Madrasa is an Arabic word that means educational institution. The origin of Madrasa goes back to the time when the Prophet of Islam established the first ever Madrasa in his mosque, Masjid al Nabawi of Madina, with dedicated learners called Ashab e Suffa. There he would teach them the tenets of Islam and explain to them the contents of the revelation, which he received (from Allah).

The establishment of an organized institution of Madrasas took place much later. The history of Madrasa education in India begins with the reign of the first Turkish Sultan, Qutubuddin Aibek. He established hundreds of mosques, which were centers of both religious rituals and Islamic education. Madrasa education works on the old traditional outline as there is no prominence on any research. They are the centers of fre education for Islamic theology.

A madrasa is an exclusivist theological Islamic seminary, or a religious school, where children are initiated into tenets of the Quran, the Sharia and Hadith. For Muslim parents and religious scholars the first priority for their children is the acquisition of knowledge about Islam and their religious beliefs. That is their most important religious and educational priority, while knowledge about other subjects, including science, technology and humanities can wait.

Apart from major emphasis on Quran, Sharia and Hadith, the children are also taught Islamic history with special reference to the conquests made in the past by the heroic warriors of Islam – a subject closely related to the doctrine of jihad, i.e., Islam’s permanent war against ‘kaffirs’ or infidels.

In an interesting article titled, Islamic Madrasa: Servicing and Challenges, Maulana Muhammad Kalim Siddiqui claimed that in 2003 the number of madrasas had grown to 1,25,000 in which nearly 30 lakh students were studying and the cost of servicing was nearly INR 14 billion.

Here are some of the reasons why madrasas are established

Religious Education: Madrasas serve as institutions for imparting religious education to Muslim children and adults.
Preservation of Islamic Knowledge: Madrasas play a crucial role in preserving and transmitting Islamic knowledge from one generation to another without any debate , or any kind contemporary touch to the old theology. They serve as repositories of old and cruel customs of Islamic traditional knowledge.
Cultural Identity and Community Cohesion: Madrasas often play a significant role in fostering a sense of cultural identity and community cohesion among Muslims.
Clergy Training: Some madrasas focus on training individuals for religious leadership roles, such as imams, preachers, and scholars. These institutions provide advanced education in Islamic sciences and produce individuals who can guide and lead the Muslim community.

Why are Madrassas being established, what do Madrassa teach?

Madrasas primarily focus on teaching subjects related to Islam and Islamic studies. The specific curriculum may vary depending on the type of madrasa, its educational philosophy, and regional variations. Here are some of the common subjects taught in madrasas:

Quranic Studies: Madrasas place significant emphasis on the study of the Quran, which includes reading, recitation, memorization, and understanding of the Arabic text. Students learn to recite the Quran with proper pronunciation and intonation (tajweed) and delve into its meanings and interpretations.

Hadith: Madrasas teach the Hadith, which are collections of sayings, actions, and approvals of the Prophet Muhammad. Students study various Hadith collections to understand the Prophet’s teachings, actions, and the application of Islamic principle in daily life.

Fiqh (Islamic Jurisprudence): Fiqh deals with the understanding and application of Islamic law. Madrasas teach the principles of fiqh, including the interpretation and application of Sharia (Islamic law) in various aspects of life, such as worship, transactions, family matters, and social interactions.

Aqidah (Creed): Aqidah refers to the study of Islamic creed and theology. Students learn about the fundamental beliefs and principles of Islam, including the oneness of God (Tawhid), the belief in prophets, the Day of Judgment, and other theological concepts.

Arabic Language: Arabic is the language of the Quran, and therefore, madrasas often teach Arabic language and grammar to enable students to understand the Quranic text in its original form. Proficiency in Arabic is also important for studying Islamic texts and scholarly works.

Seerah (Biography of Prophet Muhammad): Madrasas often dedicate a significant portion of the curriculum to studying the life and biography of the Prophet Muhammad. This includes learning about his character, teachings, actions, and the historical context in which he lived.

Tafsir (Quranic Exegesis): Tafsir involves the interpretation and explanation of the Quranic verses. Its syllabus states: “When the Muslims enter the enemy’s country and besiege the cities or strongholds of the infidels, it is necessary to invite them to embrace the faith, because Ibn Abbas, relative of the Prophet said that he never destroyed any tribe without previously inviting them to embrace the faith. If, therefore, they embrace the faith, it is unnecessary to war with them, because that which was the design of the war is then obtained without war.

The Prophet, moreover has said we are directed to make war upon men only until such time as they shall confess, ‘there is no God, but Allah”

What is the impact of Madrasa in Indian society ?

Madrasa’s impact on Indian society needs to be studied and it is important to note that the impact can vary depending on different factors such as the region, the specific madrasa, and the approach to education. Here are some of the negative impacts that have been attributed to certain madrasas:

Lack of Modern Education: One of the key criticisms is the perceived focus on religious education at the expense of modern subjects. Some argue that the curriculum in some madrasas does not adequately prepare students for broader academic pursuits or for integration into the modern workforce, limiting their opportunities for socio-economic advancement.

Limited Exposure to Pluralism: Madrassa education is completely focused on preaching Muslims about the world of 1,400 years back at the cost of modern education. Certain madrasas have been accused of promoting a controversial worldview and limited exposure to diverse perspectives, cultures, and religions. It has been seen that Madrasas students are found involved in riots and other Islamic religious activity against other religions. Critics argue that this may hinder social integration and contribute to a sense of exclusivity or separatism among some students.

Gender Inequality: There have been concerns about gender inequality in certain madrasas, where female students may have limited access to education or are restricted to specific subjects. Critics argue that this perpetuates gender disparities and restricts opportunities for women’s empowerment and advancement.

Potential for Extremism: Some critics express concerns about the potential for certain madrasas to propagate extremist ideologies or foster radicalization. While it is important to note that such instances are not representative of all madrasas, there have been cases where individuals associated with certain madrasas have been involved in extremist activities.

Lack of Oversight and Standardization: Another criticism is the lack of standardized oversight and regulation of madrasas, which can lead to variations in the quality of education and accountability. This lack of oversight has raised concerns about the potential for exploitation, financial mismanagement, or the spread of unorthodox teachings in some instances.

Madrasas have no concept of organizing social gatherings or extracurricular activities like field trips that could give students some degree of experiential learning. Madrasas in India continue to be huge thought-influencers. During Fridays, these imams give out sermons that can be used to convey socio-political commentary and influence the formulation of public opinion.

Narrow Thinking: Ignoring the provable truths of science in favor of “faith.” This sort of problem tends to be less of an issue in the older religions that have some sort of intellectual tradition, and Islam does qualify here. Attempts to hijack the truth are present, and this impedes progress. Islam needs to guard against this no less than any of the other religious traditions.

Militant Fanaticism: Attempting to weaponize faith to provide foot soldiers for the militant “fighting” arm of the religion in question. Islam is just reaching the age where both Christianity and Judaism had their final showdowns with their respective bands of militant fanatics. This is a more dangerous version of “Narrow Thinking”, especially if allowed to run wild.

Backwardness: Being on the wrong of history for certain issues can discredit religious education in many ways. The stance of Islam on women’s rights has stood still for a long time when other forces in society have advanced farther. More rights were granted by the Koran than are actually followed in any Islamic nation at present time.

The Madrasas are considered by many families as the only realistic option towards access to education for their children, especially among those who come from poor backgrounds, since these Madrasas provide food and shelter for their students. Poor Muslims fall in the trap of Madrasa education and radicalism.

Madrasa students have a tendency of becoming highly devoted to their masters, where the authoritarian doctrinaire education established on memorization inhibits even the slightest expression of free thought or individual will, and gives a green light to religious fanaticism and incites a desire to confront anyone pointed out as an unbeliever by their teacher.

Funding

These madrasas all over India take money from the government to run these organizations. At present, there are 18 states in India, including Assam, where Madrasas get Central government funds. The states also include Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Tripura, and Uttar Pradesh, but Assam has decided to ban this practice.

The Madrasa education system is the largest non-formal education network in India with more than 2 lakh Madrasas and 10 lakh teachers. Madrasas received INR 10,000 crore annually in funding, 50 per cent from ‘secret sources’ – NCPCR report. The funding of madrasa is mixed. Some are recognised by the state and are government funded. And some are privately, secretly funded by unknown sources.

India Today’s investigation also found such madrasas were mostly funded by unknown donors in Gulf states. It is well known that the Saudi government has been pumping into India billions of dollars for radicalizing the Muslim youth.

Madrasas under scrutiny

1. In the aftermath of the 9/11 terror attacks in the United States (US) in 2001, researchers, analysts, and policymakers trained their eyes on madrasas. Their initial investigations at the time found that many Taliban leaders and Al-Qaeda members had been radicalized in these Islamic educational institutions.
2. Madrasas first came under scrutiny after the 9/11 terror attacks in the United States in 2001. Many Taliban leaders and Al-Qaeda members had been radicalized in these Islamist-led madrasas.
3. Donald H Rumsfeld, who was then the secretary of defence, stated that madrasas “teach people to be suicide killers and extremists, violent extremists”.
4. In July 2004, a report prepared by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (or the 9-11 Commission) described madrasas as “incubators of violent extremism.” It did not specifically say, however, whether any of the 19 individuals who had executed the 9/11 attacks themselves attended madrasas for their education.
5. According to the ORF researchers, “There is a lack of scientific and secular subjects in the curriculum, and graduates find it difficult to find employment”.
6. A typical instance of the frightening penetration achieved by madrasas and mosques across India came into limelight after the arrest of five Muslim youth from Bijnor on 21 April, 2017, for planning a terror plot aimed at targeting Delhi and Uttar Pradesh. Next day the police arrested Mohammed Faizan the Imam of a local mosque who was radicalizing the Muslim youth and tutoring them to participate in the proposed attacks.

According to data accessed from the Minority Affairs department of the U.P., in and around Bijnor there are 15 degree level and 55 high school level Islamic seminaries. In addition, close to 1,500 mosques in the area are also under police lens.

Support to ISIS and terrorism

In 2018 India today did operation madrasa in Kerala where they found following facts:

1. Several Kerala madrasas teaching Wahhabism
2. Seminaries aided by hawala funding from Gulf countries
3. Wahhabism is a Saudi-sponsored creed of extremist Islam
   ● An India Today probe discovered that several madrasas in Kerala are preaching Wahhabism, a Saudi-sponsored creed of extremist Islam linked to global terror.
   ● In an unsettling evidence of what appears to be a covert infiltration of the ISIS ideology in the country, an India Today investigation has found several madrasas in Kerala are teaching the theo-Fascist variety of Islam.
   ● Aided by hawala funding from petrodollar-rich Gulf countries, these seminaries were found to be indoctrinating young impressionable minds with what has been the wicked goal of ISIS to establish a global caliphate through a world-wide war.
   ● Preaching of radical Islam is not limited to one center in Kerala, India Today’s investigation found.
   ● A well-known Pakistani scholar, Sohail Abbas in his research published a few years ago had pointed out that his interviewing of 517 Mujahideen arrested in Afghanistan and lodged in two Pakistani jails revealed that “the figures on rural/urban jihadis become even more interesting as all the jihadis, barring just a few, belonged to the Deobandi school of thought”.

Cases of sexual harassment with children in Madrassa

Enough evidence is available which shows that these madrassas are the birthplace of all wrongdoing, where many young boys and girls are abused and brainwashed by their so-called maulana teachers. A simple research on a internet will give you plenty of results about the sexual harassment of Minor boy and girl in Madrasaa.

Cases of sexual harassment of children from Madrassa is very common. Many a bunch of children have been rescued from Madrassa by the state police and local administration after complaints being filed. In the recent time all the matter became highly discussed when filmmaker Ali Akbar after Journalist VP Rajeena claimed that Madrasas Ustaad has exploited him sexually. Institutions like NHRC and NCPCR have taken action many times. Here we are mentioning a few cases of recent times in this document.

36 Children Rescued From Pune Madrasa After Cleric Arrested For Sexual Abuse: A total of 36 students were rescued by the police from a Pune Madrasa on Friday after reports of sexual abuse surfaced. The children, who come from Bihar, as as young as 5 years of age.The Maulana of the Madrasa, 21-year-old Rahim, had been arrested on charges of sexual assault in Pune’s Katraj suburb after two 10-year-old children ran away from the Madrasa.

Hyderabad Madrasa Teacher Held For Sexually Abusing Minor Boys: The boys, aged between 10 and 12, were allegedly abused over the past few months.

After Journalist, Filmmaker Ali Akbar Alleges Sex Abuse at Kerala Madrasa Few days before a journalist from Kerala VP Rejeena went public with a first-hand account of alleged sexual exploitation of children in Madrasas, filmmaker Ali Akbar has also spoken out about his experience at a madrasa where he has claimed students were abused and assaulted.

52 girls ‘rescued’ from Lucknow madrasa, manager held.

52 girls ‘rescued’ from Lucknow madrasa, manager held Jharkhand: Maulvi Samruddin sexually abuses half a dozen students in a Madrassa in the pretext of massage.

NHRC seeks report on health status of juveniles rescued – The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), New Delhi, has issued notice to the State governments of Tamil Nadu and Bihar and Chennai commissioner of Police seeking a thorough probe and a detailed report into the abuse of 12 juveniles who were brought from Bihar and kept in a madrasa at Ponniammanmedu near Madhavaram. The NHRC has requested Special Rapporteur Dr. Rajinder Kumar Malik to conduct a fact finding investigation by examining the juveniles and visit Bihar from where these juveniles were brought and present a report within a month.

What Muslim journalist think about Madrasa

Brainwashing and provoking for extremism/ Radicalisation

Madrasas teach kids to become radical Islamists, madrasa teachings have no real life value in modern times. That’s the same reason why the Father of the Nation of Turkey , “Kemal Aturk” banned Madrasa education from Turkey to make it a modern country. Hence, Turkish culture is the most forward and modern culture in the Islamic world.

And on the other hand we have countries like Afghanistan, Pakistan, etc where Madrasa culture has deteriorated the social fabric of those countries and have made them the epicenter of radical Islam. Hence, you decide “What is actually taught in Madrasas?”

● Allowing an educational institute to brainwash its students in the name of Islam at an early age is a fraud and will set any country back. Pakistan and Afghanistan have allowed this trend to develop and run for a long time and now look at these two failed countries.
● There are some global analysts who opine that Islamic radicalism is threatening the existence of more moderate beliefs and practices in other parts of the Muslim world.
● In a research study conducted by European Foundation of South Asian Studies titled, “Human Trafficking, Religious Indoctrination & Radicalization” it states, “Radicalization and religious indoctrination must be perceived as part of the whole process that leads to the recruitment of people by terrorist organizations, and therefore, the current focus on securitization should also encompass integration and education. Ignorance, in this case on both sides, breeds radicalism, with terrorism as its outlet.”

Some data w.r.t. Madrassa

According to the Ministry of Minority Affairs,

1. The quantum jump in the number of madrasas from 88 in 1947 to five lakhs in 2006 across India is a mind boggling narrative of unremitting Islamic aggression.
2. India has 24,010 madrasas, of which 4,878 were unrecognized, in 2018-19, (Madrasa run by Masjid is not counted)
3. Unofficial sources claim that Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind alone runs over 20,000 Deobandi madrasas in north India while other madrasas are run by private religious sects.
4. in six states—Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Bengal and Assam—a large number of madrasas are state-funded. They are the equivalent of mainstream education and their certificates are also at par with the school boards—this enhances the employability of madrasa-educated children.
5. For example, in the four states of Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Tripura and Uttar Pradesh the number of recognised madrasas is 10,680, with some 2,020,816 students.
6. There are more than 10,000 Madrasa in 4 states of India, where over 20 lakh students study and the highest number of these madrasas are in Uttar Pradesh where more than 18 lakh students are studying in more than 8000 madrasas.
7. In Bengal, for instance, where the Muslim population is more than 25 percent of the state’s population, there are only 341,000 madrasa students, or 4 percent of those between 7-19.
8. There are more than 10,000 Madrasa in 4 states of India, where over 20 lakh students study and the highest number of these madrasas are in Uttar Pradesh where more than 18 lakh students are studying in more than 8,000 madrasas.
9. In six states—Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Bengal and Assam—a large number of madrasas are state-funded. They are the equivalent of mainstream education and their certificates are also at par with the school boards—this enhances the employability of madrasa-educated children. For example, in the four states of Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Tripura and Uttar Pradesh the number of recognised madrasas is 10,680, with some 2,020,816 students.
10. Once it happened, Vaishno Devi University in Jammu and Kashmir received an annual grant of Rs 7 million and so far only half of the grant has been released, while Baba Ghulam Shah Badshah University in Rajouri and Islamic University in Kashmir have already received Rs 20 million each.

What’s are famous questions being raised against Madrasaa education

1. Seventy-five years have passed and the same rules and constitution are being followed without change, probably Muslims were a minority at that time but the condition is not the same anymore?
2. As we have seen many madrasas are involved in teaching radicalization, extremism and hate for the other communities. Should it be done on taxpayers money?
3. Particularly, the literacy rate among the 200 million Muslims living in India is lower than SC/ST and OBC. As per the data from the National Statistics Office (NSO), only 48 percent of Muslim students in India can study till class 12, while 14 percent could study ahead of the 12th standard. Where is the contribution of Madrasa on the front of education?
4. In the scenario of rising radicalization should the madrasa education be monitored by the government or not? (If not shutting off)
5. Who is responsible for the problem created by the Madrasa educated Muslims.
6. The UN in one of its reports claimed that Madrasa educated Muslims are less sensitive towards gender equality and pluralism.
7. In the year 2013 25,000 Wahhabi scholars from 20 countries were permitted to visit India. They toured across 8 Indian States and preached in 7,000 madrasas to nearly 12 lakh students. According to a source, some of the Islamic preachers surreptitiously managed to go to the Kashmir valley, too. Needless to mention, the aim of the 25,000 Imams was to preach the merits of Sharia law and jihad against kaffir Hindus.
8. Why there is no board or any arrangement to monitor the teaching and content of Madrasa.
9. Central and state governments are legal authorities to sanitize and scrutinize the syllabus and content of Madrasas. If China and France can do it, why not India?

-By Kunal Raj, Tanmay Naik & Jenisha