worldwide, the ongoing mutual attacks between Israel and Iran would seem a contest devoid of any moral high ground and only a bout between two ordinary adversaries, one that nevertheless risks spinning out of control into a larger conflagration, notes Shyam G Menon.
At least 52 people were killed when twin suicide bombings ripped through a town in northwest Pakistan's restive tribal belt on Friday in a sudden surge in violence against the minority Shia community.
The Bombay high court on Tuesday permitted procession and rituals to be taken out by the Shia Muslim community for Muharram, but with certain conditions in light of the Covid-19 pandemic.
At least 31 people, including members of the minority Shia community, have been killed in various incidents of target killings in Pakistan's commercial city of Karachi and Balochistan's capital Quetta.
At least 11 people, including four members of the minority Hazara Shia community, were killed by unidentified gunmen in a new wave of sectarian attacks in Pakistan.
Unidentified gunmen on Thursday dead five members of the minority Shia community and two employees of an NGO in the restive Balochistan province of southwest Pakistan, police said.
'The Abdullah family is the problem and facilitator of the instability that we are seeing in Kashmir.'
Ahead of the Maha Kumbh, a senior cleric has written to Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath expressing fears that mass conversions of Muslims will take place during the event, while other community leaders have flagged the alleged demand raised by some Hindu seers' body to keep Muslims out of the mega gathering.
After major protests in Quetta over Thursday's targeted attacks on the Hazara Shia community, the Pakistan government was forced to impose Governor's Rule in Baluchistan. Tahir Ali reports
Gunmen ambushed a bus carrying Shia pilgrims in Balochistan province of southwest Pakistan on Friday killing 18 people in the latest in a string of attacks in the region targeting the minority community.
Pakistan's minority Shia Hazara community has said it will not bury dozens of people killed in a devastating bombing in Quetta till the army takes control of the southwestern city to prevent further terrorist attacks.
Amidst severe cold and light shower, the Hazara Shia minority of Quetta, Pakistan is mourning the death of their relatives who were killed in Thursday's blasts. More than 20 hours have passed since they brought 84 dead bodies to Alamdar Road and started a sit-in demanding the government to improve the security of the city and hand over its control to the army.
Militants on Tuesday stormed a bus carrying Shia Muslims in Baluchistan province of southwest Pakistan, killing 13 men and injuring seven others in the latest in a string of attacks targeting the minority community. Three gunmen travelling in a pick-up truck stopped the bus with nearly 30 passengers in Akhtarabad area on the outskirts of provincial capital Quetta. Two gunmen entered the bus and fired indiscriminately.
A minaret of Khajoor ki Masjid in Gudri Bazaar in the heart of Faizabad city is said to be encroaching on the proposed Ram Path by three metres.
It provides for a broad-based composition of the Central Waqf Council and the State Waqf Boards and ensures the representation of Muslim women and non-Muslims in such bodies.
A suicide bomber on Friday blew himself up in a hospital in the southwestern Pakistani city of Quetta, killing at least four persons, including a TV journalist, and injuring over 10 others.
Board President Mirza Mohammad Athar sought recognition of the Shias as a separate minority group.
"I am supporting the Hindu side," lawyer M C Dhingra, appearing for Shia Wakf Board, told the bench.
Board chairman Maulana Mirza Mohammad Athar has sent a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, copy of which had also been forwarded to the President, to arrange a correct 'tarjuma' (translation) of Vande Mataram at the earliest. He said efforts should be made to clear the controversy over the song once and for all.
Opposition MPs in the parliamentary committee scrutinising the Waqf (Amendment) Bill are scheduled to meet Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla on Tuesday to protest its chairperson Jagdambika Pal's alleged 'unilateral' decisions and attempts to 'bulldoze' proceedings, indicating that they may disassociate themselves from the panel.
Seven people were killed and 18 injured when a Shia procession was targeted with a roadside bomb in Pakistan's restive northwest on Saturday, the latest in a string of attacks against the minority community during the month of Muharram. The bomb, which was hidden in a mound of garbage, went off as a procession from an Imambargah on the outskirts of Dera Ismail Khan was on its way to the main procession in the city, witnesses and police officials said.
Four members of the minority Shia Hazara community were killed and two other injured in a sectarian attack in Pakistan's southwestern Quetta city on Monday, said the police. Gunmen on two motorcycles fired indiscriminately at a group of Hazara men who were standing outside a shop at Prince Road in Quetta, the capital of Balochistan province, shortly after 7.30 pm. Four men were killed instantly, witnesses and police officials said.
Religious scholar Hazrat Moin Miyan said though the option of filing a review petition is open, they are accepting the verdict for the betterment of the society.
On Thursday, July 27, amid tight security, the Shia Muslim community in Srinagar took out the 8th Day Muharram procession. The procession was carried out after a gap of 33 years in the Kashmir Valley.
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.
A bench of Justices S J Kathawalla and Madhav Jamdar gave permission after the Maharashtra government granted hearing to a local Shia Muslim organisation that had petitioned the court seeking permission for a symbolic procession for Muharram amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
Police in Pakistan's populous province of Punjab have detained over 50 people in a crackdown on the banned Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan that was launched in the wake of terror attacks on the minority Shia community. The crackdown has focused on the southern part of Punjab, where several militant groups like the LeJ and Jaish-e-Mohammed have strongholds and support bases.
Authorities on Sunday imposed curfew-like restrictions in parts of Srinagar to prevent members of the Shia community from taking out Muharram processions on the eighth day of the 10-day mourning period, officials said.
A Pakistani judicial review board on Friday ended the house arrest of Malik Ishaq, the head of the banned Lashkar-e-Jhangvi who was detained last year after his group was blamed for a string of attacks on the minority Shia community.
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.
All India Ulema Council treasurer Maulana Syed Athar said, "No sane person would support those behind the blasts which claimed lives of Hindus, Muslims, Christians and the like.
A suicide bomber targeted the Muslim Shia Ashura procession killing at least 15 people and injuring 40 others in a sectarian hit in Karachi, marking a bloody start of the holiest day of Muharram.
Shortly after being criticised by the Shia community for defending Mohammed Ajmal Amir Kasab, the lone gunman arrested during the terror siege on Mumbai, lawyer Abbas Kazmi has been removed as a trustee from the prestigious Islam Gymkhana on the same ground. Kazmi's appointment as a trustee of Islam Gymkhana was terminated this week on the ground that defending a terrorist was against the essence of Islam. This is the second instance where Kazmi has been criticised.
The court has 'only decided on the issue of proof and not faith', a single bench of Justice Gautam Patel said and dismissed the suit initially filed by Khuzaima Qutbuddin soon after his brother and the then Syedna Mohammed Burhanuddin passed away in January 2014 at the age of 102.
The meeting of the Joint Committee on Waqf (Amendment) Bill took an ugly turn as the Trinamool Congress MP smashed a glass water bottle and threw it towards panel chairman Jagdambika Pal of the Bharatiya Janata Party during a heated exchange of words with BJP's Abhijit Gangopadhyay, a former Calcutta high court judge.
Tension prevailed in the old city area here when members of two groups engaged in brick-batting and arson during a religious procession, the police said on Wednesday.
Radical Sunnis attacked a Muharram procession with grenades and automatic weapons in Quetta. Curfew has been imposed.
Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Thursday threw a challenge to Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, saying he was ready for a debate on Article 370 "anytime, anywhere".
