Muslim bodies, SP condemn HC ruling on Muslims

New Delhi, Apr 5 (UNI) Reacting strongly to today's Allahabad High Court judgement declaring Muslims as no more a religious minority in the state, Samajwadi Party, the All India Muslims Personal Law Board and Muslims bodies said the court ruling went against the Constitution which lists the comunity as a minority.

However, the National Commission for Minorities said it would first like to read the whole judgement in detail before commenting.

Samajwadi Party general secretary Shahid Siddiqui told UNI that party government in the state will give all help to the petitioners to appeal for a review of the High Court ruling.

''The ruling has come a great surprise to all. The words of the Constitution and various Supreme Court rulings leave no one in any doubt that Muslims are a minority.

The High Court order was passed in the Anjuman Madarsa Noorul Islam Dehra Kalan versus State of Uttar Pradesh case. The madrasa of Ghazipur district had challenged out of turn grant-in-aid to certain other minority institutions.

AIMPLB member SQR Ilyas said the Board failed to understand the argument of the High Court. ''The Constitution has given certain rights to Muslims as a minority community, and none can go against that just on the basis of the various Census reports showing some increase in their population.'' he said.

Maulana Mehmud Madani of Jamiat-Ulema-e-Hind has also criticied the court judgement failing to understand its logic.

NCM chairperson Hamid Ansari told UNI that he would first like to read the copy of the judgement in detail and understand the judge's argument before reacting to it.

The HC has directed the Uttar Pradesh Government to treat any member of Muslim communiy equal to other non-minority religious communities without discrimination in any respect in accordance with law being an integral part of citizenary of India.

The Bench comprising Justice SN Srivastava gave the ruling after considering various criteria, including the population of Muslims as enumerated in the census reports of 1951 and 2001. According to the 2001 Census, Muslims are 18.5 per cent of UP's total population.

UNI