By Syed Shariq Mumtaz
At a private school in Indore this month, there were two annual day celebrations, one for Hindu students and the other for Muslims. The school says the decision was logistical and not discriminatory but parents claim otherwise. Religious hatred has become an everyday part of our lives now but at the very least children should be spared, said one of the parents, Syed Qasim Ali who filed a complaint through CM helpline. Many parents have reported religious sloganeering aimed at their kids by their classmates, even in junior classes. On a recent personal account, my wife was asked to remove her niqaab in a derogatory way by the principal at the top school of the city our child is admitted to. However, these are not just random incidents. It is the fallout of the systemic hate-driven agenda that is being pursued by those in power, which is perilously seeping in those innocent minds.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government’s recent move to make the singing of Vande Mataram compulsory in schools is a typical example. Muslims oppose the compulsory singing of the song as it deifies the mother, thus violating monotheism. Moreover, Anandamath, the novel in which this song is found, is anti-Muslim while masquerading as patriotic. Anandamath’s theme fits in perfectly with Hindutva’s characterisation of the 800-year long Muslim rule in India as “foreign and devastating”. The BJP government recently deleted from school textbooks the Muslim period in Indian history. Therefore, the modus operandi is to keep the community ignorant of their past and oblivious of their future by deleting their mention from the slice of history and beleaguering them in the present educational setup.
Parents are not just helpless against this sinister agenda of the political class but also hapless because they do not have a choice or an alternative. Reacting to the vande matram controversy, Maulana Haleem Ullah Kasmi, President of Jamiat Ulama-e-Maharashtra said, and many after him joined the chorus, that Muslims should withdraw their children from schools rather than make them sing this song. With all due respect to Maulana, what is the after-plan! Have we cared enough to create academic institutions, baring a few, to groom our gen next for the ever-increasing competitive future meanwhile preserving their moral values? We are compelled to send our kids to such schools albeit they are required to sing carols and vande matram but we did not create one single institution of ours that delivers such quality education that compels people to enrol their kids regardless of the caste, creed or religion even if Surah Qalam is recited there in the morning assembly.
In the age of Artificial Intelligence where the job market as we know today is getting redundant with each passing day, instead of grudging that our children are being treated miserably despite the fact that our ancestors were pioneers of science and Europeans came to study in Muslim caliphate at that time, the need of the hour is to ponder over the educational needs of the next generation, especially by those groups or individuals of the community who are already working in this field and catering to the cause to a certain extent, and create a chain of collaborative projects specifically aimed at primary schooling at the national level, that delivers quality education not just for the Muslim community but for everyone. My personal experience is that even if there is detestation among the fellow majority community due to the Machiavellian politicians, the friendship bonds of school time yet does not harbour those sentiments, at least not among the friend circle. Hence, this initiative is essential to preserve the social fabric of the country in the long run and secure the future of the community not just economically but socially too.
Muslim education in India is already facing significant challenges, with literacy rates and higher education enrolment, particularly at 4.9%, falling below the national average and other communities. Reports highlight high dropout rates, socioeconomic marginalisation, and regional disparities, especially in the Hindi heartland among the economically weaker section of the community but this ominous pattern is going to be detrimental even for the upper class. Yes, we have community conferences, debates and discussions by our intellectuals on regular basis, which reflects the mutual concern, but we need to put our act together and act by leaps and bounds in this domain. Some cataclysms show their grim consequences after generations and this is a catastrophe in making for our gen next lest we do not act now.
TICK TOCK TICK TOCK, The Time Is Slipping By!
[The writer works in the Ministry of Defence, KSA]
