21st Century survival kit by Director of Quill Foundation Suhail KK.
The bimonthly meet of PSF Mumbai, held at Mahatma Gandhi Seva Mandir, Bandra began after sunset with the recitation and translation of a passage from the Qur’an by Mazhar Hasan.
Mr. Azhar Rizwan briefed the audience about ‘KAFALAT’, a flagship project of PSF that sponsors child education and other humanitarian aids, followed by the launch of the project website www.educatechild.in by the guest of honour, Mr. Suhail KK, Director of Quill Foundation. Thereafter, Mr. Abdul Qadeer demonstrated the functioning of the website showing its key features.
PSF advisory member Mirza Kamran Baig introduced Mr. Suhail KK and the Quill Foundation. Quill foundation, in a nutshell, is a policy think-tank and has been recently invited by United Nations Human Rights Council’s (UNHRC) Universal Periodic Review (UPR) .
Mr. Suhail began his talk by appreciating the ‘Kafalat’ initiative; he said it is based on the idea of Ehsaan, perfection and professionalism. He gathered the audience’s views about the most common issues of our country, of which the learned speaker highlighted ‘hate’ against and ‘fear’ within the minorities and the other marginalized communities as the most important ones.
Quoting Swati Chaturvedi’s book, ‘I am a troll’, he explained how false stories are being cooked up and spread throughout the country through social media, by a group of people, against the minority community, hinting that the motive of all the fabricated stories is to spread hate and fear. He quoted various statistics and reports to elaborate upon the way in which the social fabric of India is being torn apart.
Citing various historians and scholars he took the audience through the pages of Indian history and the role community leadership has played in shaping the idea of the Indian nation.
He shared a 10 pointer 21st Century survival kit for the community and discussed each of them at length, its strategic importance, pragmatic measures and tangible goals.
1. Eradicate FEAR & instill CONFIDENCE –Eradicate “Wahn” Remove DEFENSIVE ATTITUDE and MINORITY MINDSET Muslims have always been minority – Achieved everything in this status
2. UNITY & ALLIANCE –within and with the other communities of the nation
3. Strategic CHARITY (focused at Existential crisis)
4. Documentation, RESEARCH & Advocacy
5. Use Democratic Institutions (National & International): International & National HUMAN RIGHTS MECHANISMS – Global alliance of Human Rights Institutes.
6. HINDU Religious Leaders – Maintaining good relations and make them CONDEMN Religious Fanaticism
7. Countering PROPAGANDA – Floating of positive thoughts in social media.
8. Guide the YOUTHS – Focus on +VE thinking – Leave EMOTIONAL reactions.. .Be CONTRIBUTORS as you were in History
9. Mutual ENGAGEMENT- with all communities of India.
10. EMPOWER: Education – Empower the Ummah through higher education’,
The session concluded with Q & A, Syed Farhan Husain and Kamran Mirza jointly hosted the event.A sumptuous dinner was served to the attending professionals and their accompanying family members and everyone departed with a new vigor, motivation and commitment to support PSF and contribute towards the cause championed by it.
