Three Muslims have been offloaded from flights in the past two weeks over terror suspicion stemming from an alleged religious bias.
In all such cases, the suspicion turned out to be incorrect. Community leaders say it is a terrible feeling being “constantly under the scanner”, but terror-sniffing security officials suggest they can’t help it.
The latest in the series of such incidents occurred on Wednesday at Delhi airport. A cleric was taken off an Emirates plane to London, questioned all night and reportedly taken into custody before being released because his phone conversation with his wife had alarmed a fellow passenger.
“Jahaz udne wala hai aur hum udne wale hain (the plane will take off and we will fly),” Maulana Noor-ul-Huda was heard saying.
The co-passenger, a woman, thought his words meant the plane would be “blown up” and complained to the captain.
Soon, the 50-year-old, who runs madrasah Darul Uloom in Uttar Pradesh’s Saharanpur, was detained.
Delhi police commissioner Y.S. Dadwal today dubbed the scare “a case of miscommunication”.
But another officer said: “We are sorry for the mistake, but we cannot ignore alerts like these given the security concerns. Also, there is a general state of panic among passengers.”
It isn’t known if passengers would react the same way if they saw someone different from Noor-ul-Huda — who was dressed in traditional Islamic attire and was sporting a beard —use similar words in a plane.
On May 5, a SpiceJet flight from Delhi had to make a “priority landing” in Calcutta after two Russians, including a woman in a burqa, behaved “suspiciously”, claimed some co-passengers who alerted the crew.
The burqa-clad passenger turned out to be a woman. Her large physique had given some the impression she was a man.
Community leaders are not amused.
“These incidents reveal the vulnerability of a Muslim. He is under the scanner wherever he goes and everyone views him with suspicion. It is terrible,’’ said Tanwir Ahammed of the Milli Council.
Abdul Noomani of the Jamiat Ulema put it bluntly. “To many, a conservative Muslim and an Islamic terrorist are the same. For them, a bearded Muslim and Osama bin Laden are one and the same.”
But some take a different line, saying Muslims, too, have to be more mindful of their actions.
“These incidents hurt us. But one should be sensitive towards the environment one lives in and be more careful,’’ said Ahmmed Illyasi of the Imam Sangh. Ghulam Muhammed of Muslim India echoed the sentiment.
Ismail Jaleel of Khilafat said: “There is a general suspicion in the minds of people about Muslims, thanks to the role played by Islamic terrorists across the world. Muslims will be able to overcome this phobia only by denouncing terrorism louder and louder.”
Unfortunate incidents these may be,but as one of the police officer said we cannot ignore alerts because the current international situation is like that.Muslims need to be careful on one hand and on the other side officials need to make sure that innocent passengers are not humiliated.It's ofcourse a difficult balancing act,but one which is absolutely necessary.
It's very unfortunate that an entire community is suffering because of the criminal terror acts of some members of the community.
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