By Rohana R. Wasala

The Island on Monday 11, 2020 reported: ‘Samagi Jana Balawegaya leader Sajith Premadasa, yesterday, called for an end to the discriminatory and prejudicial manner in which the government conducted the last rites of Muslims who had died of Covid-19, and continued racist attacks on Muslims.

“Racist attacks perpetrated against our Muslim brethren is abhorrent and should be confronted by all of us. Such heinous acts are contrary to the noble teachings of the Lord Buddha”’

 According to another news report in the same newspaper, All Ceylon Makkal Congress leader Rishad Bathiudeen in a long petition to the president appeals to him ‘to permit Muslims dying of Covid-19 to be buried and not cremated…’.

We saner ordinary Sri Lankans feel that both the defeated presidential candidate and the  controversial Muslim politico who has been under a cloud for some time now accused of causing environmental damage to the Wilpattu forest reserve, and considered worthy of being questioned   in the course of fresh investigations being conducted into last year’s April 21 terror bombings, are making a mountain out of a molehill to gain some political advantage out of the Covid-19 emergency. Their desperate pretensions need not worry anyone and need not be answered.

It was regrettable that even the sedate Bimal Ratnayake of the JVP, former MP, lamented  alleged discrimination against Muslims, who, he said, should be allowed to have an honourable burial if they are not let live honourably (as reported in lankacnews a couple of days ago). I never believed the formerly decent Bimal Ratnayake could utter falsehoods, but now I do.

UNP parliamentary candidate Oshala Herath has filed a fundamental rights petition (May 11, lankacnews) before the Supreme Court challenging the practice of cremating bodies of Muslims who died of Covid-19 infection. Whether the judiciary will intervene to countermand a vital scientific recommendation of the health authorities of the government appointed task force to maintain and control the spread of the deadly Covid-19 contagion  is yet to be seen, as my common sense tells me. 

However, opinion in the Muslim world about cremating bodies of dead Muslim Covid-19 victims is divided. Most sensible Muslims accept cremation as a scientific imperative which should be accommodated with necessary adjustments if possible to make it compatible with their religious beliefs in the prevailing situation.  A report by Agaddir Ali carried in Gulfnews.com on April 3, 2020  under the headline: ‘Coronavirus: Sharjah Ruler issues directive on burials’ ran: 

 ‘His Highness Dr Shaikh Sultan bin Mohamed Al Qasimi, Supreme Council Member and Ruler of Sharjah, on Friday directed the Department of Islamic Affairs in Sharjah not to allow the burial of any coronavirus victims in Al Saja’a area of Sharjah’ 

(Doesn’t ‘not to allow the burial of’ in this context mean ‘allow the cremation of’?)

A month ago (April 12), Colombo Times carried this piece of news: ‘President of the All-Ceylon Jamiyyathul Ulama Sheikh Rizwie Mufthi said here in a TV interview that the ashes of the dead person who is cremated could be buried with due Islamic rites in a Muslim graveyard’.

The General Secretariat of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) has issued a statement (as reported in The Island of May 9, 2020 and in other print and online sources) expressing its ‘deep concern over reports on escalating hate speech and hostility towards Muslims in Sri Lanka and rejected the publication of allegations ….(against)… the members of the Muslim community…………… as responsible for the spread of the new coronavirus epidemic (COVID-19) in this country, the authorities’ cremation of bodies of the Muslim victims of the pandemic, and the arrest of members of the community who reject these practices’. The OIC ‘reaffirms its position rejecting all policies and practices targeting the rights of Muslims anywhere, and calls on the authorities in Sri Lanka to ensure the safety and security and rights of the Muslim community, a commitment to respect their practices and religious rituals, safeguard their dignity and stand firmly against all parties behind the promotion of hatred, Islamophobia, and anti-Muslim sentiment in Sri Lanka’. 

While thus articulating its cautious expression of concern, the OIC stresses the importance of synergetic global cooperation among nations in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. My description of the OIC’s ‘expression of concern’ as cautious is because it diplomatically expresses concern only over ‘reports’, rather than perceived or actual instances, of discrimination against the Muslim citizens of Sri Lanka. We Sri Lankans know that these allegations are fanciful fabrications.

The objective way The Island reported on the issuing of the OIC statement was not followed elsewhere. The tamilguardian and the Daily FT websites ran the headline: ‘OIC deeply concerned over the targeting of Muslims………’, and Colombo Times similarly cried out ‘OIC rejects targeting Muslims in Sri Lanka…’., where mere allegation was reified as reality, perhaps in the interest of journalistic sensationalism.    

The relevant Sri Lankan government authorities will respond to the OIC statement in an appropriate manner if they consider it important to do so. I as an ordinary Sri Lankan think that the document is based on misinformation provided by some source/s in Colombo that is sympathetic to one or more of a number of fundamentalist Islamic groups that are said to be active outside the mainstream Muslim community in Sri Lanka. Muslims form some 9.7% of the country’s multiethnic, multi-religious population.  Although it has been issued from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where the OIC is headquartered, it refers to Sri Lanka as ‘this country’, which suggests that it originated in Colombo. So, the voice is likely to be that of the fundamentalist sympathisers in Sri Lanka. It does not reflect the opinion of the peace-loving mainstream Muslim community.  

Those reports about hate speech and general hostility towards Muslims in Sri Lanka that the OIC communique mentions are baseless.  Sri Lanka is a democracy. People have a right to criticise persons, groups, and institutions freely, but without infringing their rights in the process.

Criticising persons, institutions, or ideologies that deserve such criticism cannot be should not be identified as hate speech. That some young Muslim men vandalised  a number of Buddha statues in Mavanella, and that they had some relationship with a fundamentalist terrorist group that had a secret arms dump at a place called Wanathavilluwa are facts. That the April 21 terror attacks om some churches and hotels last year were carried out by young Muslim suicide bombers is also a fact. However, ordinary Muslims were not attacked in retaliation by Sri Lankans of other faiths including the victim Catholic community. 

Actually, it was not the rights of the Muslims that were being violated in this connection during the six months prior to the election of the current president followed by the change of government. Before November there was general dissatisfaction in the country with the lackadaisical way investigations were being conducted into these heinous crimes, barely a month ahead of the tenth anniversary of wiping out Tamil separatist terrorism. Some tangible progress has been made since, with breakthrough discoveries of secret hideouts, training centres, and arms caches of terrorist suspects, and some significant arrests by the CID, which seems to be working with fresh initiative. Media are being apprised of the progress of the investigations with utmost care and necessary restraint so as not to unnecessarily expose the normal innocent Muslim community (amongst whom the terrorists were taking refuge incognito) to the threat of indiscriminate suspicion and social exclusion. Some powerful Muslim politicos who were flourishing in previous administrations thanks to their conscienceless ability to switch allegiance to the winning party or alliance with each change of government are being suspected of having had undisclosed relationships with the terror suspects. 

As reported in the media, latest  revelations made in the course of investigations seem to confirm those suspicions. Naturally, other people tend to look askance at them when these individuals appear to be too worried about performance of funeral rites that tend to violate the health guidelines laid down for the safe disposal of bodies of victims of the deadly, highly contagious Covid-19 disease, which is still killing hundreds of thousands around the world.