The government is targeting the Muslim community on one pretext or the other, says Maulana Mahmood Madani
GUWAHATI – Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind (Mahmood Madani faction) President Maulana Mahmood Madani has slammed the BJP-led government in Assam for what he called “unlawful actions and humiliating treatment of a particular community (read Muslims who account more than 40 percent of the state’s population).
Addressing a press conference here on Tuesday, Madani said: “If Chief Minister Hemant Biswas Sarma wants, he can send me to Bangladesh or put me in jail. But the government must stop these discriminatory measures and derogatory behaviour.”
Since taking office in 2021, the Sarma government has been targeting the Muslim community on one pretext or the other. “Bulldozing their homes has become a norm in the state. Despite Supreme Court’s guidelines, the government has launched a demolition drive displacing hundreds of families who have been there for decades,” Maulana Madani said.
In the wake of this ongoing demolition, Mahmood Madani visited the affected areas and shared the details in the presser.
The Jamiat chief said, “I witnessed the despair on people’s faces. The most painful part is not just the demolitions, but the humiliation — branding an entire community as ‘Miya’ or ‘Doubtful’.”
Clarifying his stand, Madani asserted, “If anyone is a foreigner, deport them. We have no sympathy for illegal migrants. But Indian citizens must not be uprooted. Where eviction is necessary, it should follow Supreme Court guidelines with basic compassion.”
Reacting to the chief minister’s remark that he would send him to Bangladesh, Madani said, “I have been in Assam since yesterday. If he wishes, he can send me. But if such threats can be issued to someone whose family endured six imprisonments during the freedom struggle, what will happen to ordinary Muslims?”
He emphasised that hatred has no place in India: “Those who spread hatred and division have no right to remain in this country. India’s civilisation is thousands of years old. It cannot be defaced by enmity. Such people should go to Pakistan.”
On reports of damage to Namghars, he underlined the shared cultural responsibility: “Assam’s heritage is built by saints like Shankar Dev and Azan Faqir. If Namghars are harmed, mosques will not remain safe. Protecting both is our collective duty.”
Madani also recalled Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind’s century-long role in the freedom struggle and its opposition to the two-nation theory. “Our principle has always been service to the nation — not on the basis of religion, but on humanity and patriotism,” he said.
Present at the event were Jamiat leaders Maulana Mohammad Hakimuddin Qasmi, Maulana Abdul Qadir, and Maulana Fazlur Kareem. On the occasion, Maulana Abdul Qadir announced that Jamiat had distributed essential relief materials to 300 displaced families in Lakhiganj, Dhubri.
