Introduction
Historically speaking, late-nineteenth-century Muslim reformist ideas influ- enced the establishment of the earliest public schools for Muslim girls. Prior to that period, education for girls in Islamic matters was mainly a private affair, but it eventually became one of the main issues of public discourse, as it unfolded in the then just introduced Urdu print-culture, in the re- formist (male) madrasas, and in voluntary associations oranjumans, which formed the link between the domestic and public realms. By the early twen- tieth century, education for girls in the confinement of the zenana or women’s quarters of the home existed side by side with the first public girls’ schools for Muslim girls.1These developments, along with the overall
increasing literacy, Urdu print culture, and the democratisation of access to Islamic texts were precursors to the establishment of girls’ madrasas. While there are several valuable studies examining boys’ madrasas in India, pub- lished information on their female counterparts is scanty.2In the course of
my research my interlocutors suggested that the first larger, public girls’ madrasas in post-Partition India still bore witness to the earlier forms of ‘home teaching’, for example in the preservation of value-oriented or adab education.
As practices are best discerned through participant observation, inter- views, and informal conversations with students, teachers, and founders of girls’ madrasas over a longer period of time, a large portion of my study is
based on ethnographic fieldwork in a girls’ madrasa in New Delhi, which hosts roughly 180 students between twelve and seventeen years of age. The madrasa that I shall henceforth call Jamiªat al-Niswan was established in 1996 under the patronage of the Nadwat al-Ulama in Lucknow and recruits students from Delhi and other cities as well as villages from all over India.3
The links between the Jamiªat al-Niswan and the Tablighi Jamaªat formally began via the Nadwat al-Ulama madrasa in Lucknow, as the founders of the girls’ madrasa adopted its curriculum with its strong emphasis on Arabic. Moreover, the male founders of this particular madrasa and the male mem- bers of its core families are active in the lay preacher’s movement known as the Tablighi Jamaªat.4
This paper focuses on three issues, namely (1) the transmission of Is- lamic knowledge in the girls’ madrasa, (2) the ‘informal’ curriculum through which the broader aim of moulding the person as a whole is achieved, and finally (3) the role of the Tablighi Jamaªat in the everyday run- ning of the madrasa.
Islamic Education for Girls
Recent reports claim that there are approximately 35,000 madrasas in India5, which often form networks along lines of affiliation with various
schools of thought, such as the Deobandis, the Jamaªat-i Islami-i Hind, the Ahl-i Hadith, the Barelvis, and the Nadwat al-Ulama – all of which represent important and large Muslim organisations that emerged roughly between the late nineteenth and the mid-twentieth centuries.
To date, there is no central administrative institution or madrasa board, which creates an initial impression of relative opacity regarding the madrasas’ organisational structure. Second, the opacity toward the outside goes hand in hand with the estrangement between Islamic and non-Islamic education in India, as the madrasas have largely remained outside the scope of state intervention for over fifty years. However, especially following the events of 11 September 2001, the madrasas have received increasing amounts of attention in the Indian media, and the need to establish a cen- tral Madrasa Board has been voiced frequently.6 But the proposal has been
Madrasa Board would jeopardise the independent status of the madrasas and allow for too much state control.
Even though Islamic education in madrasas has a long-standing history in India,7public madrasas for girls only began to mushroom roughly in the
last two decades. Until the Partition of India in 1947, Muslim girls were pre- dominantly taught at home in Islamic matters.8Well-to-do families patron-
ised Islamic lessons for girls from the mahalla or neighbourhood in their homes. This informal way of teaching did not conflict with the require- ments ofpurdah, as the girls were taught by female teachers in the women’s quarters of the home, known as the zenana. Accounts of what has been termed ‘home teaching’ for girls in Delhi have been preserved in oral histo- ries of women who still remember the era prior to Partition. Moreover, the late nineteenth-century ‘advisory literature’ for women by authors such as Ashraf Ali Thanawi, Nazir Ahmad, and Altaf Husain Hali,9 has preserved
lively impressions and became a model later used in the establishment of the first girls’ madrasas shortly after Partition.
As most of those who had once patronised Islamic home teaching for girls in north India had migrated to the newly formed state of Pakistan, a gap emerged in India that had to be filled with new forms of Islamic educa- tion for Muslim girls. The most common explanations given by people I asked as to why madrasas for girls were established in the early 1950s was the following: first, the earlier educational patrons had departed; and sec- ond, the Muslim minority in independent India had to find new ways of pre- serving their Islamic legacy and herein women played a pivotal role. As the saying goes, ‘The mother’s lap is the first madrasa’. In a study carried out by the Delhi-based Hamdard Education Society, it has been suggested that of the estimated 35,000 Indian madrasas only between 8 to 10% are madrasas for girls.10However, many Muslims remain unaware of or even surprised at
the suggestion that girls’ madrasas exist, even if they are located in their own neighbourhoods, which suggests that even the madrasa buildings are often, as it were, inpurdah, hidden from public view.
A Glance Behind the Curtain
The Jamiªat al-Niswan offers a five-yearfaziladegree course in Islamic Stud- ies for girls between twelve and seventeen years of age.11The students hail
from lower to lower middle-class backgrounds, from Delhi and from far- flung places across India, and are from both rural and urban backgrounds. The teachers have been recruited from the first two batches of graduates since 2001 and from two affiliated girls’ madrasas in Malegaon and Lucknow. The founder’s family originates from the Barabanki district close to Lucknow and claims Ansari background.12Moreover, the founder, his son-
in-law who is the manager of the madrasa, as well as the fathers of two other teachers are closely affiliated with the Tablighi Jamaªat, whose global headquarters in Nizamuddin lies in the direct vicinity of the madrasa. The above-mentioned ulama also studied in the Tablighi boys’ madrasa known as the Kashf al-ªUlum, where two of them continue to teach to date. There are further ties between the madrasa and the Tablighi headquarters, such as the Thursday programme, as both the Jamiªat al-Niswan and the Tablighi Jamaªat organise women’sbayanor lectures on Thursday afternoons.
The tiny school building hosts the almost impossible number of one hundred eighty students at present, but a larger compound has been ac- quired in Okhla, a Muslim neighbourhood in New Delhi. Once the construc- tion of the school building has been completed, the madrasa will eventually host some one thousand students. Up to now, there are three to four hun- dred applicants annually, out of which only an average of forty-five students make it into the Jamiªat al-Niswan. Recently, a total application stop has been implemented, as the school building is overcrowded. The require- ments regardingpurdah, which is a term that denotes both the veiling of the female body as well as the physical segregation of women from male spaces, are laid out in the madrasa’s enrolment brochure:13
‘2. Rules and Regulations
… If the student has to go out, permission of the head teacher and the hostel warden must be requested.
Students must always wear their school uniforms during school hours. Students must remember that the Jamiªa is a centre of morality (akhlaq). The aim of the Jamiªa is the reform (islah) of morality and actions (ªamal). Students’ behaviour should be in accordance with Islamic law (shariªat). Student dress should be in accordance with Islam.
3. Holidays
… Students who go tomelas, cinemas, or other places of entertainment will be ex- pelled from the Jamiªa.
Students are strictly prohibited to wear jewellery.
Students must observe the obligatory Islamic rituals (ªibadat).
Students must attend the daily gathering (majlis) of the virtues of pious deeds (faza’il).14
Students must fully respect the teachers, founders, and Islamic scholars (ulama) behind the Jamiªa.
Students must stay avoid controversy and chaos (fitna) at all times. …
4. Student’s Pledge
I promise to observe these rules and regulations and that I shall study with great dedication and avoid things that are a waste of time and that I shall never dis- play any immoral behaviour. I promise to dedicate 24 hours of every day to my studies in accordance with the timetable of the Jamiªa and that I shall obey the command of those in charge of the Jamiªa and accept any punishment if I break any of the rules and regulations. …
6. Contact with Parents
Parents are permitted and encouraged to call the Jamiªa during certain times, to enquire about their daughters’ progress. Students are allowed to talk on the phone for three minutes., Students can go home to visit their parents every first Thursday of every month. When they are picked up from the Jamiªa, the students
must be accompanied by amahramman whose photo is on file at the Jamiªa.15A
woman is not permitted to fulfil this function. A student cannot meet aghair
mahramman, even if he is a close relative of hers. One can meet students on Thursdays after 12 noon and Fridays from 9am to noon. Parents are expected to check regularly with the Jamiªa about their daughters’ progress and possible problems’.
Regarding the seclusion of women, Cora Vreede-de Stuers has raised the question of whether purdah excludes women from male domains or ex- cludes men from female domains, similar to the argument made in Lila Abu Lughod’s Veiled Sentiments.16 There is a small front room at the Jamiªat al-
Niswan for the founder, the manager and their guests to meet, but what goes on behind the literal purdah or curtain is largely inaccessible for the
men.17 Even though it is the girls and women who ‘observe purdah’, one
could also argue that men are excluded from the women’s domain. How- ever, the mobility of women outside these exclusively female domains is clearly more restricted than that of men, who are only excluded from a rela- tively small area in girls’ madrasas.
The girls are allowed to leave the madrasa only for clearly specified occa- sions. For example, the students are allowed to go home on weekends on a regular basis. These visits home be it over the weekend, for the school holi- days during the month of Ramadan or during the summer, one of the girls’ ‘guardians’ (i.e., a male relative who is ‘forbidden for the girl in marriage’ or mahram) must pick up the girl from the madrasa, escort her home and bring her back to the madrasa on time. If he fails to do so, the family will be fined or the student may even be expelled. Male guardianship is thus central to the girls’ mobility outside the madrasa. Many other students and teachers do not reside in Delhi and thus the issues of male guardianship and mobil- ity are more complicated for them. For example, apart from those girls who come from remote areas in and around the capital, the Jamiªat al-Niswan also hosts students from places as divergent as Lucknow, Bahraich, Bijnor, Saharanpur, Malegaon, and even Mumbai, to name but a few. These girls generally only visit their homes during the longer vacations during the month of Ramadan and over the summer, when the madrasa is closed. Other- wise, many students stay behind at the madrasa for most of the school year and hence their lives are marked by a sense of austerity, as the physical space is minimal with almost no diversions.
An Opportunity to Speak Up
Every Thursday between 11:30 a.m. and 2 p.m., teachers and students or- ganise a weekly programme, which a few local women can also attend, in- cluding the female relatives of students and teachers from the neighbour- hood. The programme is held in the largest part of the building on the ground floor, where approximately 200 girls and women can be accommo- dated in orderly rows of seats supervised by senior students. Every week the teachers in charge of organising the programme sit facing everyone else in a slightly elevated section of the hall. With the hand-written programme for the day in hand, they take turns announcing the students’ contributions via
a microphone, a gesture that appears somewhat exaggerated, considering that the space is not that big, and the technical equipment leaves a lot to be desired. The amplifier and sound system are located in the adjacent front room, where the manager sits with his guests and listens to what is going on behind the door that separates them from the girls.
When the teachers give the word, the students come to the fore and re- cite a portion of text from the Qur’an, present an interpretation of a Qur’anic text in Urdu (tafsir), recounthadiths, tell an Islamic story, or sing a religious poem called tarana or naªat. Simultaneously, one of the other teachers present may call students to the fore and reprimand them for per- forming poorly during the past week. While most of the programme is in Arabic, which most of the women attending from the neighbourhood are unable to understand, great care is taken that tafsir, or the exegesis of a Qur’anic text, is in Urdu. Moreover, following the formal exegesis of a Qur’anic text, the students explain the text again in their own words. Those sections of the programme are characterised by a contrastingly familiar tone and the students’ explanations tend to merge with numerous moral appeals to the audience, in the style of theadabliterature.
Adab or Moral Education
Although lessons in adab or ‘moral education’ only take up a relatively small portion of the schedule, namely eight hours a week, observations con- firm thatadabpermeates the everyday affairs and overall atmosphere of the Jamiªat al-Niswan. Moreover, introducing and grooming the students to the rules laid out by the community’s understanding ofadabappears to be piv- otal when it comes to the madrasa’s explicit aim of bringing about ‘theislah (reform) of the akhlaq (morality) and ªamal (actions), as the madrasa’s brochure puts it. Finally, the admission papers also state that ‘the students must fully respect the teachers, founders, and ulama behind the Jamiªa’. The question is how these aims can be established and put into practice.
Apart from the formally scheduled classes in adab, during which texts such as Maulana Ashraf Ali Thanawi’s well-known and much discussed Bi- hishti Zewar,18and the ArabicQira’at ur-Rashida19are carefully studied begin-
ning in the first year of their schooling, theadab is also transmitted, prac- tised, and reproduced through a non-formal teaching regime, i.e., through
rules, discipline, bodily control, and behavioural expectations, especially vis-à-vis those considered authorities in the madrasa. Hence, the overall aim of bringing about a sense ofadabin the students is not limited to the formal didactic activities that take place in the classroom. As the teachers are barely older than their students, the students in turn feel free to interact with them in an informal way. Nevertheless, the students address the teach- ers using the formal ap or appa, instead of a less formal form of address such as by their first names or tum, which are other options, considering that some of the teachers actually graduated from the Jamiªat al-Niswan a year earlier, and thus the girls interacted with them as fellow students only a year earlier. There is one exception to the use ofaporappa, namely in the case of the manager’s wife, who at the same time is also the madrasa founder’s daughter. Being in her late twenties, this young woman is the most senior teacher in the madrasa, and hence everyone respectfully refers to her asbadi appaor ‘big elder sister’. In her case, the fictive kinship rela- tion expressed in the omnipresent reference to badi appasuggests that re- spect is not gained through family relations or ascribed status alone, but also through kindness and knowledge, as she is also considered the most learned young woman. Badi appa’s father teaches Arabic in the Kashf al- ªUlum madrasa for boys in the Tablighi headquarters and she received her secondary education in the Jamiªat us-Salehat girls’ madrasa in Malegaon, where she also learned Persian, apart from a fluency in Arabic, which is con- sidered a marker of knowledge and status at the Jamiªat al-Niswan.
The very first lesson the students learn about adab is that they have to show respect for their teachers, for books and their authors, and finally for the madrasa itself. One of the books used for theadabclasses, titled theQi- ra’at ur-Rashida, includes stories about the lives of the Prophet, his Compan- ions, and the first Caliphs. The stories deal with social etiquette, and teach the reader how to eat and drink properly, how to attend and organise mar- riages, or how to run a household with a view toward pleasing God. The teachers in turn ensure that the students not only understand the texts lit- erally but also encourage them to find in their own lives applications of the examples highlighted in the texts.
Furthermore, the all-pervading effect of adab becomes more evident when we look at the case of a girl who initially worked in the Jamiªat al-