Indian Prime Minister Mr. Manmohan Singh calls on Indian states to ensure safety of Islamic minority

(08 Sep. 2006) : Indian Prime Minster Mr. Manmohan Singh, during his meeting of Chief Ministers of individual states of the Union on Tuesday September 5th, called on the leaders to follow the policy of dialogue and not of racism with regard to the Muslim community. He warned them of the “errors of radicalism and of blaming the entire Muslim community for the evils of terrorism: this is wrong and could damage the country’s peace policies”. “A policy is urgently needed to protect innocent people and to ensure that a few individual acts do not result in tarnishing the image of the entire community,” the Prime Minister said. “Instead of a clash of civilizations, we need the idea of confluence of civilizations and this goes for all minorities,” he added.
Commenting on the Premier’s statement, Fr. Babu Joseph, the spokesman for the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India said, “The prime minister’s call to identify criminal elements in society and to initiate corrective measures against them alone, without blaming an entire community, is a welcome step in an atmosphere where lawless elements seem to enjoy undeserved patronage from some quarters.A crime is a crime and it should be treated as such without reference to political, ethnic or religious elements,” he said. John Dayal, chairman of the All India Catholic Union, said he was “happy” about Singh’s intervention. He said, “I think the prime minister has done something very wise. One cannot accuse all Muslims of Islamic terrorism. We oppose terrorism, in the world and in India, whatever the provocation, but we are not against Muslims,” he added.