Warring Muslim groups in Kerala have joined forces to fight the government on Uniform Civil Code

The government’s revival of the debate on a Uniform Civil Code – a common set of laws governing marriage, divorce, succession and adoption that would replace various religious personal laws – has united warring Muslim religious organisations in Kerala.

Setting aside their ideological differences, at least for now, these groups have joined forces to defeat the Centre. The unity call – engineered by the political party, the Indian Union Muslim League – has even led to the merger of two rival Salafist factions that had parted ways 14 years ago.

The catalyst for the unlikely reunion was the National Law Commission’s questionnaire in October seeking public opinion on a Uniform Civil Code. The questionnaire tied in with the government’s affidavit in Supreme Court, filed the same month, seeking a ban on the Muslim practice of triple talaq, saying it “cannot be regarded as an essential or integral part of the religion”.

Muslims organisations, including the All India Muslim Personal Law Board, had vehemently opposed both actions then.

In November, the Kerala groups – including one Sunni faction, three Salafist outfits and the Jamaat-e-Islami – met in Kozhikode and resolved to boycott the questionnaire. They also decided to conduct a signature campaign against the government’s proposed move to bring in a Uniform Civil Code. “Lakhs of people participated in the campaign held in mosques in the first week of November,” said Indian Union Muslim League national secretary ET Mohammed Basheer.

Factions and rivalries

All five organisations that were part of the meeting in Kozhikode espouse divergent views on a host of theological matters, including some details of prayers.

The numerically strong Sunnis owe allegiance to two rival groups led by the late EK Aboobacker Musliyar and AP Aboobacker Musliyar, which are popularly known as the EK and AP factions, respectively. Both groups, in turn, oppose the ideologies of the Salafists and the Jamaat-e-Islami.

Factional feuds have wreaked havoc in the Salafist camp too. The parent outfit, the Kerala Nadvathul Mujahideen, suffered a vertical split in 2002, resulting in the formation of the TP Abdulla Koya Madani faction and the Hussain Madavoor faction. A third Salafist group, Wisdom Global Islamic Mission, is a more recent addition.

These rivalries have often resulted in violent confrontations – between rival Sunni factions and between Sunnis and Salafists – with many people losing their lives in the process.

A common cause

However, all of them have agreed to bury the hatchet, at least for the time being, to fight a common enemy.

“The Centre will listen to our demands only if we stand united,” said Professor Alikkutty Musliar, Islamic scholar and general secretary of the EK Sunni faction. “We will not allow the government to change Islamic Shariah.”

The biggest unification, perhaps, has been that of the Salafist factions, the TP Abdulla Koya Madani and Hussain Madavoor groups. They had so far resisted all attempts at a patch-up, including several made by the Indian Union Muslim League.

On December 6, in Kozhikode, Madani said the challenges facing the Muslim community at the moment, including the Uniform Civil Code, had acted as a catalyst for the merger. “Of course, the Centre’s plan to implement the Uniform Civil Code was a major cause for concern for all Muslims in India,” he said. “We will stand united in our fight against Uniform Civil Code.”

The Indian Union Muslim League’s ET Mohammed Basheer said only his party could have united the Muslim organisations. “The party was in the forefront of the agitation after the Supreme Court verdict in the Shah Bano case in 1985, which forced the government to enact the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act,” he said. “We will resume protests if the Narendra Modi government insists on implementing a Uniform Civil Code.”

The Shah Bano verdict was a landmark case in which the court had ruled in favour of alimony for the 62-year-old divorced mother of five. However, under pressure from Muslim organisations, the Rajiv Gandhi-led Congress government had enacted the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act, 1986, which sought to restrict maintenance to Muslim women to a period of just three months after divorce.

Praising the Indian Union Muslim League for bringing together rival Muslim groups, CP Saleem, convenor of Wisdom Global Islamic Mission, said it was the late GM Banatwala, an MP of the party, who had presented a bill against the Shah Bano verdict in the Lok Sabha way back in 1985.

Problems persist

However, the reunion has not been smooth. In a setback for the Indian Union Muslim League, Kanthapuram AP Aboobacker Musliyar, leader of the AP Sunni faction, did not attend the meeting in November. Party leader Basheer said he did not know the reason for Musliyar’s no-show, saying, “We had invited him for the meeting.”

It is believed that the reason for Musliyar’s absence was his reluctance to share a platform with Salafist and Jamaat leaders.

Soon after the meeting, Mujeeb Rahman Kinaloor, editor of Varthamanam, a newspaper owned by the Hussain Madavoor faction of the Salafists, wrote that Musliyar had sowed the seeds of the Sunni split in 1985 after some Sunni leaders had shared a dais with Salafist and Jamaat leaders. “Leaders of all Muslim organisations in Kerala had participated in a meeting when AIMPLB [All India Muslim Personal Law Board] leaders Abdul Hassan Ali Nadvi and Mujahidul Islam visited Kozhikode after the Shah Bano verdict in 1985,” he wrote. “However, Kanthapuram AP Aboobacker Musliyar criticised the Samastha Kerala Jamiyyathul Ulema’s decision to share the dais with Salafist and Jamaat-e-Islami leaders. The rebellion resulted in Musliyar’s expulsion from the organisation.”

Though missing at the meeting, Musliyar later spoke at a public function of his support for the joint agitation against the government. “Uniform Civil Code would destroy the peaceful atmosphere in the country, where people belonging to different religions live amicably,” he said. “I hope that the prime minister will not take any step that might hurt religious sentiments.”

Reinforcing the view that bad blood between the groups will not be erased merely by the joining of forces to fight the government on Uniform Civil Code, CP Saleem of Wisdom Global Islamic Mission said, “We have ideological differences with the Jamaat-e-Islami and we will not participate if they call for a meeting.” He added, “The same will happen if we invite them for a meeting.” He said that in such a scenario, the Indian Union Muslim League was the only one that could keep the Muslim religious organisations united.

“Sunni and Salafi outfits have ideological differences on many issues, including triple talaq,” he added. “But no one raised those issues at the meeting, keeping in mind the larger interests of Muslim society.”

However, even as the Indian Union Muslim League draws praise for uniting the various groups, it is also facing flak on social media for keeping its women’s wing, the Vanitha League, out of the meeting in November.

Noorbina Rasheed, general secretary of the Vanitha League as well as an advocate and a member of the State Women’s Commission, however, dismissed the criticism. “I am happy as the IUML has succeeded in bringing the leaders of various outfits together to chalk out strategy in the fight against Uniform Civil Code,” she said. “That is a big achievement. Women’s participation is not a must in these kinds of meetings.”