The Global Valentine Report v.1

Indian Valentine Couple beaten... Gee, what a surprise. A MUSLIM women's group is behind it.

A Muslim women's group in revolt-hit Indian Kashmir burned greeting cards and beat young couples to stop people celebrating Valentine's Day, witnesses said on Wednesday.

The separatist Dukhtaran-e-Millat (Daughters of the Nation) raided restaurants and showered blows on some couples and then burned cards during a rally in the summer capital's centre, said an AFP reporter.

The group, along with an Islamic association called the Forum Against Social Evils, regularly wage morality campaigns against movies and other emblems of popular Western culture they deem un-Islamic.

"We will not allow Western culture to take root in Muslim-majority Kashmir," chanted several dozen marchers led by Dukhtaran-e-Millat chief Aasiya Andrabi.

Kashmir's Muslim population is socially conservative, but in recent years couples have openly dated in parks, restaurants and internet cafes.

The forum, an umbrella group that includes Dukhtaran-e-Millat, warned in newspaper ads last week that it would attack anyone found marking Valentine's Day in Kashmir where Islamic separatists have been battling New Delhi's rule since 1989."

It was hardly a Hallmark moment for the Hindus either:

"As a Valentine's Day card smoldered, more than 100 members of the Hindu extremist group Shiv Sena chanted "Death to Valentine's Day" and "People who celebrate Valentine's Day should be pelted with shoes!"

Valentine's Day has in the past two decades made strong inroads in India as the country has slowly opened itself up to the outside world - its economic boom bringing in not just foreign investment but also aspects of Western culture virtually unknown here a quarter century ago.

Across the country, stores stock heart-shaped balloons and chocolates, restaurants offer Valentine's Day specials and young lovers find refuge from prying eyes in the parks.

It's a state of affairs that enrages Hindu and Muslim hard-liners, who on Wednesday vented just as they do every Valentine's Day - burning cards, holding rallies and even threatening to beat couples caught canoodling in public, a strict no-no for those who claim to defend traditional Indian values.

"This is a conspiracy to misguide the young people of our country," said Jai Bhagwan Goel, chief of the Shiv Sena's north India branch.

In his hand, a card with an image of a Victorian couple pictured in a tepid peck under a parasol went up in flames.

"We have come to know that in America, even unmarried girls as young as 11 or 12 years have become mothers ... and every second man there is divorced," Goel told reporters after reducing several greeting cards to a small pile of ash. "This is their culture - it cannot be accepted here."

The Pakistanis sucked it up and celebrated anyway: Pakistanis mark Valentine’s despite threats and stick wielding Muzzies!!!!

Many young, urban Pakistanis ignored threats from religious conservatives and celebrated St Valentine’s Day on Wednesday with gifts of red roses, heart-shaped cakes and chocolates.

Some religious groups in the predominantly Muslim country have condemned celebrating the Christian saint’s day as un-Islamic, and warned of damnation for those who do, but that didn’t put off the romantic, or businesses keen to cash in.

‘What is Valentine’s Day except expressing one’s love for someone. What is un-Islamic about it?’ asked Huma, a woman student queuing up at a courier firm in the city of Karachi to place a Valentine’s order.


Indeed, Huna. Tell it to those Muslim fools in Multan.

But in the central city of Multan the youth wing of the powerful Jamaat-e-Islami religious party sent out stick-wielding volunteers looking to catch any unmarried couples celebrating the day in parks, hotels and guest houses.

‘The government is doing nothing to stop these un-Islamic practices but if we catch anyone we will not spare them,’ said Babar Man, leader of the youth group.

Maulana Amir Hamza, a senior member of the Jamaat ud Daawa, an Islamist aid group linked to the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba militant organisation, said Valentine’s Day was an attempt to corrupt Muslim youth.

‘There is no mention of Valentine’s day in Islamic history yet the government is patronising such Western concepts in an Islamic country,’ Hamza said.

‘Those who celebrate it will go to hell,’ he said.