Are Muslims a minority in UP?

Just two days ahead of the first phase of polls in UP, the Allahabad High Court held that Muslims cannot be treated as a religious minority anymore in the state. Justice S N Srivastava gave the ruling after considering various criteria, including the population of Muslims as enumerated in the census reports of 1951 and 2001. However, the ruling was stayed later.

The court said the UP government should treat members of the Muslim community as equal to those belonging to the non-minority communities without discrimination. In fact, a writ petition was filed by a madarssa of Ghazipur district, challenging out-of-turn grant-in-aid to certain other minority institutions. The court also asked the UP government to treat all Muslim institutions applying for grant-in-aid at par with non-minority institutions without any discrimination.

The judgement caused polarisation among political parties. The BJP welcomed it whereas the Congress, SP and others opposed it vehemently. The state government immediately moved an application for hearing and argued that it was not necessary for the single judge to adjudicate on the minority status of Muslims. UP’s Advocate General S M A Kazmi argued that the order was passed without reasons, and it was not necessary to adjudicate on this issue. However, giving relief to Muslims, a division bench of the Allahabad High Court later stayed the single judge’s judgement denying minority status to them in Uttar Pradesh.

THE REGION FIRST

The 14th Summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), held in New Delhi, extensively discussed issues on poverty, trade and terrorism. It began with inducting Afghanistan as the 8th member of the regional grouping. Earlier, Afghanistan was enjoying the status of a special invitee.

The summit adopted a 30-point declaration. In addition to the heads of government of eight member countries, the Summit was attended by five observers – USA, China, European Union, Japan and South Korea. While adopting the Delhi Declaration, Prime Minister Dr Manmohan said the declaration would give a wider mandate to promote peace and development in the region through greater connectivity.

The Declaration includes decisions to establish SAARC Development Fund, South Asian University, SAARC Food Bank and setting up of the SAARC Arbitration Council. The summit also decided to designate the year 2008 as the ‘SAARC Year of Good Governance’. The 15th SAARC summit will be held in Maldives.

Source: The Economic Times