By KAMAL AHMAD, Manager, Radiance Viewsweekly
The Ministry of Culture and Information of Kingdom of Saudi Arabia invited the Editor of the Radiance Viewsweekly to attend the World Conference on Dialogue but he was unable to go there owing to his pre-occupations. He recommended my name to the ministry for the same and they accepted it. Ministry had sent me an invitation letter to attend the World Conference on Dialogue on 16-18 July 2008 at Madrid (Spain). I got the Air ticket of Qatar airlines from Saudi Airlines to fly on 14th July, 2008 and Visa from Spain Embassy.
I reached Indira Gandhi International Airport at 2:00 AM to fly by QR-232 of Qatar Airways at 5:00 A.M. In the Business Class I met other invitees comprising dignitaries and media persons from India including Swami Agnivesh of World Council Of Arya Samaj, Shankaracharya Swami Onkaranand Saraswati ji of Parmatama Math Prayag and Vishwa Kalyan Parishad, Dr. M.M. Verma of Interfaith Foundation India, Rampal Singh Gautam of Buddhist Society of India, S. Abdullah Tariq of Rampur, Zafarul Islam Khan of The Milli Gazette, Delhi, Zahid Ali Khan of the Daily Siasat, Hyderabad, and V.K. Hamzah Abbas of Gulf Madhyamam Daily. We reached Doha at 6:20 local time and relaxed in the Business lounge. Doha airport along with other world class facilities has separate prayer halls for men and women. I said Fajr and Zuhar salat there. From there we boarded our connecting flight QR-70 for Madrid and reached there on time.
At 19:20 local time we reached the Madrid International airport where Conference representatives extended warm welcome. Our luggage got cleared without any hassles. We were housed in Auditorium Hotel along with other invitees and media persons. We were very much tired. We went to sleep early so that we may rise early for the engagements of the next day.
15th July, 2008 was free for us. We contacted the Media Centre for issuance of badges but were told to get ourselves registered first. Twice we approached for the formalities of registration but it appeared that the organisers were not properly organized by that time and we were asked to approach the next day. So we decided to go to the City Centre by Hotel Bus. City Centre is a market place with a difference. All shops are within allotted space and they do not bulge out, as we are used to in India. We wandered and roamed about and passed the day without any other thing to bother. We all came back to hotel by 19:30 by Hotel Bus.
The hotel was very near to the Airport. It appeared that the organisers had booked most of the rooms and halls for the conference. The ground floor space and rooms were earmarked for office of the General Secretary of World Muslim League. Conference Hall had all required facilities like spacious stage, equipments for broadcasting, language translation centre, LCD TVs, printers, faxes, photocopiers, internet connectivity etc.
16th July, 2008 was the day for inaugural session of the World Conference on Dialogue in the Palace of H.M. King Juan Carlos I of the Kingdom of Spain at 14:00.
We found some mosques near Madrid railway station. Spain, the country that has Qurtaba and Gharnata mosques, is not lost in the memory of Muslims. It appeared ironical that the conference on peaceful dialogue be held in a country that leaves bitter memories to what happened in the past. I was not sure whether the choice of venue was in a good taste or bad taste. I thought is it a case of high handedness to brush aside the bloody past and submit to the world today as it is?
Muslims of Spain have different Islamic centres such as Islamic Center-Mezquitta del la, Al-Umma Islamic Association, Al Falah, Arabian Cultural Association and the Islamic Centre.
We were ready to go to the Palace to attend inaugural session. Organisers provided bus and car facilities for invitees and media persons in groups. We could reached the Palace late by which time inaugural speech of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosque King Abdullah Bin Abdul A-Aziz Al Saud of Kingdom Saudi Arabia was almost over. However, the text of his speech was made available to us earlier. On the stage on the right side next to H.M. King Abdullah was H.M. King juan Carlos I, on the left side H.E. Dr Abdullah Bin Abdul Mohsin Al-Turki, General Secretary of the Muslim World League and next to him H.E.. Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, Prime Minister of Spain was also there. After the speech of H.M.King Abdullah, H.M. King Juan Carlos I addressed the gathering, followed by H.E. Abdullah Bin Abdul Mohsin Al-Turki. The Custodian of the two Holy Mosques was shaking hands with invitees to maintain the protocol. I made it a point to shake hands with the king and congratulated him for the event. I succeeded, felt elated and satisfied with my exploits. I continued with my newfound love for meeting leaders. I succeeded in shaking hands with exchange of few pleasantries. On my query to Tony Blair as to his impression about the inter-religious dialogue he avoided any direct reply. He said, “Ask my secretary.” I was obviously not interested in his secretary.
The inaugural session closed after lunch in different halls. I was there as a scribe and we had our own place to munch the lunch. This fraternity surely has a different appetite!
The first session under the theme of Dialogue and its Religious & Civilisational Foundation started at 19:30 under the chairmanship of Dr. Bawa Jain, Secretary Genereal, Millenium World Peace Summit of Religious and Spiritual Leaders and after presentation of papers session ended at 21:30.
All other sessions for tomorrow and day after tomorrow, with main themes and sub topics assigned to dignitaries for speech, were properly planned. Finally, at the end of the concluding session and Press conference mostly Muslims rushed to city Mosque for Juma prayer by car and Bus and few of them left who visited the mosque (specified a big room for prayer) in the Hotel. Everything appeared moving smoothly with Saudi funding and their management skills. With the annual experience of managing the huge task of Hajj they have acquired the skill to execute events in a blemish-free manner.
On 19th July,2008 I went to see Independence Square, Old Post Office Building, Coloumbia Square where in the evening they were enjoying music of orchestra and beautifully developed park. I had been impressed very much of cleanliness, planned development of areas and helping attitude of locals in spite language problem.
The tour was a novel experience for me.