New Models of Islamic Education in Kerala
By Zubair Hudawi
The religious education system of Mappila Muslims, who
make up almost a quarter of Kerala population, needs a
separate and profound study that will shed light on
various unique features of the system and on how it
differs from the Islamic education system prevalent
elsewhere in India. The origins and development of the
Mappila Muslim community on the Southern coasts of
India can be traced to the very first century of
Islamic calendar, according to the most popular
historic view. And as Muslims give great importance on
passing the Islamic values and morals through
generations and to facilitate the dissemination and
reproduction of religious knowledge, Mappilas of
Kerala also developed various systems of education
throughout their historical evolution.
It is evident that Mappilas had moved ahead in the
past along with the changes in the educational trends
of international Muslim community, but with
adjustments and accommodations needed in the cultural
atmosphere they lived in. An analysis of their
pre-20th century history shows that they had developed
three kinds of educational systems to impart education
at primary, higher and mass levels. Othupallies,
better translated as Maktabs or writing schools,
served as the schools of primary education teaching
the children all the preliminary knowledge about Islam
that is compulsory for every individual to know, with
a special emphasis on Qur'an recitation. 'Palli
Darses' or mosque-colleges served as knowledge centres
producing religious scholars who could lead the
community, teach its next generation and maintain the
intellectual tradition intact. 'Palli' is the local
word for Muslim mosques and Christian Churches,
whereas Dars comes from one of the Arabic word for
teaching and learning.
Kerala has a long tradition of higher religious
schools held in mosques, and the system still prevails
with a string of modifications needed in the modern
world. Systematic wa'az programmes, which lasted
sometimes to weeks and months and which facilitated
detailed oral teaching of various noted religious
texts on a host of subjects, served as an effective
setup for mass education.
The inspiring roles of many outstanding personalities,
who emerged from among Sayyed families, the scholar
community or ulema and Sufi missionaries, behind these
ventures cannot be denied. It is significant that
there has always been a healthy relation among these
three strata of leadership, and Kerala Muslims always
mention the phrase 'Ulama-Umara collaboration' as the
chief factor behind all kind of advancement among
them. Almost all of the Sufi sheikhs were eminent
scholars well-versed in Shari'a, and almost all major
ulema since the early period, including those in
Makhdoom family of Ponnani, had joined one or other of
the Sufi orders. Besides, many Sayyid families who
migrated to Kerala from various religious centres like
Hadhramaut and Bukhara, were involved in religious
teaching as well as in propagation of various Sufi
orders. One can assume that all these factors
prevented, to a certain extent, the spread of
un-Islamic forms of popular Sufism among Kerala
Muslims.
Just like other communities, Mappila Muslims had also
faced the waves of modernisation trends with the onset
of 20th century. The emergence of reformist
ideologies, the transformation of the community
leadership from the hand of individuals to that of
organisations based on various ideologies, and
increased efforts for adoption of secular Western
education changed the facets of Mappila education in
the first half of last century. Most of these
educational developments took place with the direct
involvement or guidance of various organisations, who
worked out various educational systems to disseminate
both religious and secular knowledge among the
community. The effectiveness of these systems as well
as their role in dissemination and reproduction of
religious knowledge still need an analytical cum
evaluative study.
Contribution of Samastha Kerala Jam'eyyat ul-Ulama
Religious education was at stake when calls for
'modernisation' turned the attention of community
leaders towards secular education, often at the
expense of religious learning. However, the Samastha
Kerala Jam'eyyat ul-Ulama, the platform of traditional
religious scholars whose academic tradition and
inheritance go back to Makhdoom scholar family of
Ponnani and which represents the majority Sunni
community of Kerala Muslims, focused their attention
on defending the system of traditional religious
education and worked hard for its progress. This
organisation of traditional Ulama did not get actively
involved in secular education, but adopted an ideal
religious education system that allowed all Muslim
boys and girls to have their regular schooling as well
along with religious studies.
The Samastha's educational board today runs a
systematic primary education programme that has more
than eight thousand Madrasas under it. This system of
Madrasa education, in which a Muslim child can have
12-year religious education without hampering her or
his regular schooling, has spread to all Kerala
districts and to various Indian states and foreign
countries where Muslim Malayalees live. There are
other Muslim organisations in Kerala that also run
many such primary Madrasas under s centralized system,
but the Samastha has reached far ahead of them all. It
was the first to respond when the government banned
public schools from providing religious education just
after Independence by calling on the community to set
up Madrasas in every village where Muslims live. While
many Muslim communities elsewhere in India and abroad
had to choose either secular or religious ways of
education, resulting either in alienation from one or
the other or complete assimilation with the
non-Islamic cultures and communities, this system
facilitated the harmonious integration and
co-existence of Mappilas with non-Muslims along with
keeping their Islamic identity and culture intact.
Mapilla students study Islam in part-time Madrasas in
the morning or evening and have their regular
schooling at the same time, thus being able to mingle
with students from other communities. Muslim-managed
organisations also later set up boarding Madrasas,
orphanages, integrated public schools, etc..
Dar ul-Huda Islamic Academy, A New Experiment in
Religious Higher Education
While the Samastha facilitated the integration of
religious and secular education at the primary level,
it continued its view of the secular-religious
dichotomy at the higher levels until the 1970s.
Students had to select between the two for higher
studies after having had both at primary levels from
Madrasa and schools. Parents who wanted to make their
children religious scholars sent them to Sharia
colleges where the learning was limited to various
traditional religious subjects. Its result was
incompetence of religious graduates and their
inability to cope with modern trends and the failure
of secularly-educated to carry forward their religious
ethos. In the 1970s, scholars of the Samastha started
responding to this issue by adopting various
innovations and trying to effectively synthesise both
streams of knowledge.
An outstanding figure who gave an ideological base and
intellectual perspective to this process of change was
the late MM Basheer Musliyar Al-Baqawi (1929-1987).
(Musliyar is the local word to denote a traditional
religious scholar). His foresightedness was
instrumental in various educational innovations that
occurred among the Sunni community of Kerala in the
last quarter of the 20th century. He spoke of an
educational philosophy aimed at reproducing the
philosopher-scientist scholars who lived in the golden
period of Islamic medieval history. He called for
reforming the curriculum and syllabus of the higher
centres of Islamic learning by taking lessons from
outstanding Islamic personalities came in the past. He
argued that the prevailing system of Islamic education
was very narrow, and emphasised the need of preparing
a more inclusive syllabus that would enable the
progress of humanity in all fields. He called on
Islamic colleges to introduce many subjects that are
Fard kifayah (community religious obligation) like
health sciences, professional and technical subjects.
In 1970s, Basheer Musliyar al-Baqawi initiated many
attempts to innovate the Darses in the mosques. He
tried hard to implement his vision of 'Model Darses'
which was aimed at a fresh and live approach towards
every subject taught in the Darses along with teaching
languages of English and Urdu. His point was that the
Dars graduates, the future scholarly leaders of the
community, should not be left behind and they should
be equally aware of modern trends and subjects and be
able to relate it with Islamic perspectives. However,
the attempts did not yield the needed results. In
1972, Basheer Musliyar joined the Rahmaniya Arabic
College at Kadameri of Calicut District, where he
implemented many outstanding and attractive
innovations. Rahmaniyya was the premier traditional
Muslim college in Kerala that started the teaching of
Arabic, English and Urdu languages and social subjects
along with religious subjects.
When he saw that he could not bring the innovations
and reforms in the way he desired, Basheer Musliyar
thought of a separate institution where he could
effectively and practically synthesise religious and
secular subjects, keeping in mind the changes of the
modern world. His intention of producing scholars
capable of propagating Islam in the modern world
impressed two other great personalities—CH Hyderus
Musliyar and Dr. U Bapputty Haji—and attracted support
from a host of community well-wishers, though it also
drew a number of critics. The three worked hard to
materialise their dream and succeeded in the
establishment of Dar ul-Huda Islamic Academy in 1986
at Chemmad, in Kerala's Muslim majority district of
Malappuram.
Dar ul-Huda offers a 12-year course that integrates
religious education with important secular subjects.
During the first 12 years of its running, each year
Darul Huda admitted 80 students out of hundreds of
applicants in the age group of 10-11, who had
completed the fifth standard in both madrasa and
school, on the basis of oral and written tests. The
12-year course has been divided into four stages - a
2-year Preparatory course, a 4-year Secondary course,
a 4-year Degree course and a 2-year PG course. The
syllabus includes religious subjects such as Quran,
Tajweed, Hadith, Usul ul-Hadith, Fiqh, Usul ul-Fiqh,
Aqeeda, Tasawwuf, Nahvu, Sarf, Mantiq, Balagha and
Comparative studies of various religions, as well as
secular subjects like Maths, Social Sciences, History,
Physics, Chemistry, Biology. In addition to this,
Arabic, Urdu, English and Malayalam are taught.
Facilities for extra curricular activities like
debates, discussions, oratory training, computer
studies and sports are also provided. The institution
follows selected text books of both Kerala State and
CBSE syllabuses for its teaching of secular subjects
until the secondary level. When the student completes
18 year of his age, i.e. when he reaches the 8th class
of the system, Darul Huda makes it mandatory for him
to appear for the entrance tests of various
universities offering degrees in social science
subjects and languages under their Open University
Systems. Students generally opts for subjects like
Sociology, Political Science, English, Malayalam,
Economics etc. for their degree, and the Dar ul-Huda
facilitates the study of these subjects inside the
institution by appointing separate teachers and
allocating sufficient time. Simultaneously, students
carry on their study of religious texts and subjects.
Once the student graduates from institution they have
degrees of both Islamic and secular higher educational
institutions.
Although the success of the Dar ul-Huda is still to be
assessed and evaluated, it is clear that it adopts a
very novel approach and appears to have fared
comparatively well.. At a time when there was a
feeling that religious education was the choice of
poor students or of those less talented, under-skilled
and 'good for nothing else' children, the Dar ul-Huda
catered particularly to bright students irrespective
of their background, and selected limited students
purely on the basis of merit after conducting tough
written and oral examinations. The founders of the
institution stressed that religious propagation was
done by prophets who are supposed to be the most
clever and brilliant in the community, and the
religious scholars who are their successors should be
the most brilliant among their community, too.
The Dar ul-Huda sees itself as imparting good
education in secular subjects not for its students to
get a government job and or to produce Muslim
professionals and technicians. Instead, the aim is to
produce pure Islamic scholars who have a clear idea of
the modern world, its trends and ideologies.
Interestingly, the institution has evoked great
interest among a large number of Mappila Muslims and
soon many very rich or highly educated families
started vying for admissions for their children
therein. As a result, several trusts and committees in
different parts of Kerala have started affiliated
institutions that adopt the same syllabus as the Dar
ul-Huda and receive academic assistance from it. The
Dar ul-Huda has now expanded into something like a
university chain, having around 20 colleges following
the same syllabus under a co-ordination committee.
In addition to this, Darul Huda runs a special 10-year
course in its campus to cater to the needs of
Urdu-medium students, who generally hail from the
neighbouring states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andra
Pradesh as well as Maharashtra and from some north
Indian states as well. It has started an affiliated
Urdu-medium college in Mumbai, and the Dar ul-Huda's
alumni are in the process of setting up a modern
Islamic higher learning centre in Chittoor, in Andhra
Pradesh.
The Dar ul -Huda also runs a separate section for
Quran memorization, in which the students are admitted
at the age of seven, and once they complete the
memorization process they continue the 12-year course
of the institution.
After producing 12 batches of students now, the Dar
ul-Huda now urgently needs to review its performance.
Being given a balanced and sound education, many
graduates of the institution have been able to secure
well-paid jobs at home and abroad in various fields.
However, the institution needs to closely examine the
role of its graduates in contributing to the
intellectual development of the Muslim community and
enabling it to meet contemporary challenges.
------------------
Zubair Hudawi, a graduate of the Dar ul-Huda, is
presently a Ph.D. student at the Jawaharlal Nehru
University, New Delhi. He can be contacted on
zubyjnu@gmail.com
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