love Jihad : real or fake

Yet another time this marginal community has been targeted. This time on an absolutely ludicrous issue “Love Jehad”. The RSS lobby has once again shown its hatred towards the minority community. The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh alleges that the outfit “Love Jehad” works on the main objective of “a sinister operation under which Muslims allegedly target non-Muslim girls for conversion to Islam with the help of deceptive love followed by marriage” .

A Hindu organization called Vande Mataram, in Saharanpur said they have confirmed information that Muslim youths have been luring Hindu girls in the guise of Hindus. “They smear sandal paste on their foreheads, tie sacred threads on their wrists and identify themselves by Hindu names. They trap the girls and then force them to convert to Islam. There are many examples of such conspiracy in the country,” said Mission’s founder Vijay Kant Chauhan who reportedly owes allegiance to right-wing outfits. Meanwhile, Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) and the BJP reiterated that ‘love jihad’ was going on in the country. “Such jihadis are funded by the neighbouring countries,” said Anandmayi Puri, a leader of BJP Mahila Morcha. VHP joint general secretary Vinayak Rao Deshpande said it was going on for the last one decade. “Ten years ago, we had rescued 250 Hindu girls of Gujarat who were victims of love jihad and rehabilitated them,” he claimed. On the contrary, it should be noted that there is no existence of any such term in Islam. Muslim leaders and religious scholars have completely denied the allegations.

It is coined to disintegrate the Hindu and Muslims. Jehad literally means to fight against the evil. How can some extremists associate the term Jehad with “Love” is beyond the reach of understanding. Muslims of these country are neither interfering into other’s religion, nor are they forcing them convert into Islam. There is a strict provision of “ Pardah” in Islam. It is also applicable to boys. Islam strongly asks its followers not to even look at other women (except close family members), so these allegations of love affairs should be kept aside. So, Islam and this RSS/BJP proclaimed naïve “love jehad” has no connections. Moreover, there is no law which forbids marriage between men and women from different religions. Nor does any religion prohibit its practitioners inter-faith marriage. The motive behind this hate campaign against a specific community is tangible.

The state of Uttar Pradesh is going to witness assembly elections in two years. The Hindutva elements of the state want their propaganda to reach up to the voter’s level. One more field to concentrate on is that the same outrage of hate campaign was witnessed at the time of Muzaffarnagar Riots last year. Since then, it is in continuation be it the Meerut gang rape or any other incident. The politicians and anti social elements never cease to hype such situations on communal grounds. The desire behind all the mayhem associated with something as pure as love is just to rise communal temperature. The sad part of the story is that the politicians are trying hard to get political mileage from this hate campaign.

[author image=”http://www.aapkatimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/farheen.jpg” ]I am Farheen Sultana pursuing English Honours from Jamia Millia Islamia and I am  interested in highlighting social issues and political issues[/author]

One thought on “love Jihad : real or fake

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *