Why Akbaruddin Owaisi Lashed Out

By Faiz Ahmed

Recent events in India have caused a fall-out between the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen and the Congress party. This led to a countrywide uproar at the words of Mr. Akbaruddin Owaisi, the sitting MLA in the Andhra Pradesh State Parliament. Owaisi is accused of having given a speech that is divisive and hateful which caused quite a stir in the media, and indeed some of the things that he did say were hurtful to Hindus and should not have been said. However, one must realize that Owaisi only said those things in frustration and after becoming emotional. The reason for his frustration and emotion, he laid out throughout his entire speech – injustice.

It is a testament to the sad state of injustice and apathy in Indian public opinion that no controversy is created when Praveen Tagodai incites people to kill Muslims, no one is outraged when genocide is perpetrated against Muslims in the state of Assam, and no one is outraged when the mass murderer of Gujarat walks free and hopes to become the Prime Minister of India, but a controversy is created when a leader from an oppressed Minority community responds only with words, albeit offensive words.

What Owaisi said was that despite India’s claim to be a secular democracy, it is in fact a society where the minorities are getting sidelined and pushed into relative poverty compared to the majority. Moreover, tension was also rife as Muslims in Assam were recently massacred and hardly any media outlets covered the incidents. The riots in Assam included for the first time ever, the use of automatic rifles against the Muslim Minority. Owaisi who was organizing relief efforts was also frustrated at the lack of mercy from the Assam government because it denied help to the affected Muslims, by labeling them Bangladeshi foreigners and requiring the victims whose houses were burnt down to bring forth proper documentation before providing relief.

The immediate cause however was the frustration at government inaction over the attempts to expand the illegal temple built at the base of the Charminar despite a court order. The Charminar is a landmark in Hyderabad and a Mosque which was closed down by the government. It is also an important part of Muslim heritage in India. The building of the temple at the base of the Charminar is similar to the efforts to build the Ram Mandir on the spot of the Babri Masjid which was brought down by Hindu extremists who were helped and supported by the RSS, BJP and even by the congress party itself which was in power.

There is an ongoing effort by radical Hindu movements like the BJP, RSS, Shiv Sena and the like to undermine the contributions of Muslims to the cultural heritage of India, the destruction of the Babri Masjid, a major mosque and testament of Muslim architecture and heritage at the hands of the Hindu radical movement is just one such example. Other such attempts to diminish Muslim achievements and heritage include the false claim that the Taj Mahal was created not by the Mughals but by the local Hindu kingdoms that existed before the arrival of the Mughals. Many smaller mosques and Muslim communities are burnt and destroyed regularly and now their attention has turned towards the Charminar. The Charminar which was a mosque is no longer used as one, moreover to add insult to the injury of not being able to use it as a mosque, an illegal temple was erected at the base and is being expanded, sending a clear message to the Muslims that their cultural and religious heritage is now under attack and will be sooner or later be usurped just like the Babri Masjid. No Muslim would have a problem if the Hindu community builds a temple to worship their deities, but there is a problem if that temple is encroaching into a mosque or a historical monument or even state property. 

This is a major move on part of radical Hindu movements to sideline Muslims by denying, demolishing or taking over Muslim contributions to India. Muslims have been a part of India for a thousand years and will continue to be a part of it. Just as the Hindus have rights to their temples and Christians to their churches and Sikhs to their gurudwaras, Muslims also must enjoy similar freedom. This is not something the BJP and RSS can understand. 

It is a known fact, that the AIMIM party under the leadership of the Owaisi brothers has always been popular and is not a fringe movement. They have been repeatedly elected to office many times. They have been active in the municipal issues, local issues, and even issues pertaining to the treatment of police officers by the government regarding their low salaries, the dangers to their health due to pollution and not being provided proper shoes etc. They have started hospitals and colleges where minorities are provided some relief. They have always been the first to respond with food and medicine and setting up medical camps for the victims of communal aggression against minorities in India. They have seen the blood and gore, the destroyed families, the broken people. A person can only witness so much barbarism and be quite. Sooner or later that anger and emotion will burst out.

Mr Owaisi has always tried to work within the confines of the system and by the law. However, frustration and desperation makes people angry. To say that he is a hate monger is to turn a blind eye to the reason why he was angry. His anger at the government, at the system and at the RSS, BJP and other right wing movements is more than justified. However, in his anger some things he said were a little too harsh and not in line with the spirit of Islam as the Quran strictly prohibits Muslims from insulting the deities of other faiths. As a Muslim I feel the need to remind my brother, Mr. Owaisi, that some of the statements were indeed uncalled for. But I realize that was not the essence of the speech. The essence of the speech was to highlight the injustices against Muslims in India, which the majority of Indians are indifferent to, are unaware of, or are too scared to speak out against. Mr Owaisi’s elder brother and leader of the party, Mr. Asaduddin Owaisi also stated and reinforced the party line saying that the party was not an enemy of the Hindu community. Rather they only oppose RSS, BJP and their ilk. Akbaruddin Owaisi got carried away in emotion and made those comments which were hurtful, the question should not be why the comments, rather why the emotion. The only answer to that is institutionalized injustice.

While listening to Akbaruddin’s speech, I couldn’t help but remember another great personality, the African American leader Malcolm X. Akbaruddin Owaisi and Malcom X are very similar personalities. It is something to think about. Both were the most hated men by the affluent majorities in their countries and in their times, both were repeatedly accused of hate speech, both were labeled as fanatics and fringe leaders, both were bold, both made exaggerated comments out of frustration that made them both infamous, both were members of a minority who were oppressed because of the status quo, both were loved deeply by their minority constituents, both were denounced by frightened members of their own minority communities who were regularly appearing on TV. Both spoke about injustice angrily yet the media and the population condemned their anger and not the injustice that caused the anger.

Malcolm X in his last year was telling White America to give Martin Luther King what he was asking for before other violent groups, the type which the media associated him with, come along, to get their rights by force. Similarly, Akbaruddin also worked with the parliamentary system and has tried to exhaust all possible methods to seek justice and only lashed out in anger when he figured out that despite all their efforts, they had zero gains.

Another thing that is a similarity between the two men is their commitment to preserving their cultural heritage. Malcolm X lamented that White America had robbed the black man of his history, his culture, his language, his religion and the only role models that African Americans had were grandparents who had been enslaved. Malcolm X said that “as long as you are convinced [as a community] that you have never done anything, you will never do anything” another longer quotation from Malcolm X is:

“… here your mother is being raped and you are not supposed to be emotional… your women can’t walk the streets without some (insulting term for the white man) putting their hands on them and you are not supposed to be emotional … 20 million black people that don’t even know their own name! Why? Because he took it away from you! 20 million black people that don’t even know their own language! Why? Because he took it away from you! … 20 million black people who don’t even know the history of their ancestors! Why? Because he took it away from you! … And when you try to tell them how thoroughly and completely you have been robbed they say we’re teaching hate! That’s something to think about! … and then again if we try to tell you that Negroes are being hung on the trees and are getting shot down illegally! Unjustly! And that those Negroes should do something to protect themselves, they say ‘you are advocating violence!’… If somebody tries to take you directly to the root of the problem they say that man is a hate teacher … so I just want to clear up that little point right there, because they say that we play on your emotions! And when you turn on your television tonight or your radio, or read the newspaper, they are going to tell YOU in that paper, that I was playing on your emotions! Imagine! You! A second class citizen!  That’s not getting emotional, that’s getting intelligent!”

—Malcolm X  (El Hajj Malik El Shabazz Omowale) 

There is indeed similarity between the two men, both will be hated by the majority in their lifetimes, loved by the suffering minorities, and adored and remembered for generations to come. 

In conclusion, I would like to remind Mr. Owaisi that the Quran prohibits speaking abusively about the deities of those who do not share our faith, and I would like to stress on the people of India to listen to the real message of Akbaruddin Owaisi and to understand the cause of his anger rather than get fixated on the anger itself. There is a well justified reason to be angry. However that anger should be rightly directed. I pray that God gives the people of India the courage and strength of mind to understand what Owaisi was saying. I pray that God forgives his mistakes and protects and guides Owaisi in such a way that he continues to be a force that can stand up and speak against injustice as he has been doing as the spokesman for the Muslim community for quite some time now.