Madrassas reject demand to disclose income

Representatives of 250 Islamic seminaries in Pakistan have rejected a demand they register their schools with the government and disclose their sources of income, a cleric said today.

The representatives met in Islamabad yesterday to discuss amendments that President Gen. Pervez Musharraf made last week to a law on registration of welfare organisations – part of his effort to crackdown on religious extremists.

Maulana Sharif Hazarvi, who runs Jamia Rabbania seminary, or madrassa, in Islamabad, said the amended law required Islamic schools to identify sources of their income in their annual audit reports to the government.

“If we give names of people who may have given donations, police will go after them and harass them,” he said.