India: Muslims in Uttar Pradesh protest ban on madrasas

The Allahabad High Court’s recent ruling to scrap the Uttar Pradesh Board of Madrasa Education Act 2004 has sparked protests from Muslim educators in India, VOA mentioned in a report.

It adds that the ruling, which aims to shift Islamic school students to “regular” schools, has been met with resistance from Muslim leaders who argue that it violates the constitutional rights of religious minorities to establish and run educational institutions of their choice.

While leaders of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) believe that the decision will benefit Muslim society by integrating students into modern mainstream schools, opponents argue that it disregards the progress made in modernizing madrasas and introducing nationally approved syllabuses.

The court order directly impacts around 16,500 madrasas, their 1.95 million students, and 100,000 teachers, with potential implications for all 25,000 recognized and unrecognized madrasas in Uttar Pradesh.