Education policy: The clergy’s latest jihad

Clerics break school windows against removal of verses from curriculum.

RAHIM YAR KHAN:

A group of clerics broke the windows of a government school and protested against the suggested removal of Quranic verses pertaining to jihad from the school curriculum.

A band of 16 clerics in Rahim Yar Khan protested on Monday afternoon against the proposed removal of the verses and said that they would launch a campaign in this regard.

“If the Education Board thinks that it can educate our children by denying them proper knowledge of all aspects of the Quran they are mistaken,” said Mufti Allahbukhsh Khan. The clerics proceeded to a local primary school and broke all the windows at the school. According to a school administrator, two students were injured, after glass fell on them. “This is outrageous.

How can they protest by attacking a school? What do primary school children have to do with the Education Board’s decision to change the syllabus?” said Government Primary School for Girl’s, Chak 16-SG administrator Nazish Waqar.

The clerics said that if any verses were removed from the curriculum then all religious and political parties would launch a joint campaign against the government.

A meeting of local clerics has been convened in this regard. Madaris Rabta Committee president and Jamiat Ulema Islam (JUI) district president Qazi Kahlilur Rehman said that they would resist any move to turn the country into a secular state.



Published in The Express Tribune, July 6^th, 2011.