ImHalal search: Beer haram level 1
By Bala Shah

India has been blessed with the presence of many great religions living in relative peace and harmony.  And this mix of Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Buddhism and others has given us strengths unique in the world. Mid 2008, techgoss had reported about an AP-based investment company which listed Wipro, HCL, Infosys and even Satyam stocks as halal. But IBM was not Halal.

Now an Amsterdam based Islamic company is saying: “As of Sept 1, Muslims from all over the world can search the World Wide Web safely without coming across content that might be considered "Haram" according to the Islamic Law. The search engine, ImHalal.com (imhalal.com/), only fetches results that are flagged as to be "Halal". The search engine uses various techniques to determine which results fetched are supposed to be "Halal" or "Haram". Once a user comes in contact with content of explicit nature, the search engine will return a negative search advice.”

Respected Mumbai-based tech and business blog Alootechie investigated further

“
When one searches for the keyword ‘porn’, IMHalal.com displays the following message: “Oops! Your search inquiry has a Haram level of 3 out of 3! I would like to advise you to change your search terms and try again.” [Btw, ImHalal.com considers the keywords ‘beer’ and ‘boobs’ as having a Haram level of 1 and 2 respectively!]
“

This certainly grabbed my attention.  My techgoss colleague and satirist Techgirl is always making fun of everyone.  Her ‘victims’ have called her bitch and worse.  What would this search engine say if I typed ‘Bitch Techgirl’?  Apparently, this gets a Haram level of 3; the same as if I typed the word porn. You are baad, Techgirl.

Test out the search engine and see if it appeals to you.

(Techgoss had published the following on May 23, 2008)

IBM, Cognizant, Genpact, Aegis:  Not Halal
By Bala Shah

India has been blessed with the presence of many great religions living in relative peace and harmony.  And this mix of Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Buddhism and other great religions have given us strengths unique in the world.   Sometimes, in the country the line between religion, politics and money is very thin indeed.  Not quite what the gods, saints and prophets intended.  Now an Islamic investment company is promoting some tech stocks as halal.

Halalmoney.org, based in Andhra Pradesh, describes its mission as “wealth generation within Islamic Shariah.  And to provide wealth creation opportunities to the Islamic community in a manner which is consistent with the Islamic Shariah”.

Halalmoney.org explains it vision as “preventing the Islamic community from forbidden investments”

The Halalmoney website shows a list of the ‘chosen’ halal computer stocks.   Respected tech company WIPRO was on the Halal list.  HCL, I-Flex, Satyam and Infosys were also listed as Halal.   BPO’s like Genpact and Aegis were not in the list; as for some mysterious reasons they are not Halal.  One of the stars of the Indian IT industry, Cognizant, was not in the list of Halal companies. IBM and HP, which have invested billions of dollars in India and employ tens of thousands of locals, are not in the list.

Techgoss was intrigued.  What makes an IT and/or BPO company worthy of being Halal?  We contacted Halalmoney.org to understand the logic behind their listing companies as worthy of investment, and why companies like Cognizant were not good enough.

Halalmoney.org refused the opportunity to share such inside information with our readers.  Why should any divine knowledge be secret?  One thing we are sure about is that is none of the great religions in India would advice their followers to invest in gossip websites like techgoss.

Techgoss note:  The list of Halal shares can be seen at
http://www.halalmoney.org/compliant.htm

Techgoss note:  Halal is an Arabic word meaning lawful or permitted. The opposite of halal is haram, which means unlawful or prohibited. Halal and haram are universal terms that apply to all facets of life. Allah had warned as follows: