It shocked my conscience to go through a news item in Inquilab Urdu Daily (Oct. 19) that for the last about 25 years Muslims in village Lohra under Police Station Mubarakpur in Azamgarh district of Uttar Pradesh have been prohibited to perform mandatory sacrifice of permitted qurbani animals on ground of law and order problem. Police force and PAC were deployed in the village much before the day of qurbani to ensure that nobody performs the religious ritual of sacrifice. All the animals are collected and kept in a place for the days of qurbani.
Social activists have since been approaching the authorities – local and State level – to allow them to perform the ritual but in vain. This is despite the fact that the Muslims of the village have won the case in the honourable High Court. Now the question arises: Is it Indian Secularism? Whether the same police force and the PAC deployed to prohibit the qurbani cannot ensure qurbani in their presence maintaining law and order in the village? This is the most important point.
Shafeeq Uddin
Jamalpur, Aligarh