Chief of his own faction of the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (JUI-F) Maulana Fazlur Rehman accused the government on Thursday of threatening religious leaders to close down seminaries in Malakand division.
Talking to reporters following a meeting of the JUI-F provincial general council, Fazl said the Ulema were being pressed to shut down seminaries, which “is a blatant act of terrorism and extremism”. He said that this act was “illegal and against the Constitution”.
Calling for a protest against what he termed “obscenity and vulgarity in the name of culture in Swat”, Fazl said: “With the ongoing war on terror in this region, interests of the US and its allies might seem to be same but it is actually a campaign to eradicate the Islamic culture and civilisation in this region,” he added.
“Those who have taken up arms have been declared terrorists and those who dance are [considered] peace-loving. Western culture is being imposed on innocent [people] of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, especially those living in Swat and Malakand Division, in the name of culture,” Fazl said.
He said that the JUI-F had decided to make sure that all such moves were thwarted.
Answering a query regarding the implementation of Action-in-Aid Regulations in tribal areas, he said that these changes were a part of an international agenda “against Pakistan’s interest”.
He said that the JUI-F had called a meeting of all religious parties after Eid to discuss the restoration of the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA).
Published in The Express Tribune, July 29th, 2011.
COMMENTS (8)
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You can save those saminaries by joining zardari govt as u did before making billions. Otherwise let them go, a nest o terrorists.
Gov, schools that are functioning (not including ghost schools that exist on paper only) are in a sad state, and poor who cannot afford private schools choose seminaries. It’s about time we allocate a respectable budget for education and improve quality and quantity of education provided by the gov. Closing seminaries is not the solution. That will cause resentment and more illiteracy. It is far cheaper to open and operate schools as an alternate, rather than to allocate resources to strong arm tactics and force to shut seminaries. Just give all the population an option of quality education (including religious) at gov run schools, seminaries will vanish on their own, and so will Maulana. A Muslim in our ISLAMIC republic should not have to go to a seminary to get religious education, it is state’s responsibility to provide that.
This would be the only sensible act that the govt would ave committed. These incubators of extremism and terrorism need to be shut down.
Closing down extremist madrassas is long overdue -- something that makes so much sense I doubt whether Pakistan is seriously considering it.
Don't worry you bearded fruitcake. It should be quite obvious to an extreme extent that the religion is not in danger of losing support in Pakistan, even amongst the governing bodies. Such actions are an attempt at separating the government and making it a neutral body. As long as the majority supports a religion and calls for action dictated by it, that neutral democratic body will act in that direction. Leave it alone.
Dunno why is the government only threatening, why not closing. All seminaries should be closed down, registered and restarted with proper guidance, syllabus and its head should undergo proper Teacher Education training before undertaking to teach the young minds. These steps will go a long way to correct the myopic mind set we have associated with our seminaries and also modernise the training we are able to provide to our young minds.