[Reader-list] The Fatwa in Journalism: Research Update

[Vikhar Ahmed]

The Fatwa in Journalism



Pico Iyer in his book *Tropical Classical: Essays from Several Directions*,
an anthology of his essays, writes in the essay "Prosaic Justice All Around:
Salman Rushdie vs. The Ayatollah", "When Khomeini issued a *fatwa,* or death
sentence, on Rushdie last week, it became impossible to tell who was the
prophet and who the victim-…[1] <#_ftn1>". For any person then who is
reading the essay a fatwa then is interpreted to be a death sentence. Vico
Giambattista, the seventeenth-eighteenth century Italian philosopher has
said that human knowledge is only what human beings have made. In this essay
Iyer, who is otherwise a perspicacious travel writer commits a severe gaffe
in his role as an interlocutor. Iyer is an intermediary at some level
between the reader and his idea. In his communication the author is claming
to be an 'expert' (without stating it). A reader who reads this essay
instantaneously accepts the 'fact' that a fatwa is a death sentence without
questioning Iyer's assessment. As the point made in an earlier posting the
definition of a fatwa can hardly be restricted to a 'death sentence' but
when good writers like Pico Iyer make such critical errors the magnitude of
errors of misinterpretation can only be magnified in the shallow arena of
journalism.

The word fatwa became a part of general parlance when the Ayatollah Khomeini
issued his fatwa where he justified that Rushdie deserved to die because of
his blasphemous utterances in his book *The Satanic Verses. *The instrument
of the fatwa became famous in 1988 with its association with Salman Rushdie
but as Sadik argues in his paper the infamous 'fatwa' was not a fatwa at all
[2] <#_ftn2>. Anyway, the impression that the world got was that once a
fatwa was pronounced Muslims were bound by their faith to fulfil the letter
of the fatwa. Thus, we saw quite a few Muslims the world over baying for
Rushdie's blood. Finally, in a recent fatwa, Rushdie's life was spared but
raises the necessity to critically question the media's rule in purveying
this idea that the fatwa is a death sentence. Pico Iyer has fallen prey to
this misinterpretative role performed by the media.

            Earlier[3] <#_ftn3> last year in June the Darul Uloom Deoband
pronounced that Imrana, a woman from Muzafarnagar in UP could no longer be
the legal wife of Noor Ilahi. Imrana was directly paying for the crimes of
her husband. In the same week the Darul Uloom issued another fatwa
proclaiming that ideally Muslim women must not contest panchayat elections,
and never without a veil. The Indian print media splashed these issues on
the front page giving it more importance than necessitated by the actual
pronouncements. Undeniably, the seminary at Deoband is a very important
authority for Muslims in South Asia but the print media simply blew the
whole issue out of proportion. The issue concerning the panchayat election
fatwa was investigated by Basharat Peer of the Tehelka[4] <#_ftn4> who in
his interview with the Vice Chancellor found out that a journalist from a
local Hindi newspaper had sent a letter seeking opinion whether Muslim women
could go out to campaign and contest elections without wearing a veil. The
journalist had not mentioned his profession and had merely signed his name.
A mufti had read his query and answered according to Islamic law, which
forbids women from going out without a veil. Then the journalist had written
the story and it looked like the seminary had announced a fatwa on its own.
>From there it was picked up by the national newspapers and it looked like
the fatwa was a binding order on all Muslims.

In a report in The Hindu dated 1st July in the Imrana case the report
described a fatwa as an edict[5] <#_ftn5>. The report said, "However, she
(meaning Imrana) was yet to receive a formal fatwa (edict) to stay away from
her husband and children. Islamic seminary Darul Uloom Deoband issued a
fatwa to Imrana that she could no longer live with her husband as she had
been raped by her father-in-law." The report while misinterpreting the
meaning of fatwa also makes it look like the victim here does not respect
the Indian legal system that has a grievance redressal system and as if the
fatwa is binding upon her.

            What is important to note here is that when the print media
reports on issues pertaining to the delivery of fatwas it generally treats
it under the broad rubric of reporting about Islam and it does this in an
insensitive and crass manner without recognising the internal divisions
within Islam in India. While Muslims in India can be broadly divided into
Sunnis and Shiahs, among the Sunnis they can be further subdivided into the
four maslaks or traditions of Islamic jurisprudence, the Hanafis, Shafis,
Hanbalis and Malikis. While most Sunni Muslims in India are Hanafis there
are divisions amongst the Hanafis themselves and Deoband represents a strand
of the Hanafi thought. The Barelwis who are the followers of the late Ahmed
Riza Khan Barelwi (d. 1921) and who are the most numerous in India
(according to the Islamic scholar Rafiq Zakaria) might not always follow the
fatwa of the Deoband as they have their own seminary in Barilley. The
Ahl-e-Hadis is another important sect within Indian Islam which does not
conform to any of the four maslaks mentioned above and their principal
seminary is located in Benares and they will certainly not hold the fatwa of
Deoband to be the last word on any particular issue.

            A few other fatwas that I can think of that have been reported
by the Indian media is one fatwa issued by some obscure alim of West Bengla
who forbid  Sania Mirza from playing because she wore revealing clothes. The
manner in which that issue was reported gave so much importance to the
ruling of an alim whom nobody had ever heard of that it smacked of
callousness in reporting.

The December 12th 2005 issue of Outlook had a cover story on Fatwas. The
cover had a blown up picture of heavily painted glistening lips crossed out
and the headline was *Crazy World of Fatwas*. "No Make Up" in bold red read
a bigger strap line and the last line said, "Outlook obtains a fatwa against
Muslim women using lipstick in public". The cover story was titled
"Ayatollahs All" by Saba Naqvi Bhaumik. The story starts off quite well
though it makes one ponder what she means when she writes that of the great
mass of Muslims in India, "Some are neo-converts anxious not to commit any
sin in their journey to a promised paradise". It is a troublesome statement
because almost all Muslims in India are not neo-converts.

The story moves on with the author describing how the fatwa entered pubic
consciousness (through the fatwa on Salman Rushdie of course). The reporter
makes an important point when she writes that there has been an impression
that a fatwa is a command or an edict. But then the reporter moves on to
investigate the matter by creating a fictitious setting and it looks as if
she is out to debase Islam. The question that the reporter chose to seek an
opinion of a mufti was, "As a Muslim woman, is it appropriate for me to work
and to use cosmetics like lipstick when I go to office?" The opinion sought
was from an alim from the Islamic Fiqh Academy in Delhi. It is not said to
which *maslak* in Islam this institution belongs nor is any background about
the institution given. The impression that the reader would get from reading
the fatwa is that Islam does not allow women to wear make up.

Then there are five excerpts from the fatwa collection of Darul Uloom
Deoband. The magazine writes that they culled out these *gems* (the italics
are mine) from the collection and they have been listed under the title of
'Ridiculous Fatwas'. The five *gems* are:

1.      If while breaking wind it does not smell or sound, does it still
break the wazu (cleaning before prayers)?

A. If you are sure you broke wind and you are not under a false illusion and
are not physically challenged, then you should do the wazu again.

2.      What is the punishment for a man who tells his wife that having sex
with her is like having sex with her mother?

A. There is no punishment for what a man says in private to his wife.

3.      If a chicken defecates in my well, has it become impure? How do I
purify my well?

A. Throw out 110 buckets of water from your well. Then it will be purified
and the water can be used for wazu.

4.      If my bathroom does not have high walls and a roof, should I still
bathe in the nude?

A. If the walls are high enough to cover your body then bathe in the nude,
if not, then don't bathe naked.

5.      Will Allah accept my prayers if I pass wind while doing my namaz?

A. Only if you have kept the wind within you and restrained from releasing
it are your prayers valid. If not, you should say your prayers again.



            The reporter does not state how many fatwas are there in the ten
volumes of the compendium of the Darul Uloom Deoband. Even if a safe
speculation is made about the number of fatwas in that set, taking into
account the fact that the Dar-ul-ifta of Deoband is more than a century old
and it is one of the most respected Islamic seminaries in the world, it can
easily be said that the number will not be less than several thousands.
Culling out five *gems* from this collection very subjectively presents
Muslims in a terrible light, almost mocking their religious beliefs.

            Journalism is a shallow medium of communication of information.
The medium demands that 'news' be communicated as instantaneously as
possible. It is a competitive process to see who can deliver the news as
quickly as possible. In this communication that is a dominant part of
popular culture we see that the limited research that tight deadlines lead
to a flattening out of the news. Stories aren't investigated at a deeper
level and this leads to a certain pursuit of the sensational. There is a
celebration of 'sensationalism'. In such a scenario where the sensational is
sought after and celebrated questions like objectivity and truth are lost.


            The fatwa entered the realm of public consciousness through
Rushdie and has now embedded itself in the consciousness of the public.
Nobody has not heard of a fatwa. The media has used the word so frequently
that most consumers know it as some 'Muslim rule'. The media has failed in
it's role of presenting something to the audience in an unbiased manner. The
fatwa is perceived to be bad now and every time someone hears the word fatwa
the first reaction is that it must be another binding rule for all
Muslims.


            The theorists of the media (I had a section on this in my
earlier posting) who operate from a slightly Marxist view point write that
the bourgeois notions of what constitutes news helps in preserving a certain
status quo while the liberal pluralists believe that truth is provided by
the media. As can be seen in the analysis of the way the 'fatwa' is reported
it acquires an anti-Islamic tinge to it bringing Chomsky's and Herman's
fifth filter where Anti-communism is replaced by Anti-Islamic reportage. Of
course, a larger research would demonstrate this inherent prejudice in the
Indian media of anti-Islamic prejudice that this research has proved through
the reportage of the fatwa.

            The liberal pluralists believe that news helps in the creation
of public opinion but is the truth offered for a 'true public opinion' to be
formed. As the analysis of the fatwa reportage has demonstrated there has
been a gross misrepresentation of the role a fatwa plays in the life of
Muslims and more seriously, a gross misrepresentation of what a fatwa
actually is. Thus, when truth itself is questionable then can a responsible
public opinion be formed?

            Edward Said writes that the American media is insensitive to the
differences that abound within the *ummah* (community) of Muslims. There is
a reductionism at work here that seeks to present Muslims as terrorists and
fundamentalists. Using the analogy of Islam as reported in America and fatwa
as reported in India a similar argument can be made that the variety within
Indian Islam is not recognised by the Indian print media and a reductionism
is taking place when fatwas are reported reducing them to mere edicts.There
is a callousness in reporting about Islam in India that reflects in reports
about fatwas.



------------------------------

[1] <#_ftnref1> Iyer…p. 147

[2] <#_ftnref2> Al-Azm, Sadik J. "Is the 'Fatwa' a Fatwa?" *Middle East
Report* 183 (Jul.-Aug. 1993): 27.

[3] <#_ftnref3> For many portions of this paragraph I have relied on Javed
Anand's article, "Let's Call the Ulema's Bluff" in the Times of India dated
July 7, 2005.

[4] <#_ftnref4> Peer, Basharat. "Inside Deoband: The Third-Umpire of
Fatwas". *Tehelka*. 2: 35 dtd. 03/09/05.

[5] <#_ftnref5> The Hindu. "I will abide by religious laws, says Imrana"
dtd. 1st July 2005
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