After banks and insurance, Deoband targets birthday celebrations

In a fresh fatwa, Islamic seminary Darul Uloom Deboand has said that Islam does not permit celebrating birthdays. Responding to a query posed by a woman, the country's biggest Islamic seminary observed that the tradition to celebrate birthdays was started by the Jews and Christians, but Islam does not permit this practice.

The Darul Uloom Deoband has in recent days issued edicts declaring that working in banks and opting for an insurance policy were against the tenets of Islam, sparking a debate. The seminary had also decreed that it was illegal according to the Sharia or Islamic law for a woman to work and for a family to accept a woman's earnings.

Leading Islamic body Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind's spokesman Abdul Hameed Nomani had maintained that fatwas should not be generalised and should be seen in the context in which they have been issued.

"People must read between the lines and not generalise the fatwas," Nomani had said.