ASK MAULANA — Your Questions, Answered

such as English. I myself received a traditional madrasa education and learnt English and ‘modern’ subjects on my own, after I graduated. I feel that if madrasa students are forced to study ‘modern’ subjects in addition to the subjects in the existing madrasa curriculum, it would be too much of a load for them to bear. It might destroy the very fabric of the madrasas'. In recent years, a small number of these specialized institutions for madrasa graduates that you refer to have been established in India. How do you look at this phenomenon? I think this is a very welcome development. However, it needs to be done in a more organized way. What many of these institutions lack are good teachers motivated by a missionary zeal. It won’t do to have just professional tutors. I strongly feel that more important than the curriculum are the teachers. In my days in the Madrasa tul-Islah in Azamgarh, we had teachers who worked with missionary passion. They instilled in us the spirit of enquiry, which is the mother of all knowledge and without which you cannot progress. This tradition must be revived. Presently, we have no institutes for training madrasa teachers. They need to be trained in pedagogical techniques, child development and so on. I think this is one issue that Muslim organizations must focus on. How do you think the rigid dualism between the madrasa trained ulema and the ‘secular’ university-trained Muslim intelligentsia can be bridged? In my childhood, this dualism was not so apparent. At that time, the secular educational system did not lack ethical or moral values, but today the situation is very different. I suppose this is a result of wider social changes. You cannot create an institution like an island. Neither madrasas' nor secular schools are islands, cut off from the outside world. They are both influenced by the wider society. A feasible way to overcome this educational dualism is by promoting greater interaction between students and teachers of madrasas' and those of schools and colleges, including both Muslims and others. In the past, there was this sort of interaction. Many Hindus used to study in madrasas', but not so now. Presently, there is very little such interaction between the ulema and products of secular educational institutions, and that is one reason why there is such a glaring lack of understanding between them.