New Year attack on woman in India’s tech hub prompts police probe

A brazen attack in India’s tech hub caught on camera. Surveillance video in Bengaluru showing two men on a scooter pulling up to a woman in an alley… with one of the men grabbing the woman as the other stood by watching. The man later dragged the woman to the scooter as she attempted to […]

Mother Teresa to be made Roman Catholic saint Sept. 4 – Pope

Mother Teresa of Calcutta, a nun who dedicated her life to helping the poor, will be made a saint of the Roman Catholic Church at a Vatican ceremony on September 4th. Pope Francis cleared the way for sainthood for her last December. Teresa’s compassion reached out to slum-dwellers, famine sufferers and AIDS victims, and won […]

Protests intensify in Indian Kashmir, security forces kill five

Indian security forces on Tuesday killed five protesters and injured 10 in clashes that erupted after crowds angered by the killing of a separatist militant in disputed Kashmir pelted them with stones and defied a curfew, officials said. Indian-ruled Kashmir has witnessed violent protests since July 8, when security forces killed a field commander of Pakistan-based […]

Islamic State Threatens Attacks in India

In a rare appeal to India’s Muslim minority, Islamic State says it is planning to avenge the deaths of Muslims killed in riots in Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state of Gujarat and elsewhere. India, a Hindu-majority country, is home to more than 160 million Muslims, but only a handful of them have joined […]

Muslim leader in India under fire from activists for supporting FGM

The leader of the only South Asian Muslim community known to practise female genital mutilation (FGM) came under criticism on Friday by campaigers who accused him of urging followers to continue the centuries-old custom. Little is known about FGM in India, where it is carried out in great secrecy by the close-knit Dawoodi Bohra community, […]

Hindu and Sikh villagers rebuild mosque shut since 1947

Sikh and Hindu villagers in a Malla village in Ludhiana, India helped renovate and re-open a historic mosque. The mosque had closed in 1947 due to partial building collapse. But a communal rebuilding effort led to its inauguration on February 29. Both faiths assisted with fundraising and construction. Muslims are a tiny minority in a village where 90 per cent of residents are Sikh and 9 per cent Hindu. In the past, Muslims had to travel out of the village to pray at a mosque. The Majlis Ahrar Islam Hind Party of Ludhiana had contacted Maulana Habib Ur Rehman Sani Ludhianavi to assist. Ludhianvi told the Time of India that “Even as the village has just one Muslim family, the response had been overwhelming”. Villagers arranged a communal langar during the inauguration. Ludhianavi then published photos of the event on Facebook. The villagers in Ludhiana highlight how communities work together. Iqbal Hussain, a local Muslim in the village, expressed his gratitude and the bonds of affection for other faiths in his village.

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Why Hindu nationalism threatens India’s free speech and secularism

Some of India’s most prominent scientists have signed a petition and returned awards to draw attention to India’s growing intolerance. The petition accuses the governing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of curtailing free speech and stoking Hindu nationalism. Signatories include Ashoke Sen, who won the Fundamental Physics Prize, the world’s most lucrative academic award in 2012. Pushpa Bhargava who founded the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology in Hyderabad. D Balasubramanian, former president of the Indian Academy of Science. And Dr Vineeta Bal of the National Institute of Immunology in New Delhi. The statement reads: “It is the same climate of intolerance, and rejection of reason that has led to the lynching in Dadri of Mohammad Akhlaq Saifi and the assassinations of Prof Kalburgi, Dr Narendra Dabholkar and Shri Govind Pansare.” Professor Malleshappa Kalburgi’s murder shocked India. Who would murder a “straight-talking, rationalist researcher of ancient Kannada literature”? As local media described him. One theory is that Hindu nationalists murdered him in response to his criticisms of idol worship. The founder of the right-wing Hindu group Sri Rama Sene, Pramod Muthalik, rejected any links to Kalburgi’s murder. He also threatened to cut off the tongues of writers if they continue to [...]

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Shiv Sena, the Indian Far Right Nationalist Party Pays to Increase Demographics

The nationalist Hindu far right movement, the Shiv Sena, announced in Uttar Pradesh on Saturday that it would give 2 lakh rupees to each Hindu family that has 5 children or more. This is equivalent to about £2,000 per family. The reason behind this policy drive was according to them, the rising Muslim population in […]

Faith Matters International Projects:

Faith Matters has numerous branches across the globe. We undertake the following: Faith Matters has also overseen two international ‘micro-finance’ projects which support the development of small businesses in Jerusalem, Israel and the West Bank in Palestine. The Jerusalem Interest Free Fund: The fund provides small business and study loans to. The fund offers the […]