Religious leaders dismiss fatwa against Shahrukh Khan

Bareilly: An Islamic seminary has issued a fatwa against Bollywood star Shahrukh Khan for allegedly making comments against Islam even as Muslim religious leaders distanced themselves from the decree, calling it “unnecessary” as the actor had offered his clarification.

“A person making a remark like the one attributed to Shahrukh is a kafir (non-believer) and is struck out of Islam,” said the fatwa issued by Mufti Mohammed Shoeb Raza Qadri and Mufti Muti-ur-Rehman of the Darul-uloom-Mazhar-e- Islam. Such a person must offer an immediate apology to return to Islam, the fatwa said.

Shahrukh Khan has strongly denied the comments attributed to him in an interview published in a magazine, saying he had been misquoted.

Case registered
Last week, a criminal case was registered in Mumbai against Shahrukh Khan and the publisher of the magazine under section 295-A (deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious sentiments) and section 34 (acts done by several persons with common interest) of the Indian Penal Code.

Bareilly-based Markazi Darul Ifta, which is responsible for issuing fatwas for the Barelvi sect, dismissed the decree saying the move by the two clerics was “unnecessary.”

“If someone is saying that he has not made statements [against the Prophet], then what is the need to issue a fatwa,” a spokesperson of the Markazi Darul Ifta, Maulana Shahbuddin said.

Darul-Uloom Deoband spokesman Ashraf Usmani said, “We have no plans to issue such fatwa. The fatwa issued against Shahrukh is not significant.”

Another cleric Maulana Yaseen Misbahi said, “Such kind of fatwa should not be issued on the basis of media reports.”