Madrassas in Pakistan

The madaris rose as colleges of learning in the Islamic world in the 11th century, though there were institutions of learning earlier.George Makdisi, The Rise of Colleges: Institutions of Learning in Islam and the West, 1981: Edinburgh Univ. Press. pp. 10-24 They catered not only to the religious establishment, though that was the dominant influence over them, but also the secular one. To the latter they supplied physicians, administrative officials, judges and teachers.

Conditions in madrassas were "regularly condemned by human rights agencies" as "crowded and undisciplined" according to Gilles Kepel.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OLvTNk75hUoC&q=petro-Islam&pg=PA61|title=Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam|publisher=The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press|year=2002|pages=102–3|last1=Kepel|first1=Gilles|isbn=9781845112578}} A 1996 report of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, for example, complained of students being held "in chains".{{Cite journal|date=April 1996|journal=HCPR Newsletter|publisher=Human Rights Commission of Pakistan|volume=7|issue=2}}

After the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, American television commentators widely associated madrassas with violence or fundamentalism. Former Pakistani president Gen. Musharraf tried to introduce an element of nominal control as an overture to American pressure, which have by and large been considered a failure.

Estimates of the numbers of madrassas vary, but all agree their number has grown enormously, having expanded greatly during and after the rule of President General Zia-ul-Haq (1977–1988),{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=b9QqOMnCAq0C&pg=PA162 |title=Apocalyptic Realm: Jihadists in South Asia|first1=Dilip |last1=Hiro| publisher=Yale University Press |page=162 |year=2012 |isbn=978-0300173789|quote=After 11 years of Islamization by Zia ul Haq, the madrassa total then ballooned to 2801 with the Deobandis accounting for 64% of the total, and the Barelvis only 25 per cent. Situated mostly in Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and the megalopolis of Karachi. ... With the inflow of Saudi funds in these institutions, the curriculum began to combine Deobandi ideology with Wahhabism as reflected in the education imparted to students in Saudi Arabia. Wahhabi Islam divided the world into believers and unbelievers, and enjoined the former to convert the later to the true faith. This intolerance toward non-Muslims in encapsulated in the line that Muslim pupils in radical madrassas chant at the morning assembly: `When people deny our faith, ask them to convert and if they don't destroy them utterly.`}} who initially funded Deobandi madrassas with funds from his compulsory zakat collection which began in 1980.{{cite book |last1=Kepel |title=Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam |first1=Gilles |publisher=The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press |year=2002 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OLvTNk75hUoC&q=petro-Islam&pg=PA61 |pages=102–3|isbn=9781845112578 }}

Another benefactor was Saudi Arabia who, starting in the mid-1980s, sought to counteract help the Islamist Islamic Republic of Iran was giving to the assertive Shia minority in Pakistan, with "substantial funds" to expand conservative Sunni madrassas.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OLvTNk75hUoC&q=petro-Islam&pg=PA61|title=Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam|publisher=The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press|year=2002|pages=224|last1=Kepel|first1=Gilles|isbn=9781845112578}}

According to The News International, in 1947 there were only 189 madrassas in Pakistan but "over 40,000" by 2008.{{Cite news |first= Kamila |last= Hyat |title= No room for doubt and division |url= http://thenews.jang.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=137784 |work= The News International |date= 2008-09-25 |access-date= 25 September 2008 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20090904191543/http://thenews.jang.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=137784 |archive-date= 4 September 2009 |url-status= dead }}see also: {{cite book|last1=Mohanty|first1=Nirode|title=America, Pakistan, and the India Factor|date=2013|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan.|page=168|isbn=9781137323873|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ALtRCHjSndwC&q=%22over+40%2C000%22+madrassas+in+pakistan&pg=PA168|access-date=6 April 2015|quote=In Pakistan, in 1947 there were 250 madrassas, in 1987 it increased to 3000, and in 2008, there were over 40,000 madrassas, mostly funded by Saudi Arabia to teach Wahhabi Islam.}}

According to David Commins book, The Wahhabi Mission and Saudi Arabia, their number grew from around 900 in 1971 to over 8,000 official ones and another 25,000 unofficial ones in 1988.{{cite book|last=Commins |first=David |title=The Wahhabi Mission and Saudi Arabia |publisher=I.B.Tauris |year=2009 |pages=191–2|quote=Jamaati Ulama Islam ... figured as a fairly minor part of Pakistan's religious scene until the regime of General Zia al-Haq ... who used an Islamic policy to buttress his military dictatorship. Part of his policy to `Islamize` Pakistan was a campaign to expand religious education with funds for thousands of new madrases. Their number grew from around 900 in 1971 to over 8000 official ones and another 25,000 unofficial ones in 1988. With financial support from Saudi Arabia, Deobandi madrasas were part of this vast proliferation in religious education, much of it located in Afghan refugee camps that sprang up in the 1980s. This rapid expansion came at the expense of doctrinal coherence as there were not enough qualified teachers to staff all the new schools. Quite a few teachers did not discern between tribal values of their ethnic group, the Pushtuns and the religious ideals. The result was an interpretation of Islam that blended Pushtun ideals and Deobandi views, precisely the hallmark of the Taliban.}}

In 2002 the country had 10,000-13,000 unregistered madrassas with an estimated 1.7 to 1.9 million students, according to Christopher Candland.Christopher Candland, "Pakistan’s Recent Experience in Reforming Islamic Education" in Education Reform in Pakistan: Building for the Future, (Robert M. Hathaway, ed.), 2005: Washington, D.C: pp. 151-153 According to the New York Times, as of 2009 there more than 12,000 registered madrasas and more unregistered ones in Pakistan. In some areas of Pakistan they outnumber the underfunded public schools.

In 2013, according to a departmental official who spoke to Dawn News on the condition of anonymity, approximately 2,500 madressahs are registered with the Balochistan government, while the number of unregistered seminaries exceeds 10,000.Shah, Syed Ali (22 December 2013). "[https://www.dawn.com/news/1075574 Balochistan: madressahs the fallback option]". Dawn. Retrieved 24 May 2025.

In 2020, it was reported that there are more than 22,000 registered madrassas (with many more unregistered) teaching more than 2 million children.{{cite news|url=https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/child-sex-abuse-pakistans-religious-schools-endemic-70113903 |title=Child sex abuse in Pakistan's religious schools is endemic |author=Gannon, Kathy KATH |date=13 April 2020|work=ABC News|access-date=15 April 2020}}

{{Rquote|right|"No one thought to ask about what would happen next ... nearly an entire generation came of age in a peculiar all-male world where the only concern was the Koran, sharia law and the glorification of jihad"|Dina Temple-Raston, 2007{{Cite book

| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aK02wJ_6dEcC&pg=PA68

| title=The Jihad Next Door: the Lackawanna six and rough justice in an age of terror

| year=2007

| author=Dina Temple-Raston

| isbn=978-1-58648-403-3

| publisher=Perseus Books Group

}}}}

Most madrasas teach mostly Islamic subjects such as memorization of the Quran, Tafseer (Interpretation of the Quran), Hadith (thousands of sayings of Muhammad), usul ul hadith (rules of hadith), Fiqh and Usul ul fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence and principles of Islamic jurisprudence), Sarf and Nahw (branches of Arabic grammar), Arabic language, Islamic finance, Mantiq (logic), philosophy, classic Arabic literature and eloquence. Mastery of these subjects qualifies a student to become an Islamic scholar or cleric (maulvi or maulana).

In terms of religious doctrine, many of the madrasas are funded by Saudis groups and combine Deobandi ideology with "Wahhabism as reflected in the education imparted to students in Saudi Arabia government." Critics complain on intolerance in teachings as reflected in the line that "Muslim pupils in radical madrassas chant at the morning assembly: 'When people deny our faith, ask them to convert and if they don't destroy them utterly.'" Other Saudi madrassas, particularly schools in Afghan refugee camps, may provide an interpretation of Islam that "blends Pushtun ideals and Deobandi views, precisely the hallmark of the Taliban." The vast expansion of madrasas during the 1980s meant a shortage of qualified teachers such that "quite a few teachers did not discern between tribal values of their ethnic group, the Pushtuns and the religious ideals."

Madrassas teach Arabic and while there are over 70 languages in Pakistan, few Pakistanis speak Arabic. The Economist found that of the children who complete five years of primary school, only half are literate.{{citation needed|date=July 2022}}

• Darul 'Uloom Karachi,

Karachi

• jamia Al mustaphai,gujra wala,
• Jamia Faridia, Islamabad
• Jamia Al Dirasat al islamia Karachi
• Jamia Muhammadia, Islamabad
• Darul Uloom Haqqania, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
• Jamia-tur-Rasheed, Karachi
• Jamia Binori Town, Karachi
• Jamia Al-Kauthar, Islamabad
• Jamia islamia, Mirpur, Azad Kashmir
• Jamia imdadia, Faisalabad
• Jamia Naeemia, Lahore
• Jamia Ashrafia, Lahore
• Jamia SALFIA, Faisalabad.

Providing free room and board to impoverished students, and shelter from the privations of poverty, the primarily Deobandi madrassas had a powerful esprit de corps. After many years in "conditions of intense intimacy" with little or no contact with the outside world, Madrassa students tended to be "extremely devoted" to their teachers. The strict doctrinaire teaching based on memorization discouraged even "the smallest expression of free thought or individual will", and gave root to fanaticism and a willingness to fight "anyone designated" an unbeliever by the master—whether a Shiite neighbor, Indian soldiers, even other Sunni Muslims.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OLvTNk75hUoC&q=petro-Islam&pg=PA61|title=Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam|publisher=The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press|year=2002|pages=225|last1=Kepel|first1=Gilles|isbn=9781845112578}}

The madrassas have been called "the only realistic option" for the majority of Pakistani families to provide education for their sons. Another source (Sadakat Kadri) has stated that "absent an educational Marshall Plan, the hope of educating a literate breadwinner is about as bright a future as millions of families will ever get," and that the schools offer "shelter from the social storm ... camaraderie instead of chaos," for lower middle class Pakistanis.{{cite book|last1=Kadri|first1=Sadakat|title=Heaven on Earth: A Journey Through Shari'a Law from the Deserts of Ancient Arabia ...|date=2012|publisher=macmillan|isbn=9780099523277|page=196|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ztCRZOhJ10wC&q=Heaven+on+Earth%3A+A+Journey+Through+Shari%27a+Law}}

In some areas of Pakistan they outnumber the underfunded public schools. Within Pakistan, there has been a relative jump in their numbers over the past two decades. The primary concern with the explosion of the madrassa system is not the schools in general, but the implications for radicalized minorities in them. These schools have become the new breeding ground for radical Islamic terrorists, where the next generation is trained and groomed.{{Cite web |title=Pakistan's Madrassahs: Ensuring a System of Education not Jihad |url=https://www.brookings.edu/articles/pakistans-madrassahs-ensuring-a-system-of-education-not-jihad/ |access-date=2023-08-29 |website=Brookings |language=en-US}}

A 2008 US diplomatic cable expressed alarm that Saudi Arabian-financed madrassas were fostering "religious radicalism" in "previously moderate regions of Pakistan" as children from impoverished families were sent to isolated madrassas, and once there often recruited for "martyrdom operations".

“Graduates” of the madrassas are supposedly either retained as teachers for the next generation of recruits, or are sent to a sort-of postgraduate school for jihadi training. “Teachers at the madrassa appear to make the decision,” of where the students go next, “based on their read of the child’s willingness to engage in violence and acceptance of jihadi culture versus his utility as an effective proponent of Deobandi or Ahl-e-Hadith ideology/recruiter.”{{citation needed|date=July 2023}}

The spring break for Pakistani Madrassas is one of the key factors in the beginning of the annual Afghanistan fighting season.{{Cite news |title='Madrassas are emptying' for final US fighting season in Afghanistan |first=Carlo |last=Muñoz |date=19 July 2013 |newspaper=The Hill |url=https://thehill.com/policy/defense/312195-madrassas-are-emptying-for-final-us-fighting-season-in-afghanistan |access-date=2022-09-28}}{{cite journal |date=2017-07-09 |title=The End of Afghanistan's Spring Fighting Seasons and the Demise of the Afghan National Security Forces? |first=Barnett S. |last=Koven |journal=Small Wars Journal |url=https://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/the-end-of-afghanistan%E2%80%99s-spring-fighting-seasons-and-the-demise-of-the-afghan-national-secu |access-date=2022-09-28}}

{{Main|Women's education in Pakistan}}

There are almost 2,000 registered Islamic religious schools for girls, educating almost a quarter of a million young women and providing more than half of the candidates sitting graduate-level exams every year. Oxford academic, Dr Masooda Bano has said that the madrassas gave women economic and social opportunities.{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/may/14/pakistan-madrasas-islam-girls-women |title=All-female madrasas boom in Pakistan |author=Butt, Riazat|date=15 May 2009|work=The Guardian|access-date=16 April 2020}}{{cite news|url= https://www.npr.org/2019/01/10/682917845/pakistan-wants-to-reform-madrassas-experts-advise-fixing-public-education-first |title=Pakistan Wants To Reform Madrassas. Experts Advise Fixing Public Education First |author=Sattar, Abdul|date=10 January 2019|work=NRP|access-date=16 April 2020}}

The tens of thousands of pupils and graduates of Deobandi madrassas gave that school of Islam the ability to "intervene directly" in Pakistani political life and "to contest everything that appeared to compromise their view of the Islamic world order," according to political scientist Gilles Kepel.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OLvTNk75hUoC&q=petro-Islam&pg=PA61|title=Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam|publisher=The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press|year=2002|pages=222–3|last1=Kepel|first1=Gilles|isbn=9781845112578}}

After the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, the US government encouraged former Pakistani president Gen. Musharraf to do something about Madrassas. Musharraf tried to introduce an element of nominal control.{{cite web |last1=European Foundation for South Asian Studies |title=How Pakistani Madrassas Contribute to Radicalization Dynamics and Religious Terrorism in Indian Administered Jammu & Kashmir |url=https://www.efsas.org/publications/study-papers/how-pakistani-madrassas-contribute-to-radicalization-dynamics-and-terrorism-in-indian-j-and-k/ |website=www.efsas.org}} Two laws were passed: one to create state-controlled madrassas (model: Dini Madaris, 2001); the other to register and control them (2002). The first had moderate success, as some religious institutions registered in 2003 with the Pakistan Madrasah Education Board created by this law. However, the three alternative institutions it created suffer from organizational difficulties. The second measure proved unpopular with the madrassas, but the government has restricted some access of foreign students to the madaris education system.

Madrassas in Pakistan have been used to recruit jihadists and as a pretext to finance militancy as has been mentioned in the 9/11 Commission Report. For example, officials with the Lashkar-e-Taiba's charity wing, Jamaat-ud-Dawa, travelled to Saudi Arabia seeking donations for new schools, vastly inflating the schools costs to the donors – then siphoned off the excess money to fund militant operations.{{cite news| url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/dec/05/wikileaks-cables-saudi-terrorist-funding | location=London | work=The Guardian | first=Declan | last=Walsh | title=WikiLeaks cables portray Saudi Arabia as a cash machine for terrorists | date=2010-12-05}}

Ittehad-e-Tanzeemat-Madaris Pakistan is a federation of the five waqfs (seminary boards) in Pakistan, representing the different schools of Islam – AhleSunnat Wal Jamaat Deoband, AhleSunnat Barelwi, Ahl-e Hadith, Shia and Jamaat-e-Islami. Muhammad Muneeb ur Rehman is the president of Ittehad Tanzimat Madaris-e-Deeniya Pakistan.{{cite web|url=http://www.ziaulummahfoundation.com/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100630104155/http://www.ziaulummahfoundation.com/ |archive-date=30 June 2010 |url-status=dead |title=Darululoom Muhammadia Ghousia Bhera Sharif |access-date=28 July 2015 }}

{{main|Directorate General of Religious Education}}

The Directorate General of Religious Education (DGRE) is a governmental body established in 2019 to regulate and mainstream religious seminaries. The DGRE was set up as a significant step towards integrating religious seminaries into the mainstream education system. It facilitates the registration of seminaries and operates as a facilitation center for them. With its head office in Islamabad, the DGRE has 16 regional offices across the country. It has registered around 5,000 seminaries nationwide, aiming to create equal opportunities for all students and bridge the gap between religious and modern education.

In addition to the South Asian Dars-i-Nizami curriculum, the students read books in Urdu as part of comparative religion or training in the beliefs of the sub-sect (maslak).{{citation needed|date=December 2014}} These texts are taught in a manner in order to promote understanding of differences and similarities as they exist, with the stated goal of respect for human diversity.{{citation needed|date=December 2014}} Subjects such as Western ideologies — capitalism, individualism, freedom, feminism, socialism, democracy, human rights are discussed in the context of how they relate to the Muslim thought and identity prevalent in the schools.{{citation needed|date=December 2014}}

• Directorate General of Religious Education
• Blasphemy in Pakistan
• Education in Pakistan
• Freedom of religion in Pakistan
• {{section link|International propagation of Salafism and Wahhabism by region|Pakistan}}
• Islam in Pakistan
• Islamic schools and branches
• Islamization in Pakistan
• Pakistani textbooks controversy
• Sectarian violence in Pakistan

{{Reflist|30em}}

• Ali, Saleem H. 2009. "Islam and Education: Conflict and Conformity in Pakistan's Madrassas." Oxford University Press.
• Candland, Christopher. 2005. ‘Pakistan’s Recent Experience in Reforming Islamic Education’. In Hathaway, Robert. M (ed). 2005. Education Reform in Pakistan: Building for the Future Washington D.C: Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. pp. 151–165.
• Hartung, Jan-Peter and Reifeld, Helmut. 2006. Islamic Education, Diversity and National Identity New Delhi: Sage.
• {{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OLvTNk75hUoC&q=Jihad%3A+The+Trail+of+Political+Islam+By+Gilles+Kepel |title=Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam|publisher=The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press|year=2002|last1=Kepel|first1=Gilles |isbn=9781845112578|access-date=26 November 2017 |ref=JKJ2002}}
• Makdisi, George. 1981. The Rise of Colleges: Institutions of Learning in Islam and the West Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
• Malik, Jamal, ed. 2008. Madrasas in South Asia: Teaching Terror?. London and New York: Routledge.
• Malik, Jamal, 1996. Colonialization of Islam: Dissolution of Traditional Institutions in Pakistan. New Delhi: Manohar Publications, and Lahore: Vanguard Ltd.
• {{citation |last=Moj |first=Muhammad |title=The Deoband Madrassah Movement: Countercultural Trends and Tendencies |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mbm2BgAAQBAJ |year=2015 |publisher=Anthem Press |isbn=978-1-78308-389-3}}
• Rahman, Tariq. 2004. Denizens of Alien Worlds: A Study of Education, Inequality and Polarization in Pakistan Karachi: Oxford University Press. Chapter 5.
• Robinson, Francis. 2002. The Ulama of Farangi Mahal and Islamic Culture in South Asia Lahore: Ferozsons.

{{Education in Pakistan}}

Category:Islam in Pakistan