Madrasa Education in India – A Need for Reorientation

Madrasa Education in India – A Need for Reorientation

Asad Mirza

During the last ten years or so, Madrasa Education in India has been a subject of interest, debate and prominence both in the educational and research circles, in media and of course the civil and political discourse. Based on different research studies and the demand for Capacity Building of Madrasa in India, the British High Commission in India in partnership with Dept. Of Social Work, Jamia Millia Islamia under Prof SM Sajid and an NGO of Delhi-Minorities Initiative for Learning, Advancement and Partnership (MILAP) started a Capacity Building Programme for Madrassa Teachers and Students, which later became known as MILAP Programme, modeled by Prof SM Sajid and Asad Mirza.

The Capacity Building of Madrasas (CBM) was based on inputs from madrassa teachers, administrators, religious scholars and educationists. To gauge the real need of madrassas for both its teachers and students, a preparatory consultative workshop was organized by JMI in 2008, at which religious leaders of all denominations, madrassa administrators and teachers and faculty from Dept. of Education JMI were invited. The two-day consultative workshop deliberated over the needs, requirements and aspirations of madrassa teachers and students, how modern educationists could supplement their inputs and how a better cohesive programme could be tailor-made for the madrasa audience.

After the first Training Workshop, the syllabi for both the programmes were further fine tuned, as per the demands and aspirations of the participants.

Background

The first institute of madrasa education was at the estate of Hazrat Zaid bin Arkam near a hill called Safa, where Prophet Muhammad was the teacher and the students were some of his followers. After Hijrah (migration) the madrasa of ‘Suffa’ was established in Madina on the east side of the Al-Masjid an-Nabawi. Hazrat 'Ubaida bin Samit was appointed there by Prophet Muhammad as a teacher. In the curriculum of the madrasa, there were teachings of The Qur'an, Hadith, fara'iz, tajweed, genealogy, treatises of first aid, etc. There were also trainings of horse riding, art of war, handwriting and calligraphy, athletics and martial arts. The first part of madrasa-based education is estimated from the first day of ‘nabuwwat’ to the first portion of the ‘Umaiyad’ caliphate.

Madrasas in India

Ever since their emergence, the madrasas have persisted with a curriculum that has seen few changes. The fact that literally, lakhs of Muslim children acquire their primary, and perhaps their only formal education, in these madrasas where only literature and Islamic studies with a cursory knowledge of social sciences thrown in, are taught, should be a matter of concern not only to their parents but also to anybody concerned with education in any manner.  The format of the education imparted to the students of madrasas ought to be modified keeping in view the shifting demands of the job market – a concern which can no longer be under-played.  And this is perfectly possible without an erosion of the cultural and religious identity.

Madrasas need to recognise that the world has undergone a transformation. Employers have specialised needs, which the madrasas are unable to meet, apart from training an army of imams, muezzins, madrassa teachers and Urdu/Arabic typists, and furthermore, all the pass outs are unable to find gainful employment in these four fields. To survive present and future challenges, the madrasas must find new ways to extend contemporary education to their students.

Developing suitable answers for today’s dilemmas requires an examination of the essentials of education. Education involves transference to others, of knowledge and values accumulated by mankind. Even though schools and teachers have been part of the process of education for hundreds or even thousands of years, it is the spirit of enquiry that has enriched mankind with knowledge.  We learn through reading, experience by watching others and by observing the world in general.  Inculcating a spirit of scientific enquiry in students will perhaps be the best manner of propelling them on the path of learning.

Even though this may be the general agreement, it is a fact that in this country particularly, whenever an attempt is made to institute any profound change, a resistance begins to act from its very inception.  Authorities in charge of evolving a new direction may believe it necessary to continue whatever is being done if it has an extensive history. They flinch at the vision of a madrasa system where modern education would jettison religious knowledge and make education “worldly” and “impersonal”. Scrutiny of basics however, will provide a foundation for a thorough reorientation and show what may, of necessity, be incorporated, and what must be retained.

It is a matter of satisfaction to note that of late, some madrasas, having realised the significance of modern education, have introduced teaching science, English and Computer skills in their curricula, (for example the two largest madrasas in India, Darul Uloom Deoband and Nadwatul Ulema, Lucknow have braced themselves to be the harbinger of change and have introduced English language teaching and Computer skills as part of their curriculum, howsoever small the number of participants might be, for these courses.) but have not been able to bring about any noticeable improvement in the quality of education they impart to their students.

It is often argued that if modern education is so sensational, why hasn’t it brought any notable improvement to education in the few madrasas that have adopted it? One simple reason why modern education has not bettered the condition of madrasa education appreciably is immediately apparent. In spite of modern education being imparted, thousands of madrasas don’t have a well-formulated curriculum, and/or couldn’t implement it even if they wanted to. They don’t have sufficiently trained and proficient staff.

Keeping this in view, the MILAP programme for madrasa teachers focused on first, identifying the areas which need intervention from modern educationists and secondly, how to evolve the correct training for the participants. The same set of principles also applied to Madrasa students programme.

To achieve the first objective, a two-day programme of deliberations (Capacity Building of Madrasa-(CBM) Teachers and Students) with senior religious leaders from all denominations, was convened at Jamia. The participants agreed on key areas where intervention was needed, and based on these inputs, the faculty from Jamia was invited to formulate a detailed training syllabi and modules on these topics.

Based on the initial consultations with religious scholars and madrasa administrators, one of the key strategies to improve the quality of education offered in Madrasas was designed to develop new and strengthen existing tools and skills to equip Madrasa Teachers to enhance the overall quality of the teaching-learning practices within their Madrasas. The Madrasa Capacity Building Programme was designed based on a “professional development/coaching model” intended to help Madrasa Heads offer relevant curricula in order to address the gaps in teaching-learning practices. The CBM is being offered to Madrasa Teachers and Students across India, and so far, has been organized in New Delhi, Aligarh, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Pune and Guwahati. 

The Madrasa Teachers and Students Capacity Building Programme was designed to resemble the key elements from the CBM-session and focus on training the teachers from the pilot Madrasas within its target area on secular curriculum and pedagogical issues. The training draws from successful, Madrasa-based interventions in Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, New Delhi and Assam. The objectives of the MILAP module is to develop Madrasa/Maktab teachers’ understanding of their teaching-learning styles and the learning styles of their students, the use of child-centred, active-learning practices, collaborative techniques, development and application of low-cost/no-cost Teaching, Learning Materials lesson planning and project-based methodologies.

The training topics ranged from ​Indian culture and religions: An introduction, Constitutional & other Legal Rights of Minorities, Human Rights to Introduction to Different Teaching Methods, Socio-economic and Educational Background of Madrasa Students: Implications for Teaching and Learning, Role and Responsibilities of an Effective Teacher, Child and Educational Psychology, Lesson Planning: Principles and Process, Teaching Social Sciences: Importance, Process, Issues and Innovative Techniques, Concept, Importance and types of Teaching Aids for Language Teaching, Teaching English: Importance, Process, Issues and Innovative Techniques, Preparation and Demonstration of Teaching Aids for Sciences, Teaching Elementary Mathematics & Sciences: Importance, Process, Issues and Innovative Techniques, Communication Process: Implications for Teaching and Learning Process, Spoken English, English Writing, Introduction to the Use of Computers and Internet to​Preparation of lesson Plans by the Participants  and Lesson Plan Presentations by the Participants.

Results

To gauge the effect of these training programmes, a feedback survey was conducted by an outside consultant after every programme and finally collated on an all-India basis. The feedback survey found that religion plays a vital role in the life of all the three groups of people, it surpasses the generation lap, surprisingly the younger lot; students were more inclined towards religious study, most of them think that students from Madrasa are losing out in today’s hi-tech world, participants teaching both religious and modern subjects in Madrasa acknowledge the fact that modern education is essential for the growth of the society, all of them appreciated the initiative and wished that such Training Courses could be held more frequently, in general, they were skeptical about any assistance from Government (GoI) being taken, they very well realised the bad publicity that has been doled out to name and fame of Madrasas, on an average almost 9 in 10 of all the participants were satisfied with the outcome of the Training Courses.

Based on the lessons learnt from organizing these Training Courses in 11 Indian cities, we can conclude that there is a huge demand from both madrasa teachers and students to learn and be acquainted with other subjects (modern subjects) not taught in madrassas, the madrasa teachers lack any idea about what modern educational techniques and management are, how lesson plans could help them improve their pedagogy skills, how learning about the psychological state of their students they could focus more on some students and focus less on others. The madrassa teachers lack basic skills in subjects like mathematics and science subjects. The introduction of computers was an eye opener for both the students and teachers and they were really anxious to get their hands on the latest technology and for madrassa teachers it was really an eye opener to know how they could use computers in teaching subjects like Hadith and Holy Quran. Meanwhile, the students groups all across India were eager to improve their personal skills and learn subjects like time management, English speaking and writing skills.

Most of these training programmes were of 15 to 21 days duration, and if during such a short duration, using intensive intervention, outlook of the participants could be changed and skills and topics beneficial to them could be taught to better their skills, then this module could be used to supplement their usual madrasa teaching and mid-session such courses could be organized to better their future.

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