A month after miscreants vandalized the hotel belonging to the father of the Udupi hijab ban victim and petitioner in the hijab case, another hotel owned by SDPI Udupi district president Nazeer Ahmed was demolished on Friday by Udupi City Municipal Council (CMC).
Zara Family Restaurant and Zaithoon Restaurant owned by Udupi District SDPI President Nazeer Ahmed and his brother Basheer Ahmed were ordered to be demolished in 2018 by the CMC. However, the brothers had obtained a stay on the demolition order.
According to Municipal Commissioner Uday Shetty, the building did not have any license, nor did the hotel have the trade license to conduct the business.
“This is a political vendetta by the BJP. They targetted me because I spoke in favour of the hijabi girls, and stood by them,” Nazeer Ahmed, SDPI Udupi district president and the owner of hotel Zaithoon told to The Cognate.
He said the brothers had received a notice from the CMC in 2018 to one of the hotels, Zaithoon, for having a single door whereas the hotel was extended to two doors. He said they had applied for the registration for the 2nd door, but it kept on delaying.
“We went to court and the case is still pending in court. There are many other such buildings that are violating the rules of the municipality but they only targeted us,” Ahmed alleged.
“As a middle-class man, it is very hard to overcome this. I’d invested approximately 40 lakhs in this hotel but it didn’t take them 40 mins to raze it. I see some media channels stating this building as illegal construction, I don’t know how it became illegal while I have got a licence to run the hotel. I even pay 36K tax on an annual basis,” Ahmed added.
Ahmed says the reason his hotel was demolished was that he closed his hotel on 17 March condemning the Karnataka High Court verdict against the wearing of hijab in educational institutions.
“For me, my faith and religion are more important than this building. People may think that I’ve lost everything in this world, but I know my Allah has better plans for me. My building has been demolished but my voice can’t be suppressed,” he said.
The Karnataka High Court on March 15 upheld the State government order effectively banning the wearing of hijab by Muslim girl students in educational institutions in Karnataka. The three-judge bench adjudicated that the wearing of the hijab is not an essential religious practice in Islam.
Muslim groups led by Ameer-E-Shariat of Karnataka, Maulana Sagheer Ahmed had called for a state-wide peaceful bandh on Thursday, March 17, to express the community’s dissatisfaction against the order.
The bandh went peacefully, without any disturbance. However, in response to the bandh, Hindutva groups have called for an economic boycott of Muslims in the state, to teach the community, a “lesson”.
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Razik Basrur is a freelance journalist.
