The PAS Youth yesterday lodged a police report against Mingguan Malaysia columnist Astora Jabat over an article on the azan (the Muslim call to prayer) which the former claimed had insulted Islam.

PAS Youth information chief Mazlan Aliman said Astora's article, published last Sunday in Mingguan Malaysia , was insulting as he quoted the example of Cairo in Egypt and associated the azan with the city's 'funfair atmosphere' and noise pollution.

Mazlan, who is also PAS Johor youth chief, said the police report, made at the Johor Baru central police station, was lodged as the wing felt that Astora's article was 'not in the nature of a dialogue or an exchange of ideas between intellectuals'.

"The rhetoric and polemics contained in Astora's article raises concerns that it is merely divisive and an incitement to anger and confuse the Muslim community," Mazlan told malaysiakini .

"We want the police to investigate who this Astora Jabat is and what is his motive in writing the article. Secondly, we want Mingguan Malaysia to end his Friday column," he added.

Entitled ' Salahguna azan mencemarkan imej Islam ' (Misuse of azan tarnishing Islam's image), Astora's article said that Egypt's religious endowments minister had proposed 'streamlining' Cairo Muslims' call to prayer from its 44,000 odd mosques.

The minister had proposed that only a single call to prayer was heard at any one time throughout the city of 15 million people.

"Other than azan overlapping and causing newcomers to Cairo to feel as if they were in a funfair, their duration can take anywhere between two to 15 minutes on account of lateness or difference in schools of thought," said Astora in his article.

"The proposal of (the minister) is to prevent the azan from becoming a disturbance and producing noise pollution in Egypt," he continued.

Taking offence at Astora's use of the term 'funfair', Mazlan said that Astora had deliberately insulted Islam by comparing the Muslim call to prayer to entertainment.

"Such a comparison can incite anger and dissatisfaction among Muslims and will lead to discord and controversy," said Mazlan.

'Polemics not beneficial to Muslims'

He said another point of contention was Astora's suggestion in the same article that the performance of azan was open to dispute.

Astora had claimed that this was because there was no explicit directive from the Quran as to how it was to be performed.

"What can be summarised is that although the Prophet (Muhammad) directed the words of the azan as seen by (his companion) Abdullah Zaid in a dream, it is still characterised as deductive reasoning," Astora had said in his article.

Dismissing the suggestion that Astora was proposing ideas to be debated by intellectuals and religious scholars, Mazlan said the manner and forum in which the ideas were presented were unsuitable for imparting knowledge.

"If he meant to exchange ideas with intellectuals and religious scholars, why present it in such a forum, a newspaper which is read by the masses including some who are not knowledgeable about Islam?

"This kind of polemics are not beneficial at all to ordinary Muslims," he adding this was not the first time Astora had written about Islam in public forums.

Astora had previously clashed with PAS scholars over issues involving the tudung (headscarf) worn by Muslim women and the status of certain categories of the Hadith (the sayings of the Prophet).

The controversial azan issue first came to light after an Umno members lodged a report over an article in the May/June issue of the Malaysian Bar's official newsletter, Infoline.

The report lodged by Shah Alam Umno division committee member Mohd Azhar Othman claimed that the article, written by a Johor-based lawyer, had described the azan as "noise pollution and an annoyance to neighbours" and was an insult to Islam.