Deoband school terms terrorism anti-Islamic

One of the most influential Muslim seminaries issues a kind of fatwa declaring terror activities as anti-Islam, reports Zia Haq.

One of the most influential Muslim seminaries, with followers across the world, on Monday issued a kind of fatwa, declaring terror activities as anti-Islam. The Darul Uloom seminary in Deoband also involved top clerics at a conclave in defining terrorism in the light of the Quran and Shariah.

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Reading out the declaration on behalf of an aging Darul Uloom rector, Maulana Marghoobur Rahman, a member of Darul’s governing body said: “Killing of innocents is not compatible with Islam. It is anti-Islamic.”

The declaration said Darul seriously viewed allegations from intelligence agencies as well the Centre that madrasas were terror hubs. “Madrasas don’t teach students to kill. They teach them to lead an Islamic life, where respect for human life is supreme,” he said. The Darul declared that terror acts fell under the “shirk category of sins”. According to Quran, shirk is a “sin for which there is no pardon”. That the declaration was coming was first reported by HT on February 21.

The convenor of the hugely attended conclave, Jamiat Ulema-i-Hind general secretary Maulana Mahmood Madani, told HT that attending clerics “analysed terror activities in Islamic light” and felt that before such a declaration — which has the stature of a fatwa — could be passed, it was important to codify and define terrorism according to the Quran.

He said all top clerics, including representatives of Ajmer Sharif Dargah, All India Madarsas’ Association and All India Muslim Personal Law Board, arrived at this definition of terrorism: “Any action that targets innocents, whether by an individual or by any government and its agencies or by a private organisation anywhere in the world constitutes, according to Islam, an act of terrorism.”

This is the first time that an Islamic theological institution has institutionally defined and banned terrorism.