Wishing thinking of a Muslim-appeasing government... which may, instead, aggravate the problem of radicalism amongst Muslims.
In the May 2011 Assembly election in the State of West Bengal (India), the All India Trinamool Congress (Trinamool Congress, or TMC) party, headed by Ms Mamata Banerjee, ended the 34-year Marxist rule. Trinamool Congress could win the election thanks to Muslim votes through naked appeasement of Muslims on the backdrop of the previously sweet and long-running Left/Communist-Muslim relation turned sour due to the Nandigram incident.
What Mamata Banerjee promised to win Muslim votes
In her election campaign, Mamata Banerjee pledged many unfair, illegal and undemotratic incentives to Muslims to win their votes. Some of these promises are:
Though it is unconstitutional to preserve government jobs on religious basis, Mamata, as the railway minister of the central UPA government, promised that she would create 50,000 railway jobs especially for Muslims.
In West Bengal, it would need a microscope to trace Urdu speaking people. Even then she said that Urdu would be raised to the status of the ‘second language’.
She promised build more Islamic schools or madrasas, supposedly, to raise the educational standard of Muslims.
She also promised that most of the madrasas, which are now waiting to get government affiliation, would be affiliated and so on…
Mamata begins madrasa affiliation
After coming to power, Mamata Banerjee declared that her government will stick to its declared election-time pledges and would implement them without delay. She, however, acknowledged that some of the policies her government implements may turn mistaken due to her inexperience and undertaken in haste, but she pledged to carry on anyway. To that end, the government has started the task of affilating nearly 1,000 unauthorized madrasas in the state. It is a gigantic project, and an illegal religious one in a secular state. And although she has said that the government would not take any financial responsibility for the implemented improvements of the madrasa education, it will certainly be impossible for the government to shirk its financial liability for a project it is implementing.
According to reports in several local newspapers, the board of ministers of the TMC government, advised by a group of intellectuals, have concluded that more madrasas should be set up in the state for spreading education amongst Muslims that would help them coming out of abject poverty and religious fanatism. They also believe that modern science and mathematics should be taught in every madrasa, which would help them developing a rational mind and get rid of religious dogmatism. They also maintain that such modern education in madrasas would turn Muslims tolerant toward other religions, which would help the rise of a tolerant Islam in the state. It is needless to say that this kind of expectations are simply wishful thinking of the think-tank and reflect gross ignorance of the said ministers and intellectuals about Islam and the madrasa system of education.
What is the madrasa system of education?
Historically, the madrasa education system has been based on teachings of the Koran and Hadith. Muslims believe that their Holy Book, the Koran, has been revealed by the Islamic God (Allah) and hence is immutable, while Hadiths are compilations and documentations of the saying and speeches, opinions and crucial decisions of Prophet Muhammad during his propehtic career. Most Muslims also believe that the Hadith utterances of Muhammad were also divinely inspired. So, messages of both the Koran and Hadiths are of divine nature and equally important. More importantly, Muslims believe that Islam is the best religion in the world, and it must dominate the entire world eventually.
So, whatever might be the official status of a madrasa, the text of the Koran and Hadith must constitute the core of the education curricula. The most fundamental teaching of the Koran is that human beings on the earth are not equal: those, who believe in the Koran and the prophethood of Muhammsad, are pious Muslims (Momins); and those, who do not, belong to the despicable community of kafirs. In the eye of Allah, these kafirs are His enemies and no better than beasts. Hence, Allah instructs Muslims to mount armed Jihad against them, involving atrocious torture and killing, as well as, to burn them and their houses, loot their belongings, take their women and children as captives, keep the captured women as sex-slaves, and so on. A few hateful-toward-the-kafir verses of the Koran are:
- “We have created, for hell, many genii (races) of men, ….and they are like brute beasts” (7.179);
- “Verily, those who disbelieve our signs, we will surely cast them to be broiled in the hell-fire, so often as their skins shall be well burnt, We will give them new skins in exchange, so that they may taste the sharper torment” (4.56) ;
- “Whosoever followeth any religion other than Islam, it shall not be accepted of him in this life, and in the next life he shall be of those who perish” (3.85);
- “I will cast a dread into the hearts of the unbelievers” (8.12);
- “Therefore cut off their heads, and strike off all the ends of the fingers. This shall they suffer because they have opposed Allah and His Prophet, and whosoever shall oppose Allah and His Prophet, verily Allah will be severe in punishing them” (8.13);
- “moreover, as for the non-believers, I will punish them with grievous punishments in this world, and in the world is to come” (3.56);
- “Allah loves not the unbelievers” (3.57);
- “they shall suffer a grievous punishment” (3.77).
The all-wise Allah has also created seven hells for punishing the kafirs after death, which are fireballs of varying intensities to burn them for eternity. The idolatrous Hindus will be thrown into the worst of all the hells, called Habhia, where the fire would be 70 times stronger than ordinary fire. The non-idolatrous Jews and Christians would find shelters in less painful hells.
The teachings of the Koran as well as those of the Hadiths obviate the fact that Islam is a doctrine of intense hatred, especially toward the idolaters. Allah has commanded Muslims to strike terror into heart of the kafirs through violent Jihad actions mentioned above. Those Muslims, who would commit such Jihad atrocities upon the kafirs, will be richly rewarded by Allah on the Day of Judgment (Qiyamah). In Islam, those Muslims, lucky to kill at least one kafir, are to be honoured with the title of Ghazi, and Allah will treat them as honoured guests with a place in jannat-ui-Firdause, which is the finest amongst seven heavens of Allah.
In fact, Muslims believe that just for their affirmation of belief in Allah’s Koran and in the prophethood of Muhammad by uttering the kalema, ‘La Ilaha Illalla Muhammad ur Rasul Allah’ – i.e. There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is His messenger -- Allah will pardon every sin and foulest deeds Muslims, particularly male-Muslims, commit on earth. Therefore, even the most wretched and evil Muslim males will enter paradise and enjoy all of Allah’s divine succors, whilst all kafirs will be thrust into the fireball of hell. Prophet Muhammad has also said that most of the Muslim women will also be thrown in hellfire. (see “Three Decrees of Islam”)
The concept of jihad
The central aim of Islam is to, eventually, conquer the whole world for turning it into dar-ul-Islam, i.e. the land of Islam, through jihad or holy war against kafirs populations and lands. And participation in jihad is the best form of worship of Allah. A Muslim, participating in Jihad, is called a mujahid (plural: mujahidin). Allah’s ultimate intention is to make His religion reign supreme with the help of the mujahidin. So, the Koran says:
“That you believe in Allah and His Messenger and that you strive hard and fight in the cause of Allah with your wealth and lives. Jihad is better for you than your sitting back at home and if you do so, He will forgive you your sins, your foulest deeds and admit you into the gardens of eternity (paradise)” (61:11-12).
To inspire Muslims to take part in jihad, the Allah says:
- “There is nothing in the sight of Allah which may be equated to jihad.” (9.19)
- and“No equal are those believers who sit at home (except those who are old and disabled) and those who strive hard and fight with their wealth and lives in the cause of Allah” (4.95).
- “That is because they (who sit back at home) suffer neither thirst, nor fatigue, nor hunger in the cause of Allah. …Nor they raise the anger of the disbelievers or inflict any injury (killing, robbing or taking captive) upon enemy” (9.20).
- “Anyone whose feet get covered with dust in Allah’s cause will be forbidden from the hell-fire” (Bukhari 4:66).
- Allah rebukes those who sit back at home for their cowardice and threatens them with cruel punishments and the Koran says, “If you march not forth (for jihad), I will punish you with painful torment and will replace you with other people” (9.39).
Moreover, Allah loves military discipline and rank and rows (surat-us-saff) during jihad. He says: “Verily, Allah loves those who fight in His cause in rows and ranks as if they were a solid mass” (61.4).
And discipline comes only when every one serves allegiance to a single commander. So says Allah in the Koran: “Verily, those who are serving allegiance to you (O Mohammad), they are in fact serving allegiance to Allah” (48.10).
The purpose of this discussion is to highlight the fact that central thrust of the Quran, therefore of Islam, is to terrorize non-Muslim communities and nations to subdue and subjugate them through the violent tools of Jihad. And madrasas have been the centers for incubating and imbuing young Muslims with these teaching of the Koran and hadith. It is a glaring fact that madrasas education has been at the roots of Islamic radicalism and terror, which afflict the world today. In sum, Islamic schools or madrasas have acted as factories for producing jihadi terrorists all over the world.
Therefore, the Trinamool Congress government’s project for expanding the Madrasa education in West Bengal is likely to boost Islamic radicalism and consequent terrorism in the state, unless strict overseeing and policing of what is taught as its curricula is enforced. For a secular government, headed by non-Muslim majority, it will be impossible to forbid teaching the Koran and hadith, or a part of them, in madrasas. The project of affiliating and expanding the madrasa education to reduce Islamic radicalism amongst young Muslims, therefore, has little prospect of achieving the desired outcome. Instead, it will, most likely, backfire and worsen an already intractable problem, the Islamic radicalism.
It is a safer and easier alternative for the government to take steps to phase out the madrasa education and bring all Muslim children under mainstream education, where Muslim and non-Muslim students would receive the same secular education.