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If I were a Muslim, the ulterior message of the Iraq war to me would be the ulema have been defrauding my community. In order to keep their grip over the common Muslim, they propagated the bogey of ummah uber alles. There is neither a united ummah nor a brotherhood. If there was one, Saddam Hussein and his people would not have had to go down alone and unaided.
Not one alim has organised a single piece of aid for the Iraqis. If it was not up to the alims to take military action, surely a humanitarian gesture like the despatch of a few ambulances could have been made? In a number of countries, the ulema are powerful enough to influence their governments to have sent, if nothing else, a few tanks and guns as a token of support.
Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammed of Malaysia has loudly condemned Washington. A few other countries like Indonesia have made similar noises. At the other end of the spectrum, the royalty of Arabia led by the Saudi King has actively helped the Anglo-American war. Kuwait is the launching pad for the central thrust of the invasion. A third category are the countries whose people have protested on the streets: Be they Egyptians, Yemenese, et al. Their governments have fired water canons, rubber bullets and tear gas at the people.
Then there is the sad category of Turkey and Pakistan, which have exchanged the promise of dollars from the United States for their support to the invasion. The decision of Turkey to allow its air space to be used by American planes has been endorsed by the country's parliament with an Islamic party enjoying a majority. Does this not mean that the Turkish ulema have played their part in the sale of Turkish support to non-Muslims?
The irony of this barter appears bitter to those Muslims and their progeny who were prepared to give their all to save the Caliph on the throne of Turkey in 1920. The victorious British, at the end of World War I, wanted the Sultan to go into exile whereas the Muslims of India led by the illustrious trinity of Gandhi, and Maulanas Mohammad Ali and Shaukat Ali opposed it. Reacting to the callousness of the British, some alims in India declared the country to be a darul-harb, which was not worth living in. In response to their call, half a million momins undertook hijrat to Afghanistan. 20,000 actually settled in that country whereas the rest were turned back. All this humiliation was suffered by the Indian Muslims merely for the sake of the world brotherhood. Neither Mohammad Ali nor Shaukat Ali nor any of their followers had anything to gain. Their only hope was that the head of all Sunnis should not be dismissed and forever.
Make no mistake. Allowing Iraq to go down the drain is not a matter of mere shame. It also means the betrayal of the sacrifice that Indian Muslims have made since the Great Rebellion of 1857. And the self-denial that the Muslim youth is suffering from today. By discouraging our mothers from being educated, the mullahs have ensured that the average Muslim does not develop a sense of appreciation for non-clerical studies. It is difficult for uneducated mothers to value modern studies. The result is average Muslim youth remains backward. Our forefathers were once rulers. Today we are clubbed with the Dalits by politicians.
It is not that the youth does not realise how much the world has progressed and how much he is behind in terms of education and wealth. Moreover, do not the ulema in the other countries realise the stakes for the Islamic civilisation? Amongst the many things President Bush has pronounced, he has repeated that Saddam Hussein will be replaced by a democracy in Iraq. Bangladesh and Turkey are often quoted as examples. Iran is a question mark. Does this not mean that if President Bush remains true to his word, all the other 51 Muslim countries could be the target of Pentagon?
Indian scholars like Mr N Jamal Ansari of the Aligarh Muslim University have been kind to declare (The Pioneer, Letters, April 7) that really there is no united body like the ummah. He has called Saudi Arabia the most culpable for causing terrorist attacks. He has described Saddam Hussein as the only man in the Arab world who refused to surrender to Anglo-American colonialism.
If this be the future, is there
any sense for the Indian Muslims to be flagbearers of pan-Islam? Is it
not best for the Muslims to be Indian in their civic identity? Their personal
preference can continue to flourish as Islamic. The Shias do not talk of
the ummah. They have a special fondness for Iran but for the rest they
are indeed Indians first!
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