Righteousness and Honour: Bottom-Up Islamization in Malaysia and India

• In Event: 296. (Mis-)Leading Religion and Politics: Islamization(s) in South and Southeast Asia

Abstract

This paper investigates the hermeneutics and the mechanism of articulation of bottom-up Islamization from a comparative perspective. By juxtaposing Islamist extremist entities in Malaysia and India, the paper highlights how non-state actors’ engagement in the Islamization process is contextually contingent and serves different purposes. In the case of Malaysia, the paper claims that the government’s politicization of Islam created the adequate environment for a semiotic and ideological quest for the “right” Islam. Within this context, members of KMM and Malaysia-based Islamic State perceive and enact Islamization as a process of legitimate governance, emphasizing the righteousness of the literalist interpretation of Islamic tenets. In contradistinction to the Malaysian case, the paper argues that the indigenous Islamist extremist landscape of India emerged in a socio-political context of perceived discrimination. As such, the Student Islamic Movement of Indian (SIMI) and the Indian Mujahideen (IM) engaged in the process of Islamization, not as an extension of the Pakistani state-led Islamization - as official Indian accounts claim, - but as a veneer of their attempt to fight the alleged cultural and political oppression of Muslims in India by an overwhelming Hindu majority. These two cases emphasize the epistemological and political heterogeneity of Islamization, contributing to the critical analysis of a concept whose contemporary meaning suffers from a strong Eurocentric bias.

Author

• Aida M. Arosoaie, RSIS, NTU