ISLAMABAD, Aug 16: President General Musharraf has promulgated an ordinance amending the Societies Registration Act, 1860, requiring the 11,882 seminaries in the country to get registered with the government.

The registration process will start with immediate effect and is expected to be completed by the end of November, Wakil Ahmed Khan, secretary of the religious affairs ministry, told Dawn on Tuesday.

He said the law had been amended in concurrence of the country’s leading alliance of seminaries ‘Ittehad Tanzeemat Deeni Madaris’ (ITDM) encompassing the five major wafaqs of various schools of thought.

The amendment settles a conflict between the ministries of education and interior and religious affairs, with the former two seeking a new law for registration and the latter agreeing with the ITDM to make use of the Societies Act.

Under the presidential ordinance, a new section has been added to the act. The section 21 provides that no seminary will operate without getting itself registered. The ordinance will apply to the federal capital only as Punjab, Sindh and Balochistan have separately promulgated similar ordinances. The NWFP government is expected to follow suit.

The new law also defines seminaries, which says that only such institutions which provide boarding and lodging facilities will be registered and maktabs operating in mosques will not need registration.

Official sources said the federal government had accepted the condition of five wafaqs of seminaries to get themselves registered under the 1860 Societies Registration Act by adding section 21 to it.

Talking to reporters in his office on Tuesday, Religious Affairs Minister Ijazul Haq expressed the hope that the registration process would be finalized by the end of November.