Daily Times

PESHAWAR: Religious seminaries (Madrassas) do not promote sectarianism, terrorism, anti-state elements and other negative activities. The (Ullemas) religious scholars of seminaries stress on Islamic as well as worldly education. The government is itself a hurdle in the seminaries registration.

These views were expressed by Maulana Hussain Ahmad, provincial nazim, Wifaq-ul-Madaris and nazim-e-Taleemat of Darul-Uloom Jamia Usmania while talking to Daily Times. He said that around 18500 religious seminaries across Pakistan were registered and out of the total 5000 located in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

He added that it was western agenda to degrade the religious seminaries. However, he further said that madrasas were not providing any kind of arm training to its students.

He said that those who were unaware of the madrassas’ internal environment and even not visited any madarassa could believe on those images which are presented to them about the Islamic learning institutions.

“We are failed in media war against the madrassas while the anti-seminaries forces are successful in this regard”, Jamia Usmania, nazim-e-Taleemat lamented.

“There is various tough process of seminaries registration and a form is given by the federal government for seminaries registration. The requirement for a seminary registration is mentioned in that form. After filling the form, an inspection team visits to the concerned madrassa to ascertain what the seminary either is fulfilling the requirement or not”, said Mulana Hussain.

He said that every registered madrassa submitted its annual audit and educational performance reports in the federal registrar office.

He maintained that they had challenged all those who were against the religious seminaries but no one had brought any proof against the madrasas for being involved in any terrorist training and sectarianism. “We are providing Islamic and worldly education to all the students. And we do not know the skills of weapons operating, we just know to deliver the education” clearly said Hussain Ahmad.

The Darul-Uloom Jamia Usmania is affiliated with the Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education Peshawar (BISEP). The jamia give admission only to those students who are selected in the top 50 students of merit list applied for the admission across the province. Interestingly, he said, adding that the BISEP in Secondary School Certificate (SSC) arts group in annual exam of 2016 the first position holder was a student of Jamia Usmania.

Similarly, the said madrassa providing education from class 8 and due to fewer resources only humanities group subjects are teach to the students. The science group education needed a well-equipped laboratory and other basic facilities. He added that they had a program to provide education in science group also in near future.

“We do not give admission to a student until the student bring guardian with him. We also ask the income resources of the guardian.

He said that they did not allow their students to become part of any political or other organization. “The sole aim of our Islamic education is to create more and more Ullema,” he added.