Zahid Hussain looks at the ‘University of Jihad’ in the town of Akora Khatak, near Peshawar:
Most of the pupils come from the poorest section of society and receive free religious education, lodgings and meals. Most of the madrassas have been isolated from the outside world for centuries. Students are brainwashed and the textbooks provide a one-dimensional world view that restricts their thought process.
Conditions in the schools are regularly condemned by human rights groups as crowded and inhuman. The day begins at dawn with morning prayer. A simple breakfast of bread and tea is served, followed by lessons, which continue until evening.
The students are subjected to a regime as harsh as any jail and physical abuse is commonplace. In many schools students are put in chains and heavy iron fetters for the slightest violation of rules. There are almost no extracurricular activities. Television and radio are banned. Teaching is very rudimentary and students are taught religion from a highly traditional perspective.
At the primary stage, pupils learn how to read, memorise and recite the Koran. Though the focus is on religious learning, some institutions also teach elementary mathematics, science and English.
The most dangerous consequence of the schools is that students emerge ill-prepared for any work except guiding the faithful in rituals that do not require great expertise. Job opportunities for graduates are few and far between. They can only work in mosques, madrassas or religious parties and their business affiliates.
The education imparted by traditional madrassas spawns factional, religious and cultural conflicts. It creates barriers to modern knowledge and breeds bigotry, laying the foundation on which fundamentalism is based. Divided along sectarian lines, these institutions are driven by the zeal to outnumber and dominate rival sects.
The rise of a jihad culture since the 1980s has given them a new sense of purpose. The number of madrassas multiplied and clergy emerged as a powerful political and social force. At independence in 1947 there were only 137 madrassas in Pakistan. Government sources put today’s figure at 13,000 with total enrolment close to 1.7 million.
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