Demonising madrasa is insulting freedom fighters

Abhay Kumar

BJP Member of Parliament and the Union Rural Development Minister Giriraj Singh is known for giving controversial statements. Recently he has claimed that madrasas and mosques pose a serious threat to security.

According to media reports, the BJP leader said “Bihar seems to be flooded by illegal (avaidh) madrasas and mosques. The situation is particularly grave in the areas bordering Nepal and Bangladesh”.

 Having made a wild allegation, he tried to intimidate people that “while the population of Muslims in the state is about 18 per cent, these areas have a higher concentration.

Moreover, there is a strong presence of the banned PFI across the state. So the situation poses a grave challenge to the country’s internal security”.

Afterwards, he began to criticise the JDU and the RJD-led Government in Bihar for appeasing the Muslim community and ignoring the threat of the mushrooming growth of “illegal” madrasas in the state.

But the statement of Giriraj Singh has been brushed aside by the leaders of the RJD and the JDU and they have alleged him of playing a communal card. 

The act of demonising madrasas is a part of Islamophobic discourse. The writings of orientalist writers perhaps first systematically demonised Muslim rule in their narratives and called Muslims essentially a religious community. 

The Orientalist authors created a false binary. For them, western society is based on the values of secularism, science, rationality and democracy, the Muslim society has an inherent bias against secularism, who are mired in “fanaticism” and “bigotry”. 

However, the war on terror discourse after the end of the Cold War has put fuel to Islamophobia discourse and it created a fear of madrasas. The demonization of madrasas is the continuation of the same Orientalist prejudice against Muslims.

Under the influence of Islamophobia, the madrasas were suspiciously looked at by both the right and unfortunately a section of the left. Such discourse was also used by majoritarian parties, such as the BJP, to polarise society on religious lines.

When Atal Bihari Vajpayee came to power, the establishment launched a campaign against madrasas and wild charges were hurled against madrasas.

They were linked to “anti-national” activities, the way Giriraj Singh has now spoken. But the charges were never proven. However, such an antiMuslim narrative is often invoked to target the minority community.

That is why, targeting madrasas or calling them a “den” of “anti-anti-national” activities is an act of insulting our freedom fighters and forgetting our anticolonial struggles.

Historians have proved that the Khilafat Movement in the early 1920s shook the foundation of the mighty British Empire. Under the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi and the Ulema of Deoband Seminary, millions of people turned against British rule. 

It is a historical fact that the success of the Khilafat Movement turned out to be the result of the rock-solid alliance between the Congress party and the Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind. Formed in 1919, the organisation was an integral part of Darul Uloom Deoband. 

A large number of nationalist leaders, who worked with the Congress party, had their madrasas background, including the Deoband seminary that was set up in 1866. 

Apart from Gandhi, Dr Rajendra Prasad, the first President of India, had intimate relations with madrasas. In his autobiography, Rajendra Prasad devoted the third chapter to fondly remembering his association with “Maulvi Saheb”, who “initiated” him “into the alphabet”.

Prasad, the big Congress leader from Bihar, went to Maktab in his childhood where he learnt Persian. It is where he read Persian texts such as  Karima,  Gulistan,  Bostan  etc.

Rajendra Prasad wrote in his autobiography, “The credit for the Persian that I learnt, goes entirely to this Maulvi sahib. We had started liking him and we felt sorry to leave when we had to go to Chapra’’(Rajendra Prasad, An Autobiography, NBT, New Delhi, 2018, p. 8). 

History is witness to the fact that a large number of Hindu scholars went to madrasas for education. Learning of Urdu, Persian and Arabic and going to madrasa was a common phenomenon. Similarly, Muslim scholars also learnt Awadhi, Braj Bhasha, Hindi and Sanskrit and went to the educational centres run by Hindu teachers. 

The composite culture of India and the historical reality are witness to the fact that madrasas were never called a place for breeding “anti-Hindu” or “antinational” feelings, the way Giriraj Singh