The All India Muslim Majlis-e Mushawarat, umbrella body of Indian Muslim organisations, welcomed the mandate given by the people of India to the UPA in general and the Congress Party in particular. In a statement on May 16 the AIMMM President Dr Zafarul-Islam Khan said that the elections’ outcome is a clear indication that the Indian voter has rejected the divisive and communal politics of the NDA and its allies.
Dr Khan said that the Muslim community all over the country has welcomed the outcome of the elections. Apart from other national and regional issues, the results are to a large extent due to a clear Muslim swing, especially in the north, towards the Congress Party for the first time since the demolition of the Babri Mosque in 1992.
Dr Khan said that the Congress Party’s initiatives as head of the UPA, including the Sachar Report and the measures taken in its wake, e.g., Prime Minister’s revised 15-point programme, scholarships scheme for minority students and schools for minority areas, containment of the terrorism scare created by the BJP, especially since the arrival of Mr Chidambaram as head of the home ministry, have helped to bring Muslims back to the Congress.
Dr Khan added that the secular image of the Gandhi family, Rahul’s friendly image and attitude towards the community and the poor, and the clean and sincere image of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his accessibility to the community leaders have gone a long way to convince Muslims to vote again for the Congress.
Dr Khan said that the Congress party should not take this support for granted as the Muslim community will closely watch during the next five years if the party was really serious about its announcements and policies. The community will watch if the now unfettered Congress government was really serious about implementing the plethora of schemes announced by the Prime Minister during the last three years. The community will also watch how fair the new government is in tackling the terrorism scare unleashed by the BJP as a weapon against the Muslim community. This scare is responsible for keeping many innocent Muslim youths behind bars.
The results of the 15th parliamentary elections illustrate that the people as well as our democracy have become quite mature. “Now it is obvious that the people of India have dumped the fascist and communal agenda of BJP,” said Engineer Mohammad Salim, president Jamaat-e-Islami Hind, Rajasthan.
“The people have discarded the Advanis and Modis as Prime Minister and rejected the mentality of ‘Godse’. They have expressed faith in forces who are supposed to strengthen communal harmony, secularism, and democracy,” he said, adding that the people have made it clear that they do not consider the future of the country safe in the hands of these communal and fascist forces.
Mr. Salim was optimistic about the new government that they will do their best to fulfil the expectations of the public so that harmony and mutual trust strengthen and our country proceeds onto the path of progress and development.
He advised the defeated communal and fascist forces to understand the public’s message and leave aside their old agenda of hatred and dividing the society and turn towards the path of love and harmony. This only is better for them as well as the country.
Dr. Shaik Ubaid, a community leader and founding National Coordinator of US-based Coalition against Genocide commented on the election results in India by declaring that Indian democracy has won! He was speaking at an event organised by the Indian Minorities Advocacy Network, ImanNet.
“Pluralist and democracy loving Indians all over the world including those living in the US welcome the results of the national elections in India. Indian democracy has won!
The Congress party gets one more opportunity to end the rampant corruption and the fast increasing divide between the few rich and the multitudes of poor and destitute. This divide poses a grave threat to India’s stability.
“More importantly the Congress will have to embark on a programme of detoxification of minds by countering the anti-minority and supremacist propaganda that is being taught in schools all over India. We see the results of this hate mongering among the Indian youths who have arrived here in the US during the last two decades. These youth are now being organised under many human rights fronts. They are the true wolves in sheep’s clothings.
“The Congress government must bring to justice the culprits who were responsible for pogroms, mass-rapes and ethnic cleansing. It must get serious in providing relief and rehabilitation for the victims of these massacres.
“Taking these steps will ensure that Congress will solidify its support even in places such as Uttar Pradesh, the heartland of India. It will ensure the survival of Indian Constitution and Indian democracy.
“More than being jubilant we breathe a sigh of relief that the extremist ultra-nationalist Hindu party, BJP has lost so badly. This should further dampen the prospect of the pogrom politician Modi becoming the prime minister of India in the future. Anti-extremist votes solidified around Congress once some in the BJP start projecting Modi as the future prime minister of India. While the BJP lost nationally but in places where it orchestrated anti-Christian and anti-Muslim pogroms such as in areas of Orissa, Karnataka and Gujarat it has done better.
“Congress leadership especially the young Rahul Gandhi must take note that RSS and BJP are no longer the sole traders of hate. The supremacist ideology of Hindutva that was inspired by Hitler and which led to the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi has seeped into the Congress party mostly among the younger leaders. This was made possible by the hateful history texts that were surreptitiously introduced by the Hindutva ideologues over the last decades.”
Dr. Ubaid appealed to the Indians living in the US to discharge their duty to humanity and to India and US by standing up against hate.
Dr. Shaik Ubaid is the Founder National Coordinator of Coalition Against genocide, a broad-based alliance that was instrumental in getting the US visa of Narendra Modi revoked.