THE INDEPENDENT MADRASAS OF INDIA

Dar Al-‘Ulum, Deoband and Nadvat Al-‘Ulama, Lucknow

Abstract

In recent years Madrasas have attracted immense attention in India, more so than Mosques and other endowed institutions of Indian Muslims. This has partly been on account of the general perception that fundamentalism, Islamization, and extremist violence stem from the Madrasas. The part played by ‘Deobandism’ in Pakistan and Afghanistan is perhaps responsible for this image of Madrasas in South Asia.  Islamization in itself is not problematic. It becomes a problem when fundamentalism (and the intra and inter-religious fault-lines it accentuates) and violence (inter-faith conflicts leading to symbolic or actual suppression of diversity or bloodshed) come to be linked to the Madrasas. It is an ideology under-scoring the need to recover the traditional Islam. It is a process of establishing traditional beliefs and practices among ordinary Muslims. This is a philosophy purporting to be inspired by the premier Islamic seminary in South Asia, Dar al-‘Ulum in Deoband, India. The so-called Deobandi Madrasas, located in Pakistan, control a system of education, which nurtures a single vision of Islam with a view to raising a cadre of activist-scholars with a mission to counter a perceived external threat to Islam in South Asia, not least in Afghanistan.