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| Afghanistan/South Asia |
| Concerns about India's madrassas |
| 2005-08-01 |
| No article link has site does not archive. General Pervez Musharraf may have ordered all foreign students of madarsas to leave Pakistan following the London and Sharm-el Sheikh bombings but, ironically, the Government of India continues to ignore a reality that Pakistan has finally come to accept - that many of these theological schools of Islamic learning are nurseries that breed Islamic extremism. This, despite reams of documentary evidence that Indian madarsas, too, have been preaching exclusivism and fundamentalism. Foreign students from countries witnessing a spurt in Islamist extremism, including Bangladesh and Sudan, are being routinely admitted for theological studies in leading Islamic studies centres like Dar-ul-Uloom Deoband and Nadwatul Ulama in Lucknow. Clerics, posing as qaaris, from Saudi Arabia, Gulf countries, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal routinely visit seminaries in India. The ISI has made ample use of these visits and funding routed through third countries and sham charities to set up an elaborate network of "friendly" seminaries in Bihar, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh and Assam. An Intelligence report says that "the ISI has staffed mosques and madarsas in these States with its agents disguised as mullahs." The report refers to the construction of 450 new madarsas and mosques along Nepal's border with UP, 675 madarsas and mosques in Bihar, nearly 800 of them in Rajasthan and Gujarat along the Pakistan border, and 50 in West Bengal along the State's border with Bangladesh in the past couple of years. According to another Intelligence report, Maulana Abdul Rauf Rahmani of Nepal controls a large number of madarsas in UP and Bihar. Rauf is believed to be an active member of the Mecca-based Rabita-al-Alam-ul-Islami [World Muslim League], a Wahabi organisation that propagates virulent Islamism. The input suggests that some madarsas in UP receive funds routed through the Islamic Development Bank in Jeddah. Funds from "Arab charities", many of which have been black-listed across the world, continue to flow into madarsas in Bihar along the India-Nepal border. With funds aplenty, madarsas continue to mushroom at an average rate of 20 seminaries being set up each year. |
| Posted by:Paul Moloney |
| #2 Most amusing to see all those comments on the BBC site, talking about how the madrassahs provide "an essential source of education and training". Then you see a clip showing a nightmare scene of people rocking backwards and forwards while they memorise the Koran. Yeah, that'll help them in the dog-eat-dog world of 21st century capitalism. |
| Posted by: Scooby Doo 2005-08-01 10:23 |
| #1 Send in the Sikhs. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet 0’ Doom 2005-08-01 04:48 |