Guwahati: Forty-six Muslim clerics in Assam have issued a fatwa against an up-and-coming singer, asking her to stop performing in public.
Nahid Afrin was the first runner-up in the 2015 season of a musical reality TV show.
Police said they were investigating whether the fatwa was a reaction to the 16-year-old singer recently performing songs against terrorism, including the Islamic State terror group. “We are looking at this angle as well,” ADG (special branch) Pallab Bhattacharya told reporters in Guwahati.
Leaflets bearing the fatwa in Assamese and the names of the clerics were distributed across Hojai and Nagaon districts in central Assam on March 14. According to the fatwa, a March 25 program at Udali Sonai Bibi College in Lanka, Assam, where Nahid is scheduled to perform is “against the Sharia”.
“If anti-Sharia acts like musical nights are held on grounds surrounded by masjids, idgahs, madrassas and graveyards, our future generations will attract the wrath of Allah,” it said.
The young singer, a tenth grader who lives in Biswanath Chariali, broke down on hearing news of the fatwa. “I am speechless. I think my music is God’s gift to me. I will never bow down to it (such warnings) and never leave singing,” she said.
Her mother added, “The organizers of the musical night told us that the program on March 25 will not be cancelled.” Police said Nahid and her family would be provided security cover, The Times of India reported.
Nahid, who made her Bollywood debut singing for Sonakshi Sinha in the 2016 film “Akira.” first rose to stardom after her successful innings on reality TV . Her beautiful renditions of songs written and composed by the Vaishnavite saint Srimanta Sankardeva have made her especially popular in Assam.