The South Asian: Problems faced by Muslim Women to attain Higher Education

July 26, 2005

Problems faced by Muslim Women to attain Higher Education

India is a land of diversity with different linguistic, ethnic, religious, groups and has a unique feature of ‘unity in diversity’. Indian culture is distinct and each ethnic group has the liberty to maintain their religious identity. Among the different religious groups in India Muslims constitute the largest minority group i.e. 13% of the India’s total population.

Muslim society of India is very heterogeneous in nature because of the influence of caste system, which has led to Indianisation of Islam. Indian Muslims are facing various socio-economic problems in today’s age, which has to be understood in terms of their educational background.

We want to emphasise through this discussion the problem of the educational backwardness of Muslim women. There are various reasons for Muslim women being educationally backward which include economic, social and cultural causes.

In general, women are the most vulnerable section of our Indian society due to its patriarchal nature. Muslim women suffer more because of the patriarchal nature of Islam and are not given enough freedom and hardly have access to higher education, though even the primary level education is not easily accessible to them.

In the walled city of Delhi, the sad plight which is not highlighted is the fact in Urdu medium schools, buildings are in a dilapidated condition and without basic infrastructure like drinking water. Students sit on mats whether its summers or winters, toilets are in a bad condition or are unavailable, and the behaviour of the teachers towards their wards is very bad. The girl child is abused by the female teachers who force them to perform their household chores. They come to school, take the attendance and then go to perform the
household work. This is exploitation in the name of imparting education.

They have more emphasis on Quranic education which is given at home to the girls and thus they are discouraged to go outside the home in the name of education.

Match fixing within the kinship creates distraction among young girls and they loose the zeal to achieve something through education and thus they themselves do not have academic interest. If at all they are fortunate enough to go to a good school, they are
often discouraged to go for higher education, especially overseas. The most important reason is that there is difficulty in finding educated groom if the girl becomes highly educated. The problem is even more severe if the girl has studied overseas therefore. There is often misconception regarding the “purity” of girls if they have studied in Universities, or have traveled abroad.

Women are conditioned to such an exploitative situation in their lives and accept the laws passed by religious leaders. The only solution to liberate them from the shackles of ignorance, illiteracy, exploitation is through education.

Ms. Farhat Naz, Vice- Chairperson & Editor, Ark Foundation, M.Phil. JNU, New Delhi, Ph: 09868740449,09810934270,09312838170

Posted by collective at July 26, 2005 09:10 PM

Comments

I'm agree with the comments to some extent for the educational condition of the women(Particularly Muslims). But the comments given on the religious background are totally effected by the influence of the present stereotypes about Islam, created by a section of so called intellectuals.
The sentece ["patriarchal nature of Islam and are not given enough freedom and hardly have access to higher education, though even the primary level education is not easily accessible to them."] is totally contradictry to the Islamic teachings. (Of course, I am agree with the article on the way the religion is being used by this patriarchal society). Islam never makes any differences on gender basis, but it gives the limitation for both male and female. If Quran give any guidences to a Female at the same time it talk about male, even before. If you realy want to know the real nature of it Read about it from the actual sources(i.e.Quran and Hadith)first. (A book by Mariam Jamila, a western writer who embracess Islam can also give a real picture of Society and need of implimentation of actual Islamic teachings.) The condition of the Muslim world could be seen when the whole Europe plunged into the dark age ,we ought to read the earstwhile situation of the muslims women.
The main reason is lack of knowledge about Islamic teaching,and of course the educational and economical backwardness as well as government policy which is made only on paper but never put into practice.

Posted by: Md Moin Uddin on December 22, 2005 04:37 AM

Salaam,

The Conditions of Muslims in India is getting from bad to worst.

1) The main reason for this is lack of education.

2)Our ulema are stopping us from education . Well how ?

a) In Couple of Bangalore Mosque , I have heard our Maulvies saying in Friday sermon that our community is getting spoilt because Muslims are sending there children’s to school. So the Impact , my friend removed his children from prestigious convent school and has put them in Madrasa.

b)We are discouraged from joining companies like TCS, Infosys ,IBM , Accenture etc because these companies do US and Europe Projects.

c)When saddam is hanged our Ulemas force us to be on streets protesting because some local politician has asked them to do so. How many processions had Saddam taken out for worst conditions of Indian Muslims ?

d)In my life I have never come across a situation were Ulemas have taken out procession for Better roads, Better education and Better sanitation.

e)Only when elections are near by we see our Ulemas speaking about Government policies. And they go into hibernation till next elections.

f)We don’t have a single Tv channel dedicated for this community . When there was a conference in Bangalore to launch a TV channel for Muslims , Our Ulema said that watching TV is haram .So No Channel for Muslims? Well do other Muslim countries don’t have there own TV channels.

g)When a Hindu is born his parents dream that one day he would be a Doctor , Engineer or IAS officer . When Muslim is born in India his parents dream that one day he would become a Auto driver or Open his own Tea Stall or have a Road side Kabab stall.

h)I have hardly come across Muslim entrepreneurs , Educated Muslim Politicians or Educated Ulemas.

e)When Danish cartoon was published , our leaders gave a bounty of 51 cores , Hello can his money be used to provide better education for Muslims ......

Please remember 83% of muslims are below poverty line in India . Thanks to our Ulema .

Modern Education must start from walls of Darululoom-Deoband or Muslims will face much worst scenarios in days to come.

Posted by: Rashid on December 20, 2007 03:00 PM

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