A Place And Its Negative

ishat has written several research papers tracking education in Azamgarh's Muslim society. "Education is a great leveller and the girls in burqa are actually leading the charge in this area. The first two rows of a class are always occupied by them and they score the highest marks," she says. Today Nishat fears the day her children will be exposed to rhetoric like that of the BJP's Yogi Adityanath and his men who recently trooped into town shouting "UP Gujarat banayenge, shuruwat Azamgarh se karenge...."

Incidentally, it's a fear spreading across the country among Muslims. "Is it any different in Hyderabad?" asks Asaduddin Owaisi, MIM member of the Lok Sabha who blames the "lack of a credible Muslim leadership in existing political parties" for the mess. "The mainstream political parties never bothered to promote Muslim leaders and today this vacuum has been taken over by radical elements spewing hatred. Can India live with that?"

For today's generation, which has grown up in the post-Babri Masjid demolition period, there's a feeling of disbelief and helplessness after news came in of the recent Jamia Nagar encounter in Delhi. Dr Salman Sultan, a noted intellectual and a descendant of Allahmah Shibli, asks, "Why don't they mention that tons of ammonium nitrate was found in the houses of Bajrang Dal activists in Kanpur? Why is the media silent about them? Is it not terrorism when Bajrang Dal activists burn churches in Orissa?" A prolific writer, Sultan is worried about the effect such radical elements have on the youth. "I also protest the loud festivities during the holy month of Ramzan and people in my community hate me for it. But things have changed. While the madrassas were respected in our time, the small madrassas of today are uncontrolled. We don't know who is teaching what in there," the professor laments.

For a district with some of the worst social indicators—malnutrition stands at an alarming 69 per cent and the infant mortality rate is 63 per 1,000—a crippled economy offers no succour. In Mubarakpur, where the famed Benarasi sari is handwoven, newborn babies can be seen sleeping naked on damp floors in cramped tenements. They have no future but malnourishment and possible early death. Little wonder then that when simi's Dr Shahid Badr Falahi talks ominously about bringing an "Islamic system" to India, it's just one side of the faultline that lies between Azamgarh's intellectual past and its present terror tag.