Congress MP Shashi Tharoor after raising concerns that CAA protests on ‘secularism’ may be getting hijacked by Islamist slogans which pronounce that Allah is the only god, has been trying to monkey-balance his way back to the good books of radicals.
When he was in Jamia Millia Islamia to express solidarity against CAA, the radicals chanted ‘La Ilaha Illallah’ (There is only one god, Allah).
https://twitter.com/2halffry4slice/status/1216323184779096064?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
As Tharoor addressed protestors at Jamia, the protestors shouted him down by chanting ‘La Ilaha Ilallah’.
https://twitter.com/2halffry4slice/status/1216337984464670720?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Upset at Tharoor being shouted down, Congress workers and members of Jamia Coordination Committee tore down the ‘la ilaha ilallah’ posters which were raised.
https://twitter.com/abdullahycsc/status/1216414446634983424?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
The reason Tharoor is being attacked by radicals is that in December 2019, Tharoor had reacted to protestors chanting La ilaha illallah, the Islamic Shahada which means “There is no god but God”, where the second God means Allah. The chant is often followed by muḥammadun rasulu llah, which means “Muhammad is the messenger of God”. The religious chant represents the central philosophy of Islam, that Allah is the only god, and there is no other god.
https://twitter.com/ShashiTharoor/status/1211265562883579904?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Tharoor said that their “fight against Hindutva extremism should give no comfort to Islamist extremism either”. He said that the fight against the Citizenship Amendment Bill is fight to defend inclusive India. “We will not allow pluralism & diversity to be supplanted by any kind of religious fundamentalism,” he added. Soon, the radicals descended upon his timeline to call him a ‘soft bigot’.
Tharoor was accused of soft bigotry for his comments, and said that it is “their fight”, asking him to stop telling what to do. After that fateful day, all the attempts of Tharoor to pacify the radicals have failed. Not only that, he even managed to offend them further by likening ‘Hindutva’ (which by ‘secular’ definition is Hindu extremism) to Islam and Christianity in a flawed infographic he shared last week.
As Tharoor’s pacifying attempts fail harder every time he tries, one can only wait and watch when does he finally give in and join the chanting chorus.