HAJJ SUBSIDY INDIA: BJP GOVERNMENT ENDS HAJJ PILGRIMAGE SUBSIDY FOR MUSLIMS
Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi,
India's minister for minority affairs, said on Tuesday that the move was part
of "a policy to empower minorities with dignity and without
appeasement".
"The BJP government has ended appeasement and vote bank politics," he said. Read here:https://t.co/PzhzW3WZ9g— Republic (@republic) January 18, 2018
"Hajj subsidy
funds will be used for the educational empowerment of girls and women from
minority communities," he told reporters in Delhi.
The decision
followed a 2012 ruling by the country's Supreme Court, which had directed the
government to gradually reduce the subsidy and abolish it by 2022.
The move was
welcomed by many Muslim groups in the country.
"This has been
a long-standing demand of the Muslim community in India," Navaid Hamid,
president of the All India Muslim Majlis-e-Mushawarat, an umbrella organisation
of several Muslim groups, told .
"This subsidy
was used for a long time to denounce the Muslim community, to spread lies that
Muslims were being appeased for vote-bank," added Hamid.
'AIR INDIA WAS GETTING THE
SUBSIDY'
Starting in 1954,
the Indian government has for decades offered subsidies amounting to billions
of rupees to poor Muslims wanting to perform Hajj. In 2016, the sum was about
$75m, down from about $100m in 2013, according to official data.
Muslim pilgrims were
given the subsidy through concessionary airline fares.
Hajj subsidy was
"a major earner for the national airline, Air India", said Faizan
Mustafa, a Muslim scholar and vice-chancellor of the Nalsar University of Law.
"It is Air India
that was getting the subsidy," he told .
"Some poor
Muslims will not be able to afford the journey for Hajj now. But those who are
determined to go will still go."
'We want to manage our own Hajj affairs'
Muslims worldwide
are expected to go on Hajj at least once in their lifetime - if they are able
to.
The original
argument for the subsidies was that they would help poorer sections of the
community perform the pilgrimage, something that they could otherwise not
afford.
Yet, the contested
policy faced criticism from many quarters, including India's Hindu nationalist
ruling party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which has long called it
"appeasement for minorities".
India, however, also
spends significant state funds for other pilgrimages, including the Hindu
religious festival of Kumbh.
The Hajj subsidy was
used a "political tool" in the country for decades, said Kamal
Faruqui, a member of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board.
"We want to
manage our own Hajj affairs, the government should help us. Hajj is compulsory
only for those who can physically and financially afford it," he told .
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