On Tuesday, the Jammu and Kashmir administration ordered the suspension of academic activities at schools run by the Falah-e-Aam trust (FAT), an offshoot of the outlawed Islamic organisation Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI), and directed education department officials to shut all the schools within 15 days. The order further directed officials to get the students enrolled in nearby government institutions.
Educational institutions run by Falah-e-Aam Trust (FAT), an affiliate of the banned Jamat-e-Islami org, to be sealed within 15 days.
— ANI (@ANI) June 15, 2022
All students studying in such institutions will enroll in nearby govt schools. No new admission to be taken & registrations to be done: J&K Govt pic.twitter.com/oNHgXNxxIh
This followed a probe by the State Investigation Agency (SIA) of Jammu and Kashmir Police, which revealed major illegalities, open fraud, and widespread encroachment of government lands by FAT. The FAT was created in 1972 and is linked with the Jamaat-e-Islami, an Islamic organisation that was outlawed in February 2019, prompting the arrest, imprisonment, summons, and interrogation of hundreds of its major members, activists, and sympathisers.
According to reports, the SIA discovered that all FAT schools, totalling over 300, were built on fraudulently obtained government and community land, where land was occupied through coercion, at gunpoint, and collusion with revenue officials who committed fraud and forgery by deliberately distorting entities in revenue documents.
All academic activities in the schools operated by the ‘Falah-e-Aam’ in J&K must cease immediately, according to the recent directive issued by BK Singh, Principal Secretary to the Government, School Education Department. The order reads, “All students studying in these banned institutions shall admit themselves to nearby government schools for the current academic year, 2021-2022. All CEOs /principals/ZEOs shall facilitate the admission of these students. No new admission shall be taken in these banned FAT institutions and no further registration of these institutions shall be done.”
FAT was banned in 1990
FAT was outlawed by the then government in 1990 when around 11,000 children were enrolled in schools administered by this trust. Following the prohibition, the bulk of these pupils and teachers were integrated into state-run schools. Following the prohibition, the FAT turned over the operation of the bulk of its schools to Resident Welfare Associations and village committees, which have grown to roughly 330 schools with approximately 75,000 pupils and over 5,000 teachers over the years. FAT now controls less than a dozen schools in the region.
The J&K government has resorted to the prohibition order issued in May 1990, as well as two judicial remarks made by the High Court in May 2005 and December 2021, claiming that the FAT was functioning illegally after the ban under the cover of the High Court judgement. According to the administration, they advised the J&K Board of School Education in 2019 that pupils from FAT-run schools should submit their registration and examination forms through government schools in the locality.
The chairman of the Falah-e-Aam Trust said in a statement released in response to the government order that the ban was ‘unjustified,’ explaining that the trust isn’t associated with Jamaat e Islami and is only operating seven schools that are still associated with it after the government banned it in 1990.
Ban on Jamaat-e-Islami
Following the heinous terror assault in Pulwama, the union government banned Jamaat-e-Islami on February 28, 2019. The government designated Jammat-e-Islami, Jammu and Kashmir, an “unlawful organisation” under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, in a notification published in the Indian Gazette.
JeI was in contact with militant groups and was promoting extremist activities and terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir and other areas of the nation, according to the order. It claimed that the JeI backed calls for Kashmir’s secession from India, and supported terrorist and separatist organisations. Anti-national and subversive activities were also carried out by the group.
