The need for Muslims to become modern

I have always supported Muslims whenever any atrocity or injustice was done to them. But I am an opponent of outdated backward feudal customs and practices among all communities, e.g. the caste system among Hindus and looking down on dalits.

Similarly, I am strongly against oral talaq and burqa among Muslims, and I support the demand of a uniform civil code.

Sharia law has done great harm to Muslims, and has contributed in keeping them backward. The time has come when it must be abolished ( just as the old Hindu Law was abolished in 1955 and 1956 by statutes ). It is only due to vote bank politics and bigotry of some die hard feudal minded Muslims that this has not yet been done. So I support the recent demand of some modern minded Muslim womens organizations in this connection.

The very fact that oral talaq is permitted to only Muslim males, but not to females shows that Sharia treats women as inferior. But some claim that Sharia was made by Allah, and so cannot be abolished. This is nonsense and humbug. Customary non statutory law was not made by anyone, but evolved in accordance with the social syste prevalent at that time. In the middle ages women were everywhere regarded as inferior to men. Thus, according to the old non statutory Hindu Law, a man could marry as many wives as he wanted, but a woman could marry only one husband. This shows that the old Hindu Law too treated women as inferior.

Similarly, wearing burqa is a stupid backward practice. If a woman wears a sari or salwar kameez surely she is not nude. Why should women be kept in a cage ? It is time now that Muslim men tell their wives and other female relatives to discard burqa, and support the demand for abolition of oral talaq.

Muslims should reflect

This is a message I got on facebook ( I have deleted the name of the sender ) :

Hi sir....Asslam o alaikum

Aap kaafi dooor ras insaan hai aur education & history par apko command hasil hai.  Mai  apse ek request karta hun.  Plz aap ek baar Islaam ko achhe se study krye or hmare Nabi Mohammad Sab ke baare mein padhye or Quraan ko padhye ek baar zrur sir. Uske baad aap khud faisla karye ke Islaam kaisa mazhab hai or wo kya chahta hai.

This is my reply:

I am 69 years old, and have been reading and discussing all my life since I was very young. I have studied Islam well.

 Islam was a great religion which spread from Spain to Indonesia because of its great message of equality. It was a great leveller, treating all men as equals. The oppressed people, who were often inhumanly treated ( e.g. the 'low' castes in India ) accepted Islam as it gave them social emancipation ( the same reason why Buddhism and Christianity spread ).

The early Muslims emphasized on science and education. The Prophet is said to have said that for knowledge ( ilm ) one should even go upto China . Arabs were great scientists, and regarded Hindus as their gurus in science and mathematics. They learnt the decimal system, etc from the Hindus, and passed this knowledge on to Europeans.

 However, of late the Wahabi type bigoted idiots have disgraced and painted a wrong picture of Islam, because of which many people in the world today identify Islam with terrorism.

 Islam was a great liberating religion. but many fundamentalist and stupid fools have sought to make it it an enslaving religion. For example, these bigoted idiots support burqa or hijab which puts women in a cage. In my opinion burqa or hijab is against the spirit of Islam, which was a great liberator. So it is anti-Islam. But these stupid fools will not agree to something so obvious. They say that it should be left to the choice of the woman to wear burqa or not.

 The truth is that many women wear burqa or hijab because of the force of social pressure or custom, which can be as powerful as physical force.

 Some idiots say that a woman without a burqa or hijab is naked or like a woman in a bikini. This is a stupid argument, and only idiots can make it. Is a woman wearing a sari or salwar kameez or shirt pant naked or in a bikini ?

Oral talaq, which is only permissible to men, discriminates against Muslim women by keeping a damocles sword hanging over their heads. It is one of the main causes of keeping Muslims backward. By treating women as inferior, it plucks out one of the two eyes of Muslim society. Abolition of oral talaq is absolutely necessary for emancipation of Muslim women, and since women comprise half of society, it is absolutely necessary for emanc ipation of Muslims ( see my article ' Womens Emancipation ' on my blog justicekatju.blogspot.in )

 The Talibanis want that girls should not be sent to school. But the Prophet had emphasized on education. So are Talibanis not anti-Islamic ? Some bigoted fools in Pakistan are against vaccinating  children for polio etc. Are they not idiots ?

 It is time Muslims declare these idiots anti-Islam.

Some people make pictures or cartoons insulting to Islam. It is best for Muslims to ignore this, instead of shooting such people, as was done to Charlie Hebro, which only gives Muslims a bad name.

Do away with burqa

In my opinion wearing burqa or hijab is a disgusting relic of feudal subjugation and servitude of Muslim women, and should be quickly done away with, not by force, but by educating and enlightening people, including Muslim women.

Some people say that Muslim women wear burqa or hijab of their own free will, and are not forced to do so. My reply is that the force which compels Muslim women who wear the burqa or hijab to do so is the force of feudal customs, habits and practices, which stamp the feudal sign of inferiority on a woman wearing it. If this force of feudal customs and feudal practices did not exist hardly any Muslim woman would wear the burqa, which only imprisons her.

Some people say that not covering the body has led to rapes of women. This is a stupid argument. Nobody is saying that women (or for that matter, men) should go around naked. But if a woman is wearing a sari or salwar kurta, or even jeans and a shirt is she going around naked?

I appeal to Muslim men, particularly the youth, to follow the example of the great Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey, who abolished feudalism and feudal practices, such as wearing the burqa and following the outdated and oppressive ( particularly to women) shariat law in Turkey and modernized it.
-Justice Katju