To Kill the Mockingbird

Harimau: Are you talking about that haraami from DMK? He openly sided with the LTTE when the IPKF was in Sri Lanka. It is only after Rajeev Gandhi`s assasination that he quickly and hypocritically changed his views in public about the LTTE.

I believe the real mission of Madrassas is to interepret Quran. However the real need is to question the Quran. Untile muslims do that they will keep going in circles witout making any progress.

FYI, some interesting related stuff :

http://www.harappa.com/engr/delhicon.html

http://www.harappa.com/engr/mughal.html

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The basic problem with the madrassas are they do not equip their graduates, with qualifications that make them productive members of the society. The fact that these institutions need to revamp and enter the contempory mainstream of education, economic and political realities, has been stated enough times and need not be stressed again.

Madrassa education creates a case of ``seperate but equal`` distinctions and that in the long terms generally creates problems due to a lack of uniformity. Madrassa education is also facing the problem of balancing the ideals of theocracy within the limits of state interests. In any case, the raison d`etat demands that its interests will primus inter pares nationally and hence, the state`s attempts to reformulate the interests of the madrassa educational system.

SameerJB, just to being this to your information, the elites of Pakistan have been consuming for the last 56 years, without contributing an iota and Pakistani society continues to malfunction, but it does exist. The majority of Pakistanis are non productive citizens and are only eager to act as parasites, and despite their best efforts, Pakistan lingers on.

Madrassa education is, in reality, about the myopia of a very narrow interpretation of what consitutes the reality. I have nothing against the institution of madrassa per se, but I have many qualms of what is being teached in the madrassas. One of these concerns is that they are above the pale of accountibility and such, tend to ferment an idea of themselves as a viable alternative to the nation-state. The Talibanization of Afghanistan was based on a similar logic. Madrassas seek to create the impossible and like I wrote in my ilog, ``those who wish to bring heaven down to earth, only end up creating hell``.

Ciao

echoooobooom

...welcome back in yet another reincarnation:)

Amir Ullah Khan, Mohammad Saqib and Zafar H. Anjum

...please forgive me for saying this:

the futility of this exercise is only exceeded by its irrelevance

...t

``According to Asghar Ali Engineer, a noted expert on Islam, more than 95% of the Indian Madarsahs have absolutely nothing to do with the ISI.``

Zafar, you have shot yourself in the head, with the above statistics. 5 percent of the madrassas are under ISI influence, that should be in their thousands, i didnt bother to add up the numbers you have given, but the fact is that may be 10,000 producta of the indian madrassas are ISI biased.
Zafar, how many more jihadist you want in india per year. May be , just may be, at least by your numbers, the hindutwa people have a point. We are not talking about zero ISI influence, the question is howmany does it take to kill say 10 hindus in marad beach in kerala, well they used daggers and it took 20 at the last count.

I whole heartedly agree with the views expressed by Sameer at 16 and Babu at 5.

Babu`s view are totally in line with the ultimate objective of getting what Naqshbandi at # 8 referred to.

Sameer`s views bring into light economic advantages/disadvantages of Madrissa education. I am sure economic disadvantages far outweigh any economic benefits that we gain from Madrissa education.

# 15 echooobooom

I am sure that a lot of muslims feel very proud about the schools that are run for the islamic students. I however, believe that these schools are a symptom of the prejudice and backward thinking of the muslims. The students that are indoctrinated in these schools will find it harder to assimilate and become part of the American society. This will lead to further alienation of muslims and the main stream. Moreover, the kids coming out of these schools will have much harder time dealing with people of other faiths when these kids go to the universities or the work force. I think the distrust that has been created between the muslims and the rest of Americans will further increase. I think the muslim parents who send their kids to such schools are doing them the greatest disservice. It is important for one to learn about ones culture and religion but being isolated from the main stream is so stupid. If this was done by outward forces it would be called ......... ghettoization.

....for a second there i was worried that this was written by zafar talib...then i realized i had the wrong zafar...phew, i know he wouldn`t write something like this....

Reforms & Madressas is a catch-22 sitiation.

If Madressas are confined only to religion, they produce tunnel-vision religious zealots.

If contemporary education is added into them, the education lacks creativity and an open mind. The education begins from religious beliefs which are taken as facts. Example: The students will never debate whether witness of two women equal to one man is wrong. The research will be to prove why Islam says so.

The way forward is leave madressas for religious guidance and introduction only and their studies should have no weightage as education at all. (No recognition of any kind of degree)

Lets us not ruin the normal education by mixing it with religion or dogmas in religious institutions.

This applies to all religions.

Ref Maasanamuthu #10

[Stuka,

Shahabuddin, a separatist?]

Of course not. Just as Doctor Artist Leader -- who had taken his oath of office as Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu in 1969 later burnt the Constitution of India in 1986 (you will be telling me that that was an expression of free speech guaranteed by the very Constitution he was burning) and who had no problem swearing he would uphold the Constitution when he took power as Chief Minister again in the 1990`s -- is an outstanding citizen of India.

Anencephalic cretin!

Ref veeresh #13

[In fact, if you ask the old-timers, Muslims in some parts of the country are doing, with dint of sheer labour and hard work, what Sikhs did about 50-75 years ago. It is my take that the ``past & present`` variety of madarsas in India feel threatened by this evolution.

Water finds its own level, Zafar. While the ``Muslim leaders`` bemoan their fate, their flock is oving ahead.....

+++

Just one anecdote:-when my regular taxi driver who is otherwise as illiterate as they come and fundoo to boot tells me that his daughter has stood third in the all-India selection for Nursing Staff for a particular uniformed service in India, and that she is going to proceed for training to another State 2 days train ride away, and if my equally religious M-I-L could be her LG in that faraway city, then I no longer have to feel surprised whether she was wearing a burqa, ghunghat or covering her head at home.

That is India, my India today, and there are plenty of Muslims present in it. And increasingly, there is nothing but contempt for those who choose to be left behind and resistance if they try to drag others back with them.

There will be bumps, there will be problems.]

Well said, Veeresh Saheb!

All it takes is a couple of hundred thousand people to move a community economy-wise forward. How many Tamilians are working in the IT field? How many Telugus or Kannadigas? A couple of hundred thousand each, at the most. Their states are considered the model for India today. The multiplier effect of the money they spend brings prosperity to many more people.

Every right-thinking Indian should ask himself this question: would the $150 million spent on Haj subsidy each year be better spent if instead it were allocated to improving schools for Muslim children?

I think this `madrassah modernization` scheme in Pakistan atleast is going to be more detrimental to Pakistan. Let us consider how... Most problematic madrassahs in Pakistan are Saudi funded and teach the extremist wahabi (with roots in Saudi Arabia) and deobandi (with roots in Deoband India) versions of Islam.. previously they have posed law and order problems, now armed with education in computers and other modern sciences, these brainwashed kids would come into the workforce and get a chance to spread their wahabi-deobandi ideology to normal moderate Pakistani Muslims who believe in the popular low church and sufi Islam more than this straitjacket Arabicized or Deobandi ideological Islam. I shudder to think what will happen to Pakistan then.

I agree with Rsaxena... these kids don`t need this education. For a Modern Pakistan they need science math, and secular schooling. I think the case that is being made here is for backwardness and not a forwardlooking Islam. The solution is strict government check on the madrassahs, and provision of alternative secular state schools.. I speak here with regard to Pakistan ... I am not going to dwell on what is right or wrong in India.

-Manto

Naqshbandi says:

`Since colonisation and especially the last 100 years this has changed with creeping secularisation and irreligiousness of Muslims so that now most people will send their STUPIDEST sons to the madrssahs and encourage their brightest children to become doctors and engineers`

Shukar Al Hamdulillah, kay kuch to musalmanan ko aql ayee!
Allah Ka lakh lakh shukar hai...


`Shaykh Hamza Yusuf who has almost single-handedly been responsible for making english speaking Muslims of the diaspora interested in being ulama again instead of doctors and engineers.`

Yes people, I will testify to this... Shaikh Hamza Yusuf opened his `Zaytuna` institute in Santa Clara in the heart of the Silicon Valley ... now he proudly stops young muslims from acquiring a Modern education and knowledge about the cutting edge of technology. He stops them from being doctors, engineers etc. Instead he is churning out religious scholars by the hundreds... bright muslim minds who could have gone astray and become neurosurgeons or top computer software designers, are now becoming imams and holymen. Meanwhile the Hindus and the Jews, these Muslims seem to hate so much, are progressing by leaps and bounds in these fields. Should the Muslims really complain when these two genius communities, the Hindus and the Jews, dominate Corporate America, and the capitol hill ? We have chosen the likes of Sheikh Hamza Yusuf by shunning modernist and moderate Muslims. The ignorance Sir Syed Ahmed Khan was supposed to have wiped out is alive and well in the Zaytuna Institute in Santa Clara.

-Manto

Soyasauce: My memory is not that dim. I clearly remember Shahabuddin`s call for a boycott of the Republican Day by the Muslim community, saying ``unka din hai`` as in Hindus. Yes, I would say Shahabuddin is a seperatist.