DIR, July 3: Reports about an operation likely to be launched against Jamia Hafsa and Jamia Faridia have worried families of the students of the seminary from the Dir Upper region, but some of the parents have said they will not regret their decision of sending their children to the madressah even if they die there.

About a dozen girls and scores of boys of Gandigar area study at the seminaries of Lal Masjid. Some of the girls recently returned to Islamabad after prevailing over their parents.

“We are trying to contact our children in Hafsa but we have failed so far,” said Bacha Islam.

He said he had brought back his eight-year-old daughter Kausar, but she kept insisting that she wanted to return to the seminary. “This is Jihad and I must die in Jihad,” he quoted his daughter as saying.

Therefore, he said, he had to send her back to Jamia Hafsa. He said he had three girls and one boy in the seminary and he had no information about them.