Muslim community in Sri Lanka and its future

          The destiny of individuals and community is in the hands of Allah. No human being can predict what would happen to his community in the future. Hence the future of Sri Lankan Muslim community is in the hands of Allah and we strongly believe that it is Almighty Allah is our protector and our guardian. No harm or no good can inflict without His will.  Yet, Almighty Allah bestowed us intelligence to organise and plan our lives.  Planning and organising our community affairs are part and parcel of our religion. We should plan our community affairs and organise ourselves and yet, Muslim community in SL is less organised and less planned community. We have been living in this country more than one thousand years among other communities in peace and harmony. We have survived all communal upheaval of the past. 

            It can be said that we could have a bright future in this country if we collectively work together not only protect interest of our community alone rather the interest of other communities as well.  We should not always think on communal line alone rather we should think broadly on the principle of human values and work in the interest of entire humanity. We should create a different mind sets among our people about communal relationship. We should generate an impression in the minds of people that we do not live here in Sri Lanka egoistically to protect our communal alone rather we live here in Sri Lanka to protect national interest too.  We should be proud to say that we are Sri Lankan Muslims. We should be proud of our religious identity and our national identity.  Unfortunately sometime we fail to appreciate our national identity.  In this series I shall discuss some of the challenges that Sri Lankan Muslim community faces today.  

               As a minority community Sri-Lankan Muslim community today lives at a historical crossroad, and it should reconsider its future communal development and progress wisely and constructively.  No doubt so many Islamic groups and movements work day and night to uplift hardship and difficulties of Muslims in Sri Lanka. Yet, a large percentage Muslim community lives below poverty live and a large percentage of Muslim students are drops out from higher education pursuits or professional development training and vocational training course. In long terms if this trend continues Muslim community in Sri Lanka will have to face difficult conditions and many socio- economic problems. Even today one could notice that SL Muslim faces unprecedented socio-political and economic problems. Unfortunately, the problems and challenges of contemporary   Sri Lankan Muslim community are not properly scrutinised and examined. Unlike other communities,   we do not have research centres to study problems and challenges of Sri Lankan Muslim community. Even if we have some centres they are malfunctioned or not functionally at all. Our problems are sometime highlighted in local media and international media and yet, most of the time in distorted forms with biased information and news.

          Today, Muslim leaderships from all fronts are very much worried and concerned about the future of Muslim community in Sri Lanka. Some political leaders do not know what is going on in Sri Lanka for Muslim community.  Some are wittingly or unwittingly ignoring the plights of Muslim community. Some are only bother about their political chair and pockets. They are determined to save their seats at any cost even at the expense of community. On the other hands, some other committed socio-religious leaderships have no political influence and power to help Muslim community at these precarious situations. They are helpless to do any constructive work in our community today. On the other hands, our community is fragmented into day different ideological groups.  This has shattered the unity of our community. The disunity greatly hinders our communal development and progress. 

     It is imperative that Muslim intellectuals, academics, political and religious come together and examine the some burning issues and problems that face Muslim community today. It would better rather useful to give preference and priority to some of the most important problems that SL Muslims faces today. What are the main challenges and problems Muslim community face today. It is pertinent that we identify some of those burning issues and prioritise them in order of significance and urgency. We have some internal and external challenges today. One of the most urgent external challenges is how to neutralise the hatred campaign of BBS today. Much has been said about it and much has been written about it and yet, less action has been taken in this respect. 

             It is not my objective here to examine the external challenges rather I shall discuss some aspects of some internal challenges that SL Muslims face today.  What are the some of the burning challenges of SL Muslim community today? What are most important priorities in these challenges?   Is it religious and spiritual development of SL Muslim community? Or is it uplifting education of SL Muslim community? Or is it the reformation of political leadership of SL Muslim community? Or is it working for the economic development of Muslim community? Or is it the combination of all these challenge that Muslim community should pay attention equally. 

              Of course as a Muslim individuals and communities enhancing our faith/iman and uplifting the spiritual development is the most important issue in order of priority.  It is the prophetic method and way to start communal reformation and improvement with initial spiritual and Imanic training. No doubt our faith is the foundation and bedrock of Muslim community. Whether we live in SL or any part of the world, Iman should be the driving force to all our deeds and worldly engagements. No doubt our success in this life and Next life depends on the credibility and strength of our Iman.  

     The prophet Muhammad (PBUH) had begun his mission with the foundations of faith. Theological and dogmatic of foundations of Islam are the driving forces behind the success of Prophet and his followers until the day of judgement. Our beloved prophet had already met all these types of challenges when he was sent down as a prophet in the scorching desert of Arabia.  People in Arabia had severe economic challenges more than what we have today. They had problems of illiteracy rate among people in Arabia more than what we have today. They had the worst political system than what we have today and yet, the prophetic methods of reforming people begun with touching human hearts., With reforming people’s belief systems and strengthening their faith in the creator. This methodology should be followed even today if we were to be successful in this modern material world as well. Particularly, SL Muslim community as a minority we should consistently refresh the faith and Iman of our people collectively and individually so that we as a minority could protect our people from total assimilation into un-Islamic practice and culture. We are living closely with Singhalese and Tamil community and to protect our religious and cultural identity we should have constant spiritual and religious training programmes to save our next generations from total cultural incursions of other communities. 

         It can be said that by the grace of Almighty Allah Islamic groups and movements are making great contributions in this task of spiritual and religious training and educating programmes. Unlike in the past today we have more Islamic groups and more Islamic movements.  We also see more Islamic activities today than ever before. We have more Islamic institutes today than ever before. More mosques have been built today than ever before in Sri Lanka. It would not be wrong if I say that some Islamic groups are completing each other in building mosques and Islamic institutes. Sometimes completion is between two Islamic groups and sometime between two neighbouring villages. Sometime, one Muslim village has got two or more Islamic institutes to complete each other.  All these tell us that some sort of Islamic awakening has been taking place among our community in Sri Lanka. All these tell us that some sort of Islamic awareness has been taking place within our community. All praise to Allah. This is indeed a good tiding and a promising new beginning for Muslims community in Sri Lanka.  Yet, this is one side of positive aspects of our communal development.  We should also gauge and assess negative impacts of our internal disputes and competitions on the wider Sri-Lankan communities.   To be continued next week.