A controversy over a Sunni leader speaking insultingly against a Class 10 girl for coming on stage to receive her educational achievement award during a madrasa function at Ramapuram has snowballed into a broadside against the orthodox Samastha Kerala Jamiyyathul Ulama (SKJM) with several people, including Governor Arif Mohammed Khan and Kerala Women’s Commission Chairperson P. Sathidevi, joining the issue.
“This is yet another example of how Muslim clerics continue to push hard Muslim women into seclusion, and suppress their personality in total defiance of Quaranic commands and provisions of the Constitution. Holy Quran says: And women shall have rights similar to the rights against them according to what is fair and reasonable, but men have an added degree of responsibility towards them,” said the Governor on Wednesday.
The controversial incident took place at Darul Uloom Madrasa at Pathiramanna, Ramapuram, two days ago when SKJM senior leader and veteran Sunni scholar M.T. Abdulla Musliar openly scolded the organisers for inviting a Class 10 girl on to the stage to receive her award.
Mr. Abdulla Musliar bluntly and loudly told the organisers that it should never happen again while the girl was leaving the stage after receiving her award. It was found to be an apparent insult to the girl.
Condemning the incident as anti-women, Ms. Sathidevi said the Samastha leader’s behavior was an insult to civilised society. She called upon the people to react against the regressive attempts of the clergy to pull back society into darkness.
The SKJU defended its leader’s action saying that women were never allowed on Samastha stages.
