A CLASH between the ruling coalition and the clerical old guard over the Societies Registration (Amendment) Act, 2024, has been averted, with President Asif Zardari signing the said bill into law, and issuing a similarly titled ordinance. Through this legal endeavour, the state has come halfway, passing the original law to please the JUI-F, which had been championing it, as well as giving madressahs a choice of which government department to register with through the ordinance. The PML-N-led set-up had enticed Maulana Fazlur Rehman with the Act in order to get the 26th Amendment passed. Yet realising that the provisions of the bill could cause problems for Pakistan where international terror financing and money laundering commitments are concerned, the president refused to give his assent. Mr Zardari also felt that the new law clashed with the spirit of devolution, as education is a provincial issue. However, the clerics, under the banner of the five older madressah boards, dug in their heels, threatening to take to the streets unless the law was passed. Observers also felt that the new law would reverse the madressah reforms of 2019. But with the latest development, all stakeholders have managed to save face, as seminaries can either register with the Ministry of Industries and Production or the Directorate General of Religious Education, the body set up under the 2019 reforms.

Though a confrontation has been averted, the fact is that the core issue of madressah reform has been put in abeyance in order to please the clerical establishment. The ruling parties should not have used such a sensitive issue as a political bargaining chip. As this paper has previously stated, since madressahs are educational institutions, they should be overseen by the respective provincial education departments. There is no logic behind seminaries registering with the industries ministry as these are not industrial establishments. The political gamesmanship aspect aside, the state must not dither where the registration and regulation of seminaries are concerned. There is talk from official quarters of cracking down on militancy and extremism, yet such assertions will ring hollow unless the state knows how many madressahs there are in Pakistan, what they teach, how they are funded etc. For now, the ball has been kicked into the long grass, but Pakistan cannot afford to brush the madressah reform issue under the carpet.

Published in Dawn, December 31st, 2024