LAHORE, Jan 21: There were 253,125 students in the 2,715 seminaries belonging to various religious organizations in the Punjab before the latest crackdown.

While a fresh census is being taken, a senior Punjab Police officer monitoring the jihadi groups, believes that most of the students, as well as administrators of the seminaries, have gone underground since. “We have asked police heads, district Nazims and others to collect fresh data,” he said.

Most of the seminaries were in southern Punjab. There were 971, 397 and 363 such schools in what used to be the Bahawalpur, Dera Ghazi Khan and Multan divisions.

In the north, the Lahore division had led with 356 seminaries. The Rawalpindi, Sargodha, Gujranwala and Faisalabad divisions had followed with 186, 164, 154 and 124 schools, respectively.

Out of these, a total of 1,333 schools belonged to the Brelvis and 1,069 to the Deobandis, while 192 were run by the Ahle Hadith and 113 by Shia administrations.

Brelvis also had the largest number of students, 117,931, followed by the Deobandis’ 99,907. The Ahle Hadith and the Shia trailed with 29,947 and 5,340 students.

In Lahore division, 157 seminaries had belonged to Deobandis, 149 to Brelvis, 45 to the Ahle Hadith and five to Shias. They had 19,781, 20,169, 7,074 and 610 students, respectively.

The Gujranwala division had 40 religious schools run by Deobandis, 95 by Brelvis, 14 by Ahle Hadith and five by Shias with 3,995, 10,140, 2,883 and 419 registered students, respectively.

The Rawalpindi division had 91 Deobandi and 70 Brelvi seminaries. It also had seven Ahle Hadith and 18 Shia schools. The number of students registered with them was 9,203, 9,137, 459 and 559 students, respectively.

In Faisalabad division, there were 52 seminaries run by Deobandis, 43 by Brelvis, 20 by Ahle Hadith and nine by Shias. They had 3,578, 7,527, 3,445 and 770 students, respectively.

The Sargodha division had 75 religious schools of Deobandis, 70 of Brelvis, 10 of Ahle Hadith and nine of Shias, with 6,973, 9,277, 2,548 and 475 students registered, respectively.

In Multan, 140 seminaries belonged to Deobandis, 175 to Brelvis, 30 to Ahle Hadith and 13 to Shias. They had 6,076, 12,878, 3,880 and 726 students, respectively.

In Dera Ghazi Khan division, there had been 146 religious schools run by Deobandis, 191 by Brelvis, 27 by Ahle Hadith and 33 by Shias. The number of students was 10,897, 13,565, 4,109 and 940, respectively.

The Bahawalpur division had 368 seminaries of Deobandis, 540 of Brelvis, 39 of Ahle Hadith and 21 of Shias with 38,404, 35,238, 5,549 and 841 students, respectively.

The officer linked religious extremism and sectarian militancy to the proliferation of seminaries, particularly in the Punjab.

Another officer said a team comprising officers from several departments was working on the issue. He said a report prepared by an intelligence agency had established the seminaries-sectarian terrorism link.

According to the police statistics, the officer said, there were only 150 religious schools in the area in 1947. The number increased to 210 in 1950, to 401 in 1960, and 563 in 1971. He said there was a steep increase in the number during the Zia years. In 1979, there were more than 1,000 seminaries in the Punjab alone.

The officer said a major factor in the proliferation of religious schools had been the Zia government’s decision in 1984-85 to induct graduates of the seminaries in the Education Department as Arabic teachers. He alleged that the Wafaqul Madaris diplomas and degrees were granted without any monitoring of the seminaries and formal examinations.

The following is a break up of the seminaries the number of students registered by them according to religious affiliations: