Minority Affairs

Who is the South Asian Muslim? This book has some fascinating answers

The fact that South Asian Muslims lead “challenging” and “diverse” lives and it may take a 370-page long book to prove that seems downright patronising and even prejudiced. Do you need 15 detailed essays to establish that South Asian Muslims are not to be associated with “terrorism”(the inside flap says so)? If it is with that sense of mild irritation you pick up this book, rest assured the blurb doesn’t do justice to it at all.

Slowly unfolding the sheer diversity of the kind of Islam practised in South Asia, the book surprises the reader with the breadth of differences covered by the term “South Asian Muslim”. The cultural peculiarities in which Islam found its feet in the subcontinent, as far back as the 7th century, a few years after the Prophet’s passing, also makes for a very interesting read. The relationship of the faith that people are born into with the political system they find themselves in, the larger milieu and accompanying challenges this presents, are addressed in this book through essays by some of the finest minds.

Several essays are India-based, with some exceptionally enlightening ones like Barbara Metcalfe’s majestic sweep over what is Indian, Islamic and “nationalist”. Tanweer Fazal’s remarkable essay looks at the idea of Muslim-ness as perceived by several interviewees, and the different responses to the idea of “being Muslim”. Dennis B McGilvray focusses on Muslim women in Sri Lanka, and the community’s approach to marriage, women and their property rights. It is interesting to note that Muslims were referred to as “Moors” there too in the medieval period (from the Portuguese word mouro, used for Arabs from north Africa), then as sonahar (Tamil) and finally, Muslims.The essays in the book are remarkable for their ability to tie the past with a contemporary understanding of how Muslims carry on with their lives and beliefs in today’s world.

Khaled Ahmed’s essay on media in Pakistan and Irfan Ahmed’s ‘Kafka in India: Terrorism, Media and Muslims’ need to be read together to feel the full weight of their impact and to appreciate the problems particular to life in an “Islamic republic” as the dominant community, and life in a large democracy as a big but often stereotyped minority, respectively.

The last essay is a treat. Quite aside from being read by this reviewer in the middle of soccer frenzy, Ronojoy Sen’s account of Mohammedan Sporting through the ages is a lovely metaphor with which to explore the alternating states of glory, confidence and sense of loss of all concerned — Indians, Indian Muslims and Indian football.

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