Bhopal, Nov 9 (IANS) Four days after two prominent Muslim groups in Madhya Pradesh claimed that singing ‘Vande Mataram’ was not un-Islamic, a group of Muslims joined people from other communities in singing the national song in front of a mosque in Madhya Pradesh’s Betul town.
Rukmani Balaji temple’s founder Sam Verma, an NRI, had organised a ‘Vande Mataram’ rally. A large number of people from across the society participated in the rally that was held Sunday.

As soon as the rally reached in front of the Jama Masjid at Betul Bazar, its Imam Hafiz Abdul Rajid called upon the people of his community and asked them to recite the song and several members of the minority community joined in.

“‘Vande Mataram’ is a prayer sung in the honour of ‘Mother’ and worship of mother is not wrong in any religion,” Verma said on the occasion. The Imam also said that there was nothing un-Islamic in recitation of ‘Vande Mataram’.

Last Thursday, the All India Muslim Tehwar Committee (AIMTC) and the National Secularism Front of India (NSFI) had said that ‘Vande Mataram’ was simply a prayer to keep the nation safe.

“It is not against Islam or un-Islamic. This is the reason why several Muslim freedom fighters chose to lay down their lives singing ‘Vande Mataram’,” claimed AIMTC chairman Osaf Shahmeeri Khurram.

Khurram said ‘Vande Mataram’ is not a prayer to a mother goddess. “It is a prayer to the almighty to keep the nation safe and thus there should be no problem in singing or reciting it,” he told IANS.

“Even Jamiat Ulema-i-Hind chief Mehmood Madani’s grandfather Maulana Hussain Ahmed Madani and his father Asad Madani, who was also a Congress MP, had sung ‘Vande Mataram’ on various occasions,” he said.

NSFI president Irshad Ali Khan Afridi also said ‘Vande Mataram’ was not un-Islamic. “The controversies arise only because people who issue such diktats have failed to understand it. They are, it seems, not aware of the facts,” Afridi said.