Hyderabad, June 10 (IANS) The Andhra Pradesh government has refused permission to the Ahmadiya community to hold a meeting here June 15 following protests from some Muslim groups.

Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy directed the police not to allow the community to hold its meeting at any public place as this could create law and order problems in the city.

A delegation of Muslim groups led by Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi had called on the chief minister Monday to demand that the Ahmadiya, also called Qadianis, should not be allowed to hold their conference.

The controversial sect was to hold its meeting at the Public Gardens, in the heart of the city.

The delegation said the meet could vitiate the peaceful atmosphere as the activities of Qadianis were provocative. A representation submitted to the chief minister said the Qadianis were declared non-Muslims by all Muslims countries as their beliefs clash with the basic tenets of Islam.

The delegation comprising several clerics said the activities of the sect were hurting the religious sentiments of Muslims as it calls itself Ahmadiya Muslims and warned that the permission to hold a meeting could create law and order problems.

“They (Qadianis) don’t believe that Hazrat Mohammed is the last prophet sent by Allah and this is against the basic belief of Muslims but they still carry on activities with Muslim names thus misleading people,” said Abdul Raheem Qureshi, assistant secretary of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board, the apex body of Indian Muslims.

He pointed out that the founder of the sect had claimed that he was a prophet and sometimes even said he was Jesus.

Owaisi, leader of the Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM), explained the activities of the sect to the chief minister, who directed the officials not to allow the sect to hold its meeting at any public place and not to give any official patronage to the event.

The chief minister said ministers would neither attend the meet nor send any greeting message. He also asked authorities of state-owned Road Transport Corporation (RTC) to remove the posters about the event from all RTC buses.

The delegation comprised prominent religious scholar Moulana Hameeduddin Auqil Hussami, imam of the historic Mecca Masjid here, Moulana Abdullah Qureshi Al-Azhari and representatives of several groups including Jamaat-e-Islami, Jamiatul Ulema, Tableegi Jamaat and the head of Jamia Nizamia, an over 130-year-old Islamic university.

Muslims comprise 30 percent of the city’s seven million population.

Source: http://in.news.yahoo.com/indiaabroad/20080610/r_t_ians_nl_general/ tnl-ahmadiya-community-denied-permission-b9e311f_1.html