The ‘spectacular success’ of Indian Taliban
http://www.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=28724
Abhishek Sharan
Imagine a sprawling slum housing some 2 lakh people and not a single television set.
In September last year, Cheetah Camp in suburban Trombay in Mumbai took to heart an edict issued by the local Muslim clergy and did away with the loudspeakers blaring Bollywood numbers at every wedding and festive occasion. Now, following the ‘‘spectacular success’’ of the existing ban, the talk in the narrow bylanes and street-corners is that the next to go will be the household telly.
‘‘Even the Ulema Council praised our September farmaan (edict),’’ says Abdul Jalil Khan, a highly influential member of the local clergy and one of those who issued the diktat.
Called ‘Sadar Saab’, Khan says 50-odd weddings have been conducted in Cheetah Camp since September, ‘‘without loudspeakers or fireworks’’.
Khan is now rolling up his sleeves for the bigger battle, against the ‘‘corrosive power’’ of the visuals on the air-waves. All television programmes, informative or entertaining, are replete with images ‘‘of lust and of semi-nude models’’ Khan adds.
Along with the welcome respite from the noise pollution caused by the loudspeakers, there’s also a silent revolution underway. Around the mosques and madrasas, conversations are liberally peppered with references to the holy Quran, the Hadith and ‘ittefaq-i-rai’ (consensus on any issue).
That’s why, when 17-year-old Mohammed Alam steps outside the high-walled precincts of the Al Jamiatul Arabia Merajul-Uloom Madrasa, he’s particularly careful not to stray from the path of ‘‘pure Islam’’. ‘‘My teachers are very clear. I should shun any external influence, especially women and Western things,’’ he says.
And Alam isn’t alone. In this predominantly Muslim slum, the everyday ‘‘socio-cultural vices’’ are suddenly a major cause for concern.
So, Alam shies away from even a glimpse of any woman who’s not a relative. ‘‘Except the first time—that could be accidental.’’
A single repeat and he’ll be damned, he’s been told. ‘‘Molten lead will be poured into my eyes, in hell,’’ Alam says.
No television programmes and definitely no movies for Alam though he’s watched ‘‘a few Salman Khan movies’’.
‘‘Even news programmes bristle with nudity—thanks to the commercials,’’ says Mohammed Azad (29), a teacher who gives taqreers (religious sermons) at the Merajul mosque and at Alam’s madrasa.
The madrasa and the mosque are both housed in a common campus in Sector C of Cheetah Camp, the structure standing out amid the irregular rows of shanties.
Inside the madrasa, kids hover around the sole telephone—one of the few links with the world outside Cheetah Camp. Can Alam use the radio? ‘‘Only for news. He should switch it off when there’s music coming on,’’ offers one teacher.
The locals are cagey, though most say the religious intervention is the need of the hour. But Khan is upbeat.
He has an example to cite—in Taloja, en route to Pune, several Muslim families yanked out their television plugs in 2000.
Cheetah Camp could be next.