Darul Uloom Deoband

The Darul Uloom Deoband is an Islamic seminary, the second largest in the world, located Deoband in the Sarahanpur district of Uttar Pradesh. It was founded in 1866 by prominent urdu scholars for propagating Sunni Islam in India. It is here that the Deobandi Islamic movement began.[caption id="attachment_50231" align="alignleft" width="380" caption="Many Islamic schools across continents are affiliated to the seminary. Reuters"][/caption]The institute has around 4,000 students. India today reports, “Deoband's curriculum is based on the 17th century syllabus known as Dars-e-Nizami. The core curriculum teaches Islamic law, Islamic jurispudence and traditional islamic spirituality (tasawwuf, the focus of sufism).”Many Islamic schools throughout India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Afghanistan, the UK, the US, South Africa are affiliated, or theologically linked to Darul Uloom Deoband, informs Wikipedia.The Indian Express reports:

In tumultuous times, when several educated Muslims happily bought into the idea of nation being equal to religion — as articulated by Jinnah a little later — Deoband offered solid counters. The loudly, even if slowly enunciated, point was that nationhood had to do with birthplace and the sense of one’s homeland. In the heart of an area torn apart by Partition, Deoband held on and maintained its opposition to the carving out of another nation state for Muslims, seeing such an exercise as futile.

The orthodox seminary was in the news for the sacking of its vice-chancellor Maulana Ghulam Mohammed Vastanvi on 24 July 2011, the first liberal voice to head the institute. It had also made headlines for issuing regressive fatwas against jeans, tight-fitting outfits and contraceptives, and by declaring it illegal for women to work and support the family under Sunni law.