The Political Framework of Islam

The Political Framework of Islam
By IOL Team
14/08/2003
The political system of Islam is based on the three principles of Tawheed (Oneness of Allah), risalah (prophethood) and khilafah (humans’ moral responsibility).
Tawheed means that Allah (God) alone is the One and Only Creator, Sustainer and Master of the universe. He alone has the right to command or forbid. Worship and obedience are due to Him alone.
Hence, it is not for us to set the ethical and moral codes or invent our frames of reference, though every nation, group or individual is entitled to contextualize Allah’s commandments and guidance that were revealed in succeeding religious messages within their own time and space; hence religious devotion is a dynamic and not a static condition. This principle of the Oneness of Allah does not contradict the concept of the legal and political sovereignty of the political community; hence the different models of Islamic democratic governance through Islamic history.
The risalah is the message of the prophets. Islam is the last revealed religion and the Qur’an is the last testament. Muslims believe in the previous messengers and their messages and their original and authentic Holy Books. The Qur’an lays down the broad principles on which human life should be based universally, as it is the last revealed message from Allah, and Muhammad, the Prophet of Allah, established a model system of Islamic life in accordance with these principles. The combination of these two elements — Tawheed and risalah — is called the Shari ‘ah (Law).
Khilafah means representation. Humans — both men and women — according to Islam, are the representatives of Allah on earth, His vicegerents.
To illustrate what the previous notions mean, let us take the example of an estate of yours which someone else has been appointed to administer. There are four conditions in this relation: First, the real ownership of the estate remains vested in you and not in the administrator; second, he administers your property directly in accordance with your instructions; third, he exercises his authority within the limits prescribed by you; and fourth, in the administration of the trust he executes your will and fulfills your intentions and not his own. Any representative who does not fulfill these four conditions will be abusing his authority and breaking the covenant which was implied in the concept of delegation.
This is exactly what Islam means when it affirms that man is the representative (khalifah) of Allah on earth. Hence, these four conditions are also involved in the concept of khalifah. The state that is established in accordance with this political theory will, in fact, be a caliphate under the sovereignty of Allah. It should rule with the power of the people in accordance with the principles of justice and welfare. Such a society carries the responsibility of the khilafah as a whole, and each one of its individuals shares in it.
Hence the form of Islamic government might be called theo-democracy, a combination fully different from the Western historical experience of the relation between church and state.

The Best Days of the year

The Best Days of the YearThe Day of `Arafah & `Eid Al-Adha
By Ælfwine Mischler
January 11, 2005
On the Mount of Mercy in `Arafah
God has created some times better than others in the sense that the reward for good deeds done during these times is multiplied many times. This encourages His servants to do more righteous deeds and to worship Him more in order to ready themselves for death and the Day of Judgment.
Muslims believe that the best such season of worship is the first ten days of the Islamic month of Dhul-Hijjah. These days, which include the Day of `Arafah and `Eid Al-Adha, bring the Muslims an opportunity to correct their faults and make up for any shortcomings. This year, Dhul-Hijjah begins on January 12, 2005.
The blessings of Hajj spill over to those who are not making the pilgrimage if they fast on Dhul-Hijjah 9, the Day of `Arafah. On this day, also known as the Waqfah (standing), the pilgrims stand on and around the Mount of Mercy to ask Allah’s forgiveness. When the sun sets that day, all their past sins are forgiven. If those who are not making Hajj fast on that day, the sins of two years (the past and the coming one) are forgiven. This year the Day of `Arafah corresponds to January 20, 2005.
The following day, Dhul-Hijjah 10, begins a three-day Islamic public celebration known as `Eid Al-Adha, the `Eid of the Sacrifice. In some places it is known by the Turkish name bairam; `Eid Al-Adha is the Greater Bairam. This year the dates of `Eid Al-Adha correspond to January 21–23, 2005.
For more details see:
Merits of the First Ten Days of Dhul-Hijjah
Celebrations and Prayers: `Eid Al-Fitr
The Story of Ibrahim’s Sacrifice
This `eid commemorates the willingness of Prophet Ibrahim (Abraham) to sacrifice his son Isma`il (Ishmael—peace and blessings be upon them both). Muslims should reflect on their own commitment to Allah and strive to strengthen their relationship with their Creator.
Muslims celebrate this `Eid by attending special congregational Prayers followed by a sermon (khutbah) in the morning. It is a confirmed sunnah to attend these Prayers, which are usually held outside the mosque. The form of the Prayer is the same as that of `Eid Al-Fitr Prayer and is also preceded by the Takbir. Muslims are recommended to perform ghusl (complete ritual bathing) and put on their best clothes beforehand. Women who cannot perform the ritual Prayer should attend and sit on the sides or in back so that they may share in the joy of that day.
Afterwards, or on either of the next two days, many Muslims sacrifice a sheep or goat, or seven people may share in sacrificing a cow. The sunnah is to give one-third of the meat to the poor, one-third to friends and relatives, and to keep one-third for one’s own family. The majority of scholars agree that this sacrifice is not obligatory (for those who can afford it), but is a confirmed sunnah.
Pilgrims in the state of ihram (consecration) are forbidden—among other things— to clip their nails or cut or pluck their hair. Those who do not perform Hajj but who plan to sacrifice an animal on `eid should likewise abstain from clipping their nails or cutting or plucking their hair from the first day of Dhul-Hijjah until they sacrifice. The majority of scholars agree that this abstention is not obligatory, but it is a confirmed sunnah and highly recommended.
During these ten days, Muslims should also recite Allah’s praises often with the phrases “subhan Allah” (glory be to Allah), “al-hamdu lillah” (all praise to Allah), “Allahu Akbar” (Allah is Greatest), and “la ilaha illa Allah” (there is no god but Allah).
The Day of `Arafah is an excellent time to repent and return to Allah. `Eid Al-Adha, the best day of the year, combines two great acts of worship, salah (ritual Prayer) and sacrifice. Together, they offer Muslims the chance to become closer to their Creator and Lord.

Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee talks with PM

Buddha talks on ISI, NE terror with PM
KOLKATA, Jan 11 (UNI): West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee today discussed with Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh the alarming growth of terrorism in neighbouring countries that had been threatening India’s eastern and north-eastern States.
Official sources said during his 40-minute meeting with Dr Singh, the Chief Minister discussed the situation in both Bangladesh and Nepal and the way the ISI, the Intelligence agency of Pakistan, had been encouraging the Islamic terrorists, rebel Indian insurgents groups and the Maoists.
Mr Bhattacharjee explained to Dr Singh the danger the eastern and north-eastern States, especially West Bengal, Tripura and Assam, had been facing because of these developments in Bangladesh and Nepal.
The sources said the Chief Minister also expressed concern over the way Bangladesh had fast been turning into one of the biggest markets for clandestine arms, which were being used by the Islamic terrorists, the Indian insurgent groups and the Maoists.
They said the ISI, which had been of late concentrating more on the eastern part of the subcontinent, had been helping the Islamic terrorists and Indian insurgents groups having camps in Bangladesh and through them the Maoist guerrillas with the help of a section of officials in Bangladesh Government, the NSI, the Intelligence agency of Bangladesh, the Bangladesh Army and the Bangladesh Rifles.
Mr Bhattacharjee also urged Dr Singh to create pressure on Bangladesh so that it could be refrained from encouraging terrorists and anti-Indian forces. The State Government had earlier submitted the list of training camps being run in Bangladesh by different terrorist groups to the Centre. The Centre had already taken up the issue with the Bangladesh Government, which had all along been denying the existence of any terrorist camps in its territory.

Chilarai Xena Bahini , for Koch-Rajbonshis

Now Chilarai Xena Bahini to protect Koch-Rajbonshis
BONGAIGAON, Jan 13: The preliminary work for the formation of Chilarai Xena Bahini, a wing of the All Koch Rajbonshi Students’ Union (AKRSU), has been started in a meeting held at the premises of AKRSU’s office at Bijni on the occasion of the Jatiya Swahid Divas recently.
Speaking on the occasion, AKRSU president Biswajit Roy said that there is no value of democracy in India at present though India is the biggest democratic country in the world. He clearly said that the Government of India only understood the language of gun and was interested to solve their problems who had taken up arms in their hands.
Thus, the AKRSU is compelled to constitute Chilarai Xena Bahini to protest the conspiracy of both the State and Central Governments against the interest of the Koch-Rajbonshi people of Assam, Mr Roy said.
In course of his speech, Mr Roy said that the main aim of the Chilarai Xena would be to work under the constitution of AKRSU with a democratic outlook, but if necessary, it would be ready to resist the enemy. He also said that the Chilarai Xena Bahini would be constituted only at the zonal level and not at the district level in the greater ‘Kamatapur’ area.
The president of AKRSU administered oath to a large number of youths who had joined the Chilarai Xena Bahini on the occasion.
Earlier, Mr Roy formally hoisted the union’s flag, while Damayanti Roy, president of Bijni Mahila Samity, hoisted the Mahila Samity’s flag.
The black flag was hoisted by Kshitish Barman, office secretary of AKRSU, while Sailen Roy, ex-president of Bijni Zila Koch-Rajbonshi Sanmiloni paid homage to the swahid bedi by offering garlands.

The assamese ? Who are they ?

The Assamese? Who are they?Srutimala Duara
"We are from Assam" — tell that to a person from another State of India, and don’t be surprised if you hear them asking, "Where is Assam?" The first time I heard this I thought they didn’t have geography as their subject in the class, for from our school days we are aware of the location of every State in India. Perhaps even if they did study geography, the State of Assam is excluded from the map given to them. Even to this day majority of the people think that Assam means just Shillong!
When we were in one of the hill stations, and asked where we hailed from, some folks, educated ones mind you, gave very knowledgeable exclamations when we told them that we were from Assam, "Oh, Shillong!" Even a national paper like The Times of India proved that they know nothing about Assam and the Assamese. In an advertisement regarding matrimonial under the heading ‘The National Search’ about new rates effective from September 15, 2004, in the column under ‘Nationality’ among the boxes to tick, the first box reads ‘Assamese’ and then European, Japanese, Pakistani, West Asian, British, American, other foreigners, etc. So, even a national paper thinks that ‘Assamese’ is a separate nationality. What do you have to say about this? Once, writer Nirupama Borgohain related a conversation that left me speechless — I didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. A woman from another State asked her, "The passage to the North-east is so narrow that I wonder how people can pass through." To humour the lady, Nirupama Borgohain said, "We have to crawl through." And I have no doubt that the lady believed her. Now the question is — why are these folks from outside the North-east so ignorant about us? There was a time when they thought that we were all barbarians, perhaps even cannibals waiting for the people from the other States to taste them! And today, though it took the Assam Agitation and the terrorist activities to put Assam in the India map, yet there is a lot that the people have to know about us and I wonder why this is the case. Is the narrow stretch of land that separates the North-east from the rest of India the cause? Are people scared of the very thought that they would have to crawl through the passage to be linked with us?

Asom - its future ( acording to hindu fanatic)

North-east Must Read Salam Azad Bikash Sarmah
While there are many in India, mostly religious minority leaders championing the cause of their well-defined "suppressed community" and befuddled Congressmen getting motivated by the defunct Left ideology every new day, who constantly set up socio-political warning systems of the kind that pseudo-secularism would like being attuned to, it escapes the conscience of a whole lot of politicians here as to what obsessive secularism, distorted and moulded anew to suit petty political interests, might mean — spelling a doom for a nation battered in all ways. If it is a tragedy that the Sangh Parivar wants India to return to the folds of Hindutva on the ground that Hindutva alone could save the Indian identity and reshape all past glories, it would turn out to be a greater tragedy if our leaders, particularly from the North-east, do not yet learn the practicalities of politics and hear what Bangladeshi dissident writer Salam Azad has to say about his own homeland.
Salam Azad at 38 would have loved his homeland embracing the ideals of their founding father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who though he had to pay a heavy price for what he doggedly stood for — a Bangladesh respecting its creator, India, and liberal enough to tolerate and accommodate all opinionated intellectuals and activists. Salam Azad would want Bangladesh to be secular — and let us not be again hypocritical to surmise how good it would be if Salam Azad weaves a pseudo-secular pattern for Bangladesh as well. Salam Azad would have loved dying in a Bangladesh that tolerates the tenets of other faiths, especially those of Hinduism, exactly like India that does tolerate all faiths and that goes a step further too. Salam Azad would love to write brilliantly for a Bangladesh that does not send Islamist mercenaries to India’s North-east, that does not imagine of a greater Islamic state where Hindus would be mercilessly butchered, and that does not shelter the terrorists (are they insurgents?) of a land as democratic and secular as India.
In December 2003, his celebrated book Contribution of India in the War of Liberation of Bangladesh was published only to be banned by the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP)-led government of Begum Khaleda Zia whose ally today is the fundamentalist Jamaat-e-Islami as well as Islami Oikkya Jote. And why should not the book be banned? After all, it speaks of India’s contribution! And anything that is contributory from the Indian side, even if that had happened 34 years back, should be scoffed away in Bangladesh in utter disregard to what historical realities might force upon it. That is today’s Bangladesh. But that will not be tomorrow’s Bangladesh. Because it will then be fully Talibanized by the likes of Bangla Bhai (whose real name is Siddiqul Islam) who leads Jagroto Muslim Janata Bangladesh (JMJB), an Islamist organization working on designs of a Taliban-like State in Bangladesh.
That is why the book Hindu Sampraday Keno Bangladesh Tyag Korcche (Why the Hindu community is leaving Bangladesh) evoked such widespread condemnation in Bangladesh. By choosing such a title, Salam Azad was being audacious enough to confess what Talibanized Bangladesh would like to glorify — that from Bangladesh the minority Hindu community is fleeing not for reasons like poverty (of course, most Hindus are rich there, and well-educated, which peeves the Talibanized mindset), but to escape any possible carnage of the worst kind, though incidents like rape (of Hindu women) are not of the type to hit headlines there. Naturally then, why should a writer like Salam Azad be tolerated? Do we not remember what happened to Taslima Nasreen? And why should we not conclude that today’s Bangladesh needs the Talibanic jehadis more than progressive and secular thinkers like Salam and Taslima?
To get a synoptic view of what really is happening there and how the portents endanger the security set-up and demographic stability of the North-east, let us hear what Salam Azad blurts out: "I have compared Bangladesh as it existed before 1947 with its present identity. One reality of our present-day lives is the flourishing madrasas patronized by this fundamentalist government (of Begum Khaleda Zia). What do you think is taught in these madrasas? Children are taught that Muslims are the most superior community in the world. They are also brainwashed that converting a non-Muslim to Islam is an act of faith."
"I don’t agree with this kind of fundamentalism. Can humanity accept it? At the time of graduating from the madrasas, the youth are told that if you kill a non-Muslim, then the doors of paradise are open to you. They are also told that if they bring a non-Muslim woman into the fold of Islam through marriage it is another way of serving your religion."
This is what Salam Azad tells Tehelka (December 18, 2004 issue). According to him, the Christians escape the Talibanic onslaught primarily because Bangladesh, a wretch economically, depends on Christian non-governmental aid for sustenance. That means since Christian organizations and agencies are feeding the growing breed of Talibanic jehadis, their definition of Islamic culture allows only the Hindus to be chased and chastised. Salam Azad adds: "The Hindus are being targeted because they own large property. They are also the ones who are most educated and hold white-collar jobs. You won’t find a single Hindu rickshawallah in Bangladesh. You won’t find a Hindu beggar. There are no bekaar (unemployed) Hindus simply because if they were so who would give them anything to eat. On the other hand, there are many government organizations and NGOs wishing to dole out support to the Muslim unemployed."
Salam Azad candidly speaks of two things more. According to him, if a Hindu women is raped, no police station in Bangladesh would take "cognizance of the crime," and worst, even the judiciary makes it a point to ‘not’ entertain any such case. Secondly, he goes political: "Nowhere in the world is there a national law that permits the government to take over property of ethnic minorities without assigning any reason whatsoever. The Hindus in Bangladesh are being stripped of their property. Everywhere else in the world, minorities are given special protection, but in Bangladesh the Hindu minority is subjected to State-sponsored suppression. I have addressed these realities in my books."
Is secular India listening? It does not matter to mainland India though, because a Bangladeshi jehadi drugged by the Talibanic dose would hardly venture out to North or South or West India and declare any jehad there. But when it comes to the North-east, the possibility is that any such fanatic from Bangladesh, religiously well-trained in stealthy warfare by JMJB operatives and backed politically by the BNP-led government, could play havoc with indigenous lives here for three main reasons. First, the North-east, especially Assam, entices a typical Bangladeshi to come and settle in lot many open ‘geographical’ spaces safeguarded well by as many ‘political’ spaces, and this truth is as evident as anything if one realizes the geographical proximity of the North-east to Bangladesh. Secondly, an already settled Bangladeshi population, legal or illegal (but mostly illegal by all means), would lend a helping hand to that typical Bangladeshi infiltrator on the ground of either historical nostalgia or religious kinship or possibly similar "final goals." Thirdly, in Assam where the ruling Congress government seems to conceive of newer plans to appease the religious minority every other day, our typical Bangladeshi would be welcomed by the Illegal Migrants (Determination by Tribunals) Act, 1983. To summarize, the notorious IM(DT) Act (which the scholar in Dr Manmohan Singh finds highly humane) would pave the way for a glorious life for any illegal Bangladeshi in Assam and who then would go about his clandestine designs in utter "humanitarian freedom."
Is the North-east listening then? Does Assam, in particular, realize what Salam Azad signals? One needs to be politically imaginative too, to analyse Azad’s worries. This bold writer talks of Talibanization of Bangladesh in the sense that many illiterate or semi-literate or sometimes even literate Bangladeshis are being cocooned rapidly in the warp of un-Islamic Islam in the land of Mujibur Rahman. The basic reason why the North-east, in particular Assam, must read Salam Azad is that while a huge Bangladeshi population has already boomed illegally in this region under the very nose of a secular regime, this very population might very easily be Talibanized as well, given that so many Islamist mercenaries are reportedly having their field day in areas like Karimganj and Hailakandi. What is it that prevents us from not accepting that even the madrasas in the Barak Valley are being influenced to further the Talibanic ideal of a greater Islamic State formed by carving out ‘suitable’ areas from the North-east? And to be true to Salam Azad, such a State would persecute all minorities who now would be mostly Hindus, and remotest of all, Christians too, in most areas of Assam. Surely, it is time
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This is a article published in '' The Sentinel " of 14 th jan , we cannot understand one thing that is the link between bangladesh and the formation of islamic state , if there is influx then there is of hindu from india who are fanatic and also the nepalese , biharis , marawaris and the fanatic hindu from all over india .
If you have any comments then sent it to : asimhazarika@gawab.com

asom sena a very big mistake

Asom Sena a historical mistake : AAMSUBy A Staff Reporter GUWAHATI, Jan 13 – The All Assam Minorities Students’ Union (AAMSU) has lashed out against the recent decision of the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) to raise an Asom Sena. It has described the move as a “historic mistake”. Addressing a press conference in the city today, AAMSU president Nozir Uddin Ahmed said that the decision to raise the Asom Sena is an “emotional and self-destructive” one. “The militant action of the AASU is a threat to democracy,” he said. He said that by taking the decision to raise the Sena, the AASU has unwittingly become part of a greater conspiracy to bring about the destruction of the state.The AAMSU’s strong reaction to the AASU move was evolved and given shape during its executive committee meeting held in the city yesterday. Describing the decision as “unfortunate”, the AAMSU wondered why the State Government is remaining silent when the AASU is trying to usurp the authority of the State.Ahmed said that it is the whimsical actions, like this, of the AASU that the greater Assamese society is fractured today. He said that it is because of the failure of the AASU to reflect the interests of all the ethnic groups of the state that several of the groups have created their own parties and organisations. People of all ethnig groups and communities in the state supported the AASU, till recently. Today, it does not enjoy the confidence of any group, he stated.Ahmed said that the fear and doubts raised by the formation of the Asom Sena has already found expression in the decision of the Koch Rajbongshi community to raise a Chilarai Sena. If the trend continues, Assam could turn into a battlefield of Senas, he said. It could all culminate in a virtual civil war. It is very much possible that the minorities raise their own Sena, though such a decision has not been taken so far, he stated.The AAMSU leadership accused the Congress Government in the state of silently watching the developments. Asking the government to come out with its stand over the issue, Ahmed said that government inaction has allowed the AASU to create the Sena. The Asom Sena would further divide the people of the state and prevent the realisation of a greater Assamese community, he said. The AASU should also make clear the motive behind Asom Sena, Ahmed demanded.The AAMSU has also demanded that the imbroglio over the estimated 3.7-lakh “D” (doubtful) category voters in the state be resolved before the next Assembly elections. Describing it as an obstacle to the democratic process, Ahmed said that measures should be taken immediately to go into individual cases. While those that are confirmed foreigners should be deported, the others should be allowed to exercise their franchise. “The issue should not be kept hanging,” he asserted. There are about 1.8 lakh Muslims who are listed in this category. Speaking on the occasion AAMSU working president Abdul Aziz said that people belonging to the minority community are being unnecessarily harassed in the state on suspicion of their being foreigners. He said that the community has no inclination to encourage infiltration since local resources, particularly land, is already short. He pointed out that the AAMSU has long been demanding the updating of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) keeping 1971 as the cut off year and the issue of identity cards to settle the issue once for all. Indo-Bangladesh border should be sealed properly he said, adding that the border is still easily breached.The AAMSU has demanded that the State Government take immediate steps to rehabilitate the victims of the 1993-94 ethnic riots in the state who are still languishing in refugee camps in Kokrajhar and Bongaigaon districts. It has warned that it would stage demonstrations in New Delhi to draw attention to this issue. Apart from demanding proper representation for minorities in government jobs in the state, the AAMSU has also staked claim on 30 percent reservation for minorities in the “C” and “D” category posts in the railways.Meanwhile, the AAMSU will celebrate its silver jubilee this year with a two-day schedule of programmes in the city on March 30 and 31. The celebrations will culminate with the holding of a mass convention in the city where some of the top political leaders of the country would also be invited, Ahmed said. Among those expected to attend are West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadev Bhattacharjee and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav.

nabs arms licences

RPF nabs man with 45 arms licences: GUWAHATI, Jan 13 – Personnel of the Railway Protection Force (RPF) last Tuesday nabbed a man with 45 arms licences from the Guwahati railway station. The man, Harisankar Singh (42), was travelling from Dimapur to Kolkata. He arrived in Guwahati on the Brahmaputra Mail. RPF sources said that Singh was nabbed when men of the force, in plainclothes, were carrying out searches in the train. The licences, supposedly issued by the Mon district authorities in Nagaland, were found in his suitcase. The sources said that the documents were mostly in the name of Muslims. It has given the case an ISI twist. Singh apparently confessed that he has been procuring licences for a long time and sending them over to his clients via courier. This was the first time that he was carrying the documents himself.
It is to be noted that why the reporter does like to say anly the name " muslims" and "ISI " .Or it like this that only muslims use to be procuring arms licenses and not hindu or any another .

Ukraine's 2004 presidential election

Ukraine’s 2004 presidential election is the most important event in Ukraine since independence was achieved in 1991. The November 21 runoff determined whether Ukraine fulfills its quest for democracy and integration into the Euro-Atlantic community or maintains its corrupt status-quo drifting increasingly toward an authoritarian system along the Eurasian model. The result was what some have dubbed the "Chestnut Revolution" -- named for the chestnut trees that line the boulevards of Kiev. Others called it the "Orange Revolution" -- named for the opposition's campaign color.
As the Kuchma era drew to a close the ruling elite was close to panic. The oligarchs feared they might not escape prosecution for corruption unless they ensured that a Kuchma loyalist was elected to succeed him in the presidential elections.
In April 2004, the Ukrainian Parliament failed to pass, by six votes, legislation proposed by President Kuchma to introduce, in essence, a parliamentary rather than a presidential system into Ukraine. The reforms would have transferred to the parliament and Cabinet many of the powers currently held by the president, including giving the parliament the right to appoint and dismiss the government. The reforms were widely viewed as an attempt by Mr Kuchma, who was not standing for another term, to enable pro-presidential factions to maintain power. The failure of the bill was seen as a significant victory for opposition parties.
The struggle between the old elite and its supporters and those who challenged the old order with a new vision for Ukraine played out in the candidacies of Prime Minister, Viktor Yanukovych, who was nominated as presidential candidate by the pro-presidential part, and the previous Prime Minister, Viktor Yushchenko, leader of a coalition of opposition political parties "Our Ukraine."
The 31 October 2004 presidential election pitted Western-leaning opposition leader Viktor Yuschenko against incumbent Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich, who advocates maintaining close links with Russia. Yuschenko, whose wife is US-born, is a reformist former prime minister who has pledged to move Ukraine closer to the European Union and may even seek entry into the NATO military alliance. In contrast, Yanukovich is popular in the largely Russian-speaking eastern part of the country, and has promised to make Russian an official second language in Ukraine. He received all but open backing from Russian President Vladimir Putin, who made two visits to Ukraine during the bitterly-fought election campaign. Yanukovich has predicted that he will be victorious, and says the authorities will take action against protesters who might break the law. He warned there will be no repeat of the "Rose revolution" in the former Soviet republic of Georgia a year earlier when President Eduard Shevardnadze was swept from power after crowds stormed parliament.
Most analysts agreed that Yuschenko was likely to win if the election is conducted fairly, in part because millions of Ukrainians were disillusioned with current President Leonid Kuchma, who strongly backed Yanukovich. Barred from seeking a third term, Mr. Kuchma's ten-year rule has been marred by allegations of human rights abuses and corruption.
Viktor Yushchenko became ill on 06 September 2004, and was hospitalized in Austria. The doctors there, a panel of nearly a dozen doctors, determined that he had been poisoned. Prosecutors in Ukraine said in a statement they were investigating charges of attempted murder. Attempted murder of a presidential candidate in a nation whose independence is only a little over 10 years old. In an address to deputies in the parliament in that country this week, candidate Viktor Yushchenko appeared haggard, his face was red and swollen; it was partially paralyzed with one of his eyes constantly tearing up. And I wish to read this evening some of what he told his fellow deputies in that parliament in a emotional speech.
The campaign leading to the 31 October 2004 presidential election was characterized by widespread violations of democratic norms, including government intimidation of the opposition and of independent media, misuse of administrative resources, and numerous provocations. Of particular concern on Election Day were confirmed reports that opposition representatives were excluded from Precinct Electoral Commissions in a number of regions (oblasts). The two major candidates -- Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych and opposition leader (and former Prime Minister) Viktor Yushchenko -- each garnered approximately 40% of the vote and faced off against each other in a 21 November second round.
The election results demonstrated deep divisions between the western and eastern regions of Ukraine. Ukrainian election officials purported to show Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych ahead of democratic candidate Viktor Yushchenko by more than two percentage points - figures at odds with exit poll numbers, and further compromised by widespread election day fraud and manipulation of the vote count and tabulation.
Ukraine's opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko said he won the presidency in the run-off election and called for the international community to recognize him. Yushchenko says he won a "convincing" victory in the runoff presidential election, and appealed to nations around the world to recognize him as Ukraine's new president. In a statment issued by his office, the longtime opposition leader said such recognition would "bolster the will of the Ukrainian people" by supporting "their aspiration to return to democracy." Yushchenko has accused the authorities in Ukraine of rigging the official results in the election in favor of Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich, the leader of a major business clan who is openly backed by neighboring Russia. The electoral commission said Mr. Yanukovich held a three-percent lead over Mr. Yushchenko with almost all ballots counted. But the commission did not immediately proclaim Mr. Yanukovich the victor in the hotly-contested election.
Kuchma suggested new balloting with new candidates. The European Union, the United States, and other Western powers wanted a rerun of the second round, as did Yushchenko. With no political resolution likely, the decision could ultimately come down to the will of the Ukrainian public. Such a scenario would presumably work in Yushchenko's favor. Hundreds of thousands of opposition protesters gathered in the capital for daily demonstrations since the runoff. The flawed vote sparked 17 days of demonstrations that have since become known as the "Orange Revolution" -- for the orange color the Yushchenko campaign adopted.
A re-run election, ordered by the Ukrainian Supreme Court after the initial November 21st vote marred by fraud charges, had been conducted more transparently, with fewer reports of pressure on voters and with more balanced media coverage. The repeat second round of the presidential election in Ukraine on December 26 brought Ukraine substantially closer to meeting international standards, according to the International Election Observation Mission that deployed 1,370 observers from 44 countries for the election.
On 28 December 2004 the Central Election Commission announced that opposition candidate Viktor Yuschenko was the official winner in Ukraine's repeat presidential vote on 26 December. A reformist widely regarded as pro-Western by pundits at home and abroad, Yushchenko defeated Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych 51.99 percent to 44.19 percent. Ballots were reportedly cast against both candidates by 2.34 percent of voters. Yushchenko vowed to mount a legal challenge to the results of the 26 December election as returns showed his reformist opponent with an insurmountable lead.

Madrasas and arabic colleges in contemporary kerala

Madrasas and Arabic Colleges in Contemporary Kerala
Yoginder Sikand
The system of Islamic education in Kerala presents a considerable contrast to its counterparts elsewhere in India. Kerala boasts of the highest literacy rate in India, and the Kerala Muslims, estimated at around a fourth of the state's population, is the most well-educated Muslim community in the country. Although some madrasas of the 'traditional' type do exist in Kerala, they have been overtaken by a large and expanding network of reformed madrasas that have incorporated 'modern' subjects and teaching methods to varying degrees. Comparing the 'reformed' madrasas in Kerala with 'traditional' madrasas in north India is a fascinating exercise, highlighting the diversity within the madrasa system of education in India as a whole.
India's first contact with Islam was in Kerala, where for centuries before the rise of Islam Arab traders would visit local ports to trade. Legend has it that a group of Muhammad's companions visited Kerala on their way back from a pilgrimage to Adam's Peak in Ceylon, where Adam is said to have lived. Just then, it is said, Cheruman Perumal, the Chera ruler of the principality of Kodangallur, or Cranganore, in coastal Kerala, witnessed a miraculous happening, the sudden splitting of the moon. The visiting Arab traders explained to the king that the miracle was a sign that a prophet had been sent by God to Arabia. Soon after, Cheruman Perumal travelled to Arabia and accepted Islam. On his way back to India he died at the port of Zafar in Yemen, where his tomb later grew into a popular centre of pilgrimage. On his deathbed he is said to have authorized some of his Arab companions to go back to his kingdom to spread Islam. Accordingly, a group of Arabs led by Malik bin Dinar and Malik bin Habib arrived in north Kerala and set up several mosques there.
The historical veracity of the story is disputable, although Muslim tradition does speak of an 'Indian king' who presented Muhammad with a bottle of pickle as a gift.[1] Whatever the truth of the story may be, ample evidence exists of Muslim merchants from Arabia settling along the Malabar coast not long after the Prophet's death, where they were welcomed by local kings for the valuable role that they played in the lucrative foreign trade. It was largely through the peaceful missionary efforts of Arab merchants that Islam spread in the region, particularly among the oppressed 'low' castes. Today, Muslims account for around a fourth of Kerala's population.
Traditional Islamic education in Kerala, like elsewhere, was largely mosque-based. Students would gather in learning circles or othupallys to read a text or set of texts from a particular teacher. The othupally system was almost entirely based on oral learning, and often students were not able to write despite several years of study. The curriculum originally consisted of a range of disciplines, including the 'transmitted' sciences as well as subjects like geometry, mathematics, astronomy, logic, history and medicine. Later, however, it was largely reduced to the Qur'an, Hadith and fiqh.
The early twentieth century witnessed the emergence of a number of powerful reformist movements among the Muslims in Kerala, among whose aims was the reform of the Islamic education system. One of the pioneers in the field of Islamic educational reform in Kerala was Moulavi Chalilakath Munmuhammad Haji. In 1909 he was appointed as the headmaster of the Tanmiyath ul-'Ulum madrasa at Vazhakkad in British-ruled Malabar in north Kerala. He renamed the madrasa as the Dar ul-'Ulum Arabic College, seeking to turn it into a modern institution for the teaching of both Islamic as well as 'modern' subjects. As the new name of the institution suggests, it was sought to be modelled on the system of colleges that British rule had brought about in its wake. The Haji arranged for the preparation of textbooks for the new subjects and also introduced the use of tables, chairs and blackboards in the classrooms, a radical innovation for his times. Several graduates of the college went on to launch similar experiments in other parts of Malabar. At roughly the same time, efforts to reform the traditional othupally system were launched in southern Kerala. Vakkam Muhammad 'Abdul Qadir Moulavi (1873-1932) established a chain of modern madrasas in the princely state of Travancore and also arranged for government schools to teach Arabic to Muslim students. Likewise, in Cochin, Sanaullah Makti Thangal and Shaikh Muhammad Mahin Thangal opened a number of schools where Islamic subjects were taught along with 'modern' disciplines. The work of these reformers was carried on further with the establishment of organizations set up with the purpose of reforming the traditional Muslim educational system, including the Malabar Muslim Educational Association (1911), the Lajnat ul-Muhammadiya Sangham (1915), the Muslim Mahajana Sabha (1920), the Kerala Aikya Sangham (1922), the Kerala Jami'at ul-'Ulama (1924) and the Hidayat ul-Muslimin Sangham.
A central message of these reformist movements was that Muslims must study the Qur'an for themselves, rather than be dependent on a professional class of religious specialists. They argued that the Qur'an was a book of divine instruction that must be properly understood by every Muslim. It was not, they stressed, a book of esoteric mantras to be chanted or simply a monopoly of the professional 'ulama, as was then widely believed. Naturally, the conservative 'ulama saw in the reformist project a major threat to their position as religious leaders.
The reformists' bitter critique of popular customs associated with the cults of the Sufis and their advocacy of ijtihad also directly undermined the authority of many' ulama, who were quick to brand the reformists as 'anti-Islamic' Wahhabis. At several places reformist Muslims were socially boycotted, and some conservative 'ulama even went to the extent of issuing fatwas of infidelity against them, discouraging marriages with them and even denying them the right to be buried in Muslim graveyards. Yet, the reformist cause gradually began to gather in strength, so much so that, not long after, the conservatives started to establish similar educational centres to meet the reformist challenge, setting up their own organization, the Samastha Kerala Jami'at ul-Ulama, for the purpose.
Interestingly, one of the important causes for the success of the reformists was the support that some of them received from the British in Malabar and the Hindu princely states of Travancore and Cochin in southern Kerala. In 1904, the British colonial administration deployed some mullahs from traditional othupallys to teach Arabic in selected government schools in Malabar. Later, the colonial authorities set up a small number of Muslim high schools in the region, where facilities were provided for the teaching of Arabic and Islam. Shortly after, in 1914, the government of Travancore began employing Qur'anic and Arabic teachers in several primary and high schools in the state and appointed a Mohammadan Inspector of Schools to supervise their work. The government later constituted an Arabic Examination Board, which was responsible for the training of the teachers and for preparing a fixed syllabus and textbooks for the schools. In 1920 the government of Cochin began appointing Arabic teachers in schools with a large number of Muslim students. The introduction of Arabic and Islamic education in the government schools in Kerala, in both the areas under British and princely rule, thus played a major role in helping to bridge the divide between the othupally and the 'modern' systems of education.
In the post-1947 period Arabic was introduced in several more government schools. In 1957, a year after the merger of Malabar, Cochin and Travancore into the newly created state of Kerala, Arabic was introduced in 17 additional government high schools in the state. In 1958 Arabic began to be taught in primary government schools in Malabar, where, unlike Travancore and Cochin, it had earlier been taught only at the high school level. Today, there are an estimated sixthousand Arabic teachers working in government schools all over Kerala, with some 500,000 students, mostly Muslims, learning the language. The State Council of Educational Research and Training and the Directorate of Public Instruction both have separate sections to supervise Arabic education in government schools in the state. Expert committees appointed by the state government, consisting of leading Arabic scholars, have prepared modern textbooks for the teaching of Arabic, and these are regularly updated.
At the higher levels of education, too, the government has worked closely with Muslim organizations to reform the system of Arabic teaching. Today, the universities of Calicut (Kozhikode) and Cannanore (Kannur) have a total of eleven affiliated Arabic Colleges, almost all located in the Malabar region, that provide facilities for higher level Arabic learning. Several Arabic Colleges are co-educational and it is not uncommon to find women teaching male students. They offer a five year afzal ul-'ulama degree, the basic qualification for which is a high school pass. Some of them also have facilities for a two year post-afzal ul-'ulama course. The curriculum focuses on Arabic grammar and literature, along with general Islamic Studies. Many Arabic Colleges now have computer departments as well as a range of extra-curricular activities, including cultural programmes and social work conducted through local units of the National Service Scheme. In 1980, the syllabus was considerably restructured and modernized and English was made compulsory at all levels.
Since the syllabus is set by an expert committee appointed by the state government, it is free of intra-sectarian polemics and disputations that are so central to the madrasa system in north India.
Besides the affiliated Arabic Colleges, the salaries of whose staff is paid for by the state, there are a large number of other such colleges in the state for the study of Arabic and Islamic studies that are privately run and funded. They are independent in setting their own syllabus, but they generally follow the curriculum prescribed for the afzal ul-'ulama degree by the universities of Calicut and Cannanore. In addition, they teach various Islamic disciplines, such as Islamic law and Qur'anic commentary, which are either not at all taught or else receive little attention in the afzal ul-'ulama course. These colleges have their own system of examinations, but encourage their students to appear as private candidates for the afzal ul-'ulama degree as well.
Government recognition of the afzal- ul-'ulama degree has worked to help integrate the system of Islamic and Arabic education in the state with the 'mainstream'. In 1980, the afzal ul-ulama course was accepted as equal to a regular BA, and the post-afzal ul-'ulama as an MA. This has helped increase the range of occupations that graduates can aspire for.
Graduates of Arabic Colleges in Kerala are qualified to appear for a range of examinations for various government jobs or to go in for higher education in regular universities. Many graduates now work as translators and office workers in Arab countries, and several are studying or teaching abroad. A large number are also employed as Arabic teachers in government schools.[2]
Kerala's system of higher Arabic education is the most well organised in the country today. So, too, is its system of madrasa education. Full-time madrasas, such as in north India, are today a rarity in Kerala, although among 'traditionalist' groups, labelled as 'Sunnis' in popular parlance, they are still to be found. What are called madrasas in Kerala correspond to the maktabs in the north. Students, both boys and girls, attend a madrasa for two hours daily, early in the morning or late in the evening, thus allowing them to study at regular school as well. Far from being discouraged to study at regular schools in addition to the madrasa, they are generally encouraged to do so in the belief that all forms of legitimate education are 'Islamic'. This has made for a close integration of traditional and 'modern' education in Kerala unparalleled in the rest of India.
In contrast to madrasas in much of the rest of India, most Kerala madrasas are affiliated to and run by centralized organizations, which has made for a uniformity of standards and more efficientmanagement. The most important of these organizations are the Kerala Nadwat ul-Mujahidin, the Jama'at-i Islami and the Samastha Kerala Sunni Jami'at ul-'Ulama. The Nadwat ul-Mujahidin corresponds to the Ahl-i Hadith of north India. They do not recognize any of the schools of fiqh asbinding. They argue that one should follow only the Qur'an and the Hadith, and if the schools of fiqh diverge on any matter from these two primary sources they are to be rejected. They are also opposed to popular customs that they see as having no sanction in the shari'ah. The Jama'at-i Islami shares a broadly similar orientation, although, unlike the Nadwat ul-Mujahidin, it has a clearly political orientation and sees the Islamic state as an essential pillar of Islam. What are known as the 'Sunnis' in Kerala, that is, generally speaking, Muslims not affiliated to either the Nadwat ul-Mujahidin or the Jama'at-i Islami, insist on the need for strict compliance with the schools of fiqh, which, in the case of most Muslims in Kerala, is the Shafi'i mazhab.
The Nadwat ul-Mujahidin, now divided into two rival factions, the Jama'at-i Islami, and the various groups of the 'Sunnis' have their own Islamic education boards to administer the madrasas under their control. In 2003 it was estimated that the Nadwat ul-Mujahidin's Madrasa Vidyabhyasa Board administered some 500 madrasas, the Jama'at-i Islami's Majlis ut-Ta'lim al-Islami about 200, the Samastha Kerala Islam Matha Vidyabhyasa Board of the 'Sunnis' roughly 6000, and the Sunni Dakshina Kerala Jami'at ul-'Ulama some 1000.[3] Generally, a local community owing affiliation to one of these various groups decides to set up a madrasa and approaches the concerned education board for permission. The community provides a small building for the purpose and collects money to pay for a teacher. The education board then sends an inspector, and after it approves of the scheme formally affiliates the madrasa to it. Each board has a fixed curriculum and set of textbooks specially prepared for the different grades, and these are sent to the affiliated madrasas. They consist of lessons in Arabic and basic Islamic Studies, reflecting the particular understanding of Islam of the school of thought with which the madrasa is affiliated. By the time the students pass the final grade they have a sound grounding in the faith and a good understanding of elementary Arabic. Examination papers are sent out by the boards, thereby ensuring certain minimum standards, a major problem with 'traditional' madrasas in other parts of India that are autonomous of any higher controlling authority.
In addition to the network of madrasas and Arabic Colleges that they run, each of the three major Muslim groups in Kerala has also established a number of regular schools. They are like any other private school, following the state government syllabus, but also make arrangements for the teaching of Arabic and Islamic Studies for their Muslim students.
They are generally open to all communities, and some of them have a large number of non-Muslim students as well, for whom religious education is not compulsory. As this suggests, the gulf between 'religious' and 'modern' knowledge and between traditional 'ulama and 'modern' educated Muslims, so stark in large parts of north India, has thus considerably narrowed down in Kerala today.
Bridging Din and Duniya: The Kerala Nadwat ul-Mujahidin
Among the many Muslim organizations and movements in Kerala involved in promoting 'modern' as well as Islamic education is the Kerala Nadwat ul-Mujahidin, commonly referred to simply as the Mujahid movement. Established in 1950, the movement grew out of the reformist efforts of the Kerala Muslim Aikya Sangha, formed in 1922, and then the Kerala Jami'at ul-'Ulama, set up in 1924. Several early leaders of the movement, such as K.M.Moulavi, E.Moidumoulavi and Muhammad 'Abdur Rahman, were also involved in the anti-colonial struggle. The Mujahids, admittedly, represent only a minority of the state's Muslims, but they have played a leading role in promoting educational awareness and social reform, influencing other Muslim groups in Kerala in turn. The Mujahids are, as we mentioned earlier, the Kerala counterpart of the Ahl-i Hadith in north India, but are rather more moderate, sharing an understanding of Islam somewhere in-between the so-called 'Wahhabis' of Saudi Arabia and the nineteenth century modernizing Salafis of Egypt, such as Muhammad 'Abduh and Rashid Rida. They believe that Muslims need to go backto the basic sources of the faith, the Qur'an and the Hadith, bypassing centuries of tradition as represented by medieval fiqh and Sufism.
Followers of the movement call themselves mujahids since they believe that they are engaged, not in a physical jihad or war, but, rather, in a spiritual jihad against superstition and corrupt practices that have crept into Muslim society.
Today, the Mujahid movement has some 1000 units all over Kerala, with roughly 50,000 members, many of them are highly educated professionals and businessmen. It runs scores of madrasas, schools and colleges in the state, in addition to a number of social work centres.
It sees 'modern' forms of knowledge as perfectly compatible with Islam, arguing for an Islamic understanding of modernity that willingly embraces new developments in the world but remains firmly embedded in the Islamic worldview.
Husain Aboobacker Koya, general-secretary of one branch of the Kerala Nadwat ul-Mujahidin, explains: The Qur'an stresses the importance of 'ilm, or knowledge, and this includes both knowledge of Islam as well as of the world, there being no rigid distinction between the two. The Qur'an repeatedly asks us to ponder on the mysteries of creation, exhorting us to acquire knowledge of it. Thus, an 'alim is anyone who has specialised 'ilm in any particular field. The true 'ulama are those who are learned in any branch of knowledge and at the same time are God-fearing. Hence, we are opposed to the notion of professional priesthood, although we believe that there should be specialization in different branches of learning, because of which we have the separate Kerala Jami'at ul-'Ulama.
Although the Mujahids do not deny the need for specialized religious scholars, they insist that 'traditional' madrasa-trained 'ulama do not have a monopoly of performing religious functions. In fact, in several Mujahid mosques, trained doctors and other such professionals lead the congregational prayers and read the Friday khutba or sermon. Unlike the conservative 'Sunni' mosques in Kerala, in Mujahid-controlled mosques, numbering some 600, the khutba is delivered in Arabic as well as in Malayalam, so that the people can comprehend it. For the Mujahids, the khutba is an important means for promoting education and awareness in the community. Often, their khutbas relate to contemporary issues in the light of the Qur'an and Hadith. This is in marked contrast to mosques run by the 'Sunnis', where the khutba is almost always in Arabic only, and are often simply rehashed versions of sermons written several centuries ago. Again in contrast to the 'Sunnis', women are allowed and, in fact, encouraged, to pray in Mujahid mosques. Defending this practice, Koya argues:
At the time of the Prophet women used to pray in the mosques and so we don't see any reason why they should not now, although we do not say it is compulsory. However, there are some people who believe that women must not pray in the mosques, and they find legitimacy for this in the books of medieval fiqh, which depart considerably from the Prophetic practice in this regard. They allow women to come to Sufi shrines or to travel in buses and shop in market, but they resist them coming to mosques!
'Engaging in social work is a form of jihad', Koya explains. As a grass-roots movement inspired by an activist understanding of Islam, the Nadwat ul-Mujahidin runs several social work projects all over Kerala. In addition to its madrasas and Arabic colleges it has a number of high schools that use the state government syllabus, but also provide Islamic education. Several of these schools have a number of non-Muslim students as well. It administers some 30 orphanages, 300 Qur'an learning centres, a major scholarship scheme for poor children, and several blood banks, medical centres and vocational training centres. Its Yuvatha Book House has published some 200 titles on a range of religious and social issues, including translations of works by modern Arab scholars, a five volume Islamic encyclopaedia and a four-volume Malayalam translation of the Qur'an. It also publishes several magazines, including one for women and another that deals specifically with cultural issues. The Mujahid's Rachana Kala Samithi ('Literary and Cultural Committee'), which was inaugurated by the famous Malayalam writer Vaikom Muhammad Basheer, organizes regular cultural festivals. The youth wing of the movement, Ittihadul Shubban il-Mujahidin, organizes regular anti-drug and anti-liquor programmes and coaching centers for students.
Funds from these projects are collected from Mujahid members, who contribute their annual zakat and two days' income. Mosque committees collect this money, which is then used to sponsor particular projects, such as building houses for the poor or providing craftsmen with tools. Koya explains how the Mujahid's system of community self-help is organized, turning zakat from mere charity into a means for community development:
We believe that zakat should be used to help people come out of poverty so that they, too, can in future give zakat, so we don't distribute little amounts of money to the poor, which would not help them out of the trap of poverty. In several parts of India poor Muslims go from house to house during Ramzan and people give them small amounts as zakat. I think this system is wrong as it makes the poor feel small. So, I feel our system of productive assets being given by a mosque committee is much better. Rather than giving small amounts of money to large numbers of poor people, we use the money to sponsor a small number of projects every year that can help the poor improve their earning power. The Qur'an says zakat should be spent on the poor, and does not specify that they must be only Muslims. So, last year we decided that we should also use our zakat funds for non-Muslims as well. In this way, given our limited resources, we have been engaged in promoting a socially engaged understanding of religion.[4]
The Mujahids are also engaged in inter-faith dialogue work, through which they seek to promote inter-community harmony while at the same time presenting their own understanding of Islam to people of other faiths. In this regard, the movement has published a number of books in Malayalam on Islam and religious tolerance, and has held several inter-religious conferences to discuss issues of common concern for people of different faiths. Among the participants have been Christian and Hindu priests as well as Dalit and leftist activists. At the Mujahid's annual meetings scholars are often invited to present papers on issues of current concern, including communalism and inter-faith relations.Kerala enjoys the highest levels of female literacy in India, and the Muslim women of the state are among the most educated in the country. The Mujahid movement has been at the forefront of Muslim women's education in Kerala, stressing the need for both Islamic as well as 'modern' education for girls. Mujahid intellectuals have written extensively on women's rights from an Islamic perspective, although, because these writings are almost entirely in Malayalam and have not been translated into other languages, they remain largely unknown to Muslims in other parts of India. By denying the need to follow the established schools of fiqh, they argue that Muslims must rely only on the Qur'an and the Hadith, where they find ample justification for their cause of women's rights. Thus, 'Abdul Qadir, a senior Mujahid leader, approvingly cites the case of Ayesha, wife of the Prophet, from whom the Prophet is said to have instructed his companions to seek 'half the knowledge of the faith'. This, he says, strikingly suggests that women can be teachers of men. He sees no problem in women working outside their homes along with men, provided that they are never alone with a single man.[5]
Today, in several Mujahid madrasas and Arabic Colleges girls outnumber boys by a considerable margin. All Mujahid madrasas and some of its Arabic Colleges are co-educational, although girls and boys sit apart. The movement also runs a number of Arabic Colleges exclusively for girls. A good example is the Mujahid's Anwar ul-'Ulum Women's Arabic College (AUWAC) at the village of Mongam in the Mallapuram district of north Kerala, an hour's drive from Calicut. Although there are several other women's Arabic Colleges in south India, the AUWAC is the only such institution to be affiliated to a university, in this case the University of Calicut. Here, some 300 girls study, a third of whom live in the college hostel. Several come from poor families, and some of them receive scholarships. Qualification for admission is a pass in the tenth class examination. The students then train for a five year course, divided into a two year pre-afzal ul-'ulama degree and a three year afzal ul-ulama degree. For those who want to go on for higher education the college offers a two-year post afzal ul-'ulama course, the equivalent of an MA. They study a range of disciplines, particularly Arabic, both classical and modern, the Qur'an, the Prophetic traditions, English and computers.The girls here are not simply fed on a diet of Arabic tomes. Besides their regular studies, they are encouraged to busy themselves with some sort of social work, and the college has two wings of the National Service Scheme functioning on campus. Pictures of students in the college's album show neatly attired girls in black hijabs and spotlessly white cloaks, cleaning a village pond, running a medical camp and building a road in a neighbouring Dalit settlement with shovels and spades. 'In this way', explains Zohra Bi, the principal of the college, 'we are training our children to become good citizens and also to show to ourselves and to others that true Islam means working for the betterment of society'.
Graduates of the college have gone on to take up a range of careers, for, as the Mujahids believe, Muslim women can indeed work outside their homes, albeit observing certain restrictions. Several graduates of the AUWAC teach Arabic in government schools, and a few are even elected members of local and district level panchayats.
Several of the teachers of the college, some of them graduates of the college itself, are also pursuing higher research. Zohra Bi, mother of seven, has an impressive list of degrees and certificates to her credit. After doing an MA from the Aligarh Muslim University, she earned a Ph.D. from Calicut, where she worked for her thesis on the subject of women's rights in Islam. She is the recipient of the prestigious M.M. Ghani award for the best teacher of all Arabic colleges affiliated to CalicutUniversity, of the Bharat Jyoti award, granted by the Delhi-based India International Friendship Society for community work, and of another award from Kerala's leading newspaper, Malayalam Manorama, in tandem with Air India. Zohra Bi and her colleagues are presenting new role models for pious Muslim women, and she sees her work simply as 'service of the faith'. 'Islam', she says, 'is wrongly thought of as a religion of women's oppression. Through our work in the college we want to show that Islam actually empowers Muslim women to work for the community at large'.[6]
*As this account suggests, Islamic educational institutions in large parts of Kerala offers a remarkable contrast to their counterparts in other regions of India. The considerable success of the Kerala madrasas in integrating 'modern' and Islamic education owes to a number of historical, social, economic and political factors. To begin with, unlike in much of the rest of India, Islam came to Kerala through traders, not invaders. They were welcomed by the local kings, whogranted them land to establish mosques and the freedom to propagate their faith. The early Arab settlers played an important role in the local economy, controlling the region's foreign trade. The Arabs intermarried with local women, and adopted the local language and culture. Because Muslims are so well integrated into local Kerala society today, a legacy of their long history, they have been able to organize without major opposition from other communities, unlike, for instance, in much of north India. Kerala is still largely free of overt inter-communal strife (although the situation is now changing), and this has allowed Muslims to focus on constructive community work rather than on simply defending themselves or their identity. Again in contrast to north India, where madrasas were traditionally linked to ruling houses and large landlords, Kerala experienced only a brief period of Muslim rule. Hence, Muslim society here is remarkably free of what is often disparagingly referred to as the 'feudal' north Indian Muslim culture, to which the lack of enthusiasm for reform in many 'traditional' north Indian madrasas is generally attributed.
Further, from the late nineteenth century onwards Kerala has experienced waves of reformist movements, spearheaded by Christian missionaries, communists and 'low' caste activists, which have also profoundly affected the state's Muslim population. In addition, Muslims in Kerala, perhaps owing to their historical ties with the Arab heartlands, were among the earliest Muslim communities in India to accept the reformist impulses emanating from Muslim 'modernists' in countries such as Egypt and Syria. Then again, unlike north India, Kerala was not affected by the Partition. The bulk of the north Indian Muslim middle class, who could have expected to take a lead in reformist efforts, left for Pakistan. This, in turn, had serious consequences for efforts to organize the community for 'modern' education and to reform the madrasa system. In contrast, very few Malayali Muslims migrated to Pakistan. Today Kerala has a sizeable Muslim middle class, which have played an important role in setting up new sorts of Islamic schools in the state.At the political level, the close integration of the Muslims into the state's political system has given them strong political leverage, which has helped them to receive government assistance for numerous educational ventures, including schools and Arabic Colleges. This explains, in part, why, in remarkable contrast to their counterparts in large parts of north India, many Muslim educationists in Kerala have not been averse to working along with the government.
The Kerala example is, however, not widely known among Muslims elsewhere in India. This is because, unlike in much of north India, Urdu is hardly understood in Kerala, being taught only in a very small number of madrasas and Arabic Colleges in the state. Instead, almost all Malayali Muslim scholars and 'ulama write in Malayalam, which is not understood by Muslims elsewhere. Because of this linguistic barrier, there has been little communication between the 'ulama of Kerala and their counterparts in other parts of India. However, in recent years a number of 'ulama from north India have been closely working with their counterparts in Kerala. Some Arabic Colleges in Kerala now have a small number of north Indian students, and some have even begun to teach Urdu. 'Ulama from Kerala now regularly meet their colleagues from otherparts of the country at gatherings and conferences. Delegations of 'ulama from other states now regularly visiting Kerala to gain a firsthand understanding of the Islamic education system there, and some of them have gone back to their homes to launch similar experiments. However, this has been largely an unplanned exercise, because of which its influence has been limited.
Old ways die hard, but increasingly Muslim educationists in north India are beginning to look towards the south, including Kerala, as a model they could learn valuable lessons from. Today, agrowing number of Muslims in other parts of India, including several 'ulama, are advocating reforms in the madrasa system, following in the footsteps of their counterparts in Kerala.
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[1] http://merawatan.com/watan/perumalgift.htm
[2] For details, see Syed Ehtisham A. Nadwi, 'Reflections on Arabic College Education in Kerala', in E.K.Ahamed Kutty (ed) Arabic in South India, Calicut: Department of Arabic, University ofCalicut, 2003, pp.56-76.
[3] Ibid., p.62.
[4] Interview with Husain Aboobacker Koya, Calicut, 12 August, 2003.
[5] Interview with 'Abdul Qadir, Calicut, 11 August, 2001.
[6] Interview with Zohra Bi, principal, Anwar ul-'Ulum Women's Arabic College, Mongam, 13 August, 2003.

NLTF Defects to bangladesh

NLFT pro-talk lea defects to Bangladesh, Jan 12 — In a big blow to Centre’s peace initiative in the North-east, a top leader of the pro-talk faction of the outlawed National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT) Nayan Bashi Jamatia has formed a new outfit Integrated Freedom Movement Organisation of Twipra (IFMOT) before converting to Christianity and crossing over to neighbouring Bangladesh.What has sent alarm bells ringing in the Home Ministry was the threat by Nayan Bashi, who has changed his name to Nokbar Jamatia after embracing Christianity, to persuade other militant outfits including ULFA, NDFB, Biswa Mohan faction of NLFT, HNLC, KYKL, PREPAK, KLO among others not to come forward for talks with Government of India because it betrayed them. It was with much enthusiasm that Union Home Minister, Shivraj Patil announced on the floor of the Lok Sabha, the signing of the Memorandum of Settlement (MoS) with Nayan Bashi faction of the NLFT. The MoS came with a special package of Rs 55 crore for economic development of the tribal areas after months of negotiations between Government of India, Tripura Government and NLFT pro-talk faction.However on the eve of the formal surrender ceremony, the peace process was dealt a severe jolt, when Nayan Bashi Jamatia fled to Bangladesh before denouncing the MoS. The NLFT faction led by Jamatia signed tripartite MoS on December 17 after meeting the Union Home Minister here.At least 138 members of the outfit have already surrendered arms though Nayan Bashi rejected the agreement and left for Bangladesh. The cadres surrendered 14 weapons including AK 47 and 56 rifles and 493 rounds of ammunition. “Union Home Minister had assured to continue the dialogue to find a political settlement. But instead a development package worth Rs 55 crore and rehabilitation of the surrendered militants and luxurious life with three vehicles to each leader was what was given,” Jamatia alleged through a communication.“The NLFT-NB did not come to surrender but came for negotiated political solution. The surrender ceremony was aimed to defame and humiliate Nokbar Jamatia. The IFMOT vows to fight for decades to achieve its objective,” the leader stated. Interestingly, the leader was full of praise for BJP president, L.K.Advani, who was the former deputy Prime Minister. “I met Sri Advani in April and he had agreed to fulfil the demands made by NLFT-NB. I signed the ceasefire agreement on that day after holding talks with Home Secretary,” Jamatia claimed.The Centre suspects that the Jamatia was lured into a trap by intelligence agency of Bangladesh and even paid substantial amount to reject the peace process and continue with the armed struggle. Bangladesh Government has reportedly given him political asylum.Unfazed, the controversial militant leader has now trained his guns on the four leaders who signed the MoS with Government of India on December 25. Bichindra Debbarma alias Buchuk Borok, Annan Jamatia alias Bartholomai Borok, Dilip Debbarma alias Daniel Borok and Dio Molsom alias Salka Borok were declared as traitors and it was alleged that they were lured by promise of large sums of money. “The four traitors have been expelled from the newly founded IFMOT and they would be arrested and produced before the Royal Military Council and if convicted they would punished with two year jail term under the supervision of Royal Borok Army,” the militant leader stated.Formed in 1989, the NLFT, which has so far split three times on tribal and religious lines, was banned in 1997 under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1997. Of the three factions of NLFT, the one headed by Biswamohan Debbarma is considered the most powerful. It is yet to respond to Delhi’s offer of talks.This group has an estimated strength of about 550 cadres with bases in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh. The other outfits the All Tripura Tiger Force (ATTF).Officials here said that they considered having signed the MoS with NB faction of the NLFT and would go ahead and implement the MoS. The package included development projects besides promise to withdraw the pending cases against the cadres and rehabilitation measures.What is however, worrying agencies here is that Jamatia still controls the armoury and holds sway among majority of the cadres.

Infiltration

NSCN(IM) offers help to solve influx problem GUWAHATI, Jan 12: The National Socialist Council of Nagalim (Isak-Muivah faction) has assured the North East Students’ Organisation (NESO) that it would support the movement for the solution of the problem of infiltration of foreigners faced by the North Eastern states. The NESO, the umbrella organisation of the students’ organisations of the NE states, on its part, stressed the need for maintaining the geographical integrity of all the states of the region.Addressing a Press conference here today, NESO chairman Samujjal Bhattacharya revealed that a delegation of the NESO had a discussion with the leaders of the NSCN including the chairman of the outfit Isak Swu and general secretary T Muivah at camp Hebram near Dimapur yesterday at the invitation of the NSCN and wide-ranging issues came up for discussion during the talks.Bhattacharya said that during the talks, the NSCN leaders explained the progress of talks with the Government of India and expressed their desire to solve the Naga problem politically and peacefully. They said that they are concerned not only of the Naga people but also of the people of the entire NE region. The NSCN leaders assured help in the fight of the people of the region for the solution of the burning problem including infiltration of foreigners and the problem of presence of Chakma refugees in Arunachal Pradesh.The NESO chairman said that the students’ body, on its part, made it clear that it was for peace and unity in the region and called upon the NSCN to remain vigilant against the divisive politics of the rulers at Delhi. The NESO stressed the need for maintaining the territorial integrity of all the States of the region and referred to the apprehensions in the minds of the people living in the bordering areas of Assam, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh. “We made it clear that the territorial integrity of any of the NE states should be affected and the NSCN should play its part for defusing tension in the border areas. The NSCN leaders also agreed to play a positive role in this regard,” Bhattacharya added. The NSCN leaders also assured that they have full respect to the sentiments of the people of all the North Eastern states.Bhattacharya said that the NESO wants restoration of peace in the entire region and called upon the Government of India to take the initiative for bringing the ultras to the negotiation table. He said that the militants should also reciprocate and come for talks for peaceful political solution of the problems. During the meeting yesterday, the NESO also calledupon the NSCN to play a positive role to bring the militant outfits of the region to the negotiation table. For the first time the NSCN invited the NESO for talks and this is a good beginning in uniting the people of the region, he added.Addressing media persons, the president of the Khasi Students’ Union (KSU) Samuel Jyrwa said that the KSU is in favour of solution of the problem of insurgency in the region, but a new problem should not be created while solving one. He welcomed the assurance given by the NSCN to extend support for the solution of the burning problems of the region.The Arunachal Pradesh Students’ Union general secretary Gumjum Haider asserted that they would never allow even an inch of land of Arunachal Pradesh to be included in any other state.AASU general secretary Amiya Kumar Bhuyan said that during the talks, the issue of apprehension in the minds of the people of bordering areas was raised by the AASU.

Magh Bihu - the local hindu festival today

Uruka today GUWAHATI, Jan 13 . The Bhogali Bihu, also called Magh Bihu,( the local hindu community festival ) the States hindu community has started to celebrate the occasion in a befitting manner. The festivities during Magh Bihu mainly centre around food and fun and frolic, and the vegetable and fish and meat markets in the city for the past few days are witnessing heavy rush of Bihu shoppers. With Uruka, the night of feast before the Bihu falling tomorrow, prices of fish, meat and milk products have soared, but that has done little to dent the zeal of the Bihu-revellers who are splashing out on the items of their choice in the markets. Bhogali Bihu is also the time to indulge in the traditional homemade delicacies of the State like various pithas, laroos, chira-doi, etc. Although modern city life has robbed much of the sheen off the Bihu celebrations, with the citizens having little time or inclination to prepare Bihu delicacies, commercialisation of the conventional food items has ensured that the tradition continues, albeit in a manner that may not find favour with the purists. None the less, Bihu delicacies have now emerged as big business and people are making a beeline to these shops for the past few days. The NEDFi Haat at Ambari, as in the previous years, has opened a number of stalls dealing with Bihu food items, which are doing pretty good business. People are also making elaborate arrangements for the Uruka feast tomorrow night. While the conventional practice of spending the whole night in thatched huts (bhelaghar) in open fields may not be possible in the city, people are nevertheless going for community feasts in many residential areas. People are also erecting mejis, the traditional bonfire in their campuses as also in open spaces to pay obeisance to the fire god. These would be set afire early tomorrow morning. Meanwhile, Governor Lt Gen (Retd) Ajai Singh has wished the people of the state a very happy and prosperous Magh Bihu. In his greetings message, he expressed the hope that the warmth of the sacred flame of the meji –bhelaghar would enlighten all hearts and inspire the people to work in unison towards the progress of the state.Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi, in his message on the occasion, extended his warm Bihu and Tusu Puja greetings to the people of the state and said that the occasion would usher in a new wave of bonhomie in society

Ali Akabar and Abdul Jabbar expeled by AGP

AGP steering committee expels Mian, Jabbar
Summons await Mahanta, Phukan for explanation
GUWAHATI, Jan 11: The two ‘architects’ of regional politics in Assam and AGP leaders, former Chief Minister Prafulla Kumar Mahanta and Home Minister Bhrigu Kumar Phukan will be summoned by the all- powerful steering committee of the party to explain as to why they had made party matters public by declaring a veitable war on the party leadership. The decision was taken during the noisy steering committee meeting of the party, which began at 9 p.m. yesterday and had to be suspended at 4 this morning, when the committee members had almost polarized on the crucial issue of ‘action against Mahanta-Phukan’, and failed to take any concrete decision. The steering committee, however, expelled the two controversial party legislators, Ali Akbar Mian and Abdul Jabbar from the party.

According to sources, while some of the steering committee members favoured stern action against Mahanta and Phukan for their public outbursts against the party leadership, others cautioned them that any stern action against the duo might lead the party to a split, which might cost the party very dearly in the ensuing Assembly elections slated for 2006. During the noisy debate, the group, which was against any action on the duo, said that going tough against Mahanta and Phukan, that too at a time when the Nagaon District AGP Committee, Barhampur and Dispur LAC committees of the party were putting pressure on the party leadership to withdraw all disciplinary actions against Mahanta, would push the party towards ‘disintegration’, and in that case, it would be impossible for the party and its leadership to keep the house in order before the Assembly polls. "Any stern step against Mahanta-Phukan will be disastrous for the party," sources quoted some of the steering committee members as saying. When the steering committee failed to take any concrete decision on action against the AGP heavyweights, the meeting had to be suspended for the day with the decision that the former Chief Minister and the former Home Minister should be summoned by it and asked them to explain their views directly to it. The inconclusive steering committee meeting would be resumed only after hearing the views of Mahanta and Phukan by the committee, sources said, adding that the meeting would be resumed most likely on January 18.

Sources, however, said that Mahanta and Phukan might defy the summons to be issued to them by the steering committee.

Earlier, the 12-member committee comprising the party president, convenor Birendra Prasad Baishya, general secretaries Chandra Mohan Patowary, Phani Bhusan Choudhury, Dilip Kumar Saikia, Hitendra Nath Goswami, members Nurul Hussain, Jagadish Bhuyan, Prabin Gogoi and Joseph Toppo, expelled two party legislators, Ali Akbar Mian and Abdul Jabbar for their ‘anti-party’ activities. Eleven of the 12-member committee (Thaneswar Boro was absent) were of the opinion that Mian and Jabbar, who had been suspended for defying the party whip during the last Rajya Sabha elections, instead of rectifying themselves and tendering their apology to the party leadership, had gone for anti-AGP activities during the last Lok Sabha elections.

Ali Akbar said that he would move the court against the decision of the AGP steering committee. He said that he had filed a petition in the court at the time of his suspension from the party along with Jabbar, and that the case was yet to be disposed of. "How can the steering committee take a decision on a sub-judice matter?" he questioned.

Both Ali Akbar and Jabbar said that the AGP had no future under Goswami . It is too be noted that Mr Goswami is brahmin .

It may be mentioned here that the deadline set by the Dispur LAC AGP committee for the party leadership to withdraw all disciplinary actions against Mahanta will expire on January 15.

Hindu fanatic leaders spritual head Mr Jayendra Saraswati released from Jail

Kanchi Sankaracharya released from jail
VELLORE, Jan 11 — Kanchi Sankaracharya Mr Jayendra Saraswati was today released from the jail here exactly two months after he was arrested in connection with a murder case. Sankaracharya came out at 4.30 pm and was received at the jail gate by BJP leader Sushma Swaraj, VHP leader Ashok Singhal, former Union Minister S Thirunavukkarasar and a large number of mutt officials and devotees.

The seer walked into the waiting yellow van of the Kanchi Kamakoti Peetam amidst tight security and headed for Kalavai, about 40 km from Kancheepuram, as he has been barred by the Supreme Court from going to the Kanchi mutt. A police vehicle followed his van as the smiling Jayendra waived to his admirers and cameramen without making any comments to waiting newspersons.

Many of the devotees fell at his feet as he waded through the crowd to go to his vehicle. Mutt sources said the seer would start conducting prayers at Kalavai from this evening itself. The Supreme Court yesterday ordered the release of the seer, who was arrested on November 11 in the Sankararaman murder case, on bail on his furnishing a personal bond and two sureties to the satisfaction of Chief Judicial Magistrate, Chengalput.

While granting bail, the apex Court had castigated Tamil Nadu police for having gathered “no evidence or material” against him in the case. “We are of the opinion that prima facie a strong case has been made out for grant of bail to Sankaracharya," a Bench comprising Chief Justice R C Lahoti, Justice G P Mathur and Justice P P Naolekar said while restraining the seer from visiting the Mutt till probe into the case was completed. The Court rejected the prosecution's claim that the tirade of Sanakararaman against the alleged maladministration of the Mutt and illegal activities of the seer formed a major ground for the motive of Sankaracharya to eliminate him. Hours after the Supreme Court ordered his release, junior Sankaracharya of the Mutt Jayendra Saraswati was taken into custody in connection with the same case.
It is to be noted that both these senior and junior and some from the mutt are involved in the murder case , it is interesting to note that why all the hindu fanatic leaders were waiting outside to recieved a MURDERER .As time has come for all these hindu leaders to come out clean from all the missdeeds that they support and are doing in the name of religion .

Falluja

City of ghosts

On November 8, the American army launched its biggest ever assault on the Iraqi city of Falluja, considered a stronghold for rebel fighters. The US said the raid had been a huge success, killing 1,200 insurgents. Most of the city's 300,000 residents, meanwhile, had fled for their lives. What really happened in the siege of Falluja? In a joint investigation for the Guardian and Channel 4 News, Iraqi doctor Ali Fadhil compiled the first independent reports from the devastated city, where he found scores of unburied corpses, rabid dogs - and a dangerously embittered population Watch an extract from the documentary

Tuesday January 11, 2005
The Guardian

December 22 2004
It all started at my house in Baghdad. I packed my equipment, the camera and the tripod. Tariq, my friend, told me not to take it with us. "The fighters might search the car and think that we are spies." Tariq was frightened about our trip, even though he is from Falluja and we had permission from one group of fighters to enter under their protection. But Tariq, more than anyone, understands that the fighters are no longer just one group. He is quite a character, Tariq: 32 and an engineer with a masters degree in embryo implantation, he works now at a human rights institute called the Democratic Studies Institute for Human Rights and Democracy in Baghdad. He is also deeply into animal rights.

Foolishly, I took a pill to try to keep down the flu, which made me sleepy. It was 9am when we crossed the main southern gate out of Baghdad, taking care to stay well clear of American convoys. The southern gate is the scene of daily attacks on the Americans by the insurgents - either a car-bomb or an ambush with rocket-propelled grenades.

It took just 20 minutes from Baghdad to reach the area known as the "triangle of death", where the kidnapped British contractor Kenneth Bigley was held and finally beheaded in the town of Latifya. It is supposed to be a US military-controlled zone, but insurgents set up checkpoints here. As the road became more rural and more isolated, I got nervous that at any moment we would be stopped by carjackers and robbed of our expensive equipment. At a checkpoint a hooded face came to the window; he was carrying an old AK47 on his shoulder and looking for a donation towards the jihad. There were six fighters in total, all hooded. The driver and Tariq both made a donation; I was frightened he would search the car and find the camera, so I gave him my Iraqi doctor's ID card, hoping that would work. He apologised and asked that we excuse him.


Now, there was nothing ahead but the sky and the desert. It was 1.30pm and a bad time to use this road; we had been told that carjackers were particularly active at this time of day. Tariq pointed out four young men dressed in red, their two motorbikes parked by the side of the road. They were planting a small, improvised explosive device made out of a tin of cooking oil for the next American convoy to leave the base outside Falluja.

It was 3.30pm before we got to Habbanya, a tourist resort on a lake supplied with fresh water by the Euphrates, which was once controlled by Uday, Saddam's oldest son. It was here that Fallujans, who used to be wealthy as they supplied a lot of the top military for Saddam's army, came for holidays.

Now the place was freezing, and full of refugees. All the holiday houses were crammed with people, sometimes two families to a room. The first family we came across had been there since a month before the attack started. A man called Abu Rabe'e came up. He was 59 and used to be a builder; he said he had a message for our camera. "We're not looking for this sort of democracy, this attacking of the city and the people with planes and tanks and Humvees." He had also fled Falluja with his family. They were all living in a former mechanic's garage in Habbanya.

Most of the people we spoke to in Habbanya were poor and uneducated, and had fled Falluja in anticipation of the US attack. Some were in tents; others were sharing the old honeymoon suites where newlyweds used to come when this was a holiday resort. They squabbled among themselves to persuade me to film the conditions they were living in. There was still a fairground in Habbanya, but nothing was working. In the middle of the bumper cars an old lady had pitched a tent with bricks, where she was living with her son. I tried to talk to her but she told me to go away. There was no cooking gas in Habbanya, so the Fallujan refugees were cutting down trees to keep warm and cook food.

Then someone came up and said the resistance fighters had heard we were asking questions. We decided to put the camera away and go to a friendly village that our driver knew. It was also filled with refugees from Falluja.

One 50-year-old man, a major in the Iraqi Republican Guards under the former regime, took us in. There were four families squeezed into one apartment, all of them once wealthy. The major, like the others, was sacked after the liberation when the US disbanded the army and police. Now jobless, his house in Falluja was wrecked and he was a refugee with his five children and wife near the town where he used to spend his holidays. He was angry with the Americans, but also with the Iraqi rebels, whom he blamed, alongside the clerics in the mosques, for causing Falluja to be wrecked.

"The mujahideen and the clerics are responsible for the destruction that happened to our city; no one will forgive them for that," he said with bitterness.

"Why are you blaming them - why don't you blame the Americans and Allawi?" said Omar, the owner of the apartment.

"We told the mujahideen to leave it to us ordinary Fallujans, but those bloody bastards, the sheikhs and the clerics, are busy painting some bloody mad picture of heaven and martyrs and the victory of the mujahideen," said Ali, another refugee. "And, of course, the kids believe every word those clerics say. They're young and naive, and they forget that this is a war against the might of the machine of the American army. So they let those kids die like this and our city gets blown up with the wind."

I wanted to ask the tough old Republican guard why they had let these young muj have the run of the city, but I actually didn't have to. I remember being in Falluja just before the fighting started and seeing a crowd gathered around a sack that was leaking blood. A piece of white A4 paper was stuck on to the sack, which read: "Here is the body of the traitor. He has confessed to acting as a spotter for American planes and was paid $100 a day."

At the same time as we were standing looking at the sack, I knew I would be able to buy a CD of the man in this sack making his confession before he was beheaded in any CD shop in Falluja. These were the people who controlled Falluja now - not old majors from Saddam's army.

December 24


In the morning we went back towards Falluja and heard that there were queues of people waiting to try to get back into the city. The government had made an announcement saying that the people from some districts could start to go back home; they promised compensation. About midday we got a mile east of the city and saw that four queues had formed near the American base. They were mostly men, waiting for US military ID to allow them back home.

The men were angry: "This is a humiliation. I say no more than that. These IDs are to make us bow Fallujan heads in shame," one of them said.

I met Major Paul Hackett, a marine officer in the Falluja liaison base. He said that the US military was not trying to humiliate anyone, but that the IDs were necessary for security. "I mean, my understanding is that ultimately they can hang this ID card on a wall and keep it as a souvenir," he said.

They took prints of all my fingers, two pictures of my face in profile, and then photographed my iris. I was now eligible to go into Falluja, just like any other Fallujan.

But it was late by then, somewhere near 5pm (the curfew is at 6pm). After that anyone who moves inside the city will be shot on sight by the US military. Tomorrow, we would try again to get into the city.

December 25


At around 8am, Tariq and I drove towards Falluja. We didn't believe that we might actually get into the city.

The American soldiers at the checkpoint were nervous. The approach to the checkpoint was covered in pebbles so we had to drive very slowly. The soldiers spent 20 minutes searching my car, then they bodysearched Tariq and me. They gave me a yellow tape to put on to the windscreen of the car, showing I had been searched and was a contractor. If I didn't have this stripe of yellow, a US sniper would shoot me as an enemy car.

By 10am we were inside the city. It was completely devastated, destruction everywhere. It looked like a city of ghosts. Falluja used to be a modern city; now there was nothing. We spent the day going through the rubble that had been the centre of the city; I didn't see a single building that was functioning.

The Americans had put a white tape across the roads to stop people wandering into areas that they still weren't allowed to enter. I remembered the market from before the war, when you couldn't walk through it because of the crowds. Now all the shops were marked with a cross, meaning that they had been searched and secured by the US military. But the bodies, some of them civilians and some of them insurgents, were still rotting inside.

There were dead dogs everywhere in this area, lying in the middle of the streets. Reports of rabies in Falluja had reached Baghdad, but I needed to find a doctor.

Fallujans are suspicious of outsiders, so I found it surprising when Nihida Kadhim, a housewife, beckoned me into her home. She had just arrived back in the city to check out her house; the government had told the people three days earlier that they should start going home. She called me into her living room. On her mirror she pointed to a message that had been written in her lipstick. She couldn't read English. It said: "Fuck Iraq and every Iraqi in it!"

"They are insulting me, aren't they?" she asked.

I left her and walked towards the cemetery. I noticed the dead dogs again. I had been told in Baghdad by a friend of mine, Dr Marwan Elawi, that the Baghdad Hospital for Infectious Diseases admits one case of rabies every week. The problem is that infected dogs are eating the corpses and spreading the disease.

As I was walking by the cemetery, I caught the smell of death coming from one of the houses. The door was open and the first thing I saw was a white car parked in the driveway and on top of it a launcher for an RPG.

I went inside, and the sound of the rain on the roof and the darkness inside made me very afraid. The door was open, all the windows were broken and there were bullet holes running down the hall to a bathroom at the end - as if the bullets were chasing something or somebody. The bathroom led on to a bedroom and I stepped inside and saw the body of a fighter.

The leg was missing, the hand was missing and the furniture in the house had been destroyed. I couldn't breathe with the smell. I realised that Tariq wasn't with me, and I panicked and ran. As I got out of the house I saw a white teddy bear lying in the rain, and a green boobytrap bomb.

Some of the worst fighting took place here in the centre of the city, but there was no sign of the 1,200 to 1,600 fighters the Americans said they had killed. I had heard that there was a graveyard for the fighters somewhere in the city but people said that most of them had withdrawn from the city after the first week of fighting. I needed to find one of the insurgents to tell me the real story of what had happened in the city. The Americans had said that there had been a big military victory, but I couldn't understand where all the fighters were buried.

After I saw the body I felt uncomfortable about sleeping in Falluja. The place was deserted and polluted with death and all kinds of weapons. Imagine sleeping in a place where any of the surrounding houses might have one, two or three bodies. I wanted out.

We went back to my friend the old Republican guard officer. I was so tired I could hardly take my clothes off to go to sleep but I couldn't sleep with the smell of death on my clothes.

December 26


In the morning, I went back to find the cemetery and look for evidence of the fighters who had been killed. It was about 4pm before I got inside the martyrs' cemetery; people kept waylaying me, wanting to show me their destroyed houses and asking why the journalists didn't come and show what the Americans had done to Falluja. They were also angry at the interim President Allawi for sending in the mainly Shia National Guard to help the Americans.

At the entrance to the fighters' graveyard a sign read: "This cemetery is being given by the people of Falluja to the heroic martyrs of the battle against the Americans and to the martyrs of the jihadi operations against the Americans, assigned and approved by the Mujahideen Shura council in Falluja."

As I went into the graveyard, the bodies of two young men were arriving. The faces were rotting. The ambulance driver lifted the bones of one of the hands; the skin had rotted away. "God is the greatest. What kind of times are we living through that we are holding the bones and hands of our brothers?"

Then he began cursing the National Guard, calling them even worse things than the Americans: "Those bastards, those sons of dogs." It wasn't the first time I had heard this. It was the National Guard the Americans used to search the houses; they were seen by the Fallujans as brutal stooges. Most of the volunteers for the National Guard are poor Shias from the south. They are jobless and desperate enough to volunteer for a job that makes them assassination targets. "National infidels", they were also called.

I counted the graves: there were 74. The two young men made it 76. The names on the headstones were written in chalk and some had been washed away. One read: "Here lies the heroic Tunisian martyr who died", but I didn't see any other evidence of the hundreds of foreign fighters that the US had said were using Falluja as their headquarters. People told me there were some Yemenis and Saudis, some volunteers from Tunisia and Egypt, but most of the fighters were Fallujan. The US military say they have hundreds of bodies frozen in a potato chip factory 5km south of the city, but nobody has been allowed to go there in the past two months, including the Red Crescent.

Salman Hashim was crying beside the grave of his son, who had been a fighter in Falluja.

"He is 18 years old. He wanted to be a doctor or engineer after this year; it was his last year in high school." At the same grave, the boy's mother was crying and remembering her dead son, who was called Ahmed. "I blame Ayad Allawi. If I could I would cut his throat into pieces." Then, to the mound of earth covering her son's body, she said: "I told you those fighters would get you killed." The boy's father told her to be quiet in front of the camera.

On the next grave was written the name of a woman called Harbyah. She had refused to leave the city for the camps with her family. One of her relatives was standing by her grave. He said that he found her dead in her bed with at least 20 bullets in her body.

I saw other rotting bodies that showed no signs of being fighters. In one house in the market there were four bodies inside the guest room. One of the bodies had its chest and part of its stomach opened, as if the dogs had been eating it. The wrists were missing, the flesh of the arm was missing, and parts of the legs.

I tried to figure out who these four men were. It was obvious which houses the fighters were in: they were totally destroyed. But in this house there were no bullets in the walls, just four dead men lying curled up beside each other, with bullet holes in the mosquito nets that covered the windows. It seemed to me as if they had been asleep and were shot through the windows. It is the young men of the family who are usually given the job of staying behind to guard the house. This is the way in Iraq - we never leave the house empty. The four men were sleeping the way we sleep when we have guests - we roll out the best carpet in the guest room and the men lie down beside each other.

"Its Abu Faris's house. I think that the fat dead body belongs to his son, Faris," said Abu Salah, whose chip shop was also destroyed in the bombing.

It was getting dark and it was time to go, but I needed some overview shots of the city. There was a half-built tower, so I climbed it and looked around. I couldn't see a single building that hadn't been hit.

After a few minutes I got the sense that this wasn't a good place for me to be hanging around, but I had to pee urgently. I found a place on the roof of the building. While I was doing that a warning shot passed so close to my head that I ducked and didn't even wait to pull up my zip, but ran to the half-destroyed stairs to climb down the building. I felt as if the American sniper was playing with me; he had had plenty of time to kill me if he wanted to.

For the rest of the day people were pulling on me to come and see their houses. Again, they asked where all the journalists were. Why were they not coming to report on what has happened in Falluja? But I have worked with journalists for 18 months and I knew it would be too dangerous for them to come to the city, that they are seen as spies and could end up in a sack. So since I was the only one there with a camera, everyone wanted to show me what happened to their house. It took hours.

Back in Baghdad that night, I changed my clothes and decided to send them to the public laundry. I was worried about contaminating my family with Falluja. I was thinking that nobody was going to be able to live there for months. Then, I took a very long bath.

December 27


I woke up at home in Baghdad around 9am. I had had enough of Falluja, but I still felt that I didn't understand what had happened. The city was completely devastated - but where were the bodies of all the dead fighters the Americans had killed?

I wanted to ask Dr Adnan Chaichan about the wounded. I found him at the main hospital in Falluja at midday. He told me that all the doctors and medical staff were locked into the hospital at the beginning of the attack and not allowed out to treat anyone. The Iraqi National Guard, acting under US orders, had tied him and all the other doctors up inside the main hospital. The US had surrounded the hospital, while the National Guard had seized all their mobile phones and satellite phones, and left them with no way of communicating with the outside world. Chaichan seemed angrier with the National Guards than with anyone else.

He said that the phone lines inside the town were working, so wounded people in Falluja were calling the hospital and crying, and he was trying to give instructions over the phone to the local clinics and the mosques on how to treat the wounds. But nobody could get to the main hospital where all the supplies were and people were bleeding to death in the city.

It was late afternoon when I drove out of Falluja and back to Baghdad, feeling that I had just scratched the surface of what really happened there. But it is clear that by completely destroying this Sunni city, with the help of a mostly Shia National Guard, the US military has fanned the seeds of a civil war that is definitely coming. If there are elections now and the Shia win, that war is certain. The people I spoke to had no plans to vote. No one I met in those five days had a ballot paper.

A week after I arrived in London to make the film for Channel 4 News, the tape of the final interview arrived by Federal Express. It was the interview with Alzaim Abu, who had led the fighters in the Shuhada district of Falluja and fought the Americans in the early battles in the city centre. We had been been trying to track him down for nearly three weeks. Then Tariq had got a call from him the night I had left for London saying that he would talk.

There was a lot of bullshit in the interview; lots of bravado about how many Americans they had killed and about never surrendering and how Fallujans would win. He said that there were a few foreign fighters in the city, but none in his units; mostly, they were Fallujans.

But one thing stood out for me that explained the empty graveyard and the lack of bodies. He said that most of the fighters had been given orders to abandon the city by November 17, nine days after the assault began. "The withdrawal of the fighters was carried out following an order by our senior leadership. We did not pull out because we did not want to fight. We needed to regroup; it was a tactical move. The fighters decided to redeploy to Amiriya and some went to Abu Ghraib," he said.

The US military destroyed Falluja, but simply spread the fighters out around the country. They also increased the chance of civil war in Iraq by using their new national guard of Shias to suppress Sunnis. Once, when a foreign journalist, an Irish guy, asked me whether I was Shia or Sunni - the way the Irish do because they have that thing about the IRA - I said I was Sushi. My father is Sunni and my mother is Shia. I never cared about these things. Now, after Falluja, it matters.