By TwoCircles.net staff reporter
Patna: Madarsas are rising up to the challenges to change the public perception and misgiving about it. It has launched public interaction programme to educate people about its role.
Bihar Madarsas in co-ordination with Darul Uloom, Deoband has initiated a programme to remove suspicion and portray correct picture of Madarsas, which are only involved in imparting religious teachings and moral values for harmony, patriotism and brotherhood.
This programme will start in Bihar on 27th May, when prominent citizens, social activists, public representatives and media personnel will be taken to Jamia Madania Madarsas at Sabalpur near Patna. This visit will highlight functioning of Madarsas and will provide opportunity to interact with madarsas students.
“People have started viewing madarsas with suspicion due the wrong portrayal of the institution as place of fundamentalist teachings. This is why, it is necessary to dispel such myths and make people understand that madarsas are places of learning like other schools” said M A Shaban, one of the organiser.
In Bihar, there are over 10,000 madarsas and 1119 government aided madarsas. Rabita Madarise Islamia, which is the state level co-ordination body of the programme, has already charted the phase wise programme to cover all the prominent madarasa in the state.
Rabita is supported by All India Muslim Personal Law Board, All India Milli Foundation, Imarat-e-Shariah and others in this initiative. Similar move is also planned for other states like U.P, Maharashtra and West Bengal.
Jamia Madania has also planned a state level anti-terrorism conference on June 1st which will be attended by prominent Muslim leaders and scholars. This conference will also take up the issue of modernisation of madarsas.