Did a Muslim cleric ask Muslims to prepare for war against Hindus & Christians?
A misleading & communal claim is spread by various members from the right-wing with malicious intent.
Claim
Years ago I wrote an article headlined ‘How green is my Bengal?’ which fetched the usual cacophony of #LeftLiberal protest and snark.
Sadly Bengali ‘intellectuals’ are collaborators in this hate project. Useful Idiots don’t realise the mob will devour them first.
Peerzada Taha Siddiqui of Furfura Sharif mazaar, #Bengal, exhorts Ms to prepare their children for war against Hs..
Rating
Explanation
A video of a Muslim cleric Peerzada Taha Siddiqui had been doing the rounds in social media lately. Most of it is shared by the BJP party members, supporters, or members of other right-wing organisations. In the video, a Muslim cleric can be seen calling the Muslims to prepare for war against Hindus and Christians. Similar claims were made by various social media users including right-wing lawyer Shashank Shekhar Jha; Sourish Mukherjee, VHP’s media incharge for Bengal; Rakesh Singh, a party worker from BJP Bengal; Kanchan Gupta, a senior advisor to the Union Government’s Ministry of Information & Broadcasting; and Abhijit Majumder.
What’s the truth?
A keyword search in Twitter led us to a tweet by Tamal Saha which said that the Muslim cleric called for the Muslims to be ready for war but the war should not be fought with swords, arms or lathis but with education.
Fact: On Jan 27 Furfura Sharif Pirzada said :Muslims wake up, parents teach your children to fight. Get ready, #Muslim children have to fight a war against #Hindu & #Christian. But that war should not be fought with swords, arms or lathis. That war should be over EDUCATION ..1/2 pic.twitter.com/rerzL1BRT6
— Tamal Saha (@Tamal0401) February 3, 2023
The full version of the video which runs for almost 28 minutes can be found on YouTube which was uploaded on 27th January 2023.
In the 17th minute of the video, Pirzada Taha Siddiqui can be heard saying, “Wake up Muslims. Teach your children to fight. Prepare them for the fight. Prepare them for the war, against Hindus and Christians. But the war is not to be fought with swords. War will not be fought with arms, and it will also not be fought with lathis. But the war would be fought with education. A Muslim boy should fight with Hindu boy in education. A Muslim girl should fight with a Hindu girl in education. When Hindu & Muslim children of Bengal do well in education, they should fight with other states over education”.
A segment about education is clipped and a few seconds of Siddiqui’s speech is shared in social media with a misleading and communally charged claim that a Muslim cleric had called the Muslims to prepare for war against Hindus and Christians.
Conclusion
A video of a Muslim cleric, Pirzada Taha Siddiqui, is clipped and shared with a false and communally charged claim that he had called for Muslims to prepare for war against Hindus and Christians.
