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Report
Workshop on Awareness and Capacity-Building
of
Muslim Women
On
April 9-10, 2011, Saturday and Sunday
@Indian
Social Institute, Ambedkar Hall, Benson Town, Bangalore
Report
of the Workshop
Bangalore: “Religion in my
view cannot be understood unless you understand the
socio-cultural context in which it was revealed. One has
to understand the society in order to understand the
religion. All of us are firm in our belief that our
religion is pure and has come to us as revealed by us.
Therefore we delink it from the historio-cultural
context. One would better understand the religion, if he
were to study the history, culture and society when the
messengers or revelations came.”
This was stated by noted
reformist thinker Dr. Asghar Ali Engineer while
presenting the keynote address at a workshop organized
by the Indian Social Institute, Centre for Study of
Society and Secularism and the Talent Promotion Trust
here on April 9.
Keynote Address by Dr.
Asghar Ali Engineer.
Reformist thinker,
Chairman, Centre for Study of Society and Secularism,
Mumbai
Here are the excerpts from
the keynote address by Dr. Asghar Ali Engineer:
The Holy Quran has two
types of verses 1-Normative and 2-Transcendental. Arab
society was not culturally monolithic when the Prophet
began to address and reform it. Makkah was religiously
and commercially important centre and the Quraysh tribe
was the custodian of the
 Holy
Harem and Kaaba, the pivot of sanctity. There was tussle
between migrants and natives. The Bedouins used to earn
their living either by grazing animals or by raiding and
looting the commercial caravans. Status and position of
women varied between tribes and communities. Some tribes
even practiced polyandry. Quranic commentator Tabari
has mentioned the practice of polyandry. If a woman in a
polyandrous relationship wanted to tell her man that she
does not want to continue the relationship, she would
turn the direction of the tent before his arrival.
Makkah’s women enjoyed a better status.
Family structure came into
existence only when property and assets came into being,
which itself was outcome of organized economic activity.
It urged setting parameters of a family, casting the
responsibility of children and setting conditions for
division of property. So certitude of paternity and
therefore marriage also became necessity. Divorce
followed it. Since Bedouins had no property, no family
took shape.
Arabian peninsula was
inhabited by pagans and a few settled communities. Arabs
had refused to be ruled by any king. In fact, Arabic had
no word for a king. Malik was borrowed later as a term.
Slaves were maltreated. Women’s status was bad due to
patriarchy (dominance of men). The Prophet was tasked
with transforming a society from tribal culture to a
family based system. The Holy Quran repeatedly urged
about the care and upbringing of orphans and widows.
Greed for money was growing. Women could not travel
alone. They had to travel on camelback or horseback. The
Quran also condemned accumulation of wealth.
The main purpose of the
religion was to change and reform the society. The Quran
was pragmatic in the process of reform. It did not
implement reforms in a haphazard way. So, although, the
slavery was not abolished with one stroke, but enough
indication was given that it was undesirable by asking
the followers of Islam to set free slaves as a way of
penance.
There was this practice of
free sex with slave-girls. Quran prohibited this. There
has been debate on this. The Quran made it mandatory for
people to marry the slave-girls after nikah.
Slavery continued to be practiced among Arabs till
recently although it was abolished in the America in 19th
century. Some Afghans who came from Afghanistan said
Arab Mujahideen captured Russian women during
Soviet-Afghan war and used them for sexual relationship.
Moreover, whole discourse
among Arabs used to be about duties towards husbands
while the Holy Quran reversed it entirely. Quranic
discourse is rights-based. Religion comes to change the
society but we put social influence to change the
religion.
Media today looks upon
Muslim society, not the real Islam. So they malign
Islam.
 Secondly,
Islam grew in a feudal society as Umayyad rulers
reversed the Khilafat. So Kings corrupted the courtiers
and a culture of sycophancy was cultivated. Harems
mushroomed in kingdoms. They began to follow Roman and
Persian emperors. Islam spread very rapidly in the wake
of conquests and the society came to embrace and imbibe
all the cultures, traditions, and ethos of conquered
lands and societies. Women could not be trained
properly. Thus entire discourse turned against women.
Then in matters of
compilation of Hadith, it was taken as a principle that
if the narrator is upright, the hadith will be accepted
regardless of the unreasonableness of the content. Take
for instance this hadith in which it is said: If a woman
were to assume the leadership of a nation, that nation
would be doomed. It was narrated by a person known as
Abu Bakra. This was being widely invoked when Benazeer
Bhutto was to assume the mantle of leadership of
Pakistan. Even today it is quoted ad nauseum.
Moroccan author Fatima Mernissi investigated the
background of this hadith thoroughly. She found it to be
a forged hadith. It was revealed that Abu Bakrah was
aspiring to become the governor of a province under the
caliphate of Hazrat Ali, may Allah be pleased with him.
He forged this hadith during the days of tussle between
Hazrat Ali and Hazrat Ayesha, may Allah be pleased with
her, to gain the favour of Hazrat Ali in pursuit of his
motive.
Most hadith were compiled
300-400 years after the Prophet. There are even
statements related to the Prophet prohibiting collection
and compilation of hadith. Shariah was evolved in five
phases. Sunni Islam had about 100 schools of
interpretations in the beginning but only four survived.
All these interpretation were heavily influenced by the
locus of the interpreters, the great imams of the Sunni
Islam. Imam Abu Hanifa’s interpretation are coloured
with
 conditions
that prevailed in Iran and Iraq as he lived in Iraq.
Imam Shafii’s interpretations were influenced by
situation in Egypt where even Coptic influence was
dominant.
Some people say the Ulema
are the inheritors of the prophets. It is quite well
known that there is no priesthood in Islam, so there is
no question of there being any ordination. An Aalim is
simply knower. So anybody from amongst us who has
studied well could be an Aalim. The Prophets used to
change and revolutionise the societies while the today’s
ulema are insistent upon maintaining status quo. We need
to study a lot about various societies, cultures, laws,
traditions, customs and ethos. It would be fallacious
to think that ulema are the spokesmen of Allah. They are
equally fallible.
There are grotesque
discrepancies in matters of compilation of hadith. A
hadith narrated by Hazrat Ali, may Allah be pleased with
him, says, ‘A Woman’s faith (iman) is incomplete and her
wisdom too is questionable.’ How is it that such
contents are found within the Hadith collection while
Hazrat Ali was the husband of Hazrat Fatima, the
favourite daughter of the Holy Prophet, peace be upon
him.
Turkish Government has
undertaken the task of training women to sort out the
Hadith that hold them unequal.
Based on this patriarchal
reading of Hadith, the Saudi muftis have been giving
highly objectionable fatwas that are repugnant of the
Quranic framework on gender issues. One among the recent
ones had opined that a woman should breastfeed an adult
employee in order to make him her foster-brother and
safeguard herself from him. How could a religion that
enjoins women to cover their bosoms tolerate this
vulgarity?
Quran has extended equal
rights to men and women both. The Holy Quran has not
prohibited women from anything. Our ulema say (referring
to the Fatwa from the Darul Uloom Deoband last year)
that women should not work outside their homes. This is
a cultural statement, not the religious one. Women can
participate in even as combatants in the battle. Holy
companion Umme Ammara shielded the Holy prophetsaw
when a contingent of the Makkans surrounded him in the
battle of Uhud and took the direct hits on her body. The
Quran does not say anything about assigning the role of
cooking, washing and upbringing of children to women.
Marriage is a social
contract in Islam (meesaqan ghaleeza). You can
place terms and conditions with your husbands, except
that it should not be un-Islamic. In matters of
divorce, custody of children, lactation, meher,
Islam ensures women get a more than a fair deal. It will
be women’s and children’s prerogative to decide with
whom they would like to stay upon divorce. In matters of
nursing of infants, it will be women who decide who
should feed the child, the mother or a privately hired
nurse. Meher is absolute right of wife. But Arabs have
reversed it and claim this amount from male suitors as
bride price. It is only in matters of inheritance that
daughters inherit only half of what their male siblings
inherit from the parental property. However, if the
inheritance related verses are carefully read, the words
like tusi biha audain is a constant refrain which
means the parents could decide to give to their
daughters through will more than what they deserve.
Even local traditions
ensuring fair deal to women have been part of Muslim
ethos. In Jammu and Kashmir, parents leave special wills
for spinsters (who decide to remain single) under
dukhtar e gosha nasheen and in Iran a tradition of
Sheer Baha (compensation for nursing mothers)
exist.
Verses like Arrijalu
qawwamuna alan nisaa have been variously
interpreted. Perhaps qamaa ala should mean ‘to
take care of’, ‘provide for’ etc in today’s context
rather than legitimizing patriarchy. Fiqqahul Quran
explains this term as ‘to stand for’. It says that those
among the spouses will earn, will stand for the other.
It is a functional term, not a theological term.
Much against all these,
the Muslim society today has adopted practices that are
either repugnant to the Quran or do not gel with the
Islamic spirit. Arabs have this tradition of giving
talaqul maut, or divorcing the wives by husbands on
death beds in order to deprive the women of their share
in inheritance.
Quran’s is the most modern
law. But we are imprisoned in the Arabic ulema’s fiqh.
They do not want to come out of it. Amendment to Muslim
Personal law is opposed because it dilutes patriarchy.
Dr. K. M. George,
Director, Indian Social Institute, Bangalore inaugurated
the workshop. He said the situation of Muslim women was
miserable as they were neither opinion-makers nor
decision-makers.
Dr. Vasundhara Mohan,
Director, CSS, Mumbai : The Muslim women are not able to
exercise their rights enshrined in the Holy Quran. They
need to be empowered with both their Quranic rights and
Constitutional rights.
Sagaya Shanthi,
coordinator, I thank the dignitaries and the
participants.
Lecture 2
Patriarchy-free Reading
of the Quran
By M. A. K. Tayab IAS (Retd),
Former Secretary, Govt. of India
In 2002, the religious
police of Saudi Arabia pushed the girls fleeing from a
school building on fire in the city of Makkah to return
to their rooms, put on their hijab and come out. No
words can be sufficient to describe the morally
abhorrent depravity of the religious police
 Muttawwun.
At least 14 girls were either asphyxiated or burnt
alive. Eyewitnesses said they saw the mutawwun
beating back the girls inside the school because they
were not properly covered. Then crown prince (now king)
Abdullah ordered investigations into the incident but
then after three days the newspapers were told not to
publish anything further about the incident.
No religious law is above
preserving human life. Human life is sacrosanct. Problem
is not the Saudi police’s creative solution of the
problem—they could have removed their own headgear and
placed it over the heads of women. Commented Khaled Abul
Fadl, philosopher hailing from Saudi Arabia and now
living in the US: Problem is the puritans’ abnormal
obsession with the seductive power of women, and not
with sanctity of life of human being.
Many justifiably asked
what type of law or insanity of theology would support
such behavior. The incident represents an emotive
attitude that trumps theology, law and even logic. There
is no religious obligation in Islam that takes priority
over preservation of human life. The well established
maxim says: necessities will render the forbidden
permissible.
Talaq was a liberative
piece of social engineering. But the way it is
interpreted by the Hanafi school of ulema, it may come
as a shock to know that it is unknown to the Quran. Much
of this owes itself to male-centric and patriarchal
reading of the Quran.
Lecture-3
Kaneez Fatima
Librarian and Civil
rights activist, Hyderabad
The Mecca Masjid blast in
2007 woke us up when we found that despite Muslims being
the
 victims,
were being accused of triggering the mayhem. Hundreds of
innocent Muslim youth were picked up from Old city parts
and detained without filing FIRs and were tortured. It
was then that we, a group of few women formed a group
called Nisa Resource and Research Centre for Women. We
began to document such cases, helped the families
overcome the trauma, presented such family people before
the media and trained them in expressing their woes. We
launched the advocacy sessions to teach the simple folk
about their civil rights and how to build up pressure on
the government to either launch trials or release the
youth. The released youth were rehabilitated in various
occupations and were even provided monetary assistance
to set up businesses. Nisa has recently launched its
magazine Nisa Quarterly Research magazine.
Lecture-4
A. Faizur Rahman
President, Forum for
Moderate Thought in Islam, Chennai and writer
Both words Iman and Islam
have connotations of peace. Aman is derived from
Iman while Salam is derived from Islam.
Religion of Islam ensures peace in every sector of life
and development. A Muslim is supposed to get peace from
his marital life. It is why all the Quranic rights and
duties have the element of peace embedded in them.
The status of men and
women in Quran is almost identical. Men and women have
equal rights and duties towards each other. Pre-puberty
marriage is null and void in Islam. The Quran uses the
word ‘rushd’ which can be roughly translated as
‘maturity in terms of intellect’, and not merely in
physiological sense. Saudi Arabia and several other
Muslim societies have reversed the practices. Saudi
courts have justified marriage of seven-year old girl to
a 43-year old man. Word ‘Khula’ does not find a mention
in the Quran. In my view, the instrument of Talaq as it
appears in the Quran is applicable to both spouses. It
cannot be different in case of women.
Quran has laid down the
procedure of Talaq in elaborate details in seven stages:
1- talking and explaining 2- physical separation between
the spouses 3-Again talking and explaining 4-
arbitration 5- 1st divorce, 6- 2nd
divorce, 7- 3rd divorce.
Some interpreters explain
the term wazribuhunna as beating the wife. This
term appears 50 times in the Holy Quran and in 62% cases
it refers to ‘explaining’. It appears in five different
meanings in the Quran.
To stage-manage Halalah is
an illegitimate exercise which the Quran cannot be
expected to legitimize against hapless women. It is
thoroughly misinterpreted instrument of the Quran.
Lecture-5
Rights of Muslim Women : A
glance at the social situation
Where do we
Stand?
By Maqbool Ahmed Siraj,
journalist, social activist
I have been working among
students for the last quarter century, trying to counsel
them on careers, funding their studies through
scholarships, arranging accommodation in hostels, and
organising orientation camps to bring them in touch with
professionals from diverse fields of activity. The work
often takes me to Muslim dominated slums in Bangalore.
Nearly six lakh, i.e., about 40 % of Bangalore Muslims
live in slums or near slum conditions. Teeming
multitudes crammed into small houses built across narrow
streets, these slums are inhabited by petty businessmen,
self-employed individuals such as auto-rickshaw drivers,
tinkerers, welders, auto mechanics, bakers and hawkers.
A social worker who lives in one such typical slum, has
often brought to me several meritorious students with
high aspirations and enough talent and dynamism. I
hereunder present some facts of family lives in order
that our readers could draw visual images of mode of
life in these slums: (In order to protect the privacy of
the individuals, all names have been changed).
• Akbari is 49 and has given
birth to 25 kids. Twenty three of them live with her in
a house that is barely bigger than 25 feet by 12 feet.
Several of them are married and have kids who share the
scarce space. Imagine the moral development of kids in a
crammed house where children grow while sharing space
with married couples.
• My friend takes me to a particular street and bets
that he could point out a dozen Muslim grandmothers
whose ages range from 27 to 30. Early marriages are
bane. If women could be grandmothers at the age of 30,
it means that two generations were dept away from
reaching up to the stage of SSLC.
• A coaching academy run by a
concerned Muslim in the locality has 15 Muslim girls on
its rolls who are being coached for 10th grade Board
exams. Of these, four are divorced women. Two of them
have kids too.
• Naseema is 65 and is a
housemaid. She is herself second existing wife of her
husband. She bore 14 children, all alive. Six of her
daughters are second existing wives of their husbands.
·Gulabjan
is a 54 year old maid. Part of her face and neck bear
the burn marks due to acid attack which she attributes
to her deceased husband from whom she bore nine kids.
Curiously, seven kids were born after the acid burning.
One of her child went missing 14 years ago and is yet to
be untraced. Several of her daughters are existing
second wives of their husbands.
To have 25 kids from a
marriage, or to be second existing wives, or to be
grandmother at 30 is not against sharia. But would
anyone of us like to live a life like this or have a
family with such credentials? What is to be concluded is
that we do not live by religious norms alone, we follow
societal conventions, go by propriety, and live by
prevalent norms. It is where we need to differentiate
our status.
Most of our underprivileged
families are caught in indebtedness, deep psychological
tensions and often enmeshed in family discords. In more
than 95 per cent cases, the students needing help,
approach us in company of mothers, not fathers. Family’s
ailments generally owe themselves to economically
irresponsible fathers who are alcoholics and
spendthrifts. Entering into multiple marital alliances,
they barely care to maintain the families. Those into
roaming occupations viz. hawkers or auto drivers,
exploit the anonymity offered by a metropolis and
indistinguishable localities and go about marrying ever
new women and continue their wayward behaviour.
Desertions are therefore more rampant than divorces.
Huddled living and fear of young girls eloping with boys
from the neighbouring house, result in marriages soon
after attainment of puberty. Dawn of adult consciousness
is early as large families and several couples share the
narrow residential space. Early marriage leads to
child-mothers and hampers sufficient education of girls.
Cascade of kids hardly ever allows the weak family
economy to afford decent schooling and productive
education. If girls are married away early, boys are
pressed into worksites without any definitive
occupational training.
By any standard, Bangalore’s
Muslims are a very high profile community. While six
lakh Muslims share these conditions, another eight lakh
live in much better socio-economic milieu. There are big
builders, developers, owners of IT industries, research
labs, tycoons, educationists in umpteen numbers. The
Muslims dominate the business in matters of perishables,
furniture, middle level hotel and restaurants, catering,
tours and travels, transport, wholesale in several
essentials. The community runs as many as 250 English
medium schools, five engineering colleges around the
city, 10 degree colleges, around 30 PU colleges, three
polytechnics, and great many social welfare
institutions. Yet the plight of those six lakh Muslims
mars the image of the Muslims. City’s most socially
blighted areas are Mysore Road and Tannery Road from
where as many as 250 mosques and 140 madrassas also
operate. If this could be the condition of a major chunk
of Muslims in Bangalore, one could imagine plight of the
community in Pilibhit, Shajahanpur, Bulandshahar, Kanpur,
Lucknow, Gorakhpur, Benares, Gaya, Patna, Rampur,
Murshidabad, Guwahati, Dhubri, Howli, Asansol, Muradabad,
Sambhal, etc where educational awakening is still in its
incipient stage.
Menial labour or skullduggery
keeps company for next three decades or so. Hard labour
renders the men invalid by the time they cross the age
of 40. Ailments induced by hard labour and insanitary
habitat, eat into their vitals. It renders them
incapable of raising incomes commensurate to the needs
of the large families. Vicious cycle goes on, sucking
into its vortex, Muslim multitudes. No wonder then, why
slums in Bangalore are infested with delinquent
husbands, broken homes, vagabond children and divorced
and deserted women saddled with kids whose future hangs
in balance.
Most of the time the
assessment of situation and is short on sound analysis
of the socio-economic context in which Muslims exist in
India.
Family values cannot be
nurtured with one-sided exhortation of modesty for
women. Roots of malady are too deeply entwined with
socio-economic ills to be remedied with simplistic
solutions or reading of glossy leaflets. Modesty of
dress and behaviour are a luxury for families where
women slog and men are slothful. Modesty of behaviour
has much to do with kind of schooling, etiquette
imparted at homes and even pattern of housing. And as
one would realize, none of these could be subject matter
of campaigns. They require long planning, sustained
drive and a whole lot of paraphernalia that requires a
holistic understanding of problems rather than dawah
campaign and Islamic summer camps.
Urban slums are increasingly becoming paradise for
Muslim men and nightmare for women. Lascivious men
indulge themselves in all vices while women have to bear
the brunt of raising families. But the mosque sermons
still exhort the men about virtues of raising large
families and talk about subservience of women to men.
Since women are barred from congregational prayers, it
all leads to heightened awareness of man’s dominant
position in a Muslim family. Hence, provisions like
polygamy, three utterances of ‘talaq’, absence of
alimony on dissolution of marriage are abused to the
hilt. To boot, there is no mechanism in place within the
community for marital counseling, to shelter women
unfairly sent out of their marital homes, to ensure that
meh’r (dower) amount is transferred to brides and she
exercises her right to have it for her use. There is no
effort to make the husbands take care of kids they have
sired, to ensure a decent livelihood for all in the
family.
We have been witness to the
Muslim Personal Law Board mounting spectacles year after
year in all-India sessions or talking about status of
women in Islam, but it has never bothered to set up even
a single marital counseling home or a short stay home
for women from broken families. Women are invariably
denied share in inheritance be it from parents or
husbands. Nearly half the dowry burning cases of women
in Bangalore originate from Muslim families. Police are
routinely bribed to suppress the cases. Mehr is
hardly ever paid. No thought has been spared to give the
women the right to claim half the property gathered
after marriage if the marriage is dissolved. In areas
where even the writ of the police does not run, how
could darul qazas implement their fiats? Girls
are married away much before the prescribed national age
for marriage and sulk life long for having acquired no
education.
We may sustain the illusion
of a happy Muslim family through campaigns. But
socio-economic realities are too grim to be denied. No
wonder why others smile at us disdainfully when they see
the mismatch between loud rhetoric and messy family
scenario. Morale of the women in the family would go up
only when they find that they are treated with fairness,
dignity and equality. If not in the family, they should
have forums within the community to attend to their
grievances. Unfortunately, mechanism to redress these
grievances is nowhere to be seen. There are only high
sounding slogans, no substance.
It is where the Muslim women
need to make a difference. We need rehabilitation homes
for discarded women, vocational training centres, even
centres to rescue women from red light areas and reform
them, a large army of volunteers who can impart morals
as well as skills to women, organize them in Self Help
Groups, make them productive, set up working women’s
hostels (where Muslim women have facilities for Ramazan,
taraweeh, meals as prescribed in their religion),
pre-marital counseling as well as marital disputes
arbitration mechanism, centres for legal awareness and
education, personality development centres, etc. Some
headway has been made in Bangalore during the last few
years with setting up Basera Working Women’s Hostels,
Rifaa Home for the Girl Child, Bazme Niswan (for
stipends and scholarships for the poor girls), Imdad e
Niswan (aiding marriage of poor girls), Aasra Home (for
shelter-less women), Basera Girls Home (for orphans), Madrasatul
banat, Tanzeemul Mohsinath, Lifeline Microcredit society
for organisation of women in SHGs. But we need to go
further.
Here lies the role for Muslim
women. One hopes you would come forward.
Feedback from Participants
Nishat Fatima, BE, software
engineer, iGate Technologies, Bangalore:
I do cover my head while working in my office, but do
not cover my mind. I told my bosses that I should be
judged by the quality of my work, not by how I dress.
Tarannum Fathima, BE, Infosys
Technologies: The
workshop has helped my tremendously. Now I know what are
my rights and what role Islam assigns to the women.
Asma Khan, BE, Lecturer,
Engineering college, Bangalore:
I stayed with Brahmins during my studies. For lack of
knowledge, I used to be diplomatic and sailed and swam
with them. The workshop has helped me know the real
rights and duties. It has increased my energy level. I
am appearing for my IAS. Make dua for me.
Shahawar A., B.Sc (Nursing):
It has helped me to understand my rights and duties in
the light of the Quran. The Talent promotion Trust
helped us at crucial moments in life and career. We too
would initiate such measures in our life.
Fazlulla, B.Sc (Nursing):
I have to work mainly among women in future. It was good
that I came to know all this.
Fouzia Chowdhury, Lecturer,
VHD Home Science College, Bangalore:
Asghar Ali Engineer’s profound research and learning has
highly impressed me. I had the feeling that all that
ulema say is not real Islam. Now I have the confirmation
of my understanding.
Hina Aafreen, MCA Student,
RBANMS College, Bangalore:
I will now learn Arabic and directly access the Quran
and will not believe what the ulema say.
Nazifa Haleema, BE student,
Bangalore: I
belong to a very conservative community from mangalore
district. Muslims do not respect working women there.
Shaima, B.Com student,
Bangalore: I came
to know of Muslim woman’s rights.
Sufiya begum from Raichur, BE
Student in Bangalore:
It has enriched me immensely.
Abrar BE student, Bangalore:
We gained tremendous knowledge.
Asmathunnissa, LLB student,
Mysore: The
workshop has helped me tremendously in gaining an
enlightened view of Quranic status of women and their
identity.
M. Shaistha, B.Ed student,
Tiptur: Never
before we had such awareness sessions.
Asma Shamayel, BE, Team
leader, Software development, Wipro Technologies,
Bangalore; Siraj
uncle has been behind us all these years in development
of our mindset. We hope more such women come up who take
up cudgels against the status quoists.
Sabir and Zubeda Begum,
Association of Physically Disabled, Lingarajapuram,
Bangalore:
Wonderful exposition to the real teachings of Quran
about women.
Niazuddin, KAS officer (retd.),
Bangalore: Muslim
women must strive to get into administrative service.
Corruption is rampant there. They would need tremendous
stamina to withstand all that.
Prof. Fairoz Nadeem,
professor of dairy economics, Veterinary University,
Bangalore: Muslim
ulema stall changes apprehending the loss of morality.
Rajiv Gandhi brought computers in India. People accused
him of eliminating jobs. But today there are jobs for
asking. Let us call ourselves ‘developing
community’, not backward community.
Ayesha Begum, MBA student,
Bangalore:
wonderful exposition to the Quranic teachings for full
two days. We are going loaded.
Naveeda Anjum, B.Com,
Bangalore: I have
gained immensely.
Mehnaaz Nadiadwala, NGO
activist working among HIV victims; Only
such exposure to enlightened views will help the
community come up in life.
Aafreen begum, BA student in
Mt. Carmel College, Bangalore:
Never before we were told so much in such a short time.
I am going back with a lot of substance. So far I used
to be very tactical in my replies to the objections from
my colleagues. Now I will be bold in repelling their
misunderstandings.
The workshop was designed for
50 participants. There were 35 participants on the first
day of the workshop i.e., Saturday, April 9, 2011 and 55
participants on the second day, i.e., April 10, 2011.
Food, wuzu and namaz arrangements were made at the
Indian Social Institute premises. Participants from
outside Bangalore were provided accommodation in the
Institute Hostel.
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