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Ismailis in deadly education
spat
By Sudha Ramachandran
BANGALORE - An alliance of Sunni
religious organizations in Pakistan proposes to have
the Nizari Ismaili community, also known as
Aga Khanis, declared infidels. The proposal comes
amid increased targeting of members of the Ismaili
community and criticism of the educational
institutions they run in Pakistan.
The Nizari Ismaili community is an Islamic sect
whose members are followers of the Aga Khan. The
Koran is their primary religious text. They could
be described as a Shi'ite sub-sect, as like
the Shi'ites they regard Ali as the Prophet
Mohammed's successor. However, they broke away from
the Shi'ite mainstream centuries ago when they
adopted Ismail as their seventh imam, instead of
his younger brother. Another difference
between Shi'ites and Ismailis is that the latter
consider the Aga Khan's birthday and the anniversary of
his inauguration as more important than Muharram -
the most important event on the Shi'ite calendar,
when the battle of Karbala and the death of Hussein are
commemorated. Ismailis, unlike other Muslims,
rarely undertake a pilgrimage to Mecca.
Ismailis regard themselves as "proper
Muslims". However, Sunnis and Shi'ites in Pakistan
(and other countries where Ismailis live) believe
they are "different". For one, they seem quite
"Westernized". Ismaili women are not expected to
wear the burqa (veil). In their
congregation halls, women pray alongside men - on
separate but similar and adjacent carpets,
denoting equality between the sexes. The schools
run by Ismailis are co-educational. A distinct
Hindu influence is also discernible in their style
of worship. They sing hymns while praying and
believe in reincarnation.
Ismailis, who
had escaped by and large the attention of
Pakistan's Sunni hardliners, are now under attack.
About 22 Sunni organizations have come together as
the Difa-e-Islam Mahaz (Front for the Defense of
Islam) to spearhead the anti-Ismaili campaign.
In
1947, Pakistan was created as a home for
the subcontinent's Muslims. It is overwhelmingly
Muslim; 70% of the population is Sunni
and 20% Shi'ite. The Sunni-Shi'ite rivalry, which
goes back centuries, exploded into violent bloodletting
since the 1980s. More than 4,000 people
have been killed in the sectarian violence in
Pakistan. While Pakistan has not witnessed
Hindu-Muslim riots - some would suggest that this
is because Hindus have either fled to India or
keep a very low profile in the country - sectarian
violence has occurred often with various minority
sects being targeted. For instance, Ahmadiyyas
have been persecuted from the 1950s onwards.
A Karachi-based Ismaili businessman
told Asia Times Online via e-mail that the
current campaign of Sunni hardliners to declare
Ismailis infidels might be in its preliminary stage, but
it has already triggered considerable alarm within
the community. "There are fears that we will
suffer the fate of the Ahmadiyyas," he said.
Like the Ismailis, the Ahmadiyyas have
a liberal interpretation of Islam. In
1953, anti-Ahmadiyya violence in Pakistan resulted
in the deaths of thousands of Ahmadiyyas. In 1974,
the Pakistani constitution was amended to
declare Ahmadiyyas non-Muslims, because they do not
consider Mohammed to be the last Prophet of Islam.
They were subsequently threatened with death if
they tried to pass themselves off as Muslims. It
is illegal for Ahmadiyyas in Pakistan to pray in
mosques or inscribe Islamic prayers on their
gravestones.
Ismailis now fear that they,
too, will be declared non-Muslims and, worse, be
targets of mob violence. They have bitter memories
of Sunni mob violence. In 1982, in the Chitral
area in northwestern Pakistan, about 60 Ismailis are
reported to have been killed and their community
buildings burned down. In recent years, employees
of the Aga Khan Foundation have been attacked.
The Aga Khan Foundation is
involved in extensive development work in
Pakistan, especially in the fields of education,
health, socio-economic development and so on. In January, Sunni
extremists gunned down a prominent Ismaili leader
and scholar in Gilgit. The killing was aimed at
stoking sectarian tension in the region and it was
successful in doing so for violent riots raged in
the area for days.
The violent targeting
of Ismailis comes against a backdrop of growing
anti-Ismaili feelings. This should be viewed in
the context of post-September 11,
2001, anti-Western/Christian feelings among Sunni
hardliners in Pakistan. Sunni militant groups have
targeted Christians several times in recent years.
Sunni hardliners have often accused the Aga Khan
of working with Israel and the US against the
interests of the Pakistani state.
While
the "Western" lifestyle and the "blasphemous
beliefs" of the Ismailis might have provoked to
some extent Pakistan's Sunni hardliners, their
anger appears to have more to do with concern over
the Ismailis' growing secularizing influence in
the educational arena in Pakistan. In addition to
innumerable hospitals and charitable
organizations, the Aga Khan Foundation runs a
network of schools that provide quality education
to young Pakistanis.
In
2002, the Pakistani government
signed an executive order inducting the Aga
Khan University Examination Board (AKUEB) into the
national education system. The AKUEB follows the
British O-level and A-level system of education.
So far access to this system has been
limited to the rich. The induction of the AKUEB
into the national education system would make it
affordable and therefore accessible to a larger
number of people.
The
Pakistani government's announcement that it would
allow schools to adopt the system of the AKUEB
triggered angry criticism from the Islamists.
Jamaat-e-Islami chief Qazi Hussain Ahmed issued a
warning to the Ismailis that he would launch a
campaign against them similar to the one against
the Ahmadiyyas. Over the past year, Sunni
extremist outfits have launched a virulent smear
campaign against the Aga Khan Foundation, its work
and the Ismaili community. They have accused the
foundation of receiving money from the "enemies of
Islam", ie the US, Israel and India, to spread
anti-Muslim ideas among the people.
They
have criticized the curriculum of the AKUEB as
undermining the tenets of Islam. The Sunni
hardliners have misrepresented the work the Aga
Khan Foundation is doing with regard to women's
reproductive health. They have accused it of
encouraging "immoral lifestyles" and introducing
"a free-sex environment".
The Jamaat has
accused the AKUEB of secularizing the country
through the introduction of this system. However,
the ordinance allowing the AKUEB system states
that it would follow the national curriculum and
syllabus. So what are the Sunni hardliners scared
of, especially since the adoption of the AKUEB
system is voluntary?
The
Ismaili businessman argues, "Sunni hardliners fear
that the AKUEB system being more efficient, more
people - including those who have hitherto been
forced to opt for the madrassa education
the Islamic fundamentalists offer - will now go
for the AKUEB education."
The battle is
for control of the minds of young Pakistanis. And
the Sunni extremists are fighting in the only way
they know - violence, death threats and
intimidation.
An array of Sunni hardline
groups that have otherwise been at loggerheads
with one another have come together to fight their
common enemy - the challenge posed by the system
of education provided by the AKUEB. According to a
report in the Daily Times, an English newspaper in
Pakistani, the Difa-e-Islam Mahaz hopes to get
other Islamic sects including the Shi'ites and
Ahle Hadith on board its effort to have a
fatwa (decree) declaring Ismailis as
non-Muslims. Whether the Shi'ites join the effort
to target a sub-sect of their own community
remains to be seen.
There is
little reason Shi'ite hardliners would want to hold
hands with their Sunni counterparts. After
all, relations between the two, which have been
marked by violence and bloodletting over the past two
decades, have deteriorated considerably over the
past couple of years. Pakistan's Sunni majority
largely considers Shi'ites as infidels.
However, Shi'ite hardliners are as
insecure with the Aga Khan Foundation's work and
the system of education it provides as are the
Sunni hawks. They feel threatened that it would
shrink the size of the turf over which they wield
influence.
A new dimension has been added to
sectarian violence in Pakistan, which has generally
run along the Sunni-Shi'ite divide, with Ismailis
emerging as the main targets of Sunni hardliners.
On which side the Shi'ite hawks decide to
jump - whether on the side of their Ismaili
"brothers" or of their hardline counterparts in the
Sunni fold - will significantly determine the
contours of the conflict in the coming months.
Sudha Ramachandran is an
independent journalist/researcher based in
Bangalore.
(Copyright 2005 Asia Times
Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact us
for information on sales, syndication and republishing.) |
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