“We love you, sir.” Sirajuddin Qureshi, president of India Islamic Cultural Centre was addressing national security adviser Ajit Doval, lauding him for his outreach efforts for the Muslim community.

Doval initially did not acknowledge it. But Qureshi persisted, looked at Doval and raised his pitch a notch. “Doval sahib, we all love you.” The former spy then gave in, blushing, recognising the remark with folded hands, and some overzealous audience members clapped.

Doval was sharing the stage with Muslim World League’s secretary general Mohammed bin Abdulkarim Al-Issa, a former minister in Saudi Arabia, at India Islamic Cultural Centre in Lutyens’ Delhi on Tuesday afternoon. The auditorium was packed. 

Outside the auditorium, a live screen was rustled up for 200-250 invitees who could not find a seat while many – such as bureaucrat Shah Faesal – chose to stand inside. A total of 700-800 people from different walks of life – from lawmakers to religious leaders, from academicians to retired or serving bureaucrats – had turned up to listen to Doval, and Al-Issa, who has been extolling virtues of moderate Islam and co-existence.

Before Qureshi’s compliment, Doval, in his 15-minute speech, said:

“The edifice of India is built on the principle of equal rights, equal opportunity and equal responsibility. The quality is guaranteed by the constitution and law.”

“Terrorism is not linked to any religion. It is the individual that is misguided.”

“Our differences have to take a backseat. We have to resolve them through dialogue.”

But there were more reasons for Qureshi’s effusiveness. Doval was also instrumental in bringing Al-Issa to the cultural centre for the event hosted by Delhi-based Khusro Foundation, its director Qureshi later told Newslaundry. 

Doval during his speech touched upon the journey of Islam in the Indian subcontinent and how it became a safe haven for the persecuted from all faiths. Listing India’s connection with Saudi Arabia, he said the wife of Prophet Muhammed liked Kashmiri silk.

Diversity and co-existence

But the star attraction was Al-Issa, former justice minister and confidante of Saudi Arabia’s crown prince and prime minister Mohammed bin Salman. The Muslim World League chief had in 2020 led a delegation to Auschwitz for a Holocaust memorial.

During his speech at the cultural centre, he praised India’s model of co-existence and its secular constitution. He also revealed that he has found friends in Hindu spiritual leaders Sadhguru and Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. “With those people I have just mentioned we have a common mission to promote peace. It’s a natural part of our life to convey the (message of) diversity.” 

Notwithstanding “negative trends”, Al-Issa said both Saudi Arabia and India needed to benefit from common values of diversity and harmony. He said Muslims in India are proud of their “constitution and nation”.

The invitees included Bharatiya Janata Party MPs MJ Akbar and Hans Raj Hans, and Samajwadi Party MP Shafiqur Rahman Barq, besides former chief election commissioner SY Quraishi and Jamia University V-C Najma Akhtar. Religious leaders such as Kalbe Jawad, Asghar Ali and Syed Naseeruddin Chishty were also in attendance.

Uniform Civil Code ‘link’

In the run-up to Al-Issa’s India visit, media reports had linked his five-day tour to the central government’s push for Uniform Civil Code. But the Khusro Foundation denied any link.

Qureshi told Newslaundry that the invite to Al-Issa for the Khusro event was sent through the national security adviser many months ago even before the “UCC issue”. “He confirmed his availability just after Hajj (around 15 days ago).”

Rohit Khera, another director of the foundation, also denied the link. “The visit was in no way connected to UCC. Not at all.”

Meanwhile, in a front page ad on Tuesday in Urdu daily Inquilab, the All India Muslim Personal Law Board and Jamiat Ulema-I-Hind called out attempts by a section of the media to portray the visit as a push to UCC and a “slap on Muslims and scholars opposing the uniform civil code”.

Al-Issa did not mention UCC in his speech, and the religious leaders Newslaundry spoke to said that a foreign country can’t interfere in domestic affairs.

The message

Meanwhile, Fazzur Rahman Siddiqui, a fellow at the Indian Council of World Affairs, listed four key takeaways from Al-Issa’s ongoing five-day tour.

First, he said, “the world is trying to create an alternative voice, which is moderate, tolerant and pluralistic, in the mainstream Islamist world”. “Amid this, to represent these voices, India is trying to seek help from countries, such as Saudi Arabia, that are at the forefront of Islam.” 

Siddiqui said Saudi is the “best example” as it is the holiest place for Muslims. “If a place is considered holy, then each and everything emanating from that place is holy. So if you ally with such people, there is a message from India that we are part of moderate voices heard from different continents.”

“Second reason is Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries have been disenchanted with extremist voices, which they had earlier fueled, in the last 10-15 years. Saudi Arabia knows the world will listen to it because of the respect it commands in the Muslim world. So it works both ways. Saudi Arabia is championing these moderate voices and India is trying to embrace them. That’s another template to deepen our ties with Saudi Arabia.”

The third reason was the gulf country’s desire to lead the Islamic world through moderate Islam, he said. “The fourth is that the visit will help the current dispensation in countering narratives being propagated by many of its regional and global adversaries.”