Hyderabad: All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen president and Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi said the claims of the Gujarat government that the Quran says consumption of beef is bad for health was “baseless” and a “white lie”.
Billboards have appeared in Ahmedabad, with pictures of Chief Minister Anandiben Patel, asking people to respect the cow.
The billboards quote a verse that is claimed to be from the Quran which purportedly says that beef “is the cause of several diseases.”
The billboards have been put up by the Gauseva and Gauchar Vikas Board of the Gujarat Interacting with mediapersons, Mr Owaisi said there was is no such verse in the Quran.
“Even to call it a white lie would be an understatement. We don’t want to learn the Quran and Islam from them,” he said.
“If they really love Muslims, why is it that the Metro line in Ahmedabad does not run in Muslim areas? Why has the gas line not been extended there? How is it that the whole rubbish medical waste of Ahmedabad is being dumped in Zuhapura? Aren’t they concerned about all these things, about providing civic amenities,”
Mr Owaisi said, adding, “It is totally wrong to talk about such things. They don’t know anything about the Quran at all.”
On the issue of the eight-day ban on meat in Thane and four-day ban in Mumbai during the Jain community's upcoming fasting period, Mr Owaisi said it was a “great coincidence” that it came in the backdrop of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s meeting with corporate leaders at Delhi.
“What kind of message are we sending to the prospective investors? This is nothing but total madness,” he said. He said it was not a Muslim issue but it is an economic issue.
Apart from Muslims there are many people who are non-vegetarians, he pointed out. “What will happen to poor workers who earn their livelihood by selling meat,” Mr Owaisi said.
He said, “Tomorrow if Asaduddin Owaisi says let everyone be served meat because Bakrid is there, no vegetables should be sold, no one should eat anything but meat, would you tolerate it?”
