AMU at the Crossroads

umbertoeco#32,31:

Are you sure you want Singapore to be a model for India?

At its core is not affirmative action but a society which gives equal opportunities to all and strictly controls any divisive tendencies while allowing retention of individual identitis. Muslims in India under this model will certainly get the full protection from the police and state which they do not get in India at the moment.

Singapore tightly controls the activities of its Muslim community through its Islamic Religious Council. The Council decides the Madrassa teaching, controls masjid funds and even approves sermons to be delivered during Jumma prayers to ensure that they do not contain anything against any other religious community. Muslim girls in public schools cannot wear hijab. Singapore ordered all Madrassas to bring their teachings of English, Mathemeatics and Science at par with public schools or lose recognition. Recently, it has asked all Madrassa teachers to go through govt. approved training to ensure that they teach only moderate Islam. If this system was to be introduced in India, the Wahabi-type Islam learnt at Darul Uloom at Deoband and taught at Madrassas would be a thing of the past.

BTW, any school or college whose students or faculty cheered against Singapore would certainly face the wrath of the state at no time at all. I do not know of the current situation but when Singapore`s relations with Maylaysia were strained, Lee Kuan Yieu refused to have Muslim pilots in the Air Force. When the Muslims protested, he replied that he wanted to spare them the agony of firing over their fellow Muslims if there was a fight with Malaysia.

If you wanted to bring the Singapore model to India, contact your local BJP candidate because the Congress or Lalo Yadav or certainly not going to support you.

#6

Hi Vikas,

Thanks for sharing your views with us here.

I would like to take up the ghettoisation comment. I don`t think ghettoisation is a one way process. It is reflection of the state of trust and bomhomie between the two communities.

Singapore`s case is examplary as here the govt. ensures that in every HDB block, all communities have adequate representation. I wish the Indian govt. could follow the example set by a small country like Singapore.

Thanks

#3

Thanks for your views.

You say: ``As an alig, I do think that AMU has a special status, including minority status.``

You think? Even after reading the article, you think? It is the minority status that has been taken away.

As of the reservations, I respect your view. Fifty years of non-affirmative action has done wonders for the Indian Muslims!

This very good article but at this time cricket is important.
India is finished. Pindi express will make sacrafice of indian team. They can not play expess at 160 Km/Hour.

[``gujju..i`m serious...you want good recommendations when you apply to US colleges, don`t you?``]

WTF !! Sue me for being ignorant....but I thought a decent rank at GRE/GMAT was good enough....

The AMU cannot directly discriminate in favour of Muslim students but it can and does so indirectly. This is through its Internal Student Quota for admissions. This quota which roughly fills half of its admissions applies to students who have gone to a Higher Secondary School run by the AMU. Most of the students at this school are Muslims and almost all of those who get admission to the University through this process are Muslims. I do not think that this Interanl Quota system is under any threat. And if it is not, AMU will continue to have Muslim demographics.
The basic problem in India is the poor quality of Madrassa education which is even worse than that provided by government schools. From what I have read, the quality is uneven and some of the Madrassas (in Bihar?) are good enough that many Hindus send their children to them. Someone should try to hold the successful ones as models for others.


Urstruly:
There was only one AMU at the time of the Partition. Now there are at least two others - Jamia Milia University in Delhi and Darul Huda Islamic Academy in Kerala.

I don`t get what Pakistan`s inevitability has to do with anything?

I agree with Amrita and Nasah and avkrishna.

I still stand against any sort of preferential treatment at the Secondary Education or Professional level for anyone.

However, primary education MUST be available to ALL at little to no cost to level the playing field for the future.

This is great. About time we also put a stop to reservations for other religious groups.

Or extend reservations to Govt. funded universities exclusive to Hindus.

Of course, if they are privately funded, then the Govt. has no business interfering.

Thanks,

Urstruly #20

`` THE REASON PAKISTAN WAS INEVITABLE ``

Pakistani Muslims have not done any better. They are still collecting rent from their gora masters.

just kidding folks -- I agree with Faruk, Dost mitter ji and Amrita -- it may be unnecessary to grant a minority status to AMU.....

Nasah sirji

if AMU anyways was full of well of folks in professional courses, why the need for reservation for muslims? they can compete with others anyways.

if anything, the need is for young and bright of muslim community to mix with their fellow indians, not ghettoization, else urstruly eagerly awaits them ;-)

20/urstruly

Of course..... But then why did you leave 120 millions of your brothers behind with hinud kafirs ? you knew this is going to happen - didn`t you?

#16 by Indian007 on January 13, 2006 11:09am PT

gujju..i`m serious...you want good recommendations when you apply to US colleges, don`t you?

THE REASON PAKISTAN WAS INEVITABLE

17/nasah
[....Aligarh Muslim university should be exclusively for the educational and manner uplift of the AVERAGE backward Muslims -- and the Benaras Hindu University exclusively for the AVERAGE backward Hindu students...... ]

what`s this - TNT with a makeover?... :)

um, i dont exactly understand what the point is here. mainly because i dont understand why the lack of minority status would immediately mean a flood of non muslim students. as far as i am aware [my father belongs to the batch of 1957] Aligarh Muslim University has always had more muslim students not because of any minority status but because more muslims apply there than anywhere else. the kids of my dad`s friends from college went to amu when the time came and so did most of the kids of the others that he has kept in touch with. in the years since its establishment, it has become a family tradition for many families. also, this idea of amu as an institution made up of the poor masses is slighty exxagerated imo - lots of the kids come from very well off families. and not a few claim descent from royal blood.

and as for the others claiming amu as the bastion of pro-pakistani traitors, could your ignorance be any more evident? the amu happens to have contributed immensely to india`s struggle for independence, its culture and arts and has any number of its alumni in civil service. one of its vice chancellors went on to become the president of india.

sir syed`s views and the link to allama iqbal does exist [if im not mistaken, iqbal wrote the college anthem] but if we are to go on an excavation expedition into the histories of institutions, amu will not be the only one with famous skeletons in its past.