Is Faiz’s Hum Dekhenge Anti-Hindu? IIT-Kanpur Will Decide

In a rather unusual development, the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)-Kanpur has set up a panel to decide whether Pakistani poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz's iconic poem "Hum dekhenge" offends Hindu sentiments. Some students of the institute had sung the poem, written in 1979, at a protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act on 17 December.

According to The Print, a complaint in this regard was filed by a faculty member, Vashi Mant Sharma. The complainant had objected to two lines from the poem that read "Jab arz-e-Khuda ke kaabe se/Sab but uthwaye jayenge” and “Bas naam rahega Allah ka”. Literally, the lines translate to “when all idols will be removed from God’s Kaaba” and “only Allah’s name will remain” respectively.

News18 quoted IIT-Kanpur director Manindra Agarwal as saying, "In the video, the students are seen reciting the Faiz poem which can also be perceived as being anti-Hindu."