By Nikhat Fatima, TwoCircles.net
Hyderabad: With a doctorate in Islamic studies, Dr Rafat Seema is an ‘Aalima’ and has been active in lending support to social causes from her student days. She is the founder of NISA, a woman’s organization through which she reaches out to the underprivileged.
When scores of Rohingya refugees first came to Hyderabad many organizations came forward to help them with food grains and clothes. Rafat Seema was also part of these drives.
“But being a scholar, my thoughts were different,” she shared with TwoCirlces.net, “I felt these material things will only provide help for some time and the people who are offering help will also stop after some time. After all, how long will people help? One day these refugees will have to fend for themselves. So why not give these people something that will not be exhausted? Something that will be of use to them for always? It was then that I decided that I can teach them to read the Quran, to read and write Urdu and English.”
Even as other organizations that Rafat Seema is part of were conducting health camps for the Rohingyas, many of whom had external injuries and pains due to the tiresome journey and the hardships they went through in their attempts to escape the massacre, Seema was soothing their pains with her kind words and counselling.
Seema asked Shamshuddin, one of the Rohingyas who was in charge of the group, if the womenfolk would be interested to learn the holy Quran. He wholeheartedly agreed and even gave space for the classes in his small house.
“For the first class itself as many as 70 women of all age groups gathered and their faces were beaming,” recalls Dr Seema.
She began her weekly classes with the help of another volunteer from her organization as she could not manage the large group.
Every week a volunteer accompanied her and several women made donations in the form of food grains, clothes and money. However, the volunteers would not come every day so she would take the class herself.
The trauma of the Rohingya refugees is unimaginable, she says, “Besides the food, clothes and medicines they needed some outlet to overcome. And the classes I took provided them with something to keep their minds occupied. Reading the Holy Quran had a soothing effect to calm their fears”.
After a year Dr Seema shifted her classes to another corner of the huge ghetto after realizing that many women needed the benefits of the class. She started a new batch in the house of Taha, another refuge, who helps the refugees by talking with donors and updating them about the needs of refugees.
After more than 3 years now, all the Rohingya refugees are all well settled in the pockets of the suburb of Hyderabad in Balapur, which is 15 kilometres from the main city.
Dr Seema’s students who are more than 100 are now able to read not just the Holy Quran but also the English alphabets, small words, they can add and subtract and write the numbers till 1000. The reason they picked up fast is she used to give them homework for the entire week.
“The interest of the women and the encouragement of their men is amazing. After the class, we talk about other issues. They tell me about their relatives who are in Bangladesh. Or about the marriages of the youngsters that have been fixed. Then I try to mobilize some fine clothes or a new set of cutlery for the marriage from the women of my organization,” Dr Seema said.
Dr Seema is not just their teacher but also their friend, counsellor, motivator and someone they can turn to in need of help.
For the other 6 days of the week, Dr Seema is busy with her organization Nisa Research and Resource Centre for Women, through which she creates awareness among Muslim women about their rights and helps them deal with their day to day problems.
She says women need to stand up for themselves and face the challenges without always depending on men.
She is also a director of another religious institute called Jamia Makarimul Akhlaq through which she helps children of the Rohingya refugees. The institute sends auto-rickshaws to the city once a week for half a day where the children are engaged in interactive sessions through which they learn to be worldly-wise. The children are provided with breakfast and lunch.
On other days the institute offers distance education to homemakers and dropouts.
Dr Seema ran a magazine by the name ‘Nisa’ to provide a platform for young female scholars but due to increasing costs, the magazine had to stop.
She also takes online classes in Arabic for women from all over the world. Her hands are always full of imparting education if not spending time with her grandchildren.
She is also associated with Civil Liberties Monitoring Committee and has actively participated in protests demanding justice for the innocent youth who were falsely implicated in the Makkah Masjid blast, in the murder case of Ayesha Meera and several other cases.
She also played an active part in helping the youth start afresh their lives after their acquittal in the Makkah Masjid case after their innocence was proved.
“If I can help someone even in a small way I feel happy. If we are privileged it becomes our natural duty to help those who need help. If not our existence has no meaning. A life without a purpose is meaningless. And my purpose is to help women realize their worth,” she said.