Source: Newsweek Pakistan
AS PART OF COW PROTECTION PUSH, GUJARAT GOVERNMENT HAS ERECTED BILLBOARDS CLAIMING TO SHOW THE QURAN DISCOURAGES CONSUMPTION OF BEEF.
By Punit Paranjpe—AFP
A Muslim leader in India warned Wednesday of communal unrest after a state government claimed the Quran discourages eating beef, the latest contentious effort to protect cows in the Hindu-majority country.
The government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state of Gujarat has erected billboards with an alleged Quranic verse saying eating beef causes disease, together with an Islamic symbol of a crescent moon and star.
Hardline Hindu groups have long pushed for a national ban on the slaughter of cows, which they consider sacred. But moves to protect cows have intensified since Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came to power after general elections last May.
Several states have introduced a ban on slaughtering the animals and selling their flesh, a move that critics say discriminates against Muslims and other religious minorities who rely on the cheap meat for protein.
Shabbir Alam from the main mosque in Gujarat’s Ahmedabad city said the billboards were an insult to Islam because no such verse existed. “Such hoardings can spark violence and disturb the peace between the two communities,” the mufti told AFP. “Anything which is not from the Quran and publicized as part of the holy book is an insult to Islam. I strongly condemn this act of the Gujarat government.”
Categories: Anti-Islam Attitude, Anti-Islam Campaign, Asia, India, Secularism, Separation of Church and State
Maybe, to avert chaos, the Muslims of India can publicly challenge their government of quoting the verse/s of the Holy Qur’an that they claim forbids us from eating beef….
They can go on national media for this debate….?
We should also address it from a larger context also of coexisting in a friendly and peaceful atmosphere with the fellow Hindus in India.
Quran allows eating beef but it cannot be enforced in India. Just like prohibition of alcohol and permission of polygamy cannot be enforced in the West.
God is bothered about what you eat and drink. He is concerned, what comes out of our mouth!(bad mouth).
What goes in may not corrupt us; but what comes out corrupts us.