► (095) ◄ To the Chief Judge of the Court

[Bediuzzaman's defence in the Guide for Youth trial. 5 March 1952.]

In His Name, be He glorified!

To the Chief Judge of the Court

I request that you listen to this very brief statement about the very lengthy story of my life of persecution. The following are the reasons they have given for the last twenty-eight years of unprecedented ill-treatment, surveillance, and imprisonment:

The First: They accuse me of being opposed to the regime. We say in reply:

Every government has opponents. On condition they do not disturb public order or infringe security, no one is answerable for an idea or way of conducting themselves which they believe in with their hearts and consciences. For although the more than one hundred million Muslims who were under the rule of the English and their tyrannical, religiously bigoted government for a hundred years, rejected their infidel regime due to the Qur'an and did not accept it, up to the present the English courts have not bothered them in that respect. And although the Jews and Christians who since early times have had a place among our nation and in its governments, and have been opposed to its religion and sacred regimes, and have held contrary, critical views, at no time have the courts of law interfered with them in any way. Furthermore, during his own caliphate, 'Umar (May God be pleased with him) was tried by a court together with a common Christian. The fact that the Christian's [religious] views were not taken into consideration by the court despite his being opposed to both the Muslims' sacred regime, and their religion, and their laws, shows that a court of law cannot be partisan, but has to be unbiased. For the vicegerent of the earth was tried together with a common infidel.

Thus, relying on hundreds of verses of the Qur'an, not only myself but all people of conscience are opposed to a temporary regime that has replaced the Qur'an's sacred laws, and on account of the anarchy of corrupt civilization and behind the screen of the liberties of the Republic is an absolute despotism, and may be used as a tool to tyrannize religious people. Moreover, opposition to any government can never be deemed a crime.

The Second: They have inflicted punishments on me for thirty years on the pretext of the possibility of disturbing the peace and breaching security. I say this in reply:

Although according to the investigations of the court there are both five