By Omar Rashid
New Delhi: Muslims in Uttar Pradesh await the festival of Eid-ul-fitr, scheduled to fall either on Monday (March 31) or Tuesday, amid a drive by the administration to enforce restrictions on offering namaz in public.
While the government has since last year been directing Muslims to not offer namaz on roads, arguing that it obstructs traffic and causes inconvenience to others, this time officials have issued strict warnings to ensure directives are implemented.
In Meerut, a major city in western Uttar Pradesh, a senior police officer warned that if people violated the directives, they could face criminal action, a consequence of which would be the cancellation of their passports or licences.
In Sambhal, which has been the centre of controversy ever since violence broke out last November, officials even went to the extent of saying that Muslims would not be allowed to gather even on their rooftops for namaz.
After facing criticism from opposition party leaders, Sambhal’s district magistrate Rajendra Pensiya on Friday, after the conclusion of the alvida jumma namaz (held on the last Friday of Ramzan), clarified that the prohibition was only for the roofs of eight to ten dilapidated homes in the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI)-protected area near the Sambhal Shahi Jama Masjid.
“There was no prohibition on anyone offering namaz on the roofs of their homes. This was misleading and we had rebutted it. There was only prohibition on the eight to ten dilapidated roofs near the ASI-protected area,” said Pensiya.
Before the alvida jumma namaz, Meerut city’s superintendent of police Ayush Vikram Singh said notices and directives had been issued about the prohibition on offering namaz on roads.
Singh said that in 2024, police had taken action against 80 persons for defying the directives.
This story was originally published in thewire.in. Read the full story here.