Majlees-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen win shows Muslims’ creative thinking: Maulana Vastanvi

NEW DELHI: Hyderabad-based Majlees-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen opening its account in the Maharashtra assembly is just a “local development” according to Maulana Ghulam Mohammad Vastanvi of the Akkalkuwan Seminary in Nadurbar. However it also reflects “creative thinking” on the part of Muslims on the political front, he added.

Maulana Vastanvi – who rose to fame following his removal as proctor of Dar-ul-uloom Deoband after reportedly said Muslims needed to move on from the 2002 riots discourse – told ET that MIM had “at least broken the myth that only certain parties could monopolise the Muslim vote.”

“MIM’s victory is more due to the strength of its candidates, rather than an overall trend of Muslims voting for Muslim parties and abandoning more mainstream parties,” he said. “Having said that, it is a creative kind of political thinking being employed, to tell some parties like Congress that they are not a captive vote bank, and to look at ways of getting representation,” he said.

When asked whether he was worried about the historically low levels of representation for Muslims in States and the Lok Sabha, Vastanvi said that in the present political climate, it was not surprising.