Project ‘Global Islamization’ and Role of ‘Love Jihad’ in India

I. Introduction: Understanding Islamic Jihad

Islamic Jihad is an obligatory ‘religious duty’ of every Muslim under Quran which means to ‘struggle’ or ‘fight’ or ‘jihada’ in the cause of Allah relentlessly by employing all means (peaceful or violent) till all the ‘infidels’ or ‘kafirs’ (non-Muslims) accept Islam as the only ‘true religion’ in the world.

The importance of Jihad can be gauged from the fact that it appeared 41 times in 23 verses of Quran as well as indirect references to it in about 109 Quranic verses, collectively called as the ‘sword verses’. According to Sahih Bukhari [the pre-eminent Hadith (prophetic traditions as Sunnah) collection of Sunni Islam] also, there are about 200 references to jihad in Hadith; about which 98% or 196 of them are clearly referred to in the true sense of ‘jihad by the sword’ [jihad bis saif or qital fi sabili Allahi (armed fighting/killing in the way of Allah)].

Islamic Jihad in its most ancient and widely used form i.e. Jihad by sword (jihad bis saif) and it is the ‘greatest of all jihads’ striving in the cause of Allah and Prophet Mohammad i.e. al-jihad fi sabil Allah as clearly written in Quran has been waged from the birth of Islam in the 7th century AD up till now.

Now, with growing participation of women in waging global jihad, the dangerous malice of ‘Love Jihad’ (LJ) has increasingly come under the scanner in India. The need, however, is create more awareness of ‘LJ’ amongst the non-Muslim gullible women – the main targeted group or victims of LJ.

II. Understanding “Love Jihad” and its Operations in India: Cases Galore

As a term, “Love Jihad” (LJ) was first heard in the Pathanamthitta district in the southwestern Indian state of Kerala around September, 2009, and later used in a judgment of Kerala High Court in December 2009 where Justice K T Sankaran made this observation that ‘an alleged Muslim plot to forcefully convert young Hindu girls to Islam by having Muslim boys entrap them in love affairs’, asking the state government to consider enacting a law to prohibit such “deceptive” acts of LJ”. According to reports by special branch of Kerala police, Islamic fundamentalist outfits like National Democratic Front (NDF) and ‘Campus Front’ of Popular Front of India (PFI) have roots in college campuses in various cities across Kerala.

“As per available information”, the court observed, “the plan was to ‘trap’ brilliant upper caste Hindu and Christian girls from well-to-do families. The programme was started in 1996 with blessings of some Muslim organizations of Kerala.” The court had earlier dismissed the anticipatory bail applications of Shanshah and Sirajuddin, two youths who had eloped with girls belonging to Hindu and Christian religions. According to police, the girls said they were persuaded to convert to Islam and were directed not to disclose the activities of PFI which was allegedly assisting the two accused. Justice Sankaran said that ‘cases of LJ have serious ramifications for national security.’ It also causes communal tensions amongst the religious groups, endangering peace and harmony. Many communal flare-ups across Kerala and India can be attributed to the growing cases of ‘LJ’.

Cases of ‘Love Jihad’ from 13 Districts of Kerala during 2006 -2009

SN	Districts	Incidents	Cases Registered	Rescued
1	Thiruvananthapuram	216	26	6
2	Kollam	98	34	7
3	Alappuzha	78	22	6
4	Pathanamthitta	87	36	11
5	Idukki	156	18	9
6	Kottayam	116	46	13
7	Ernakulam	228	52	26
8	Thrissur	102	41	19
9	Palakkad	111	19	9
10	Malappuram	412	88	31
11	Kozhikode	364	92	29
12	Kannur	312	106	27
13	Kasargode	586	123	68
TOTAL	13 Districts	2866	703	261

Source: Crime Record Bureau of Kerala Police and a Study by National University of Advanced Legal Studies (NUALS), Kochi. Note: The statistics of Waynad district are not available.

Christian groups, too, also protested against increasing cases of LJ. Father Johny Kochuparambil, Secretary of Kerala Catholic Bishops Council’s Commission for Social Harmony and Vigilance, wrote in an article in the church council’s newsletter listing 2,868 Christian girls who fell into the “LJ” net between 2006 to 2009. The Council has also issued “LJ” guidelines to parents of school and college going girls to prevent it from recurring. According to Global Council of Indian Christians, “Love Jihad in Kerala is part of global Islamisation project.”

According to Janmabhumi newspaper published from Kerala, “The Jihadi Romeos engaged in ‘LJ’ are given special ranks, rewards, and money for carrying out their operation of trapping more and more unsuspecting girls into this. Jahangir Razak, a former student of Kozhikode Law College, one such Jihadi Romeo, is said to have trapped 42 Hindu girls till date. He is reportedly linked with a sex racket running in Chennai and terrorist organizations. One Shajahan from Pathanamthitta has trapped 6 young girls from Malayalappuzha Panchayat itself.”, as said in the report.

On June 25, 2012 Oommen Chandy, Cong CM of Kerala informed the state legislature that 2667 young women were converted to Islam in the state since 2006 (India Today, September 4, 2012), while the Muslim League, part of the Cong led UDF govt rejected it as ‘myth’.

In December, 2011 the Karnataka government asked state police to investigate the case of 84 Hindu girls ‘missing’ from Udupi and Dakshina Kannada districts since June of the same year, suspecting ‘LJ’ behind it. The Times of India on April 6, 2010 under the headline ‘Love Jihad: girl rescued’ reported that “Pooja, 17, from K R Nagar, Mysore district, was rescued 10 days after she was kidnapped by Azeem Afeez, 22. She told the police that Azeem forcefully converted to Islam before marrying her. She was also rechristened as Meheq Taj.”, the report said.

The cases of ‘LJ’ can be found across India, thus making it an all India phenomenon. In Assam, even a woman Congress MLA, Rumi Nath who was already married to her Hindu husband and a mother of one child, fell in the trap of ‘LJ’ by her Facebook Muslim friend from Bangladesh who fled with her boyfriend to Dhaka but later Assam Police arrested the duo hiding in Silchar.

Marathi writer Suneela Sovani has written a book on ‘LJ’ which has been translated into English by Shreerang Godbole with a title “Love Jihad, Muted Horror”, which is a must read for all the non-Muslim girls to understand the ‘modus operandi’ of ‘LJ’. According to a reputed Malayalam Daily, Kerala Kaumudi, “Trapping naive non Muslim girls (read as Hindu girls) in the web of love in order to convert to Islam is the modus operandi of LJ”. The Muslim boys are given money, cell phones, bikes etc to trap non-Muslim girls. Increasingly social media tools like Twitter, Facebook etc have been widely used by them to trap the ‘on line all the time’ young generation of non-Muslim school and college girls.

According to Ketan Ranga of Mid-Day, “young Muslim boys are trained to make Hindu or Christian girls fall in love with them (in a time span of two weeks) and then convert them to Islam in six months. If the recruits can’t make the girl fall in love in two weeks, they are told to move on to the next target.” as the reporter said in his October 30, 2009 “Love Jihad’s baby machines” story in the Mumbai daily. Later, those non-Muslim girls are made to bear children from these Muslim boys who after giving birth to children are brainwashed into becoming suicide bombers or involved in acts of Islamic terrorist activities, some of whom are also sent to Middle East (mainly Saudi Arabia and Dubai) to be engaged in ‘sex trade’ there, as per the report. For instance, 12th November 2013 edition of Kannada Prabha reported that Ayesha, who was arrested, presented before the court and then sent off to Bihar, in connection with Patna bombings of Narendra Modi’s rally, was from Mangaluru and was a Hindu girl till recently who was converted to Islam by using ‘LJ’. So be aware ‘LJ’, lest you too will become its next prey!

III. Use of ‘Al-Taqiyyah’ (Islamic Holy Deception) for Waging ‘Love Jihad’ across Globe

In all the cases of ‘LJ’, it is found that Muslim boys have used the Quranic but lesser known principle ‘Al-Taqiyyah’ (or Holy Deception) to trap the gullible and vulnerable non-Muslim girls into their ‘love trap’ i.e. going to Temples, attending Pujas, wearing Tilak, eating prasads while ridiculing fellow Muslims, talking against Islam/Quran/Prophet – all of which are permissible under the Quranic ‘Al-Taqiyyah’ principle to befool the infidels; thereby creating a more moderate and liberal image for themselves convincing the targeted Hindu girls that they are ‘good Muslims’ and their ‘true lovers’. The same is done with other Christian and Sikh girls, among others in both India and abroad. For instance, Imran Khan, famous Pakistani cricketer and now the chief of political party in Pakistan, used this infamous Al-Taqiyyah to lure, marry and convert a rich Jewish girl Jemina and after having children with her, showing true colour ordered her to wear burqa (Islamic veil), which she refused to wear and went back to London, apologizing to her parents for acting against their wishes and cautions. There are so many Ayeshas and Jeminas now in India and across the non-Muslim world.

IV. Concluding Remarks

As the role of women in waging global jihad have been on fast rise, a new malicious strategy has been devised by Islamic Jihadi groups to convert more non-Muslim girls to produce more mujahideens for “Islamification” of the whole world, sooner than later. “LJ” is being used for this Islamic project for ‘Global Islamification’ as ordained by Quran, targeting the non-Islamic secular countries and its fair sex for this.

Meanwhile, the deafening silence of Islamic organizations, religious bodies, Quranic experts etc of having both national and international roots in failing to condemning ‘LJ’ have raised more questions than answers. While they are so quick to issue ‘fatwas’ at the drop of a hate, why none of them ever issue a ‘fatwa’, at least condemning if not proscribing the practice of ‘LJ’? Does the practice of ‘LJ’ in India and across the globe enjoy their blessings for furthering Islamic cause? What they want to hide, which the entire India and the world have known by now, thanks to internet, free press, above all, the 24×7 social media. If they have real guts, at least some of them should stand up and accept this bitter fact that Islam casts in stone of 7th century, needs ‘overhauling reforms’ in tune with the changing realities of 21st century. It can’t afford to look backward to 7th century’s obsolete antediluvian practices for inspiration, while the rest of the world is looking forward to the hopes and aspirations ushered by ‘knowledge capitalism’ of the coming century. But who will bell the cat or set the pigeons free for harmony and human progress?

The Islamic fundamentalists also use violent means against those who dare to tell this truth, but truth can never be concealed and will emerge victorious at the end. Many publishers in India and abroad also fear to publish anything exposing the truth of Jihad or ‘LJ’. But somebody must take the call, as already much of the truth, has already been ‘sacrificed’ in the utter timidity and stupidity cloaked under ‘political correctness’.

Free speech and empirical facts on Islamic Jihad must be respected, published and widely disseminated for creating greater awareness about this dangerous malice, or else, our cherished liberal values like democracy, secularism, tolerance etc will be decimated by continuous onslaughts of global Islamic Jihad.

As Angela Markel, Chancellor of Germany said so presciently in 2009, “Tolerance is a great virtue, but tolerance will be digging its grave, if it can’t defend against intolerance.” US President Ronald Reagan, while denouncing undemocratic, illiberal communism in a famous speech delivered in UK’s House of Commons in 1982, said, “If history teaches us anything, it teaches self-delusion in the face of unpleasant facts is folly.”

Being ‘self-deluded’ by not reporting this ‘unpleasant fact’ of ‘LJ’ will, then, be the biggest historical self-destructive folly of all the remaining secular and democratic states as well as civilized societies across the world. So, let’s be brave and together speak out loud, now – Love ever, ‘Love Jihad’; never!

Written by Sourabh Jyoti Sharma >>

Sourabh is a pursuing PhD research scholar working on ‘Chinese Navy in Indian Ocean and Strategic Implications for India”, at Department of Political Science, Delhi University.