BOMBAY, 13 June 2006 — The Muslim community demanded that beyond reservation, the Muslims should get share in power and jobs proportionate to their population in the country. A resolution to this effect was passed at the Maharashtra Muslim Convention which was jointly hosted by the All India Ulema Council and the Bombay Aman Committee at the Anjum-e- Islam campus here yesterday.
The resolution also stated that Muslims should not only be given share equal to their population in the Parliament, state assemblies and councils, but also in the police, local bodies and bureaucracy too. Muslims were urged to unite and pressurize the political parties they are associated with to give representation to them based on their ratio of population.
The speakers at the convention also discussed the exploitation of Muslims by the political parties as vote banks and the entire Muslim community being viewed as terrorists. A large number of Muslim delegates from Bombay, Bhiwandi, Malegaon, Aurangabad, Sholapur, Pune, Nagpur, Akola and other districts of Maharashtra participated in the convention.
Various Muslim leaders rejected the call to form an independent Muslim politial party, but suggested that a Muslim front in alliance with the backward communities would be beneficial.
Some leaders also suggested that efforts should be made to remove the misunderstanding that has cropped up in the minds of the Hindu community about the Muslims.
Muslim leaders also blasted the state and federal governments for practicing double standard and said that though the government would act fast and arrested a misguided Muslim who became a terrorist, it has not taken action against members of the Hindu militant Bajrang Dal for their involvement in the bomb blasts in Nanded and Ghatkopar in Bombay nor booked them under the stringent Maharashtra Control of Organized Crime Act (MCOCA).
Renowned Muslims scholar, Maulana Zillur Rahman Siddiqui pointed out that more than 65 percent of the Muslim population in India lived below the poverty line.
According to the 1991 census, the Muslim population in India is 13 percent, but there ratio in power is zero. The total ratio of Muslims in the Indian Administrative Services (IAS) is only two percent.
During the past 50 years, only 116 Muslim officers had climbed the ladder to top positions in government services, that included 45 in the Indian Police Service (IPS) and 57 in the Indian Foreign Service (IFS).
Out of 2,700 students in engineering only 92 are Muslims and out of 2,900 medical students, only 98 are Muslims, according to the statistics released at the convention.
