Kerala: Pilgrims' move to Islamic State land puts believers in corner
KOZHIKODE: The recent reports on youths, including women, from the state joining Islamic State (IS) have put the ordinary Muslim believers in a fix, forcing them to either defend the faith or keep silent on the controversy. Many believers told DC that the wide publicity received for the ‘War for God’ waged by the Islamic State (IS) and the public slaughtering of those who defy the tenets of IS had given Islam a bad image.
“In the narratives on terrorism, I am not worried about the name of a religion getting ruined. But for the common people to have to be guilty of their mere existence as believers is unjust”, said N.P. Ashley, a teacher at St Stephen’s College, New Delhi. “Records of the diversity in the life of Islam spanning over 1,400 years in hundreds of countries through different communities need to be invoked in dispelling both the Islamist and Islamophobic impositions of singularity,” he added.
“Those following Muslim religion to its fullest form are the worst fatalities of the recent IS fume as they are now targeted for the religion they follow in its purest form,” said Raniyal Niyada, a law student of Kozhikode. “Even the girls who follow the dress code as prescribed by the religion are afraid to come out in that attire,” she added.
Writer A.M. Shinas said that there are many believers who subscribe to the views of IS in the state. “It is not new. Those who chopped off the palm of a teacher years back also executed the same ideology,” he added. “But it is only a microscopic class that follows such hardcore religious streams,” he added.
But many believers lament that they find it tough to explain the messages of peace and amity promoted by Islam. Blogger Sunil K. Faizal said that his mother, a conservative woman who used to offer namaz every day believed in universal God. “She believed that all faiths leads to one God like many streams lead to a river, then to the sea. But the recent discussions put such innocent believers in a fix”, he added.
