A Muslim seminary in Hyderabad reportedly issued a fatwa Friday against chanting "Bharat mata ki jai," saying it is not only against Islam but is also illogical. A Muslim MLA was recently suspended from the Maharashtra Assembly for refusing to utter the slogan.
Recently, a controversy with regard to chanting the nationalistic slogan sparked in the Maharashtra Assembly. Two MLAs of the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) had refused to chant the slogan in the Assembly after Shiv Sena leader Gulabrao Patil and other leaders demanded that they say so. Waris Pathan, who refused to be coerced into saying the slogan, was then suspended for the rest of the Budget session, the Indian Express reported.
Now, the Jamia Nizamia, an influential Muslim seminary, said that only a human can be the mother of another human not a "piece of land," while outlawing the slogan for Muslims.
"The mother of a human is human. No piece of land and no animal and no other object gives birth to humans...This is why calling the land of Bharat as mother is against reason. The religion (of Islam) also says the same thing," the Times of India quoted the fatwa as saying.
The fatwa further added that calling "land of Bharat as their mother" is "the person's individual religious belief and that the person cannot force others (to believe in this)."
Another AIMIM member Asaduddin Owaisi, an MP from Hyderabad, had refused to chant the slogan last week in the Rajya Sabha in response to Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat's remark that young people in the country should be taught to chant slogans in favour of the country. MP and lyricist Javed Akhtar then slammed Owaisi in his last speech in the Rajya Sabha.
