Author: Sunando Sarkar
Publication: The Telegraph
Date: May 27, 2003
URL: http://www.telegraphindia.com/1030527/asp/bengal/story_2009450.asp
Weeks after the Vishwa Hindu Parishad
called for a probe into madarsas for "training jihadis", the National Commission
for Minorities has done something very similar: it has convened a meeting
of madarsa board chiefs across the country and asked them to "bring along"
copies of their syllabi.
The meet in the capital, however,
looks like being still-born. Originally planned for today (May 26), it
has already witnessed a deferment and, as of now, is scheduled for next
week (June 3). But, with Bengal taking the lead in refusing to send a team
there, doubts are being expressed about the level of participation in the
"all-India" meet and whether it will actually kick off.
The reason offered by the commission
is different from the VHP's. It has "expressed concern about the problems
faced by the madarsas in the country" but officials here feel the "real
motive" of the new panel, recently appointed by the BJP-led Centre, does
not differ from that of the Sangh's.
Besides the timing of the revamp-madarsa
call - it comes weeks after VHP chief Praveen Togadia's statement about
madarsas - which is a "giveaway", the wording of the invitation is sufficiently
vague to arouse "well-founded suspicions" of the minority institutions,
say officials. Though the commission said it was concerned about the "problems
faced by the madarsas", none of the institutions had actually approached
the panel with them, officials here pointed out.
"It is surprising that a body set
up to look into the interests of the minorities is echoing an organisation
that is perceived to be a threat to them," said one of the officials.
"That the National Commission for
Minorities has allowed itself to be hijacked by the Sangh is evident from
its belief that madarsas are exclusively minority institutions," he added.
West Bengal Board of Madarsa Education
president Abdus Sattar, who would not be making the Delhi trip, said much
the same. "Madarsas affiliated to our board have a sizeable percentage
of Hindu students (around 15 per cent of the total students) and an even
larger percentage of Hindu teachers," he said. "How can they be called
minority institutions when they are controlled by the government with an
autonomous board in charge just like other schools and colleges?" he asked.
West Bengal Minorities' Commission
chairman K.M. Yusuf supported the contention. "The scrutiny of madarsa
syllabi lies outside the purview of the commission," he said. "There's
already a constitutional body under the state school education department
and only the Union ministry of human resources development is legally empowered
to look into matters relating to educational institutions," he said, regretting
the confusion over the status of madarsas as educational institutions.
Doubts are also being raised about
the "competence" of the minorities commission, comprising only two Muslim
members (one of them a former head of a unit of the BJP's youth wing),
to scrutinise the madarsa syllabi.
