Bid to silence voice of moderates

THE FRIDAY attack at a mosque in Pulwama is being seen as a plot by extremists to impose their will on liberal Muslims in the Kashmir Valley. Terrorists are opposed to believers in shrines. Moulvi Abdul Rashid Dawoodi, who was the target of Friday?s grenade attack, described it as an attempt to ?silence his voice of moderation?.

THE FRIDAY attack at a mosque in Pulwama is being seen as a plot by extremists to impose their will on liberal Muslims in the Kashmir Valley. Terrorists are opposed to believers in shrines. Moulvi Abdul Rashid Dawoodi, who was the target of Friday’s grenade attack, described it as an attempt to “silence his voice of moderation”.

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In June this year, terrorists had lobbed a grenade at the house of Ahad Bab, a widely respected religious head, in Sopore in north Kashmir, killing two.

Dawoodi, 29, a student of a moderate religious scholar and leader Qazi Nissar -- the Mirwaiz of South Kashmir assassinated in Anantnag in June 1994 – said over phone from his bed at Sher-e-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences, Srinagar, that “those having an issue with me should come forward and debate”.

“As far as I am concerned,” the priest from Harnag, Anantnag, said, “ I am a religious preacher. I will continue to do that. These attacks will not deter me from my path.”