A three-day academic conference on Islamophobia will begin at the Calicut University auditorium on Friday.
Over 20 academic papers on different aspects of Islamophobia will be presented at the conference which is being organised by the Solidarity Youth Movement. The rapidly growing trend of hate campaigns against Muslims across the globe and their European origins and their effective use in electoral strategies in various countries will be discussed.
A. Anas, the director of the conference, told The Hindu that while Islamophobia was a major academic and social debating issue in Europe and the US, it was not so in India though hate campaigns were intense here too.
He said that though Kerala had a great liberal and tolerant tradition, Islamophobia was fast gaining ground in the State. Three scams in the recent past — the love jihad, the Kashmir terrorist recruitment and the Muslim orphanage issue — were clear examples of Islamophobia campaigns. All the three scams were, he claimed, fabricated by vested-interest groups. The scams had largely contributed to the discrimination against Muslims as well as fear and hate of the community.
The conference would look at the various reasons and origins of the phenomenon globally as well as at the national level and would try to identify collective steps for checking the trend. It wouldn’t be a one-sided blame game, Mr. Anas said, as it would also investigate flaws on the part of the Muslim community.
