All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen chief and Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi expressed concerns over the calls to survey or demolish some religious structures.
Speaking during the debate commemorating the 75th anniversary of the adoption of the Indian Constitution in the Lok Sabha on Saturday, December 14, Owaisi asked, “I am being asked whether a mosque existed 500 years ago. If I dig up the Parliament and discover something is found, would it become mine?”
Owaisi referred to Article 25 and its provisions while commenting on the Supreme Court’s recent statement that no places of worship would be surveyed until the hearing of pleas challenging the Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991, is concluded.
“Read Article 26, it gives religious denominations the right to establish and maintain institutions for religious and charitable purposes. Prime Minister Modi says that Waqf has nothing to do with the Constitution. Who is teaching the PM? Make him read Article 26. The goal is to snatch away Waqf properties. You want to snatch it away on the basis of your strength,” Owaisi said.
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On Urdu language
Further, Owaisi alleged that the Centre was trying to finish the Urdu language by promoting Hindutva culture. Stating that it was in Urdu the call for freedom, ‘Inquilab Zindabad’ was made, he said, “Read Article 29, it gives freedom of language. Urdu, a language in which our freedom fighters gave the slogan of ‘Inquilab Zindabad’, has been finished.”
“Ask them (BJP) about culture, they will say it is our cultural nationalism. In reality, it is not BJP’s cultural nationalism, it is the cultural nationalism of Hinduvta which has no connection with the nationalism of India,” he added.
