By IndiaTomorrow.net,
New Delhi, 16 March 2015: India’s largest Muslim organization on Monday strongly condemned the continuous Hindu right campaign to dispute and suspect the constitutionally recognized identity and existence of religious minorities in the country by calling them ‘Hindu’. Jamaat-e-Islami Hind has termed the call as violation of constitutional rights of minorities.
A top leader of Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS), the parent organization of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, had on Saturday reiterated that all the citizens of the country are Hindu.
Reacting over the statement, Nusrat Ali, Secretary General of Jamaat said, “Existence and identity of minorities are being made suspicious even though they have been acknowledged in the Constitution and specific rights granted to them as separate entity.”
Sah Sarkaryavah (joint general-secretary) of RSS Dattatreya Hosabale had said: “Mohan Bhagwatji (RSS chief) has said it 20 times that all those born in India are Hindus. Whether they accept it or not, they are culturally, nationally and DNA-wise the same. Whom do you call minorities? We don’t consider anybody to be a minority. There should be no minority concept in the country because there is no minority,” he was quoted in the media as saying.
In his reaction to the statement, Nusrat Ali, Secretary General of Jamaat-e-Islami said: All citizens of India are called Bharatiya, Indian or Hindustani but how can all of them, including Muslim, Sikh, Christian, Jain, Parsi, Dalit, Adivasi and many others be called Hindu? Won’t it be violation of their constitutional rights? Won’t such campaign harm the atmosphere of communal harmony?”
The Secretary General of Jamaat further said that it is a universal fact that people are associated with religions on the basis of their beliefs. Therefore, if some people want to call themselves as “Hindu” on the basis of their belief they have full right to do that. But their organization or people have no constitutional and moral right to call “Hindu” all other people who profess and practise different religions and beliefs.
“As for Indian Muslims, they believe in oneness of God, Prophethood and Life After Death and so they cannot even imagine to wear a separate identity as “Hindu” or as any name other than Islam, and neither can one be granted such unconstitutional right to do that,” Jamaat leader said.
