Dialogue between Islam and Eastern Religions to start tomorrow

New Delhi (20 February 2010): An international conference of dialogue between Islam and Eastern religions will be inaugurated here tomorrow, Saturday, by Shri M. Hamid Ansari, Vice President of India. The conference is being held by major Indian Muslim organisations with the cooperation of Jamia Millia Islamia’s Zakir Husain Institute of Islamic Studies and the Qatar-based World Union of Muslim Scholars. 

The inaugural session of the conference, to be held at the Ansari Auditorium of the Jamia Millia, will be presided over by the President of Jamiat Ulama-e Hind, Maulana Arshad Madni. Special invitees include Dr Ibrahim Al-Naimi, head of the Qatar State’s Committee for World Dialogue and World Union of Muslim Scholars’s vice president Prof. Ali Al-Quradaghi. Important Muslim, Hindu, Buddhisht, Jain and Sikh religious leaders and scholars will take part in the conference from across India as well as neighbouring countries. Participants include Shankaracharya Onkaranand Saraswati of Prayag, Jain TV’s Dr JK Jain, Sikh member of Pakistani parliament Dr Araish Kumar, Art of Livings’ Swami Sadyojathah, Swami Shantatmananda of Ramakrishna Mission, Dr. K.J. Yesudas and members of Parliament Sardar Tarlochan Singh, Santosh Bagrodia and M. Rama Jois.

The conference aims at building better social relations between believers of various faiths in South Asia and open ways of communication and understanding between the people of the region. Delegates of all eastern religions from across the country as well as Nepal, Pakistan, Srilanka and some Arab countries are taking part in the conference.  Hitherto, Islamic dialogues have been held only with Christians and Jews. This is the first attempt to start a dialogue between Islam and Eastern religions.

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