Tauqeer Raza Khan is an Indian politician from Uttar Pradesh and is a religious leader of the Bareilvi sect of Sunni Muslims. He is the pres...
Tauqeer Raza Khan is an Indian politician from Uttar Pradesh and is a religious leader of the Bareilvi sect of Sunni Muslims. He is the president of the political party Ittehad-e-Millat Council that he formed in 2001. He is the great-grandson of Ahmed Raza Khan, who was the pioneer of the Barelvi movement in South Asia between the 1870s and 1880s. Soon after the Muzaffar Nagar riots in 2013, Tauqeer Raza Khan resigned from the handloom ministry of Uttar Pradesh. In 2016, he was criticised by his own sect religious leaders for visiting Deoband town in Uttar Pradesh, which is the home of another religious sect of Muslims named Deobandi. He went to Deoband for uniting the Muslims of Bareilvi and Deobandi sects. The All India Muslim Personal Law Board (Jaded) was founded by Tauqeer Raza Khan after alleging discrimination charges on the All India Muslim Personal Law Board.
Wiki/Biography
Tauqeer Raza Khan was born in Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh, India.
Physical Appearance
Hair Colour: Salt and Pepper
Eye Colour: Black
Family
Parents & Siblings
His great grand father’s name is Ahmed Raza Khan, who was the founder of the Bareilvi movement in South Asia that started taking shape in Bareilly during the 1870s and 1880s.
Tauqeer Raza Khan’s great grandfather, Ahmed Raza Khan
His elder brother’s name is Subhan Raza Khan, who is the chairman of the Dargah-e-Aala Hazrat in Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh.
Tauqeer Raza Khan’s elder brother, Subhan Raza Khan
Wife & Children
He is married. Tauqeer Raza Khan has a daughter named I Khan and a son named Naqi Ali Khan from his first marriage. He has two daughters named Mustajab Beghum and Bibie Jan from his second marriage.
Religion/Religious Views
Muslim
Denomination
Sunni
Career
Politics
Ittehad-e-Millat Council, a political party in Uttar Pradesh, was started by Tauqeer Raza Khan on 7 October 2001. In its first municipal elections, the party earned ten seats and 36,000 votes. Tauqeer Raza Khan’s party entered into an alliance with the Indian National Congress in 2009 through which Praveen Singh Aron, a Congress candidate won the general elections by defeating his opponent Santosh Gangwar of the Bharatiya Janata Party. He extended his support to the Samajwadi Party in the 2012 Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections. Shahzil Islam, an MLA from Tauqeer Raza Khan’s party, won the elections from the Bhojipura constituency. He won with a great margin of votes from the Muslim community. Tauqeer Raza Khan was appointed as the vice-chairman of the Handloom Corporation of Uttar Pradesh. While serving the Samajwadi Party, Tauqeer Raza Khan requested the former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh Akhilesh Yadav to form a special committee to probe into the Muzaffar Nagar riots. In September 2014, Khan left Samajwadi Party and stated that his party would not support the Samajwadi Party anymore. In 2014, Tauqeer Raza Khan entered into an alliance with the Bahujan Samaj Party of Uttar Pradesh.
Religious Sect
Tauqeer Raza Khan formed a non-governmental organisation named All India Muslim Personal Law Board (Jaded) (“Modern”) for Barelvi Muslims in India in February 2015. He blamed the Deobandi board members for discrimination and formed his separate law board for Barelvi Muslims. In an interview with a media house, Khan said that Barelvi Muslims were feeling suffocated under the AIMPLB. He said,
AIMPLB has lost all credibility as its two main components have separated. We are the new board now. We were feeling suffocated earlier.”
Controversies
- Tauqeer Raza Khan attracted controversy in 2007 after issuing a fatwa against Bangladeshi author Taslima Nasrin. In the fatwa, Taslima Nasrin was restricted from entering India, and a cash reward of rupees five lakh was announced to anybody who behead Taslima Nasrin. Tauqeer Raza Khan stated in a press conference that Taslima Nasrin wrote against the Islamic practices, and she must leave India and burn her books. He stated,
The only way a fatwa against Taslima Nasreen, whose writings clerics denounced as anti-Islam, could be withdrawn was if she burnt her books and left India.”
- In January 2022, Tauqeer Raza Khan demanded the martyrs status for those terrorists who were killed in the Batla House encounter on 19 September 2008. In an interview with a media house, he stated that in 2009, the Congress party promised him to probe into the matter. He said,
Congress had said to me that they would probe Batla House encounter if their government is formed in 2009. Had there been a probe, the world would have known those killed as terrorists should be given martyr status.”
- While addressing a Social Integration Conference program at Bareilly in 2017, Tauqeer Raza Khan mentioned a Hindu woman who got married five times and pointed out that the names of the fathers were not known to her children. Khan attracted controversy when he was criticising the law to prohibit triple talaq as an Islamic practice, and he was also against the implementation of the uniform civil code in India. He concluded his statement by stating that there must not be any interference by Hindus in Islam and vice versa.
Facts/Trivia
- The Uttar Pradesh police detained Tauqeer Raza Khan for his involvement in the Hindu Muslim clashes of Bareilly in 2010. The situation got more complicated when the Muslim Students Organisation and the Barkati Educational Trust demanded his release by stating that the situations in the city would not get normal until he was released from the police custody. They said,
He was arrested on the basis of a fake complaint and claimed that, if he was not released, the city might not return to normalcy.”
- The chief minister of Delhi Arvind Kejriwal met Tauqeer Raza Khan in 2013. During the meeting, Tauqeer Raza Khan praised Arvind Kejriwal for his India Against Corruption movement, and Kejriwal also found Khan as a respectable person.
Tauqeer Raza Khan posing with Arvind Kejriwal
- In 2014, Tauqeer Raza Khan criticised Samajwadi Party for failing to protect the Muslims in the state, and soon, he quit the party after demanding a special investigation into the communal clashes. He blamed the then chief minister of Uttar Pradesh Akhilesh Yadav for creating an anarchy-like situation in UP. In a press meeting, Tauqeer Raza Khan stated that Akhilesh Yadav had no power over the police and civil administration. He said,
The people of Uttar Pradesh had high hopes from the young chief minister Akhilesh Yadav – that he would herald a new era in the state, but he has disappointed people as he has no control over the officers of the police and the civil administration. This has created an anarchy-like situation in the state. If the Chief Minister had the ability and experience to run the administration, the situation in Muzaffarnagar would not have been so critical.”
- In May 2016, the Special Cell of Delhi Police detained a boy on terrorism charges in Deoband in Uttar Pradesh. Soon after his arrest, Tauqeer Raza Khan went to meet the family of the boy at his home where Khan’s rival sect Deobandi was originated. Thereafter, at the Darul Uloom Deoband, an educational institution, Tauqeer Raza Khan stated in a public meeting that the union of the Deobandis and Barelvis was the only way to fight against the common enemy, who were affecting the Islamic practices in the country.
- Soon, the meeting of Tauqeer Raza Khan with the Deobandi religious leaders was covered by noted media houses of India. It was called a sect fight between the religious leaders of Barelvi and Deobandi by The Times of India. Tauqeer Raza Khan was issued a notice by his brother Subhan Raza Khan soon after Tauqeer’s visit to Deoband. Tauqeer Raza Khan was ordered to apologize publicly, and he was threatened to face a fatwa by a mufti or an Islamic scholar. The matter discussed during the meeting between Khan and Deobandis was probed by a panel of 12 muftis. Consequently, Tauqeer Raza Khan was found guilty under the haram (religious sin), and he then performed a Tauba (repenting before God).
- The Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi, inaugurated the International Sufi Conference in March 2016, which was criticised by Tauqeer Raza Khan while stating that a conflict among the Muslims was smouldered by Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) by attending such Sufi Conferences. He said,
The history is witness of the fact that a Sufi never went to the doors of rich, its first time that in name of Sufism privileges are being availed from Prime Minister and the RSS.
- Tauqeer Raza Khan was spotted provoking 20 lakh Muslim youths in his rally in Bareilly on 8 January 2022 against the Hindus over the “Dharam Sansad’ controversy. He stated that if the Muslim youth would take the law into their hands then the Hindus would not find a place to hind in India. He said,
I want to warn my Hindu brothers that I’m scared that the day my Muslim youths are forced to take the law into their hands, you will not find a place to hide anywhere in India.”
'20 lakh Muslims listening … I'm afraid my Hindu brothers, if my youth takes law into their hands, you won't find any place to hide in India', Maulana Taukeer Raza Khan over the 'Dharam Sansad' controversy.
Amir Haque & @RShivshankar with analysis. pic.twitter.com/IYZpkopPvu
— TIMES NOW (@TimesNow) January 7, 2022
- Nida Khan, the cousin daughter-in-law of Tauqeer Raza Khan, joined the Bharatiya Janata Party on 30 January 2022. On 18 February 2015, his nephew Sheeran Raza Khan got married to Nida Khan. After five months of marriage, Nida Khan experienced instant divorce from her husband and was forced by her in-laws to practice Nikah Halala. She stood against the Nikah Halala practice and went to her parents’ home. Nida Khan is the founder of the Ala Hazrat Helping Society, which is an NGO that works for the victims of triple talaq and Nikah Halala. She is counted among the notable women rights activist in India. Soon after joining the Bhartiya Janata Party in January 2022, she stated in a media conference that the safety of Muslim women was secured in the reign of the Bharatiya Janata Party.
Congress leader Maulana Tauqeer Raza Khan’s daughter-in-law Nida Khan (2nd left) joined BJP on January 30 along with other leaders from SP and Congress
- Tauqeer Raza Khan extended his party’s support to the Indian National Congress ahead of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections in January 2022.
Tauqeer Raza Khan posing with Priyanka Gandhi Wadra
- Tauqeer Raza Khan often posts his videos and pictures on social media accounts. More than 6k people follow his Facebook page.
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