Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The State Minister for Federal Education and Professional Training Engineer Bligh ur Rahman met with the representatives of the Ittehad Tanzimat Madaris-e-Deeniya to discuss the mainstreaming of seminaries operating across the country.

According to details, it was agreed at the meeting that the Ittehad Tanzimat Madaris-e-Deeniya would collectively adopt the syllabus of the Federal Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education (FBISE) for matriculation and intermediate classes.

Moreover, the Ministry of Federal Education and Professional training will endorse the establishment of the boards of the Ittehad Tanzimat Madaris-e-Deeniya according to the already established structure of intermediate and secondary boards.

The minister of state assured the participants that the matter related to the establishment of madaris’ boards would be discussed in the federal cabinet for its final approval. However, until the establishment of the boards, the Ittehad Tanzimat Madaris-e-Deeniya would be working under the existing system in place, in which Inter Board Committee of Chairmen (IBCC) issues certificates of equivalence to the students of seminaries.

Maulana Qari Muhammad Hanif Jalandhry while talking to Daily Times said; “The meeting was quite good and the government is looking serious to bring the madaris into the mainstream.”

He explained further: “The Ittehad Tanzimat Madaris-e-Deeniya will establish their own boards of intermediate and secondary education replicating the existing system of the Federal Board.”

He said that the representatives of the Ittehad Tanzimat Madaris-e-Deeniya lauded the efforts of the government to include compulsory Quranic education at the primary and secondary levels and urged the provincial governments to follow the step.

The meeting also decided that the Federal Board will provide capacity building trainings to the examiners, exams setters, paper-checkers and markers of the Ittehad Tanzimat Madaris-e-Deeniya according to their size. For Shahadahtul Aliya (Master’s degree) in Arabic and Islamic studies, the madrassa students would have to take exams in compulsory subjects i.e. English, Islamiyat and Pak Studies at the bachelors level.