Madrassahs have historically served as centres of learning for clerics and religious scholars. In Pakistan, they have gained ascendency as welfare institutes, providing food, learning, shelter, and livelihoods to thousands of destitute youth who cannot afford mainstream education. Recent social and political developments in the country have prompted a revaluation of the role of Madaris in society with calls for concerted and practical efforts to meaningfully integrate the 3.5 million Madrassah students as equal and vibrant youth of Pakistan.

The challenges are considerable and mostly emanate from a reliance on top down approaches based on preconceived notions about the aptitudes, capabilities, and aspirations of young people in seminaries.  This has created a large segment of marginalized and disenfranchised youth with diminished potentials to meaningfully contribute to the society and economy of Pakistan. In this regard, an effective intervention to mainstream Madrassah youth must be supported by empirical evidence and bottom up consultative processes, ensuring participation from all segments of the Madrassah hierarchy in Pakistan.

UNDP’s Youth Empowerment Programme relied on a participatory approach to develop an implementation plan for constructively engaging young people in the religious seminaries of Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces. Selection of a local implementing partner (CODE Pakistan) with established linkages inside networks of seminary power actors played a pivotal role in initiating the consultative process. The ‘learning from the beneficiaries’ approach involved the following steps;

• A scoping research was undertaken to identify strategic actors for taking ownership and supporting the development of a detailed implementation plan to constructively engage Madrassah youth in Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces.
• Based on the recommendations of the scoping research, the Youth Empowerment Programme team and CODE Pakistan organized four provincial (two each in Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa) and one federal dialogue with more than 80 Madrassah stakeholders to develop an implementation plan for the social and economic empowerment of young people in religious seminaries.
  

Development of the implementation plan through a consultative process helped in overcoming established biases regarding the preconceived limits of social and economic engagement activities with Madrassah students. For instance, Madrassah stakeholders informed that vocational training programmes for youth in seminaries should abandon traditional blue collar skills and focus on digital and translation skills, foreign languages, and writing skills to leverage the latent capacities and interests of Madrassah students. Furthermore, contrary to popular perceptions, Madrassah stakeholders were open to facilitating constructive interaction with seminary students belonging to a different schools of thought. They were also keen to participate in debates and sports competitions against university students. Finally, apart from a range of institutional and downstream interventions for Madrassah mainstreaming, the implementation plan is a historical document, mapping the development and evolution of Government programmes and plans of action to mainstream young people in Madaris from the perspective of their intended beneficiaries. This has helped in identifying gaps in past approaches and paved the way for possible course correction and collaborative progress towards mutually agreed goals.

The implementation plan has been shared with the Government to inform its ongoing work on Madrassah mainstreaming in line with the Government’s Vision 2025 agenda and ongoing initiatives for common education policies. 

Author:

Hamza Hasan

Hamza Hasan works with UNDP's Youth Empowerment Programme as a Senior Social Inclusion Officer. He is a Cultural Anthropologist with experience of promoting and facilitating meaningful participation of vulnerable groups in the development process through research, strategic programme development, and inclusive project implementation