According to another political decision, fazil and kamil degrees would be treated equivalent to the Bachelor's and Master's degrees of general education respectively. The cabinet approved on August 28 the bill seeking amendment to the Madrasa Education Ordinance 1978, making the upgrade to madrasa degrees, which will be placed for passage in the next session of parliament, scheduled to begin on September 12.

Mainly there are three types of madrasas in Bangladesh: ebtedayee madrasa, qawmi madrasa, and alia madrasa. The first two categories comprising nearly eighty percent religious seminary, are not registered with the madrasa education board. Neither the education ministry nor the four qawmi madrasa boards know the exact numbers of qawmi madrasas in the country, how many teachers they have employed, or the number of students enrolled to these seminaries.

One would also be dumb-founded to take a note of the syllabus pursued in madrasa education. From the beginning, not in our country alone, but across the world, studies in Islamic theology have always been incorporated in madrasa education. There has been some revision in the syllabus of alia madrasas. In alia madrasas English, mathematics, history, and geography are taught to a comparatively lesser extent and studies in Islamic theology get the greatest weight.

According to the qawmi madrasa board, these seminaries are offering a 16 year course and a student has to learn 35 subjects, mostly based on Islamic theology, in a five-tier education system from class 1 to 16. Enormous change must be made in the existing syllabus to uplift madrasas from the status of mere factories producing mullahs, and also to integrate the madrasas with the mainstream of the educational process. Modern subjects including science must be included in the new teaching schedule of the qawmi madrasas.

No one can argue that teaching in madrasas is modern enough while no one can deny that modern education is essential for madrasas as well. In qawmi madrasas, where only Islamic theology is taught, a student could not learn the skills necessary to get a job. The students having the Dawra degree from the qawmi madrasas, at best expect to become imams in mosques or teachers in the qawmi madrasas themselves.

The madrasa education received more state favour than general education during the tenure of this four-party alliance government, contributing to the significant growth of madrasas across the country. Apart from 9,000 government registered madrasas there are an estimated 15,000 other institutions across the country offering religious education without registration and government control.

Education has always received great weight in the Islamic religion. The religion of Islam emerged in the barren Arabian land which was both culturally and socially backward. Thus education was put forward as the lamp to illumine darkness. Hazrat Muhammad (sm) won the war of "Badar" and many captives in the war were freed on different conditions. One such condition was that if a prisoner could educate ten Muslims he would be emancipated.

The suggestion of the Prophet to go to China to acquire knowledge, or to get educated from non-Muslim prisoners obviously implied no inclination to religious teachings. Rather, Islam essentially, in several ways, directs acquiring knowledge of the need based modern education.

The BNP-led alliance government pledged, as many previous governments had done, to modernize madrasa education and to integrate it with the formal education system. But these pledges had not been backed by decisive action. Now it is imperative for the government to start modernizing of madrasa education and elevation of its degrees should be conditional upon adherence to the modern teaching system.

Madrasas have a glorious history in this country for serving important religious and social purposes. But this glory has been tarnished due to the involvement of madrasa students in militancy. The intelligence agencies marked 323 qawmi madrasas, where militant training was taking place. The madrasas having link to banned extremist groups must be closed down.

Publication of annual income, expenditure and audit reports, and declaration of their assets and liabilities must be made mandatory. The government must make it obligatory for all madrasas to disclose their sources of income and declare dissociation from any militant activity or group. Donor agencies providing, or intending to provide, financial assistance for madrasa reform should also make their grants conditional on the above criteria.

Elevating madrasa degree without evaluating the quality of education is no doubt an imprudent political decision. Drawing equivalence between the madrasa degree and the Master's degree of general university, without modernizing the syllabi and curriculum of madrasas, is sure to hamper the mainstream education system of the country.

Certainly there is no denying that madrasas have made a very negligible contribution in creating skilled manpower despite the fact that they receive nearly 12 percent of the total budget allocation for education. Conscious citizens fear that taking a hasty decision on such an important national issue, the government has paved the way for unqualified madrasa graduates to creep into public administration to the detriment of all.

ANM Nurul Haque is a columnist of The Daily Star.