Hyderabad: Protests in city over French President remarks

Hyderabad: Several religious and social organisations which observed Eid-e-Milad-un-Nabi marking the birth anniversary of Islam's last Prophet Muhammad turned this into an opportunity to vent their anger by staging a protest against the French President Macron, over Prophet Cartoon row. While some of them appealed for a total boycott of French products, others ran a social media campaign against a city-based English daily for supporting Macron through its editorial.

Following the protests which broke out all over the world against the remarks of French President, this was time for Hyderabad's Muslims to come on road on Milad-un-Nabi which coincided with Friday. Organisations including Tehreek-e-Islam conducted a protest in Nampally and All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) appealed to the Muslims to boycott French products. "Islam is a religion of peace and tolerance. The act of blasphemy by the French president is an extreme violation of Muslim sentiments and all Muslims will stand united against such blasphemous entities, irrespective of their geographical, ideological and sectarial differences," said Mufti Mohammed Asif Bilal Quadri Barkati, President Tehreek-e-Islam.

Sunni United Forum of India (SUFI) had organised a peace rally in a worshipful manner which was started from Quadri Chaman in Falaknuma to Mecca Masjid near Charminar. After offering Zohar prayer the Dua was offered by Maulana Syed Qubul Pasha Shuttari, President Majlis Ulma-e-Deccan in Mecca Masjid. Later on, the rally was flagged off from Mecca Masjid by Syed Shah Ibrahim Hussaini Sajjad Pasha, Shaik-ul-Islam. MLA Mumtaz Ahmed Khan, Hafiz Muzaffar Hussain Khan and others were also present.

Some Islamic organisations organised an online public meeting. For the first in 71 years, All India Majlis Taameer-e-Millat (AIMTM) organised the online public meeting, Jalsa-e-Rahmatul Lil Alameen, which was conducted indoors with city scholars at Red Rose in Nampally.

"Earlier the meeting was in a national level, but this year keeping Covid-19 pandemic norms, AIMTM have conducted a meeting globally with International scholars including Renowned Islamic Scholar including Shaikul Islam Dr Tahirul Quadri, Founder and Patron of Minhajul Qur'an International, Grand Mufti of Australia Imam Abdul Quddus Azhari, Shaik Fakeruddin Owaisi from South Africa among prominent Islamic scholars addressed the people in the conference where lakhs of people have joined on social media," said Dr Fakhruddin Mohammed, Chairman AIMTM.