ISLAMABAD, Aug 30: The Tanzimul Madaris Ahle Sunnat (Barelvi) on Tuesday rejected registration of seminaries under the amended law and said it would not cooperate in the process unless their reservations about changes made in the law were removed.
Earlier last week, the Islamabad chapter of Wafaqul Madaris (Deobandi) had announced not to get their affiliated seminaries registered and had constituted a 19-member committee to deal with the government on the issue.
Speakers at a convention organised here by Tanzimul Madaris on “Religious institutions and contemporary needs” also said that they would not abide by the government’s dictates on the question of syllabus nor would they stop teaching the concept of Jihad as it was in the Holy Quran and Hadith.
They rejected allegations that some religious schools were giving militancy training to students.
A large number of scholars, including the Tanzim’s chief, Mufti Munibur Rahman, and Dr Sarfaraz Naeemi and Minister for Religious Affairs Ijazul Haq addressed the convention.
MMA president Qazi Hussain Ahmed also attended the convention but made no speech.
Mufti Munib said that religious leaders wanted a dialogue with the government on all issues concerning seminaries, but would not compromise on the independence of their institutions.
He said the government should carry out registration under the 1860 Societies Registration Act. He added that a large number of seminaries were already registered under the act and there was no need for fresh registration.
He pointed out that the alliance of five federations of religious schools “Ittehad Tanzeemat Madaris Deeniah” had reservations about the amended ordinance, especially its provision about submission of their audit reports to the registrar.
He described the government’s policy of deporting foreign students of seminaries as discriminatory and violative of the Constitution and human rights. He called upon President General Musharraf to personally intervene and review the policy.
He also called for government-ITMD dialogue to settle all outstanding issues.
Mr Ijazul Haque said that the seminaries were playing the role of NGOs and urged them to promote moderation in society.
He said the government was distributing registration forms through the ITMD and it was the first time in nation’s history that an ordinance had been prepared in consultation with the ITMD.
The minister faced some embarrassment when the participants started chanting slogans against him when he talked about promoting enlightened moderation.
Later in a brief chat with reporters, the minister said that the government would initiate action only against those seminaries which would be found involved in preaching hate and promoting extremism.
Dr Sarfaraz Naeemi told the audience that the Tanzim had the following of 3542 seminaries in the country and its students had always played a role of honorary ambassadors of the country.
He criticised the government’s decision of deporting foreign students and said it was strange that while “we are expelling them India was providing facilities to foreign students”.
He said that English, Urdu, Mathematics and General Science were already part of the curricula of seminaries.
