LAHORE, Dec 22: The government and leaders of five main chains of seminaries reached an agreement here on Thursday under which a new legislation will be introduced for enlisting madressahs. The agreement was finalized in a two-and-half hour meeting between federal Religious Affairs Minister Ijazul Haq and Mufti Muneebur Rahman, Dr Sarfaraz Naeemi, Maulana Saleemullah and Qari Hanif Jullandhari of Ittehad Tanzeemul Madaris Deniya. Federal secretary Wakeel Ahmad Khan was also present.

The government is reported to have removed all reservations of the religious leaders regarding the earlier ordinance and promised to give weight to their opinion in the new enactment.

The three-point agreement says that the Dec 31 deadline for registration of seminaries has been withdrawn while a new form seeking details of religious institutions would replace the earlier one.

In the old form, religious schools were to submit their annual performance report and get their accounts audited from the registrar of cooperative societies.

In the new form they are required to submit only academic performance reports while their accounts can be audited by any public or private auditor and they will have to submit a copy of it to the registrar.

Madressahs have also been allowed to include comparative study of religions in their syllabus while earlier this was banned in the name of checking sectarianism and militancy.

A new clause has been added to the form under which a madressah having more than one campus or branch will not be required to enlist other branches separately.

The agreement calls for tabling the ordinance before the parliament and all the four provincial assemblies for proper legislation as soon as possible.

Speaking on the occasion, Mufti Muneebur Rahman said if during the legislation process the government amended the law without prior consultation with them they would not be bound to abide by it.

Mr Haq told reporters that the new ordinance would soon be placed before all the legislative assemblies for enactment. He said all religious schools, except those located in the federal territory, would be registered by provincial governments, he said.