Page 61 - Non-violence and peace-building

Non-violence and Peace-building in Islam

crowd of angry people gathered and began heading
towards the Nadwa, raising slogans.
This was a very delicate situation. The crowd could
easily have set the Nadwa on fire, and then the whole
of Lucknow could have been rocked by rioting. The
authorities of the Nadwa hurriedly got together to decide
what to do. They agreed that there was just one way to
respond to the angry crowd—by handing over to them
the killer of the cow. There was no other way to save
Lucknow from going up in flames. And so, the Nadwa’s
authorities approached the man who had slain the
cow. They explained to him how delicate the situation
was, and about the very real possibility of the Nadwa,
and, indeed, the whole of Lucknow, being rocked by
communal violence. And this, they said to him, was all
because of him. If only he were to give himself over to
the angry crowd, things would cool off. “We know this
may be very dangerous for you,” they explained, “but we
hope that you will receive God’s help and that nothing
will happen to you.”

The man agreed to their proposal. He came out and
stood before the angry crowd. He said to them, “I have
killed your cow, and so, you can do whatever you like
to me. However, I must say that I did not strike the cow
with the intention of killing it. I only wanted to chase it
away. It was just by chance that it died.”
When the man appeared before the demonstrators
and they heard what he had to say, their anger cooled off.
The men who were earlier bent on angry confrontation
simply agreed to let the matter rest by taking from the
killer of the cow the cost of the animal. The money was

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