By M. Burhanuddin Qasmi,
On February 25, 2008, Darul Uloom Deoband (DUD), the second largest centre of Islamic learning in the world after Cairo’s Al-Azhar, held an “All India Anti-Terrorism Conference” in Deoband. The clarion call given against terror by one of world’s most orthodox, nationalist and revivalist movements of India struck global headlines. Most news stories and analytical columns went with positive notes; Darul Uloom was lauded for the historic move. Writers and reporters have been wisely avoiding pinpointing on anything which may dilute the message against terror that Darul Uloom has about to convey.
Apart from 16 thousand participants, mostly madrasa administrators or DUD alumni, on the stage on 25th February were some 200 prominent scholars from all major Muslim denominations and institutions of India. To my notice an unwise rather unpleasant scene was on for a while over the stage that day which I ignored in my earlier columns in good faith focusing only on the anti-terror Deoband conference. It was when Maulana Mahmood Madani and Maulana Arshad Madani of Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind (JUH) chose to pose for media persons with flash cameras on the heart of the stage while other speakers were on serious discourse. Both the leaders could delay their interviews but they preferred to be like those Indian politicians who ‘bribe’ media for personal publicity.
Many present on the stage were not happy with the fact that Jamiat leaders were using Darul Uloom’s platform for their one-upmanship against each other. The fight ‘physically’ began on 6th March when Jamiat president Maulana Arshad Madani faced a no-confidence motion against him in the working committee meeting. He walked out of the meeting and Qari Usman, deputy rector of DUD, was appointed caretaker president by the Mahmood Madani group.
The Jamiat in-fighting and follow-up stories were marketed by Delhi based Urdu press and a few unknown Urdu dailies got selective popularity according to support to either group of the disputing factions and even at least one Urdu newspaper was launched afresh following the leadership crisis in one of India’s premier Muslim organizations established in 1919.
Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind is a leading Muslim organization and has genuine support base in all corners of the country and has mass pulling ability, credited to its historic virtues, and these are the facts which inspire a peasant from as far as Assam to volunteer it. Last month Mahmood Madani group tested Jamiat’s popularity and moved an ocean of humanity to Delhi’s historic Ramlila Ground. More than 300,000 Muslims lent their voices to terrorism condemnation along with a few other inter-religious and intra-religious leaders. The large gathering can best be interpreted as a creative innovation by Muslim religious leadership in democratic engagement within the mainstream Indian society.
On the contrary, arguably both the disputing factions of Jamiat are using Deoband’s anti-terror campaign to further their own ends. A genuine question strikes, why are they working day in and day out organizing ‘peace’ conferences while they — uncle and nephew — have caused their own peace at home and that of millions of people who love Jamiat or are anyway associated with it be compromised by their uncompromising attitudes towards the common good which lies in unity?
At the early stages of the ugly division in Jamiat, DUD’s rector Maulana Marghubur Rahman had offered an amicable solution to the dispute and invited both the factions to come to the table unconditionally where he would work as an arbitrator but the proposal was not taken positively by the two groups.
Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind was established by the Deoband alumni as front line organization to promote Deoband’s causes being a semi-political, social and religious organization. And it has been doing so since its inception without causing any harm whatsoever to its real founder– Darul Uloom. Thus all Deoband alumni and madrasas affiliated to Deoband are directly or indirectly close to Jamiat. It is as hard to separate them from each other as to separate water from milk. And rightly so, Jamiat’s division caused dangerous differences elsewhere in classrooms, staffrooms and even among senior madrasa administrators across India including DUD. A few DUD’s students vandalized the campus on 31st May night and favoured Arshad Madani group after the successful peace conference in the day by Mahmood Madani group in Delhi where most of the faculty members were present.
Following the incident the executive body (Shoura) of DUD on 15th June asked its office bearers who also hold positions in both factions of Jamiat to choose either of the two to keep DUD away from Jamiat fiasco. Shoura asked Maulana Arshad Madani and Qari Usman, both presidents in the two disputing groups in Jamiat, to choose one — either a post in Jamiat or at DUD. Arshad Madani is secretary of education at DUD while Qari Usman deputy rector. Notably the Shoura demonstrated fabulous maturity and aired a clear message ‘enough is enough.’ It has also conveyed laudably to both factions in Jamiat that DUD is not with any group and it must not be used for egoism. The Shoura of DUD has appealed to all madrasa heads, Ulama and students to abandon both fighting groups. This is perhaps the only strategy which can teach these two that they are leaders only when they have followers.
(Author M. Burhanuddin Qasmi is editor of Eastern Crescent, a Deoband alumnus and director of Mumbai based Markazul Ma’arif Education and Research Centre. He can be contacted at [email protected])