Madrassah Study: Study Area

Madrassahs are prevalent all across the Muslim world and indeed also in some predominantly non-Muslim countries, specially in Europe and North America.

While some social science studies of madrassahs have been carried out in Africa1, no systematic study has currently been conducted in South Asia. There is a tremendous need for analysis of madrassahs in Pakistan, specially due to the proximity to Afghanistan – the focal area of America’s war on terrorism, and India’s claimed linkage between madrassah graduates and the regional conflict in Kashmir. An understanding of the madrassah phenomenon in Pakistan can thus also lead to ways of reducing conflict between two nuclear adversaries.

While historians differ about the motivation of Pakistan’s founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah, regarding the formation of an Islamic state,2 there is little doubt that contemporary Pakistani identity is anchored in Islam. The conflict in Kashmir is perceived by most Pakistanis to be a continuation of the struggle which led to the creation of Pakistan itself.3 Indeed, Pakistan was carved out of British India as a homeland for Muslims, and is one of only two countries in the post-colonial world (the other being Israel), to be created solely on the basis of religious identity. The significance of studying madrassahs in Pakistan thus merits specific analysis.

At the time of independence in 1947, there were only 137 Madrassahs in Pakistan. According to a 1956 survey, there were 244 Madrassahs in all of Pakistan (excluding East Pakistan, which became Bangladesh in 1971).4 Since then, even by official accounts, the number of madrassahs has doubled every ten years, with current estimates as high as 45,000.5

Some of these seminaries run on public philanthropy and are currently believed to produce indoctrinated clergymen of various Muslim sects. More orthodox Muslim sects have undoubtedly been radicalized by exposure to war, first in Afghanistan and Kashmir, yet the linkage between madrassah education and the perpetuation of these conflicts has not been studied in detail. However, the Madrassah problem goes beyond militancy. The curriculum of contemporary madrassahs often provides a constrained worldview which bears little resemblance to traditional Islamic education in historical context.5-5

There are five distinct types of Madrassahs in Pakistan, divided among sectarian and political lines.6 The two main branches of Sunni Islam in South Asia — Deobandi and Bareili—dominate this sector. Ahle Hadith/Salafi Muslims have their own schools, as do the shias, the doctrinal differences of these schools are often irreconcilable in an educational setting. The differences in demographic recruitment and placement between these sects has not been evaluated, and deserves close attention. For example the largest group of madrassahs is Bareili, which are diametrically opposed to the Wahabbi doctrine (which has received much media coverage), and yet have been linked to the Kashmiri conflict by the Indian government. Understanding the dynamics of madrassah recruitment, funding sources, and curricular differences between sectarian schools is critically important.

Previous Data Gathering by Researchers in Present Study

The research team for this project has wide-ranging field experience in Pakistan. The field research team leader authored a study almost ten years ago as a member of the Pakistani civil service on the rise of madrassahs in Ahmedpur district (attached as a sample work to this proposal). We have access to data sources within the government and the madrassah establishment based on our familiarity with the region that would be very difficult for most scholars to obtain.

Ahmedpur East sub district is in the Province of Punjab in Pakistan, the region has gained notoriety for being hub of sectarian terrorism and violence. One of the recently banned religious organizations “Jaish-e-Muhammad” (Army of the Prophet) has its headquarter and major following in the area, it is also regarded as a strong-hold of another banned organization “Sepah-e-Sahaba” (Army of Companions of the Prophet). These organizations had very close institutional linkages with the Taliban government in Afghanistan.7 Workers of these organizations have been charged with targeted violence against western targets in Pakistan after fall of Taliban. The key people belonging to Jaish-e-Muhammad have been charged with murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl.

The 1994 study in Ahmedpur was, in many ways, ahead of time; it uncovered many alarming trends and dimensions in the Madrassah movement, which subsequently proved correct. (Summary of study is attached). Yet it was a relatively modest undertaking with limited resources. Nevertheless, the presence of this data and the renewed effort proposed in this study will provide a rare temporal comparison over a decade.

The principal investigator of this proposal has had extensive experience in using social science research methods in conflict resolution, and has particular familiarity with Pakistan and Islamic education. The proposed project will combine the field knowledge and experience of both the principal researcher and the primary field collaborator to analyze the issue more thoroughly.

The growth of madrassahs has also been hypothesized to be a result of deeply embedded poverty in Pakistani society, specially rural areas and a breakdown of state services. In order to test this hypothesis, a specific analysis will be made of Madrassahs in Pakistan’s capital Islamabad in comparison to data from Ahmedpur. Unlike Ahmedpur, Islamabad is an urban center and relatively prosperous and rich in terms of economic opportunities and social services like health, education and employment. Yet, madrassahs are also found here.

Islamabad has been chosen as the urban case region for studying madrassahs because of the relatively high income and literacy of the area in comparison to Ahmedpur and the influence of Pathan immigrants in this area. Furthermore, Islamabad is the capital and will most likely be the first area where government reforms will be implemented. A sub-division (basic administrative unit in Pakistan) such as Ahmedpur, on average, has a population of approximately one million. Islamabad also has a population of about a million people. We can safely regard the two areas in which study will be conducted as representative samples of rural-urban dynamics.

1 Brenner, Louis (2001). Controlling Knowledge: Religion, Power and Schooling in a West African Muslim Society. Bloomington IN: Indiana University Press.

2 See for example, Jalal, Ayesha (1994). The Sole Spokesman: Jinnah, the Muslim League and the Demand for Pakistan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; Ahmed, Akbar (1999). Jinnah, Pakistan and Islamic Identity. London: Routeldge.

3 For an excellent analysis of the Kashmir conflict and broader Indo-Pak relations see Ganguly, Sumit (2002). Conflict Undending: India-Pakistan Tensions since 1947. New York: Columbia University Press.

4 Nadhr Ahmad’s 1956 survey quoted by Jamal Malik, “Colonialisation of Islam: Dissolution of Traditional Institutions in Pakistan”. (Lahore, 1996).

5 Singer, op.cit. 3.

5-5 See for example the account of traditional Islamic education in Spain: Menocal, Maria Rosa (2002). Ornament of the World: How Muslims, Christians and Jews Created a Culture of Tolerance in Medieval Spain. Boston: Little Brown and Company.

6 For a detailed contemporary analysis of various Muslim sects and the religious scholars that govern them see Zaman, Muhammad Qasim (2002 - forthcoming). The Ulama in Contemporary Islam: Custodians of Change. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press.

7 Rashid, Ahmed (2000). The Taliban. New Haven CT: Yale University Press.