Wifaqs of religious madrissahs decides to strongly resist government measures

Lahore: The Ittehadul Tanzeemat e Madaris, an umbrella organization of the five Wifaqs of religious madrissahs at a meeting at Mansoora decided to strongly resist the government measures against the madrissahs and reject all unconstitutional steps of the rulers pursuing the agenda of the imperial powers.

The body sought an urgent meeting with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif to enable them to remove the misgivings regarding the madrissahs and the Ulema on this score. They also called for stopping the arrests of the Ulema and immediate release of those already  arrested.

The decision was announced by the heads of the five Wifaqs at a joint press conference after the heads’ meeting. They said that Pakistan is an Islamic state and the constitution did not allow any anti Islam activity but the government was bent upon advancing the designs of the US and the west against Islam.

They included Maulana Abdul Ma’lik, Mufti Munibur Rahman, Qari Muhammad Hanif Jaulandhry, Yasin Zafar and Syed Kazim Raza Naqvi. They said that the madrissahs were fortresses of Islam and not factories of terrorists, and the nation stood united in their defense.

They said that nobody objected to the madrissahs registration, but the government was neither registering these institutions nor had it named the institution allegedly involved in terrorism. On the other hand, they said, an anti- Islam agenda was being pursued through the harassment and arrests of the Ulema and the ban on the use of loudspeakers of mosques.

Mufti Munibur Rahman said that the government was deliberately pushing the country towards turmoil and chaos. He said that after the Peshawar tragedy, the Ulema and religious circles had fully supported the National Action Plan against terrorism including the military courts although they had   reservations due to the inclusion of the words “religion and sects” in the plan. He said the negative effects of the amendment had become evident by now. He said that terrorism was of different forms and shapes however only the madrissahs were being targeted. He said that on one hand, the government was bemoaning the huge losses caused by the dharnas in Islamabad but on the other hand, it was opening a new front against the religious forces in the country.

Mufti Munibur Rahman said that their talks with the government were also going on and they had already held talks with the Federal Secretaries of Religious Affairs, Education and Interior, but the crackdown against the madrissahs had not been suspended even for a single day. He said they had called upon the Interior Minister to release the names of the madrissahs and the individuals involved in un-constitutional activities so that the nation could know those involved in terrorism and assured that they would not defend such elements.

“The survival and the defense of the state is the collective responsibility of all of us and we stand shoulder to shoulder with the government in this regard, and will not defend any act of tyranny, lawlessness and terrorism”, he added.

Mufti Munibur Rahman said that they had written to the Prime Minister, the Punjab Chief Minister, besides the heads of sensitive agencies but they had not received any reply from any quarter. He said the monitoring of the madrissahs had been going on since Pervez Musharraf time. Allegations had been leveled against madrissahs for the last eighteen years but no evidence had been produced ever. He said that if they were not given reply on time, they would be compelled to stage protest.