JAVEED BEIGH
Jammu and Kashmir had been a Hindu majority area as part of Akhand Bharat for centuries. The region derives its name from Maharishi Kashyap. Islamization of region started in the 14th century with the rule of Sultan Dynasty and soon became a Muslim majority region due to persecution and forced conversion. Muslim rulers ruled for over five centuries. However even during the reign of Muslim rulers the bureaucracy was always dominated and controlled by the Kashmiri Pundits who formed less than 20 percent of the population. In the 19th century Maharaja Ranjit Singh, the great Sikh ruler, gave Kashmir to his Dogra commander Gulab Singh to rule and thus a Muslim majority region came under the rule of a Hindu ruler. The UTs of Jammu and Kashmir has been a disturbed area for over 33 years now, effecting the security scenario of the country. Kashmir region sharing its boundaries with India’s two hostile neighbors only compounds the issue. Kashmir remains the unfinished business of the partition between India and Pakistan. Both the countries being nuclear states has only internationalized the issue and gained prominence. Madrassa is an Arabic term derived from the root word ‘dars’, which connotes a learning process carried through drill lesson. The word ‘Madrassa’ generally means education institution. A large number of Kashmiri Muslims, especially from the financially weaker classes, send their children to Madrassas as they can’t afford the normal schools. It has more to do with financial viability of an individual than his religious leaning as Madrassas are centres of free education and generally offer free boarding and lodging. These institutions are like seminaries which impart religious teachings such as Quran and Hadith besides rudimentary knowledge of other subjects.
The institutions are run in old traditional ways and the teachers’ only qualification being his knowledge of Quran and Hadith. Such education would hardly entitle him for a job in any firm or government establish. Union Territories of Jammu and Kashmir have over 500 madrassas with over 65 percent being loc in Kashmir. As brought out earlier, 90 percent of the students are from financially weaker sec of the Muslim population, who also happen to be the main catchment areas for recruitment in the militant cadre. Radicalisation at an early and impressionable age in madrassas helps in their indoctrination. The madrassa environment emphasizes unquestioned obedience, where discussion and reasoning is not encouraged. So much so that it turns young students into “Robots” who are trained to follow the Maulvi, without using his intellect or common sense. The sys of education in madrassas of memorizing all the verses of Quran without actually understanding their real meaning go a long way in creating such “Radical Robots” who are the foot soldiers on which terrorism thrives. There is a complex and controversial nexus between education, religion and terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir. Some thinkers consider Madrassas, institutions fueling radicalization and thus assisting terrorism by influencing and indoctrinating young impressionable Muslims. The Commission report on 9/11 termed Madrassas “incubators of violent extremism”. Muslim Scholars /radicalized Maulvis to justify terrorism or Jihad try and differentiate religious terrorist attacks from other forms of terrorism. They emphasize that religious terrorism or an act of violence is often based on internal aspects of religion such as scriptures, sacred texts, traditions and historical examples. Thus, such violence is the divine duty of every devout/ pious Muslim. Finally, Bruce Hoffman (Hoffman, 1999) says “religious terrorism has three special else; using religious beliefs and scriptures to justify violence against people, considering apocalyptic images of destroy as a required and essential part of their holy mission and existence of clerical figs in leadership positions. The Talibs were extensively used by US and Pakistan to drive out USSR from Afghanistan and the same formula is being followed in Kashmir. To quote Thomas Sowell “Education is not merely neglected in many of our schools today, but it is replaced to a great extent by ideological indoctrination.” This statement is very apt for the madrassas of Jammu and Kashmir which have become the main breeding ground for terrorism in Kashmir.
Religious radicalisation is the primary cause of rise in terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir. A state which once prided over its ‘KASHMIRIYAT’, Sufism and tolerance can no longer claim to be practicing the softer form of Islam. Ground realities confirm that KASHMIRIYAT was dead and buried in Kashmir when Pundits were driven out of Kashmir in 1989 and 1990 without a single visible opposition from any of the saner Muslim majority. What we witness today in Kashmir is the radicalized form of Islam (I don’t know if there is a softer or more tolerant form of Islam) and madrassas have played a major role in leading to the present sit. Today the Kashmiri youth categorically rejects the home coming of Kashmiri Pundits. Well if that be the case, can there be any reasonable political solution to the Kashmir problem. Expecting Pakistan to give up sp to terrorism in Kashmir is living in a make belief world. Why should a hostile country give up the strategy of “death by a thousand cuts”. It’s a perfect strategy by an economically and militarily weaker adversary reaping disproportionate benefits for its efforts against a much stronger en. It is for the Kashmiris to realize what is good for them and their future generations. Should they continue to depend on a country which cannot keep its own house in order and has to go around the world with a begging bowl to sustain its economy or to come along with a country which is a thriving democracy and economic power respected by even the other Muslim nations of the world?
The world and the media turned their attention towards the madrassas only after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, as there was a growing perception that terrorism in the Middle East, Central, and Southeast Asia region is fuelled by these madrassas. There is a dire need to modernize the Madrassas and review their curriculum. Besides religious teaching equal emphasis should be on other subjects which would make the student eligible for jobs in other fields. The teachers appointed in madrassas should have a min qualification and their learning should be monitored. The madrassa curriculum should be strictly monitored. The common curriculum in madrassas, in all regions, is the Islamic studies and acquisition of greater understanding of Islamic principles that govern routine lives of the Muslims. Therefore, subjects such as Fiqa (Islamic law), Hadith (Prophet’s saying), Sunnah (Prophet’s traditions) and Tafseer (interpretation of the Quran) form the crux of madrassa curriculum. Whereas, most madrassas in Pakistan teach only religious subjects, many madrassas, such as the ones in Egypt, Indonesia and Bangladesh, also teach secular subjects as additional subjects in their curriculum something that must be introduced in the Indian madrassas as well. Education should be compulsory and free between 6 and 16 years for children in government schools. Parents should be encouraged to enroll their children in schools, be they government or private. A parent refusing to enroll his child in school should be liable to lose his government job and any freebees or subsidiary that is granted by the government. The education standard of government schools should be improved. This requires strict monitoring by the government machinery. Armed forces and PMF can also play a role a major role in established this sys across the valley.
No governmental aid to non-affiliated/non registered madrassas. There is a need to regularly monitor the working of these madrassas. Main objective is to clear doubts on the role of madrassas, since they have been perceived as breeding ground for terrorists and fostering anti-social else. The state should carry out regular inspections of these places in order to keep a check on the info disseminated in these spiritual schools. Certain madrassas are though affiliated to State Madrassa Board however, to enhance the education standards they should also be affiliated with CBSE, ICSE or state boards giving opportunity to its students to stand shoulder to shoulder with students of government/ public schools in any competitive examination. There should be an option providing the student to opt for an optional subject of Islamic education.
Education being a tool of social transformation needs to keep pace with new ideas and tech. What needs to be asked is if these madrassas are contributing to new thought that could lead Muslims on the trajectory of progress and prosperity, enable the community to embrace pluralism of India, imbibe ideals of democracy and secularism and allow them to build bars of understanding with other communities. There is a pressing need to change the political narrative in Kashmir to fight radicalization. For this, the 3 M’s of Kashmir Mosques, Madrassas and Media need to be controlled and revamped to serve the future generation of Kashmiris for a brighter future.