Author: Omer Farooq/ Hyderabad
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: September 24, 2003
In a revolutionary step, Muslim
women religious scholars in Hyderabad have started issuing fatwas or religious
decrees on the legal, personal and marital problems of the Muslim women.
This has become possible with the
setting up of the first of its kind "Darul Iftah" for women under the aegis
of a women's Islamic religious educational institution "Jamiatul Banaat".
A panel comprising three fresh graduates from the Jamiatul Banaat has issued
the first ever fatwa - a ruling that wearing of male cloths by women is
un-Islamic. Three women - Muftia Fatima Aziz, Muftia Saeeda Fatima and
Muftia Rizwana Zarreen - have completed ten years of religious education
and two years of practical course of issuing fatwas at this institution.
In the parlance of Islamic Jurisprudence,
Mufti is a religious qualification entitling a qualified scholar to issue
a ruling or an opinion on any issue in accordance with the Islamic Shariah
law. Rector of Jamiatul Banaat Moulana Mufti Mohammed Masatan Ali said
that the idea of setting up such an institution exclusively for women came
to him because there was no such institution in the country to tackle the
issues and problems of Muslim women in the light of Islamic Shariah or
the personal law.
But he made it clear that only those
with proper religious educational qualification and deep knowledge of,
Quran, Hadith (tradition of Prophet) and the Islamic law were allowed to
pass such decrees.
The Darul Iftah for women would
be providing its services free of cost to Muslims. In the very first fatwa
issued by this institution, the all women panel ruled that use of color
contact lenses, bleaching, trimming of eyebrows, removing of the hair from
the head, and wearing male clothes by women was un-Islamic. However if
a woman is suffering from problems of hair on her upper lips or the chin,
she can remove it.
The panel also ruled that a woman
has every right to maintain her beauty (Zaib o Zeenat) in Islam.
The fatwa was issued on a query
sent by a woman Juwariah Fatima of Hyderabad. The former head of the Department
of Islamic Studies Anwar Moazzan has welcomed the initiative and hoped
that it will increase awareness among Muslim women about their rights under
the Islamic laws. He, however, pointed out that there is nothing new about
it as Prophet Mohammed's wife Hazrat Aisha used to issue legal opinion
after passing away of the Prophet.
