Back in 2022, a 19-year-old female from Madhya Pradesh in India, accused four Muslim men of raping her while rapists said, sexual relations with a Hindu female would earn them a place in Islamic paradise (Jannat). According to the victim, when she pleaded with her assaulters to spare her, they chillingly said, “We will go to jannat (heaven) if we have sex with Hindu women”. When she pointed out that she is married and six months pregnant, they said “everything is fair in Islam”.
The dehumanization of Hindu and non-Muslim females is a feature of Islamist indoctrination which happens through mosques, madrassas, Islamic universities and other socio-religious institutions. The constant bombardment of the Muslim mind with messages like ‘girls who do not wear hijab/burqa are asking to be raped’ further instills the outlook that Hindu women are ‘roaming naked‘ and ‘asking for it’.
It is not only happening with Hindu and non-Muslim females. In all the madrassas, minor boy students are being regularly raped by their teachers while the rapist tell the victims that such sexual company to the teacher would open the door of Jannat for the victim and his family members. According to a statistic, only in 2020, more than 626 madrassa students fell victims of sexual abuse and rape, although the actual number is much higher.
An investigation by The Associated Press found dozens of police reports, known in Pakistan as First Information Reports, alleging sexual harassment, rape and physical abuse by Islamic clerics teaching in madrassas or religious schools throughout Pakistan, where many of the country’s poorest study. The AP also documented cases of abuse through interviews with law enforcement officials, abuse victims and their parents.
There are more than 22,000 [now the number is over 31,000 in 2023] registered madrassas in Pakistan, teaching more than 2 million children. But there are many more religious schools that are unregistered. They are typically started by a local cleric in a poor neighborhood, attracting students with a promise of a meal and free lodging. There is no central body of clerics that governs madrassas.
Police say the problem of sexual abuse of children by clerics is pervasive and the scores of police reports they have received are just the tip of the iceberg. Yet despite the dozens of reports, none have resulted in the conviction of a cleric. Religious clerics are a powerful group in Pakistan and they close ranks when allegations of abuse are brought against one of them. They have been able to hide the widespread abuse by accusing victims of blasphemy or defamation of Islam.
Police officials say they have no idea how many children are abused by religious clerics in Pakistan. The officials said clerics often target young boys who have not yet reached puberty in part because of the restrictive nature of Pakistan’s still mostly conservative society, where male interaction with girls and women is unacceptable. The clerics for the most part had access to and trust with boys, who are less likely to report a sexual assault.
Incidents of rape inside Islamic madrassas are happening in every country in the world. While it is happening in Indonesia, the largest Muslim nation in the world, madrassa students are not spared by their teachers even in Western nations, including the United States, Britain and other European countries.
According to Bangkok Post, “Devout Muslims send children to madrasas, but they don’t speak up about these crimes as they feel it would harm these key religious institutions”.
In Pakistan, cases of rape inside madrassas as well as Muslims targeting Hindu and non-Muslim females is rampant, where authorities in most cases do not take any action against the perpetrators of such heinous crime.
Most shocking fact is, in some cases, Muslim rapist, particularly the clerics and madrassa teachers shamelessly defend their rights to consensual intercourse with young boys.
Astonishingly, Pakistan’s former prime minister Imran Khan in an interview to American news site Axios reiterated his position that onus of sexual assault and rape is on victims and their clothing. He said, “Wearing fewer clothes will have an impact on men unless they’re robots”.
In another interview with HBO, Imran Khan defended Muslim rapists.
According to an article published in the PIME Asia News, sex abuse is widespread in female madrassas in Bangladesh. The report said, in Bangladesh about six million girls study in Quranic schools, which many parents choosing this type of education because they are free. There are two types of madrassas: private Qawmi schools, and government-sponsored Alia schools.
In South Asian countries, cases of abduction, rape and forceful conversion of Hindu females is rampant. In Pakistan, situation is extremely volatile where Hindu females are regularly forced into conversion following rape or gang rape. Indian newspapers and news sites are regularly reporting cases of rape and forceful conversion of Hindu girls and women, while Muslim and secularist media are making frantic bids of either burying or twisting such gruesome cases. Such notorious trend shall not end until Muslims continue to uphold the obstinate belief of getting direct access to ‘Jannat’ as a reward for raping a Hindu and non-Muslim female.
