‘Minorities being treated as mere vote bank’

Times of India: Bareilly: Friday, 19 December 2014.

On the occasion of World Minorities Rights Day, several Muslim organizations across different sects came together on Thursday and rued how the community was being treated by the political leadership as "mere vote bank".

Muslims from Bareilly, Moradabad and adjoining areas also regretted the fact that several welfare schemes announced for them in the past never took off. The participants also shot off a letter to PM Narendra Modi.

All India Muslim Personal Law Board president Maulana Mohammed Mufti Raees Ashraf told TOI: "Muslims, including Ulemas and intellectuals, gathered for a meeting in Bareilly on Thursday. It was discussed that minorities in the country do not feel safe. We have decided to boycott celebrating the day until both central and state governments fulfil their promises made at the time of elections."

All India Imam Masjid Association vice-president Maulana Nasir Husain Ashrafi, too, condemned tokenism in the form of observing a day to espouse the minority rights and then forget everything about them.

Saleem Baig, an RTI activist who has filed several RTIs to know the current status of minority schemes announced by various political parties, said, "We have become mere vote banks. Schemes for the upliftment of minorities are announced just for show and their budget is later allotted to some other schemes."

Baig said that though the formation of a Waqf Nigam and Saman Avsar Ayog were recommended by the 2006 Sachar Committee and even the central government had promised to set them up in the same year, it still remains a pipe dream.

"Through an RTI filed last year, I came to know that no time frame has been fixed for setting up a Waqf Nigam," he said.

Hazrat Maulana Abdul Quayyum, general secretary, All India Tanzeem-e-Ahle-Sunnat, said, "Most of the schemes for protection and development of minorities in the country are announced during the election time to woo voters. But majority of these scheme remain only on paper."

During the meeting, the fate of the much-touted 2012 central government scheme, Padho Pradesh, which promised interest-free loans to minority students aspiring to study abroad, was also discussed. "It was revealed in an RTI reply dated June 2014 that the government had sanctioned a sum of Rs 10 crore in 2013-14. In the financial year 2014-15, only Rs 4 crore were left of that. However, when I enquired about the number and details of beneficiaries under the scheme, it was revealed that till now, not a single person had been benefitted," Baig said.

The RTI activist also took on the ruling Samajwadi Party, which had announced schemes like Rin (loan) Mafi Yojna and medical quota for minority students in their election manifesto. "However, it was revealed through an RTI query in September 2014 that both of these schemes have not been implemented in the state yet," he said.