Sahafat daily headline, which has been in the forefront of vitriolic campaign against Moulana Ghulam Mohammad Vastanvi since his election to the rector’s post, screams that “Darul Uloom gets rid of Vastanvi?” A story filed by the paper’s local correspondent from Deoband says “Vastanvi failed to defend himself in the Shoura and requested to the members for the honourable exit from the institution”. The paper says ‘Modi- nawaz Vastanvi koo Shoura ne dikhaya baa izzat baree hune kaa raasta’.
Another daily Hamara Samaj’s headline screams ‘Nomani was given the baton of Deoband’. It highlighted the absence of Moulana Badruddin Ajmal from the Shoura meeting who played key role in the election of Vastanvi. Its sub-heading yells that ‘Seh ruknee tahqiqati committee ki tashkeel , attarfroosh rukan nadarid’.
However, the major Urdu daily from the capital Rashtriya Sahara’ made the main headline as ‘Moulana Ghulam Mohammad Vastanvi mohtemim ke Uohede (post) par barqarar’. It tries to give balance report on the happenings in the Shoura meeting. Other dailies such as Jaded Khabar, Akhabare Mashrique and Hindustan Express also reported on the same line avoiding giving any twist to the meeting. Akhabr-e- Mashrique published from Calcutta also said the Vastanvi got a breather for time being.
The Shoura meeting’s proceedings were carried by all the newspapers as a main story of the day and provided maximum space for it.
It is to be mentioned here that a section of Urdu media has open front against Vastanvi for his alleged statement on Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi saying that minorities were getting their due share in development. Though, he later denied making any such remark praising Modi, but his opponents launch a no-hold-barred campaign to oust him from the rector’s post. One hopes that after the decision of the Shoura, the controversy surrounding around Moulana Vastanvi would die down. .