– Mohammed Atherulla Shariff
Bengaluru, October 20, 2023: There was no better day than 19th October to inaugurate a landmark building of Students Islamic Organisation of India as the organisation was founded on the same day 41 years before. The first state president of SIO Karnataka (1983-85), Mohammed Iqbal Mulla was the profound choice for this auspicious occasion.
Undoubtedly there are more beautiful and grand buildings in Bengaluru, the IT capital of India, but the building inaugurated now, the state headquarters of SIO, is more significant as it is the fountainhead of the life-giving message of Islam, observed Iqbal Mulla after a formal inauguration of the building. The message is not only for the student community but for the entire mankind, he said.
Recalling the dreams of the first chief patron of the students’ body, Late Abul Lais Islahi, Iqbal Mulla said, “Allah will not deprive His blessings to those who sincerely work in His path and Students Islamic Organisation is the torchbearer of His cause,” in the campuses.
It’s time to take the message in the regional language and literature. There is a lot of scope for our message in the days to come since the world is now returning towards religious beliefs, he concluded.
Another former state as well as national president of SIO, S. Ameenul Hasan recollected the days from 1983 when the headquarters used to move along with the zonal presidents to a permanent office in Bengaluru established in 1993. He expressed high expectations from this new building. Mr. Hasan said as the world has turned into a global village, the Islamic movement is also a global phenomenon now. Our approach and reach should be global.
Mr. Hasan, currently the national vice president of Jamaat-e-Islami Hind, the parent body of SIO, took the audience to the ongoing Palestine-Israel war. It is mother of all problems which is going to emerge now, he said. Until the public opinion in the European countries changes, the issue is unlikely to resolve, he added. In India too we have ample opportunities to render this job. Our former cadre is spread across the Western world who can engage in lobbying and opinion making at the intellectual level, he emphasized.
Presiding over the programme, the national president of SIO, Mr. Ramees EK asked the cadre not to limit this building to organizational activities rather to turn it into a centre of learning and intellectual activities. Earlier, Dr. Belgami Mohammed Saad, the zonal patron of SIO Karnataka, and Moulvi Mohammed Faheemuddin of Bidar also spoke. Many former zonal presidents of Karnataka chapter of the organization and cadre were present.
