KOLHAPUR: A local committee of Muslim clerics in the city ordered the community not to encourage their women to contest the Kolhapur Municipal Corporation (KMC) election.

The Majlis-e-Shoora-Ulama-e-Shahar Kolhapur is a committee of 40-50 local clerics, which controls mosques in the city. Last week, it distributed a note asking Muslim women not to contest the election, citing it as anti-Islamic; however on Friday, the Hilal Committee, an apex local body of Imams and scholars of the community, denounced this order and said the order is against the Constitution of India and cannot be followed.

Muftir Shad Kanure, the head of the Majlis-e-Shoora associated with the order, was not available for comment but some members of the committee told TOI that the order is not meant to discourage Muslim women. They added that the order had been released as a regular practice of clerics that alert the community on religious behaviour.

The order, issued on September 23 quotes the Sharia and two other collections of laws sacred to Islam and asked the women in the community to refrain from contesting in the election.

The unsigned order was distributed among the community's influential leaders, at a time when political parties have started declaring their lists of candidates for the KMC election. At present, there are as many as 20 Muslim women contesting the elections.

Along with the Hilal Committee, a majority of the community denounced the diktat and said that Muslim women should participate in the election without trouble.

"This diktat is against the Constitution and we denounce it. Instead, we appeal to the community to serve the civic body. Like men, women too have a right to contest the election. Our Constitution has given us the right and we are bound to the Constitution," said Mansoor Ansari, chairman of the local Hilal committee.

Hasina Faras, mother of sitting corporator Adil Faras is also contesting from central part of the city. "It's a ridiculous and condemnable order. I wonder where these people were for so long when women of the community were contesting the elections. We will not listen to such people who are acting in anti-Constitutional ways. They must know there are more than 200 women corporators of the Muslim community in Maharashtra," said Faras, a leader of NCP.

MIM's women corporators working best: Owaisi

All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM), which has Muslim women as corporators in Aurangabad and Nanded in Maharashtra appealed to the clerics not to ignore women. "We have enough experience in this regard. We have women corporators at several places and they are raising community issues and issues of women. They are working best. None of them have experienced any problem in public life," Asaduddin Owaisi, the chief of the MIM told TOI.