Rotten Insignia of Our Madāris

“We no longer ask what is the best approach to educating our children, we ask only how we can minimize the flaws in our current approach. We talk always of “reform” and never of rebirth.”

— Andrew J. Coulson, in his work “Delivering Education”

So much is being written, said, debated and talked about Madāris these days that I could not simply elude the temptation to explore the concept. Wikipedia defines Madrasah as “…Arabic word of Semitic origin … for any type of educational institution, whether secular or religious (of any religion).” Wikipedia further categorizes Madāris as public school (Madrasah āmah), religious school (Madrasah dīniyyah),university (Madrasah Jāmiah), and so on. Note that this definition does not coagulate to the hitherto insignia of Madāris being considered as schools meant for religious. Unfortunately, Madāris as we know them today have been brandished as religious schools that are outright orthodox and breed extremism. How and why this has happened might be more political than pedagogical in nature. However, it unquestionably calls for looking at how we have treated our Madāris that lead to their predicaments, and what we can do to alter the situations.

On Cognitive Empowerment

“Coming to understand a painting or a symphony in an unfamiliar style, to recognize the work of an artist or school, to see or hear in new ways, is as cognitive an achievement as learning to read or write or add.”

Nelson Goodman

The Muslim Indian community is today plagued with various maladies, including poverty, illiteracy, ignorance, and political insecurity. Perhaps M. A. Jinnah had foreseen and prophesied this state of the Muslim Indian community, and had vehemently demanded the partition of the Indian Subcontinent. Jinnah may or may not have been justified in his demand for a separate state; however, the reality stands to witness that partition has in no way solved these problems; neither in India nor in Pakistan. At the same time, it is cognitively absurd at this juncture to divulge, introspect, and resent on a historical rhetoric beyond our control. We might always be tempted to depart from the metaphorical and embellished thought process of conferring Partition as the root of our present maladies. However, our mental cerebration would almost always stop us from extricating the effect of Partition and its emotional implications on the sorry state we cut today. Why is any thought of the future so hauntingly dismayed by the past? Why cannot our thought process be alienated from this rhetoric impediment? The primary reason is that we acutely lack cognitive empowerment; and love to mix emotions and thinking [aka mixing drinking and driving??].