A Muslim cleric in India Wednesday excommunicated at least 54 Muslims and nullified their marriages for singing a Hindu nationalistic song.
Mufti Abdul Quddus Rumi of Agra declared that singing of the Vande Matram national song "would lead them (Muslims) to hell."
A fatwa, or decree, issued by the cleric said Muslims advocating the song were deviating from the religion.
The fatwa also nullified the marriage of those excommunicated, Press Trust of India reported.
Muslims who favor the Hindu nationalistic song should offer prayers to renew their faith in Islam and remarry according to Islamic rites, the cleric said.
The excommunicated people had participated in an election meeting of the right-wing Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party where the song was played.
Of the 54 persons who were excommunicated, 13 have asked for forgiveness.
Vande Matram, a song by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee in his novel Anand Math, has triggered great communal debates since the mid-1930s.
Muslims regard the book as a work of deeply anti-Islamic imagination. Its hero, Anand, kills Muslims en masse and burns their houses in order to rid the country of all Muslims.