Fortnightly free newspaper distributed in the UK Midlands
The Asian Today
The Asian Today is a free fortnightly community newspaper published and distributed in the Midlands, England.
It is a community newspaper providing the region's south-Asian community access to important news stories, current events and encouraging community interaction and dialogue as well as provoking debate and discussion.
The Asian Today began in September 2002 under its original name, The Asian Leader, before briefly adopting Your Leader in August 2005 and then permanently rebranding itself as The Asian Today in September 2005.
The newspaper is one of the few English-language newspapers circulated in the Asian community but is said to be the widest read ethnic newspaper in the Midlands. Its distribution and readership spans Birmingham, Nottingham, Leicester, Walsall, Wolverhampton and Coventry, largely encompassing areas with a high south-Asian population where it can be collected in takeaways, supermarkets, taxi ranks, community centres and entertainment and cultural outlets.
The newspaper has broken numerous national stories including an exclusive interview with Dr Mohammad Naseem on the subject of terrorism, which was followed up by the mainstream press as well as shocking revelations of systematic abuse of a veiled Muslim woman, Mrs Mahfooz Bibi, at the hands of police officers, which was widely cited by national and international press and in religious and cultural forums and even picked up by the Muslim Voice UK. Most recently, the newspaper featured the threat of violent protests from prominent UK Sikh leader, Sewa Singh Mandla, after the Sikh community was angered by the Bollywood film, Jo Bole So Nihaal, which they believed committed sacrilege and also exposed the case of a Blackheath imam who was suing a lottery-funded mosque.
The newspaper is published by Birmingham-based Urban Media Ltd. who also produce Desi Xpress. The editor of The Asian Today is Zakia Yousaf.
Behzti is a play written by the British Sikh playwright Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti. The play sparked controversy in the United Kingdom in December 2004. A controversial scene set in a Gurdwara included scenes of rape, physical abuse and murder. Some members of the Sikh community found the play deeply offensive to their faith. On the opening night, 18 December 2004, at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre, in Birmingham, England, a protest organised by local Sikh leaders faced violence that erupted among the protesters. Performances of the play at the Rep were cancelled two days later.
Pakistan has various religious minorities. According to the 1941 census of India, there were 5.9 million non-Muslims in the provinces that today form Pakistan. During and after Pakistan's independence in 1947, about 5 million Hindus and Sikhs emigrated, with Punjab alone accounting for migration of 3.9 million. 23% of Pakistan's population, including Bangladesh, was non-Muslim minorities in 1947. Since the Partition of India, the percentage of people belonging to religious minorities has fallen to approximately 3%. After the partition, non-Muslims formed about a quarter of East Bengal's population and 14% overall.
Adam Yosef is a British multimedia journalist, photojournalist and community activist.
Desi Xpress was a weekly national entertainment newspaper, published in the United Kingdom by Urban Media Limited.
The Saltley Gate Peace Group, is an inner city interfaith organisation based in Birmingham, England.
The British debate over veils began in October 2006 when the MP and government minister Jack Straw wrote in his local newspaper, the Lancashire Evening Telegraph, that, while he did not want to be "prescriptive", he preferred talking to women who did not wear a niqab as he could see their face, and asked women who were wearing such items to remove them when they spoke to him, making clear that they could decline his request and that a female member of staff was in the room.
Ramesh Kallidai is the former Secretary General of the Hindu Forum of Britain which is the largest umbrella body representing British Hindus. Kallidai was the first Secretary General of the organisation. He has also served as a Commissioner of Integration and Cohesion to the British Government, appointed by the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government. which brought out a white paper called 'Our shared future', which laid out a new agenda for community cohesion in the UK He has acted as a formal advisor to the British Government on various platforms such as the London Criminal Justice Board, the Race Hate Crime Forum. and the Diamond Advisory Group of the Metropolitan Police. He was appointed a cultural ambassador to the London 2012 Olympics He has also presented evidence to select committees at the House of Commons and House of Lords on issues such as religious discrimination and anti-terrorism.
Sikhism is a religion originating in the Punjab region of India and Pakistan, former imperial possessions of the British Empire. The religion was recorded as the religion of 420,196 people resident in England at the 2011 Census, along with 2,962 people in Wales, 9,055 in Scotland and 216 in Northern Ireland, making for a total Sikh population of 432,429.
Undercover Mosque is a documentary programme produced by the independent television company Hardcash Productions for the Channel 4 series Dispatches that was first broadcast on 15 January 2007 in the UK. The documentary presents video footage gathered from 12 months of secret investigation into mosques throughout Britain. The documentary caused a furore in Britain and the world press due to the extremist content of the released footage. West Midlands Police investigated whether criminal offences had been committed by those teaching or preaching at the Mosques and other establishments.
Daljit Singh Shergill, known as Shergill Sahib, was a Sikh leader from Punjab, India, who was president of the first gurdwara in the UK. He immigrated to the West Midlands in the early 1960s. He became president of Smethwick Gurdwara in 1984.
The city of Birmingham, England is home to an evolving media industry, including news and magazine publishers, radio and television networks, film production and specialist educational media training. The city's first newspaper was published in 1732.
In 2010, Pakistani Christian woman Aasiya Noreen was convicted of blasphemy by a Pakistani court and was sentenced to death by hanging. In October 2018, the Supreme Court of Pakistan acquitted her based on insufficient evidence, though she was not allowed to leave Pakistan until the verdict was reviewed. She was held under armed guard and was not able to leave the country until 7 May 2019; she arrived in Canada the next day.
Khatm-e-Nubuwwat Academy is an Anti-Ahmadiyya organisation located in Forest Gate, London, United Kingdom. The organization describes itself as leading an awareness campaign against "Qadiani propaganda", a derogative term often used for Ahmadi Muslims. The academy also studies, and publishes on theological concepts such as Khatam an-Nabuwwah, or Seal of the Prophets which in its opinion describes the absolute finality of Prophet Muhammad. The organization is loosely affiliated with similar organizations around the world, particularly with those in Pakistan.
Upinder Randhawa is a radio and television reporter and presenter working in the United Kingdom. He has also acted in four movies in India. He has worked as a director and produced KIRDAAR which is getting released worldwide. Randhawa also worked as a line producer and an executive producer in the film industry. He's the CEO & Founder of Freedom Films Productions and is currently working on some Bollywood productions as well as some ventures with his business partner Shahid Hasan and film maker Anees Bazmee.
Religious discrimination in Pakistan is a serious issue in modern-day Pakistan. Christians, Hindus, Atheists and Ahmadi Muslims among other religious groups in Pakistan are routinely discriminated against. They are at times refused jobs, loans, housing and other similar things simply because of their choice of religious faith. Christian churches and Ahmadi worship places and their worshippers are often attacked. At the time of Pakistan's creation the 'hostage theory' had been espoused. According to this theory the Hindu minority in Pakistan was to be given a fair deal in Pakistan in order to ensure the protection of the Muslim minority in India. Khawaja Nazimuddin, the 2nd Prime Minister of Pakistan, stated: "I do not agree that religion is a private affair of the individual nor do I agree that in an Islamic state every citizen has identical rights, no matter what his caste, creed or faith be".
The Rochdale child sex abuse ring involved underage teenage girls in Rochdale, Greater Manchester, England. Nine men were convicted of sex trafficking and other offences including rape, trafficking girls for sex and conspiracy to engage in sexual activity with a child in May 2012. This resulted in Greater Manchester Police launching Operation Doublet to investigate further claims of abuse with 19 men so far being convicted. Forty-seven girls were identified as victims of child sexual exploitation during the police investigation. The men were British Pakistanis, which led to discussion on whether the failure to investigate them was linked to the authorities' fear of being accused of racial prejudice. The girls were mainly White British. In March 2015, Greater Manchester Police apologised for its failure to investigate the child sexual exploitation allegations more thoroughly between 2008–10. Sara Rowbotham, the sexual health worker who first recognised patterns of child abuse in the community and fought to bring these crimes to police attention, was made redundant in 2017. A former Detective Constable who was investigating the grooming gangs, Margaret Oliver, resigned in 2012 in disgust of the handling of the cases by the police force and spoke out as a whistleblower to inform the public.
The Derby child sex abuse ring was a group of men who sexually abused up to a hundred girls in Derby, England. In 2010, after an undercover investigation by Derbyshire police, members of the ring were charged with 75 offences relating to 26 girls. Nine of the 13 accused were convicted of grooming and raping girls between 12 and 18 years old. The attacks provoked fierce discussion about race and sexual exploitation.
Islamophobia in Canada refers to set of discourses, behaviours and structures which express feelings of anxiety, fear, hostility and rejection towards Islam or Muslims in Canada. Members of the Sikh, Christian Arab, Jewish Arab and Hindu communities have all reported incidents of harassment which, while intended towards Muslims, was traumatic and broader in its scope than just Muslims.
Islamophobia in the United Kingdom refers to a set of discourses, behaviours and structures which express feelings of anxiety, fear, hostility and rejection towards Islam or Muslims in the United Kingdom. Islamophobia can manifest itself through discrimination in the workforce, negative coverage in the media, and violence against Muslims.
Salma Yaqoob is a British political activist and psychotherapist.
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