Ulema conference adopts resolution urging govt to maintain existing system of religious schools

Shamim Shahid

Peshawar: Amid the ongoing tussle between the government and the JUI-F over the Societies Registration (Amendment) Bill 2024 that deals with the registration of seminaries, party chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman has accused the incumbent regime of creating divisions among religious scholars after the latter called for “keeping madrassas issue separate from politics”.

“Conspiracy being hatched to create division among the clerics […] why are scholars being pit against each other,” the religio-political leader questioned while addressing a press conference in Charsadda on Monday.

Maulana Fazl remarks came shortly after the conclusion of the Conference on Madrassa Registration and Reforms, wherein a resolution urging the government to maintain the existing system of religious schools was approved.

During the conference — which was attended by scholars and administrators of religious institutions from all schools of thought, the clerics called against turning the madrassas registration issue into a “political arena”.

Reacting to the conference, Fazl said that his party doesn’t want confrontation with the state, but registration of seminaries. “They wanted to give us a new system in 2019, but it was just an agreement,” he said.

Following the agreement, the Directorate General of Religious Education (DGRE) was established under the executive order.

The JUI-F chief said there had been an agreement on the madrassas registration bill before the passage of the 26th Constitutional Amendment, and a draft was prepared.

“All relevant stakeholders, including the agencies, agreed on the bill, which was later passed by the National Assembly and the Senate,” he said, asking why the amendment bill was returned by President Asif Zardari.

He further said that every seminary was “free to register itself anywhere”, then why they were being brought under the control of the directorate. “They [the government] were associating the seminaries with an act or agreement,” he said, adding: “We are affiliating the madrassas with law.”

In current circumstances, he said, they were not willing to accept any proposal tabled by the government.

Fazl asked the government to focus on the country’s security situation amid rising terror attacks in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan. “Focus on the country, we are here to save madrassas,” he added.

Furthermore, the JUI-F chief claimed that armed groups were present in both restive provinces — KP and Balochistan — during the February 8 general elections. “In both provinces, religious and nationalist parties were kept out of the assemblies.

He also accused the authorities of pushing the seminaries towards extremism, alleging that they want to control the religious seminaries on orders of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the United States and the West.