This week finds me on a journey westwards to attend what is being called "Davos in New York". The World Economic Forum's annual meeting this year has shifted from snowy Davos to sunny (unusually) New York to show solidarity with this city in its battle to deal with the trauma of September 11. En route I spent a grey Sunday morning in London and was surprised to find the major newspapers filled with the Muslim problem. How do we learn to live with an Islam that has become increasingly aggressive and horrifically violent in recent times?

The front page of the Sunday Times has a story on the Britons being held in Guantanamo Bay that traces their journey to the Taliban from a small English town called Tipton. Relatives of 20-year-old Iqbal are quoted: "According to relatives, Iqbal, a night shift factory worker, had become increasingly devout over the past three years, growing a beard and urging his family to pray more. He refused to be photographed believing that only God had the right to make images."

The front page of the Sunday Observer had a story on an Algerian Islamist group that is selling videos outside mosques in London showing brutal killings by Islamic zealots in the hope of drawing more young men to the cause. The commentary says, "Kill in the name of Allah until you are killed. Then you will be in peace forever in paradise ... the war against the Jews and Christians is being won."

In New York, I notice that the Times is equally taken with the idea of understanding the sort of Muslim anger that led to September 11 and there are tales from Pakistan of young men who joined the Taliban and boast of how they would do it again if they got a chance. They regret that they were not among the "martyrs" because then they would be in a paradise filled with women and wine. Odd that a religion that has such contempt for women and wine on Earth should tempt believers with visions of them in paradise. But there are more important questions than that to be asked.

Questions that we are not asking in India because we are so afraid of hurting Muslim sentiments, so afraid that even after General Pervez Musharraf admitted that radical Islam was causing a problem in Pakistan we have not dared admit that we face a similar problem in India. Considering that we have the second-largest Muslim population in the world we need to take note of the effects of radical Islam, particularly among the lower middle classes and the semi-literate, but we continue to pretend that we have nothing to worry about. There are two reasons for this and the first has to do with the fact that we are currently ruled by a government backed by an ugly collection of fanatical Hindu groups so any attempt to point out flaws in Islam or Muslims gets you labelled "pro-BJP". The second reason is that most attempts at rational discourse on the question of radical Islam fail because even moderate Muslims resent any questioning of their faith.

This is really where the problem lies. If radical groups and lunatic maulvis have become the voice of Indian Islam it is because moderate Muslims are by and large too afraid to speak up. And, it has to be sadly said that they also suffer a siege mentality that makes them join the chorus of those who seek to absolve Osama bin Laden of blame for September 11. I have met moderate Muslims in Delhi, Mumbai and in rural parts who say they do not believe bin Laden was responsible for the attacks because if he had been he would "never lie" about it. When I pointed out that the Americans have released a video on which he is clearly shown gloating about the attacks they claim that this is not sufficient evidence because his words are unclear. What about his gestures? Oh, they say, he could be saying anything. They also admit that to many Muslims (not them, of course!), bin Laden is a hero for having dared to take on the US. I ask them why they, in India, should be anti-American and they say that America has always tried to denigrate Islam and this they cannot accept. It is these same moderates who often repeat the mad rumour that the WTC and the Pentagon were attacked by the Jews. They know this, they say, because that morning 4,000 Jews did not turn up for work at the WTC.

These views are not just immoderate but crazy. Yet we ask no questions nor make any attempt to persuade Muslims to start asking questions themselves. If you go to a madarsa, for instance, and mention it is schools like these which are causing the problem, you will find everyone protesting that all they teach is Islam, Arabic and Urdu.

That is the problem. Children taught to look at the world entirely through a religious prism will always see it divided into believers and infidels. Madarsa education is the problem but in India it is often funded by the state and not even a Hindu nationalist like Murli Manohar Joshi dares change this.