BOOK REVIEW

Madrasas in South Asia: Teaching Terror?

Edited by: Jamal Malik

Publisher: Routledge, London and New York

Year: 2008

Pages: 190


South Asia’s madrasas have increasingly come to be discussed in terms of their real or alleged security implications. This owes to numerous factors, particularly to America’s so-called ‘War on Terror’. Yet, surprisingly little empirical research has been done on the madrasas in the region. Wild generalizations, based on sensational exceptions, have led to untenable conclusions about all madrasas. This timely book discusses various aspects of madrasas in contemporary South Asia, warning us against making any facile assumptions.

In his introduction, the Germany-based Pakistani scholar Jamal Malik argues that far from being monolithic, South Asia’s madrasas display considerable variety: in terms of sectarian affiliation, approaches to ‘modernity’ and ‘modern’ knowledge, and relations with the state and non-Muslims. Hence the hazards of making any generalizations about them. Malik’s analysis is heavily Pakistan-centric, and he refers only in passing to madrasas in other South Asian countries. He points out that while some madrasas indeed have been associated with terrorism, particularly in Pakistan, this owes much more to the particular socio-political context in which they operate than to any inherent radical tendency in the madrasa system as such. Radicalism in the case of some Pakistani madrasas owes principally to their use by the United States and Pakistan in the war against the Soviets in Afghanistan, the Pakistani state’s use of Islamist groups, including select madrasas, in its war in Kashmir and increasing resistance to American aggression in Afghanistan and elsewhere. America’s so-called ‘War on Terror’, which has resulted in unimaginable loss of life and destruction in many Muslim lands, and has been used by ruling regimes in many Muslim countries to clamp down on internal dissent, has further fuelled radical tendencies in several madrasas.

Malik also makes the debatable claim that due to their ‘increasing economic and social pauperization’, sections of the ulema ‘tend to become increasingly radical’. He mentions only in passing, without elaborating, the crucial role of the ‘globalization’ agenda of Western powers, in which comprador regimes in Muslim countries play the role of subservient lackeys, and the mounting internal class and cultural contradictions within Muslim countries as key factors propelling radical resistance in selected madrasas. ‘Globalisation’, a euphemism for the contemporary form of Western imperialism, comes along with pauperisation of vast numbers of people in so-called ‘Third World’ countries and the imposition of Western consumerist and hedonistic culture.. This is perceived as threatening the cultural integrity of Muslim (and other non-Western) societies, and one reaction to this is radicalism as witnessed in the case of certain madrasas in South Asia, most particularly in Pakistan.

Saleem Ali, yet another Pakistani scholar, discusses the class basis of madrasa education in Pakistan’s southern Punjab region. He sees the madrasa system as functioning as a counterweight to feudalism. Madrasas provide free education, boarding and lodging to vast numbers of children from poor families, neglected by the state and oppressed by powerful landlords. He points out that sectarian strife in the region, that sometimes takes violent forms, particularly between Shias and Sunnis, owes not just to propaganda against other sects taught in the madrasas, but also to active external patronizing of selected madrasas by foreign governments.

Ali suggests ‘comprehensive land reforms’ in Pakistan to prevent peasants seeking refuge from feudal oppression in radical religious groups. This is, needless to say, obvious, but Ali’s optimism about ‘free market’ economics to bring this about is naïve, to say the least, and obviously quite unwarranted. His claim that ‘Such reforms can be undertaken through market mechanisms and instituted gradually to avoid capital flight’ strikes one as unduly optimistic. But his suggestion that the ulema of the madrasas could be encouraged to be exposed to alternative Islamic voices and to become involved in inter-sectarian and inter-religious dialogue is certainly welcome.

Cadland points out that the issue of madrasa education in contemporary Pakistan must be discussed not in isolation, but in the wider context of the country’s political economy. The Pakistani state, he says, spends only a fraction of its revenues on education, investing heavily in the subsidising of elite education, while ignoring the masses. This is the principal cause of the pathetic conditions of education in the country. It is also a major source of the popularity of the madrasas, which provide free education, boarding and lodging to their students, most of whom come from poorer families.

Reforms in the madrasas, Cadland argues, cannot be imposed from the outside, as the Pakistani state and America, for instance, have sought to do. Rather, he suggests, the Pakistani state must work for this alongside the ulema, particularly those whom he terms as ‘moderately-minded’, through genuine dialogue. He rightly points out that the oft-heard claim that the lack of teaching computers, English and the natural sciences is a major cause of the ‘backwardness’ and ‘radicalism’ of the madrasas is fallacious.

The remainder of the book deals with madrasas in other South Asian countries. In her piece, Usha Sanyal looks at two leading madrasas of the Barelvi sect in India to examine the process of the shaping of a distinct Barelvi sectarian identity. She sees this in the context of competing claims by different Muslim sects to Islamic ‘authenticity’, as well as efforts on the part of madrasa managers to ‘modernise’ their curriculum in order to receive state recognition and funding. Similarly, Arshad Alam compares two leading Indian madrasas, one Barelvi and the other Deobandi, tracing the process of formation of distinct sectarian identities, each set against and identified by opposition to the other. He claims that these (and other) madrasas are more concerned with teaching what they see as ‘true’ Islam, defined against what they brand as ‘false’ claims to Islamicity made by other Muslim sects, than with the othering of Hindus and Christians. He argues that the debate is an internal one, which rarely exceeds the Muslim community. Although highly contentious, this claim does point to the oft-ignored fact that for many ulema the ‘other’ within is often perceived as even more menacing than the ‘other’ without.

Readers might find the book obsessively concerned with Pakistan, but that is probably because Pakistani madrasas have been the most talked-about in the context of debates on madrasas and extremism. Certain crucial issues have been left out of the discussion, most notably the efforts of some ulema groups (as in India) to counter terrorism (of different varieties, including by Muslims, non-Muslims and the state ), new experiments in madrasa education made by sections of the ulema, the lively internal discourse among the ulema about madrasa reforms and so on. Despite this, and given the fact that little serious work has been produced on the madrasas of South Asia despite their being so much in the news, this book is certainly a welcome development.

(Yoginder Sikand runs a blog titled ‘Madrasa Reforms in India’, which can be accessed on www.madrasareforms.blogspot.com)

Education, Literature and Islam

Writings by: Mohammad Mujeeb

Edited by: Akhtarul Wasey and Farhat Ehsas

Published by: Shipra Publications, 115-A, Vikas Marg, Shakarpur, Delhi: 110092, Ph: 65277210. Email: info@shiprapublications.com

Price: Rs 750


Prof. Mujeeb was one of the most brilliant stars of the firmament of new ideas that the group led by Dr. Zakir Husain spread out over the Jamia Millia Islamia, which was both the birth-ground of a new educational philosophy and practice and a battle-ground of new ideas necessary to lead the Indian Muslim into a future of intellectual and spiritual freedom, a happy balance of faith and rationalism and a constructive synthesis of core Islamic and Indian civilizational values. This book represents all the shades and hues of the astonishingly diverse intellectual and academic expressions and achievements that Prof. Mujeeb was known for. Early years of the twentieth century saw many changes slowly but surely sweeping the Indian society. This movement of history was not as visible on the surface as it should have been, but neverthe-less many structures and patterns of thought and action, traditional views about the world and universe and perceptions about social values and objectives of life were under intense stress due to new ideas and thoughts impacting the western-educated middle class people in the country. What later came to be termed as a clash of tradition and modernity has its origins in the same period. Un-doubtedly the great Indian renaissance had already revolutionized the Indian mind during the nineteenth century and it had left many lasting marks on the traditional thinking and living. But tradition and the age-old customs were still intact to a very large extent and they did not encounter any prominent threat to their survival. But one thing was no doubt very disturbing even at that time. It was the unsettling effect of new ideas on the religious faith, at least of an extraordinarily intelligent and perceptive section of the urban Indian youth. This section not only started questioning the valid-ity and rationale of the religious beliefs and customs, but also tried to evolve altogether new forms of religious ideas and experience.

Hindus having being much ahead in receiving western educa-tion were the first to get influenced by these changes in thought pattern and views of the life and society. Naturally then, this sec-tion of society was much more prominent among Hindu middle-classes. The twentieth century came with new promises for this section which made itself much more prominent and expressed itself in many forms.

Muslims were no doubt much more tradition-bound and tied to their religious faith in a manner that no winds of change could be able to touch their inner core of religiosity and traditionalism. But the impact of rationalism driven by the enlightenment that Sir Syed Ahmad Khan heralded among Indian Muslims, left at least a more mentally alive and strong section of the Muslim society open to the changes that were becoming inevitably necessary. It was this section comprising energetic and promising Muslim youth which soon assumed the role of intellectual and cultural leadership of Indian Muslims.

This intellectually strong and demanding section of the Muslim society had a few skeptics, even atheists but taken as a whole, most of its representatives were strikingly balanced in their orientation towards tradition and religion. These intellectually and spiritually challenging people reinterpreted their religious and cultural tra-dition in a very creative manner and thus reinvented their rela-tionship with their past.

This book tries to represent as much as possible all shades and hues of the astonishingly diverse intellectual and academic expressions and achievements that Prof Mujeeb was known for.