After the student-people’s uprising, the application for establishing new madrasa has increased rapidly and also the steps have increased to accept the application. This is the story of the government controlled Alia Madrasa, but Qawmi Madrasa which goes beyond government control does not have any exact number.
During this period, the number of establishing general educational institutions and academic approval proves much less and is happening in a particular region. The Daily Amader Barta, the only print version educational newspaper of Bangladesh, has released this fact through its investigative news.
According to the report of Bangladesh Madrasa Education Board, from December 2023 to July 2024 new application for setting up Dakhil Madaras was only one. On the other hand, after the uprising, in eight months’ time this number has increased to 18. Moreover, before the eight months of uprising, the application of upgrading Dakhil Madrasa into Alim was three, that has increased to 12 in the next eight months.
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Some 54 new madrasas were established in 13 years from 2011 to 2023. Out of this, 10 new madrasa was built from 2021 to 2023. Whereas, after August 5, steps have been taken to establish 82 madrasas around the July Movement period.
In order to give academic approval to any new educational institution, the education board concerned conducts a survey through GPS map to learn the distance of adjacent educational institutions. Bangladesh Bureau of Educational Information and Statistics (BANBEIS) supplies it to the education board. It is learnt from the BANBEIS that it has provided 103 GPS maps to educational institutions in the last four months and its report analysis shows that out of these institutions 82 are only madras and 58 applications have been submitted after student-people’s uprising. Besides this, after 5 August, applications have been submitted for 21 general educational institutions all of which belong to Mymensingh Education Board.
People belonging to madrasa education say that madrasa students and teachers experienced various types of discriminations in terms of nationalization, student stipend and MPO enlistment. After July uprising, the fear in these areas has squeezed and the encouragement to establish more madrasas has started. According to BANBEIS, currently, the number of madrasas in the country is 9 thousand 256. In 13 years from 2011 to 2023, only 54 madrasas were established. Out of them 44 new madras were set up till 2020 means in ten years. And till 2023 the number of newly established madrasa was 10.
Several officials of the Directorate of Madrasa Education and Madrasa Education Board have said on condition of anonymity that positive results were not accrued even though huge number of applications regarding madrasa education came during the AL government. Last year, this number was extremely poor. However, after the mass uprising quite a good number of applications have come and the board is also conducting population census, distance of catchment area madrasas and other relevant information quickly.
After Covid-19 period, the number of madrasa students has steadily increased, as BANBEIS says. According to its report, the number of students in madrasa was 41 lack 26 thousand 626 in 2023 that proves the highest number in two decades, they added.
While contacting Professor Mazharul Hannan, President of Bangladesh Principals’ Council told the Daily Amader Barta that, during the time of Corona very few number of madrasas were closed comparing to general educational institutions and the expenditure of general education is more than that of madrasa education. Because of these two significant reasons, the number of madrasa students has increased. Moreover, many guardians became unemployed during Covid who could not afford to maintain the food and other expenses of their children and so sent them to madrasas.