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Letters to the Editor
Jihad in Kerala
This refers to the report “The jihad in ‘God’s Own Country’” (March 9). The statement that within Kerala itself, politics has contributed to the empowerment of Islamists is misleading. The allusion that the Jamaat-e-Islami had traditional control over Muslim votes in north Kerala is wrong. It was the Muslim League that had control over the Muslim vote in Malappuram, which is only one of the northern districts of Kerala. The Muslim League and the Jamaat-e-Islami were always at loggerheads in matters of elections. It is true that in recent years the Left has taken control of north Kerala. Progressive and secular elements in the State view this as a good sign.
N.M. Mohammed Ali,
Thiruvananthapuram
The Jamaat has never resorted to violence. Its endeavour is to foster communal harmony which it does by conducting Eid meetings, and distributing kits during festivals of other religions. Jamaat was never a political party. So the question of its traditional control of Muslim votes in north Kerala weakening does not arise.
Muhammad Zahir,
Aluva
By saying that in the imagination of Kerala Islamists SIMI-linked terrorists are the inheritors of Islamist resistance dating back to Sheikh Zayn-ad-Din’s 16th century anti-colonial struggle, the report does disservice to the secular anti-colonial legacy that visionaries like him sought to invocate.
The anti-colonial and pluralistic tenor of the epic text Tuhfat al- Mujahideen inspired people across the religious divide to wage a spirited battle against the Portuguese aggression.
It is misleading to argue that the Jamaat’s traditional control of Muslim votes in north Kerala weakened. In the last Assembly polls, the Jamaat supported the Left Democratic Front in all the 140 constituencies and helped it to wrest some seats from the IUML in Malappuram and neighbouring districts.
Andaleeb Wafy,
Bangalore
The article poses hard questions and proceeds to answer them. To the question why residents of States with no history of large-scale communal pogroms are contributing cadre to terror groups, it says that most of the recruits worked or studied in other States or places where they faced discrimination.
As one who grew up in Kerala, I would like to say that for me, reading the Ramayana and the Mahabharata was the most natural thing to do. Along with my Hindu and Christian friends, I grew up on magazines like Poombatta and Balarama.
Thehseen Zakir,
Kochi
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