[Reader-list] The Trouble with Dr. Zakir Naik

[Javed]

Dear Pawan
Its not just you alone - I think its a combination of you, Kshmendra
and a few others who Shiddha is acusing. Don't you remember that just
a few days ago you wanted to know why I am supporting as well as
condemning Zakir Naik at the same time. Your earlier mails cannot be
seen disconnected from this one. And I think here comes another one.
Now that more people on list are rejecting Naik, why do you have to
convince us again and again about his wrong-doings.

I think you need a holiday please. Or some of us need one from you.

Javed

On Wed, Jun 23, 2010 at 11:44 AM, Pawan Durani <pawan.durani at gmail.com> wrote:
> Dear Shuddha ,
>
> Seems you have lost it ...lost it completely. Please ask others if
> they consider you an intellectual and that too secular.
>
> I have shared an article about Zakir Naik , which i found interesting
> . I have not even added a word to it , neither did I expect an
> explanation on this from anyone.
>
> Seems Delhi heat is playing too much on you ....try Nainital.
>
> Your accusations against me were uncalled for.
>
> Pawan
>
>
>
> On Wed, Jun 23, 2010 at 11:15 AM, shuddha at sarai.net <shuddha at sarai.net> wrote:
>> Dear All, Yusuf, Pawan and Kshmendra,
>>
>> I am utterly amazed at the persistence of bigotry on this list. Thanks, Yusuf,
>> for pointing out that Dr. Zakir Naik is someone who is anathema to very many
>> Muslims. I have watched several of his internet broadcasts, and find him
>> utterly, utterly laughable and prejudiced, and also either very ignorant, or
>> very dissimulating about the history of Islamicate cultures. I have never had
>> any hesitation in saying that people like Zakir Naik are charlatans, but I see
>> no reason, why I (who identifies himself, and is identified, as a secular
>> intellectual) or anyone bearing a Muslim name should have a specific
>> responsibility to do so. My attitude towards him is not any different from my
>> attitude towards Pravin Togadia (the rabid Hindu fanatic) or for that matter
>> any fundamentalist or bigot of any persuasion.
>>
>> I find the kind of insinuations that have been made by Pawan and Kshmendra
>> disturbing. I find it insulting that some people should expect others to have
>> to have some kind of special responsibility to atone for the idiocies of others
>> who might share an ethnicity or a religious background. A sometime
>> Shankaracharya of Puri openly declared his support for untouchability and the
>> Sati system, does this mean we should ask any and every believing Hindu to be
>> accountable for his (the said Shankaracharya's) utterances, or for the utterly
>> pathetic conduct of an outfit like the Rame Sene? If anyone were to suggest
>> that I would find such a suggestion as offensive as the one being implied by
>> those who are using Zakir Naik to cover for their bigotry.
>>
>> The fact that people on this list can hold others guilty by association,
>> because of their name, or their beliefs, or assumed beliefs, is very sad
>> indeed. It looks like the long and tragic history of prejudice in the twentieth
>> century (or earlier) is something that some people still have difficulty
>> learning from.
>>
>> best,
>>
>> Shuddha
>>
>>
>>
>> On Tue, 22 Jun 2010 05:53:56 -0700 (PDT) Kshmendra Kaul
>> <kshmendra2005 at yahoo.com> wrote
>>
>>> Dear Pawan
>>>
>>> Thanks for sharing this. An apt reading of the reality of the likes of Zakir
>>> Naik and "India's purportedly secular intelligentsia".
>>>
>>> - "Unlike traditional clerics, Dr. Naik quotes freely from non-Muslim
>>> scripture, including
>>> the Bible and the Vedas. (You have to pay attention to realize that
>>> invariably this is either to disparage other faiths, or to interpret them in
>>> line with his version of Islam.)"
>>>
>>> - "Finally, unlike Hindu bigots, such as the World Hindu Council's Praveen
>>> Togadia, whose fiercest critics tend to be fellow Hindus, radical Muslims go
>>> largely unchallenged."
>>>
>>> - "Moreover, most of India's purportedly secular intelligentsia remains loath
>>> to criticize Islam, even in its most radical form, lest this be interpreted
>>> as sympathy for Hindu nationalism."
>>>
>>> - "Unless this changes, unless Indians find the ability to criticize a
>>> radical Islamic preacher such as Dr. Naik as robustly as they would his Hindu
>>> equivalent, the idea of Indian secularism will remain deeplyflawed."
>>>
>>> Kshmendra
>>>
>>> --- On Tue, 6/22/10, Pawan Durani <pawan.durani at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> From: Pawan Durani <pawan.durani at gmail.com>
>>> Subject: [Reader-list] The Trouble with Dr. Zakir Naik
>>> To: "reader-list" <reader-list at sarai.net>
>>> Date: Tuesday, June 22, 2010, 1:48 PM
>>>
>>>
>>> Source :
>>> http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704365204575317833268479268.htm
>>> l?mod=WSJINDIA_hps_sections_opinion
>>>
>>> "Britain's decision to bar an influential Muslim cleric from entering
>>> the country underscores the failure of Indian secularism."
>>>
>>> By SADANAND DHUME
>>>
>>> If you're looking for a snapshot of India's hapless response to
>>> radical Islam, then look no further than Bombay-based cleric Dr. Zakir
>>> Naik. In India, the 44-year-old Dr. Naik—a medical doctor by training
>>> and a televangelist by vocation—is a widely respected figure, feted by
>>> newspapers and gushed over by television anchors. The British,
>>> however, want no part of him. On Friday, the newly elected
>>> Conservative-led government announced that it would not allow Dr. Naik
>>> to enter Britain to deliver a series of lectures. According to Home
>>> Secretary Theresa May, the televangelist has made "numerous comments"
>>> that are evidence of his "unacceptable behavior."
>>>
>>> The good doctor's views run the gamut from nutty to vile, so it's hard
>>> to pinpoint which of them has landed him in trouble. For instance,
>>> though Dr. Naik has condemned terrorism, at times he also appears to
>>> condone it. "If he [Osama bin Laden] is fighting the enemies of Islam,
>>> I am for him," he said in a widely watched 2007 YouTube diatribe. "If
>>> he is terrorizing the terrorists, if he is terrorizing America the
>>> terrorist, the biggest terrorist, I am with him. Every Muslim should
>>> be a terrorist."
>>>
>>> Dr. Naik recommends the death penalty for homosexuals and for apostasy
>>> from the faith, which he likens to wartime treason. He calls for India
>>> to be ruled by the medieval tenets of Shariah law. He supports a ban
>>> on the construction of non-Muslim places of worship in Muslim lands
>>> and the Taliban's bombing of the Bamiyan Buddhas. He says revealing
>>> clothes make Western women "more susceptible to rape." Not
>>> surprisingly, Dr. Naik believes that Jews "control America" and are
>>> the "strongest in enmity to Muslims."
>>>
>>> Of course, every faith has its share of cranks; and, arguably, India
>>> has more than its share. But it's impossible to relegate Dr. Naik to
>>> Indian Islam's fringe. Earlier this year, the Indian Express listed
>>> him as the country's 89th most powerful person, ahead of Nobel
>>> Laureate economist Amartya Sen, eminent lawyer and former attorney
>>> general Soli Sorabjee, and former Indian Premier League cricket
>>> commissioner Lalit Modi. Dr. Naik's satellite TV channel, Peace TV,
>>> claims a global viewership of up to 50 million people in 125
>>> countries. On YouTube, a search for Dr. Naik turns up more than 36,000
>>> hits.
>>>
>>> Nobody accuses Dr. Naik of direct involvement in terrorism, but those
>>> reportedly drawn to his message include Najibullah Zazi, the
>>> Afghan-American arrested last year for planning suicide attacks on the
>>> New York subway; Rahil Sheikh, accused of involvement in a series of
>>> train bombings in Bombay in 2006; and Kafeel Ahmed, the Bangalore man
>>> fatally injured in a failed suicide attack on Glasgow airport in 2007.
>>>
>>> Nonetheless, when the doctor appears on a mainstream Indian news
>>> channel, his interviewers tend to be deferential. Senior journalist
>>> and presenter Shekhar Gupta breathlessly introduced his guest last
>>> year as a "rock star of televangelism" who teaches "modern Islam" and
>>> "his own interpretation of all the faiths around the world." A handful
>>> of journalists—among them Praveen Swami of the Hindu, and the grand
>>> old man of Indian letters, Khushwant Singh—have questioned Dr. Naik's
>>> views, but most take his carefully crafted image of moderation at face
>>> value.
>>>
>>> At first glance, it's easy to understand why. Unlike the foaming
>>> mullah of caricature, Dr. Naik eschews traditional clothing for a suit
>>> and tie. His background as a doctor and his often gentle demeanor set
>>> him apart, as does his preaching in English. Unlike traditional
>>> clerics, Dr. Naik quotes freely from non-Muslim scripture, including
>>> the Bible and the Vedas. (You have to pay attention to realize that
>>> invariably this is either to disparage other faiths, or to interpret
>>> them in line with his version of Islam.) The depth of Dr. Naik's
>>> learning is easily apparent.
>>>
>>> But this doesn't fully explain Dr. Naik's escape from criticism. It
>>> helps that Indians appear to have trouble distinguishing between free
>>> speech and hate speech. In a Western democracy, demanding the murder
>>> of homosexuals and the second-class treatment of non-Muslims would
>>> likely attract public censure or a law suit. In India, it goes
>>> unchallenged as long as it has a religious imprimatur. However, create
>>> a book or a painting that ruffles religious sentiment, as the writer
>>> Taslima Nasreen and the painter M. F. Husain both discovered, and
>>> either the government or a mob of pious vigilantes will strive to
>>> muzzle you.
>>>
>>> In general, India accords extra deference to allegedly holy men of all
>>> stripes unlike, say, France, which strives to keep religion out of the
>>> public square. Taxpayers subsidize the Haj pilgrimage for pious
>>> Muslims and a similar, albeit much less expensive, journey for Hindus
>>> to a sacred lake in Tibet. This reflexive deference effectively grants
>>> the likes of Dr. Naik—along with all manner of Hindu and Christian
>>> charlatans—protection against the kind of robust scrutiny he would
>>> face in most other democracies.
>>>
>>> Finally, unlike Hindu bigots, such as the World Hindu Council's
>>> Praveen Togadia, whose fiercest critics tend to be fellow Hindus,
>>> radical Muslims go largely unchallenged. The vast majority of Indian
>>> Muslims remain moderate, but their leaders are often fundamentalists
>>> and the community has done a poor job of policing its own ranks.
>>> Moreover, most of India's purportedly secular intelligentsia remains
>>> loath to criticize Islam, even in its most radical form, lest this be
>>> interpreted as sympathy for Hindu nationalism.
>>>
>>> Unless this changes, unless Indians find the ability to criticize a
>>> radical Islamic preacher such as Dr. Naik as robustly as they would
>>> his Hindu equivalent, the idea of Indian secularism will remain deeply
>>> flawed.
>>>
>>> Mr. Dhume, a columnist for WSJ.com, is writing a book on the new
>>> Indian middle class.
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>>
>>
>>
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