The Ahle Hadith have always exercised great influence in the big
cities of Pakistan. They campaign against the non-Islamic accretions
of custom and call themselves non- 'imitative'. Only 6 percent of the
seminaries belong to them but the recent increase in them has been
phenomenal. They are divided into many factions, some of them keeping
away from politics to concentrate on preaching, while Markazi Jamiat
Ahle Hadith has stayed loyal to the Muslim League of Nawaz Sharif.
According to a report by Islamabad's Institute of Policy Studies,
Pakistan has 6,761 religious seminaries where over a million young
men are taking religious training. The Ministry of Religious Affairs
has given out similar numbers in its report. But Herald (November
2001) says: 'According to the Interior Ministry, there are some
20,000 madrasas in the country with nearly 3 million students'. In
1947, West Pakistan had only 245 seminaries. In 1988, they increased
to 2,861. Between 1988 and 2000, this increase comes out to be 136
percent. The largest number of seminaries are Deobandi, at 64
percent, followed by Barelvi, at 25 percent. Only 6 percent are Ahle
Hadith. But the increase in the number of Ahle Hadith seminaries or
madrasas has been phenomenal, at 131 percent, going up from 134 in
1988 to 310 in 2000. Out of the total number of youth taking
religious training in the seminaries, 15 percent are foreigners.
Among the Ahle Hadith, there are 17 organisations active in Pakistan,
looking after their own seminaries. Out of them, six actually take
part in politics, three take part in jehad, and three are busy
spreading their mazhab or school of thought. They are all puritans
who do not follow the state fiqh and are also called wahhabi. Most of
them follow the lead of the ulema of Saudi Arabia and receive
assistance from rich Saudi citizens.
The Great Ahle Hadith tradition: There are 17 Ahle Hadith
organisations in Pakistan, out of whom six take part in politics and
three take part in jehad. Differences of ritual exist among them, as
also differences of strategy. At times these differences become very
intense and give rise to mutual vilification, as in the case of
Markazi Ahle Hadith of Allama Sajid Mir and the former
Lashkar-e-Tayba (Now Jamaat al-Dawa) of Hafiz Muhammad Saeed. Jamaat
Ghuraba Ahle Hadith holds that its supporters should quietly reject
the political system till the majority of the population becomes Ahle
Hadith, after which Pakistan will automatically become Islamic.
Jamaat al-Mujahideen thinks that the political system is batil
(false) and as long as a caliphate does not come into being, it will
not take part in politics but will struggle to establish an Islamic
government. Hafiz Saeed's organisation holds the same position.
There is a central executive committee (Majlis-e-Amal) which seeks to
guide the Ahle Hadith establishment in Pakistan. Under it, the
following parties occasionally meet to decide plan of action: (1).
Markazi Jamiat Ahle Hadith (Prof Sajid Mir); (2). Jamiat Ghuraba Ahle
Hadith (Maulana Muhammad Idrees Hashmi); (3) Jamaat al-Dawa (Hafiz
Abdus Salam Bhatvi); (4) Jamaat al-Mujahideen (Dr Muhammad Raashid
Randhava); (5) Mutahidda Jamiat Ahle Hadith (Maulana Ziaullah Shah
Bokhari); (6) Jamaat Ahle Hadith (Maulana Muhammad Hussain
Sheikhupuri); (7). Tehreek al-Mujahideen (Commander Owais Sajjad);
(8). Jamaat al-Dawa al-Quran Afghanistan (al-Sheikh Samiullah). The
Majlis-e-Amal has met only three times but one agreed resolution it
adopted was published in the Ahle Hadith monthly journal Sahifa Ahle
Hadith (Karachi) in January 2000: 'We believe that General Musharraf
does not represent Islam or Pakistan but America and its allies. We
condemn General Musharraf's decision and demand that he should not
sow the seeds of hatred between the people and the army simply to
extend his personal rule. He should stop giving statements against
mujahideen Muslims because America and its allies listen only to the
language of violence and will not negotiate till the Muslim umma
decides to break America into pieces through guerrilla war, as it did
in the case of Russia'.
Markazi Jamiat Ahle Hadith: Markazi Ahle Hadith is the best known
party apart from Jamaat al-Dawa formerly known as Dawatul Irshad with
its jehadi wing, Lashkar-e-Tayba. The Jamiat traces it origins to a
congregation in Bihar (India) in 1906. After 1947, its two centres in
Lahore and Mamun Kanjan near Faisalabad kept alive the Ahle Hadith
tradition. It made its first show of strength in Lahore in 1986 under
the political activism of its leader, Allama Ehsan Elahi Zaheer. A
graduate from Saudi Arabia, his links with the Saudi religious
hierarchy and funds made him an important personality within the
Jamiat. Before he was assassinated (perhaps owing to some sectarian
tracts he wrote) he had transformed the Jamiat into a political party
aligned with the Pakistan Muslim League. In its manifesto, the party
explained the Nazriya Pakistan (Pakistan Ideology) thus: we believe
in the two-nation theory as the basis of Pakistan; and we believe in
the supremacy of the Quran and the Sunna in Pakistan. Other
resolutions conform the 'non-imitative' opposition to the established
fiqh, in this case Fiqh Hanafiya. The Jamiat also took the decision
to declare the rule of a woman as being against Islam. This caused
its opponents to label the Jamiat as a B-Team of the Pakistan Muslim
League. Mian Nawaz Sharif confessed that the Jamiat had served the
PML better than Jamaat Islami.
Very little has appeared in the press about the politics of Hafiz
Saeed's Lashkar-e-Tayba and its mother organisation, Dawatul Irshad,
because of the close coordination it enjoyed with its 'handlers'.
Hafiz Saeed in his early heady days took on Markazi Jamiat Ahle
Hadith (with whom he shared his wahhabi creed) and criticised their
inertia with regard to jehad. This objectionto the Jamiat is shared
by Jamaat Ahle Hadith of Maulana Sheikhupuri too. The Jamiat hit back
and discussed in detail some aspects of Lashkar-e-Tayba that no one
in Pakistan dared discuss for fear of the state. One 1993 cassette,
containing the khutba-e-juma in Faisalabad of Qari Abdul Hafeez of
the Jamiat, levelled the following charges: that despite the fact
that the leaders of Lashkar-e-Tayba held that a boy going for jehad
did not need the permission of his parents, their own sons did not go
to jehad because 'their mothers did not give permission'; that the
Abu Jandal Group of the Lashkar looted banks in Pakistan in the
(wrongly attributed) tradition of a Companion of the Prophet (PBUH)
who used to loot caravans to strengthen Islam; that members of
Lashkar abducted Barelvi girls and kept them as slaves, claiming that
Hafiz Saeed had allowed the custom of keeping slave girls; and that
colossal sums of money gathered in the name of jehad were pocketed by
the leaders of Lashkar.
Youth Force and Tehreekul Mujahideen: The greatest asset of Jamiat
Ahle Hadith is its central Wifaq al-Madaris which looks after the
wahhabi seminaries all over Pakistan. The Jamiat has offices in all
provinces but its more important support is gathered around its
branches in Faisalabad, Lahore, Dera Ghazi Khan, Khanpur, Jhelum,
Rahimyar Khan and Islamabad. It has eight subsidiary organisations,
among which Ahle Hadith Youth Force is quite important. Because of
its ability to mobilise and act, it is often called the 'spine' of
the Jamiat. Led by Hafiz Shahid Amin, it takes part in overtly
sectarian disputes, often against the Barelvi and Shia (but not
Deobandi) organisations in such cities as Dera Ghazi Khan where the
Shia community is strong. The Youth Force has fought legal and armed
battles with the Shias there, fully supporting the Sipah Sahaba
demand that Shias be declared non-Muslim. It also fights the Barelvi
acts of shirk against the Holy Prophet PBUH and takes over mosques
where such transgressions are committed. The next important
subsidiary is Tehreek al-Mujahideen which is a fighting outfit headed
by Sheikh Jameelur Rehman who heads also Pakistan's Muttahida Jehad
Council, the apex body of all militias fighting in the jehad. Tehreek
al-Mujahideen was born in Indian-Held Kashmir in 1989, but after it
started sending its fighters for training to Afghanistan, it first
aligned itself with Jamaat Ahle Hadith then 2000 onwards became
linked to Markazi Jamiat Ahle Hadith. It trains near Muzaffarabad in
Azad Kashmir and has resisted efforts for merger with Lashkar-e-Tayba.
Tehreek al-Mujahideen is funded by Haramain Islamic Foundation which
funnels money from Saudi Arabia. (The contact with Saudi Arabia was
established after the Ahle Hadith of Pakistan started a movement of
protection of Mecca and Madina after the Shia tried to hold meetings
at Kaaba). In 1985, Imam Kaaba and a representative professor of
Madina University became members of the Foundation. Mansur bin Abdul
Rehman al-Qazi of Haramain Islamic Foundation declared in the Tehreek
journal Shahadat in July 2000 that he was satisfied by the Tehreek's
spreading of the salafi faith in Indian-Held Kashmir. It is also
supported by the Pakistani masses through the Tehreek offices in all
the districts of the country. Tehreek al-Mujahideen claims that 500
of its warriors died in the jehad in Kashmir after killing 3000
Indian soldiers and officers. Among the Pakistanis killed, 215 were
from Punjab, 49 from Sindh, 45 from Azad Kashmir and 19 from the
NWFP. In all, 70 Muslims of Indian-Held Kashmir also achieved
martyrdom. The Tehreek received a setback when in 1999 its commander
Abu Waseem Salafi was martyred by Indians. In February 2001, another
shock came when its leader Maulana Abdullah Ghazali was captured by
the Indians. The wahhabi-salafi warriors of Tehreek al-Mujahideen
have made efforts to spread their faith in Indian-Held Kashmir,
converting many Barelvi mosques in Poonch and Kupwara into Ahle
Hadith mosques.
Jamaat al-Mujahideen Ahle Hadith: By rights Jamaat al-Mujahideen
should have been the 'mother' organisation of Ahle Hadith because it
traces its origin in the mujahideen of Syed Ahmad Shaheed (d. 1831
AD) immortalised in two books by Maulana Ghulam Rasul Meher. Fighting
against the British, the Jamaat established its secret headquarters
in Bajaur. In 1948, it mobilised in the Kashmir jehad. Led by Ghazi
Abdul Karim Khan, it today holds that democracy be replaced with the
Islamic system of shoora, that jehad be institutionalised on a
permanent basis within the state structure, and that bidaa (popular
accretions) be removed from Muslim rituals. In 1979, Jamaat
al-Mujahideen joined up with Deobandi Maulavi Yunus Khalis of
Jalalabad and took part in the Afghan war in all the major battles.
More importantly, Jamaat al-Mujahideen became the 'mother'
organisation for all the Ahle Hadith warriors willing to take part in
the Afghan jehad. All the members of the Ahle Hadith organisations,
including the leadership of what later came to be known as
Lashkar-e-Tayba, first went into Afghanistan under the aegis of
Jamaat al-Mujahideen.
Jamaat al-Mujahideen Ahle Hadith has some basic differences with
Markazi Ahle Hadith, one being that it was not askari (militant) and
that it had succumbed to politics and had started defending the
democratic system in Pakistan. Other differences centre on the
ownership of certain seminaries. Markazi Jamiat removed the first
objection by absorbing Tehreek al-Mujahideen and entering the list of
jehadi organisations. Another Ahle Hadith organisation Jamaat Ghuraba
Ahle Hadith is known for its tough puritanism and focuses on the
building up of the madrasa system and stiffening the generally lax
faith of the Muslims. Its Jamia Muawiya in Lahore is well known.
Another Lahore seminary at Chowk Dalgran, Jamiya Ahle Hadith, is run
for Jamaat Ahle Hadith by Hafiz Abdul Ghaffar Ropari. In a famous
case of 'love marriage' the chief justice of the Lahore High Court
was swayed by the non-Hanafi concept of the wali. Many judges
continue to recommend the concept of wali,as against the freedom of a
girl to marry by her own choice, because of the growing influence of
the Ahle Hadith puritanism. On 20 May 2002, Jamaat Ahle Hadith, is a
session presided over by its leader Maulana Sheikhupuri, and assisted
by Maulana Abdul Ghaffar Ropari and Maulana Javed Ropari, warned the
Musharraf government to stop secularising Pakistan, begin the
enforcement of Islamic law, separate non-Muslims in the voters' list,
and release Hafiz Saeed, the leader of Jamaat al-Dawa (formerly
Lashkar-e-Tayba).
WHILE THE Western World worries about Islam, the specter of Hindu
nationalism carries the potential of threatening the stability of the
Indian subcontinent and the world beyond. A bit of bad news out of
New Delhi earlier this month was that the hard-line, Pakistan-bashing
home minister, Lal Krishna Advani, had been named the number two man
in the Indian government and a potential successor to the ailing and
aging Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
Whereas Vajpayee was the human face of the Hindu nationalist
Bharatiya Janata Party, which has led a coalition government for four
years, Advani is more in tune with the party's base of radical
nationalists who seek to undermine the secular India of Jawaharlal
Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi. In addition, Advani's policy towards
Pakistan is larded with nuclear threats and bellicosity.
With tensions between the two nuclear powers still high, any increase
in Advani's influence is a blow to compromise with Pakistan over
Kashmir and to India's time-honored secular political institutions.
Many Indians believed that the BJP's secular allies in the ruling
coalition would not accept such a hardliner as Advani as Vajpayee's
heir, but they have been proved wrong. And while it seemed that
Vajpayee was willing to downplay ''Hindutva,'' a concept of exclusive
Hindu identity dear to the party's heart, Advani can be expected to
emphasize it.
Like their Muslim extremist counterparts, Hindu nationalists seek to
expel Western secularism from their midst, persecuting non-Hindus,
trashing hotels that celebrate Valentine's Day or Christmas, and
demanding that cities with Islamic names, such as Allahabad, be
changed. Other religions - and there are more Muslims in India than
there are in Pakistan - are considered offshoots of a basic Hindu
entity that should submit to Hindutva. Hindu nationalists rant that
Hindi should be the national language, even though millions of
Indians speak other native languages.
The crowning moment of Advani's brand of Hindutva came exactly 10
years ago when an ancient mosque believed to have been built on a
Hindu site was torn down by a howling Hindu mob egged on by BJP
leaders including Advani. Militants shouting ''Hindustan is for the
Hindus'' and ''Death to Muslims'' rioted, and more than 1,000 people
were slaughtered, most of them Muslims.
The recent rioting in Gujarat, in which hundreds of Muslims were
killed while the police looked on, came as result of the controversy
surrounding the Hindu nationalist demand that a Hindu temple be built
where the mosque stood. In a country riven with communal violence,
Advani is unusually provocative.
Most disturbing is Advani's advocacy of nuclear threat. He once said
that India's nuclear bomb would ensure that India would triumph in
Kashmir. India's much bigger conventional army could have prevailed
in any war with Pakistan, but ironically, India's bomb brought forth
a Pakistani bomb, and now India's numerical advantage in conventional
weapons and troops counts for less.
Indians have said that their nuclear bomb was as necessary to
counterbalance China as Pakistan, but to men like Advani having a
nuclear bomb is part of Hindutva and the greater glory of Indian
culture and destiny that lost out to the West during colonialism. The
feeling of grievance and greatness deprived is as much a part of
militant Hindu culture as it is among Islamists.
When India brought forth its bomb to become a nuclear power, Hindu
nationalists talked of it as a Hindu bomb, and they spoke of building
a Hindu temple on the desert test site. Many quoted the lines from
the Hindu epic, the Bhagavad Gita, that Robert Oppenheimer uttered in
Alamogordo at the dawn of the atomic age: ''I have become Death/ The
destroyer of worlds.''
India will not be a safer or a more secular place if Advani comes to rule.
H.D.S. Greenway's column appears regularly in the Globe.
PTI [ WEDNESDAY, JULY 10, 2002 9:36:14 AM ]
WASHINGTON: Reaffirming its desire to have good relationship with both India and Pakistan, the United States has said it is "anxious" to get through the current crisis and see a dialogue begin between the two South Asian neighbours on the Kashmir issue.
"It is a very difficult issue. And what we are trying to do now is to make sure that both the Indians and the Pakistanis understand that the United States is interested in them beyond this crisis. We want a good relationship with India on every aspect of that relationship, economic, trade cooperation, military cooperation. The same thing with Pakistan," US Secretary of State Colin Powell said on Tuesday.
"We are anxious to get through this crisis and see a dialogue begin between the two sides so that we can start to move forward to help find a solution to the problem in Kashmir ultimately," Powell, who is expected to visit India and Pakistan towards the end of this month, said testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
He said the US has worked "very hard" to keep the Indo-Pak tension from "blowing up or boiling over on us. And I spend an enormous amount of time on the telephone with the two sides, spoke to President Pervez Musharraf again on Monday, spoke to the new Indian Foreign Minister Yashwant Sinha on Sunday."
The Committee hearing was called to discuss the agreement between the US and Russia to reduce the number of strategic weapons but there is no real bar to raising other issues.
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