MAHMOOD ALAM SIDDIQUI, a JNU scholar, pleads for necessary changes in the curriculum of madrasas, so that their products can be linked to the mainstream education.
Since the foundation of Darul Ulloom Deoband in 1867, India’s most respected Islamic seminary, this is the first time that one of its graduates, Waseem-ur Rahman has passed the U.P.S.C. examination this year, securing the rank 404 among the 734 successful candidates. Waseem-ur Rahman received his five-year school education from a madrasa, Ehyaul Uloom before joining Darul-Uloom-Deoband, where he got Fazilat degree. On the basis of Darul Uloom Deoband’s degree, he was admitted in B.U.M.S. at Jamia Hamdard Aligarh. Meanwhile he began to prepare for the civil services exam, and finally succeeded in cracking it in his fourth attempt at the age of 31 along with his completion of B.U.M.S. and MD courses.
The success story of Mr. Waseemur Rahman proves that madrasa is also a place where talent can be explored and it is not a hub of conservatism and its syllabus has not to do anything with terror, as a section of the media has been claiming for long. The duty of defaming Islam and its educational institutions is being discharged by Hinduvta forces.
ROLE OF MADRASAS
Contrary to their campaign against madrasa, the madrasa education helps its graduates, who generally belong to the poor families, to qualify competitive exams. Apart from this, the madrasas are the only source of education for poor children and village kids who otherwise will become the victim of child labour, sex trafficking or other abuses, as the Famous American scholar Alexander Evan writes in one of his scholarly articles published recently in The Foreign Affairs research magazine: “The majority of madrasas actually present an opportunity not a threat. For young village kids, it may be their only path to literacy. For many orphans and rural poors, madrasas provide essential social service; education and lodging for children who otherwise could well find themselves the victims of forced labour, sex trafficking or other abuses”.
In fact sections in the government and its bureaucracy have been practising deep discrimination against the Muslim community since independence. During this long period, when the madrasas have been playing a significant role in promotion of learning in the community and making them literate, the Government has adopted a dual policy in order to solve the problems faced by the community. In this regard, only rarely governments have initiated any studies on the community to find out the social, educational, economic and political status of Muslims, and have adopted half-hearted attitude in regard to implementation of the recommendations made by these committees or commissions.
WIDESPREAD DISCRIMINATION
As the Gopal Singh Committee, formed by then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in 1983, mentioned in its report that “there was a sense of discrimination prevailing among the minorities and that it must be eliminated, root, branch, if we want the minority to form an effective part of the mainstream.” (The Frontline, 15 December, 2006)
The Sachar Committee, constituted by the present United Progressive Alliance government led by Manmohan Singh, in March 2005, which submitted its report in November 2006, made it clear that the socio-economic and educational condition of the Muslim community is abysmal and just above the Dalit and worse than Hindu OBCs.
Despite the facts revealed by this committee that the Muslim community is lagging behind all other Indian communities in every sphere of life, there is no ray of hope for implementation of recommendations made by this committee, because the government is not only insincere in implementing these recommendations but there are also obstacles from the judiciary, which vehemently dissuades the Government from doing this. Justice T.S. Thakur of Delhi High Court remarked when he was hearing a petition challenging the implementation of the Sachar report, asking: “Is this meant to appease some community? A lot of money is spent in the welfare of state; is it that you (the Union government) spent it only for minority?” The remark is highly improper according to the famous journalist A.G. Noorani (The Frontline, June 20, 2008) and in my opinion it is not only improper but also an injustice and indication of the mindset of most of the people who matter in our country.
In this situation, madrasas have been playing a very significant role in spreading education and knowledge among the community, and providing essential services for poor children and rural kids. As a result of this, a number of madrasa students, after completion of their madrasa education, go to colleges and universities to receive modern education where they prove their talent through their brilliant performance in their respective fields.
In Jawaharlal Nehru University the total number of Muslim students is estimated at 550. Among them 350 have madrasa background. Some of these Arabic knowing students are employed by a number of ministries or other government departments as translators, or sometimes they are hired by news agencies as translators-cum news readers, or appointed as lecturers in colleges and universities. Their demand in corporate sectors and Arab countries is increasing day by day. By this big number of madrasa students and their work, we can assess the valuable services provided by madrasas for the development of the country.
MODERN SUBJECTS
It is noteworthy to mention here that some students of madrasa background, embark on preparation of civil services exams where they face some problems in preparation for the competitive exams, because the syllabus followed by the madrasa, was prepared by Mulla Nizamuddin Suhalwi in the Mughal period according to the requirement of his time, So this syllabus is not able to fulfil the requirement of the modern age of Science and technology, because it does not comprise the most important modern subjects like “History”, “Political Science”, “Mathematic” and English. Despite the fact that these subjects are core subjects and it is necessary to be well versed in these subjects to qualify in any civil services examination. Being laborious, the madrasa students begin to work hard to overcome this problem, but this is unfortunate that when they become capable to appear in this exam, they have crossed the age bar, except the OBC and S.C. candidates. As we saw in the case of Dr. Waseemur Rahman, who qualified the exam in his fourth attempt at the age of 31, was given one year more than the general category. In this way the madrasa students are not able to pick the fruit of their hard work. If madrasas allow a few changes and amendments to its syllabus, it can produce many more Waseemur Rahmans, who can serve the community as well as the country through securing success in the civil services examination also.
So the need of the hour is to introduce significant changes and amendments to the syllabus in order to keep pace with the time and fulfil the requirements of this modern age. And this is possible only through making English, political Science, History and math as compulsory subjects at madrasas in the light of the syllabus of N.C.E.R.T. from class 6th to class 12th. . In such a way madrasas can produce such kind of Ulama who can play a significant role to save the Muslim community from social, economic and educational backwardness and can kindle in it the light of knowledge and learning and can thus serve the community and the country.