The Basavaraj Rayareddy controversy raises a question larger than party politics: how is Islam understood in India, and how well have Muslims enabled others to understand it?
By Mohammed Talha Siddi Bapa
Karnataka Higher Education Minister Basavaraj Rayareddy could perhaps have chosen his words more carefully. Speaking at a Muslim community mass marriage programme at Kuknoor in Koppal district, he described Islam as a great, humane and scientific religion and reportedly placed it above other religions. He expressed a desire to undertake Hajj, encouraged people to study the Qur’an and argued that misconceptions about Islam are being spread in society. The Qur’an, he said, was not meant to be read by Muslims alone. Anyone could read it and try to understand its message.
The comparative description of Islam predictably became the headline. The political reaction centred largely on whether Rayareddy had elevated one religion by lowering another. He subsequently clarified that praising Islam did not mean he considered other religions inferior and said that he respects good ideas in different faiths.
There is a legitimate issue here. Appreciating one religion does not require ranking it above others. Islam can be appreciated on its own merits without declaring Hinduism, Christianity or any other faith inferior. But allowing that one expression to consume the entire discussion would mean overlooking the more interesting proposition contained in his speech: people should learn what a religion actually teaches before arriving at conclusions about it.
That proposition deserves consideration independently of Rayareddy, the Congress, the BJP or the politics surrounding the controversy.
A Politician Who Reads
Rayareddy’s remarks are more interesting in the light of his longstanding interest in ideas. His older parliamentary biography lists reading books on philosophy and culture among his favourite pastimes, while his public interventions over the years show a recurring engagement with questions of religion and society. His clarification after the controversy was consistent with that disposition. He said he studies the history and ideas of different religions and respects what he considers good in them.
This does not make him an authority on Islam, and his description of it as “scientific” requires greater precision. What is significant is the method implicit in his argument: read, study, compare and then form an opinion. In an atmosphere where religious identities are frequently understood through political claims and counterclaims, that method itself deserves attention.
What Rayareddy Saw, and What Lies Beneath It
Rayareddy appears to have been impressed by some of Islam’s visible moral and social disciplines. He spoke about humanity, fasting, charity, restraint and a way of life that seeks to regulate human conduct. These are important aspects of Islam. But for a reader interested in philosophy, a more fundamental question lies beneath them: what gives these disciplines their meaning?
Islam begins with Tawheed, the belief that there is one Creator of the entire universe. Human beings, irrespective of race, caste, wealth or nationality, are His creation and stand equal in their fundamental relationship with Him. Human life, therefore, is neither an accident without purpose nor a possession over which man exercises unlimited sovereignty. It is a morally responsible existence that will ultimately be accounted for before the One who gave it.
The same worldview holds that the Creator did not leave humanity without guidance. Divine revelation, communicated through a succession of prophets and culminating in the message brought by Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, provides moral direction while leaving human beings with the freedom to choose. Death does not end moral responsibility. Human freedom is ultimately accompanied by accountability.
Seen from this foundation, the practices Rayareddy appreciated acquire greater depth. Charity becomes more than generosity because wealth carries an obligation before God. Fasting becomes more than abstinence from food because it trains a person to restrain desire even when no human authority is watching. Justice cannot depend merely upon who benefits from it because the individual believes in an authority higher than society, government or personal interest.
Rayareddy has appreciated some of the visible fruits of Islam. Given his evident interest in philosophy and culture, its roots may offer an even more interesting field for reflection: the relationship between the Creator and creation, freedom and responsibility, revelation and reason, earthly existence and ultimate accountability. Islam’s social disciplines make fuller sense when seen within that conception of life.
When Appreciation Becomes Controversial
Criticising Rayareddy’s comparative wording is one thing; treating appreciation of Islam itself as an affront to another religion is another.
A Hindu may appreciate the compassion associated with Jesus without becoming less Hindu. A Muslim may praise Basavanna’s rejection of social discrimination without compromising his Islamic convictions. A plural society becomes intellectually poorer if appreciation of another tradition is treated as betrayal of one’s own.
Rayareddy’s more useful proposition was therefore not that Islam should occupy first place in a hierarchy of religions. It was that people should study Islam before forming conclusions about it. Islam makes claims about God, man, morality, family, society, wealth, justice and human destiny. Those claims can be questioned, its historical experience can be critically examined and Muslim conduct can be judged against the principles Muslims themselves profess. Serious disagreement after serious study is intellectually healthier than certainty constructed from fragments of information.
Which Islam Does India Encounter?
For many Indians, Islam is encountered less through its sources than through controversies involving Muslims. Public discussion repeatedly returns to terrorism, conversion, hijab, polygamy and similar questions. Some are legitimate subjects of debate. The difficulty arises when these questions become a substitute for understanding an entire religious tradition.
A person may consequently possess strong opinions about Islam without having read a translation of the Qur’an, a serious biography of Prophet Muhammad ﷺ or even a short introduction to the Islamic worldview. His understanding may have been assembled largely from television debates, political speeches and social media.
Rayareddy’s advice to read before judging is therefore reasonable. But Muslims should resist the temptation merely to celebrate a minister for saying something favourable about Islam. The argument that challenges those who misunderstand Islam simultaneously places responsibility upon those who claim to understand and represent it.
Muslims Have Published, But Have We Created Readers?
It would be unfair to suggest that Muslims have neglected this responsibility. Considerable institutional effort has gone into presenting Islam in India’s languages. Dedicated publishing houses and organisations have translated the Qur’an, Seerah and Islamic literature and produced works dealing with faith, society, family, ethics and contemporary questions.
Karnataka itself offers an important example. Shanthi Prakashana has built over the years a substantial body of Islamic literature in Kannada. Its publications range from the Qur’an, commentary and Seerah to Islamic studies, family and society, history and children’s literature. Similar efforts in different Indian languages have enabled readers to approach Islam without first learning Urdu, Arabic or English. Such work deserves acknowledgement.
The challenge today, therefore, is not simply the absence of literature. It is the distance between publication and penetration.
How much of this literature travels beyond Muslim circles and reaches the curious teacher, university student, journalist, writer, neighbour or public intellectual who wants to understand Islam? Are we producing books, or are we also creating readers? Are significant works available where people outside the community naturally search for ideas, in mainstream bookstores, libraries and increasingly digital platforms?
Earlier generations faced the considerable challenge of making Islam available in Indian languages. That work must continue. The additional challenge before the present generation is making that material discoverable, readable and relevant in a digital, visual and increasingly polarised public sphere. The question is no longer only whether a Qur’an translation exists in a particular language, but whether the curious reader can find it easily and has someone with whom the questions arising from his reading can be discussed.
A book placed on a shelf fulfils one purpose. A book that begins a conversation fulfils another.
The Mirror Must Turn Towards Muslims
Muslims frequently complain about misinformation concerning Islam, and much of that complaint is justified. Fabricated claims circulate widely, communal politics rewards suspicion, and sections of public discourse reduce a diverse community to a set of stereotypes. Such distortions need to be challenged. But Muslims also need to ask how effectively they communicate with the society in which they live.
How many Muslim families have meaningful conversations about faith with their neighbours? How often do journalists, academics, teachers, writers and social activists encounter Muslim institutions outside moments of controversy? If a non-Muslim comes to one of our institutions with difficult questions about Islam, will he find an environment in which he can ask them openly and receive a thoughtful answer?
There is another difficulty. Muslims can become so occupied with defending Islam against accusations that Islam reaches others largely in the form of rebuttal. Someone associates Islam with violence and Muslims respond. Someone misrepresents the Qur’an and a clarification follows. Such responses may sometimes be necessary, but a faith cannot be adequately communicated through a permanent cycle of accusation and defence. People also need an opportunity to encounter Islam on its own terms: what it says about the Creator, human beings, conscience, family, wealth, power, justice, compassion, death and the purpose of existence.
Nor can literature carry the entire burden. If Muslims speak of equality but reproduce social hierarchies among themselves, the contradiction will be noticed. If Islam’s insistence on honesty is explained in books while dishonesty is tolerated in public dealings, another publication will not solve the problem. If the Qur’an’s demand for justice is invoked only when Muslims are victims, its universal character becomes difficult for others to see. If compassion is presented as a Prophetic virtue but disappears in relations with neighbours and weaker sections of society, every negative perception cannot be attributed to hostile media.
This is where Rayareddy’s remarks become a mirror rather than a compliment. Islam does not become more credible because a minister praises it, just as its claims do not become weaker because another politician attacks it. The more useful question is what enables a person outside the Muslim community to encounter values in Islam that political discourse often obscures.
From Availability to Encounter
The next stage therefore requires more than publishing additional books. Regional language literature must be accompanied by accessible digital content, engagement with universities, writers and journalists, open spaces for conversation and opportunities for people to ask difficult questions about Islam without defensiveness. Muslims themselves also need to read other religious and philosophical traditions seriously. Dialogue is more credible when curiosity travels in both directions.
None of this means prejudice will disappear merely because information becomes available. Some hostility is ideological and some political interests benefit from maintaining it. Such prejudice requires democratic, legal and political responses. Ignorance is different. Ignorance is best addressed through knowledge, contact and experience.
Rayareddy’s observation that the Qur’an can be read by everyone may ultimately be more consequential than the argument over whether he called Islam great or superior. Muslims themselves believe that the Qur’an addresses humanity, not an ethnic or hereditary community. If that conviction is taken seriously, enabling fellow citizens to encounter its message is not an optional exercise.
The Kuknoor controversy will pass, as political controversies usually do. The more enduring question will remain. If reading and reflection can enable a person to discover humanity, discipline, charity and moral purpose in Islam where public stereotypes often produce suspicion, Muslims have reason to welcome that encounter. They also have reason for introspection.
The task is not to wait for another minister to praise Islam. Nor is it simply to produce another book and count its circulation. It is to ensure that fellow citizens have a fair opportunity to encounter Islam through its sources, through serious conversation and through the conduct of Muslims themselves, and then to form their judgement on the basis of knowledge rather than rumour.
