Assalamalaikum (Peace be upon you), Dear Readers!

I had informed you all in my previous post, that i would be traveling on a Journey to the well known madrasa “Jamia Darusaalam, Oomerabad”. Well i just returned back from it and trust me, it was a great experience!

I am sure there are many amongst you who are not aware of Oomerabad. Well how can you be, it ain’t a big city! And those who hear the word “Umri” or “Oomeri” after an Islamic scholar’s name, like “XYZ Umri”, then know that he is from this Islamic university.

Oomerabad,  is a very small town located about 8 kms from the city Ambur, the place best known for its leather business in India. Ambur is nearly 150 kms from Bangalore and Chennai. This town is named after a famous leather merchant whose name was “Kaka Oomer” (or Umar). He was a noble man. He came to this place about 150 years ago and started his business which flourished by Allah’s grace. Then he started inviting people to come and live in that place and people started settling down gradually. He arranged for drinking water facility, agricultural facility, and much more. This town came to be known as “Oomerabad”, after the name of the founder “Kaka Oomer”. But his quest to help people did not end here. He wanted to setup an Islamic University, a madrasa, from where people could gain the knowledge of Allah and thus flourish in this life. His prayers were answered by Allah and hence he laid down the foundation of “Jamia Darussalam”, about 80 years ago. His pious intention and trust on Allah brought much recognition to this Islamic University. Since its inception, Jamia Darussalam Oomerabad has produced Hundreds of Islamic Scholars who spread across the world. Some among them have also went ahead and completed their Masters and PHd from world renowned universities like Jamia Islamia, Madina.

Alright, that was “Once upon a time” story about Oomerabad! Now lets talk about my Journey to this prestigious university, my experience in it, and what i learnt from being a student of this Islamic University .

I was accompanied by two of my Da’wah team mates, Nabeel and Akif ur rahman.

To reach Oomerabad, we had two options – either to go via Bangalore or via Chennai. We choose to go via Bangalore. We booked our train reservations three days prior to the start of our course. We couldn’t get confirmed seat and were put in waiting list. We were quite positive (thanks to everyone’s advice ) that our seats would get confirmed without any problem. But when we reached the station to catch our train, we learnt that our seats were not confirmed. WE MISSED OUR TRAIN! The entire journey takes around 15 hours and now we were left with no options. No train, No buses and No flights. We returned home disappointed and prayed to Allah for a way out of of this mess. To our surprise, we got a call from a friend who fetch us three flight tickets to Bangalore! Alhumdulillah, the flight was early in the morning and we reached Bangalore by 10 am the next day. From there we had to catch a local Train to reach Ambur (City famous for leather business). From Ambur, we had to catch bus to reach our destination, Oomerabad.

We were welcomed by the students in the campus and guided us towards the main office block. We met our course coordinator who quickly took us to our room. Below are the snaps of our room:

Food was awesome and on time. There was absolutely no complaint from our side and we were getting more than what we were officially allotted. I have a habit of becoming friends with cooks where ever i go. In all the previous companies i worked in, all the cooks were my good friends. Not only does the poor guy feel happy (since these guys are neglected by all), we also get advantage over others when it comes to food . Below are some of our snaps with the cook and other students while in Dining hall:

The classes started two days after we arrived in the University. Out of the entire strength of the class, we 3 were the only ones who were not scholars. Remaining all were qualified scholars and that’s when we realized that this course was actually meant for scholars. This was a Da’wah learning course in which Scholars were being taught on how to convey the message of peace to others and hence become Daees. And guess what? In this particular course, we 3 were the most experienced in the field of Da’wah (Since we are in it for the past 8 years) and others had absolutely no experience in it. Mashallah, Our classmates never let us feel that they were qualified scholars, rather they were always anxious to learn from our experiences.

The very next day, i was asked to take sessions for all the scholars on various topics in which i had experience. This proves that it is Allah who gives respect and it is he who pulls it away! This is not in humans hand. So instead of worrying about earning respect, just be sincere , honest and dedicated in your work, and automatically you earn respect. (This was a great learning for me!). At first, I was quite astonished, but later i understood the fact that every person is an expert in his own field. There are a lot of things which we learn from these scholars who have spent years in Islamic Universities studying Sharia and at the same time there are a lot of things we (as Daees) need to teach these scholars from our worldly experiences.

During our stay in this Madrasa, we realized that there is an important need of introducing subjects like World politics, world scenario, Internet and Technology, English language etc. We observed that 90% of these qualified scholars are completely unaware of the happenings of this world and have no idea about the latest technology. So where are they going to end up? Either handling another madrasa or leading as Imaam in a mosque!

The critics of Islam blame Madrasas and call them “havens for terrorists”. What a stupid conclusion which is due to their ignorance of reality. The students of such Madrasas are ignorant of the happenings in the world. Many students, whom i interviewed, have absolutely no idea about 9/11 attacks. They have no clue about whats happenings even in other parts of India. Nearly all of them were talking too sheepishly about using force, even though they held knowledge on Quran and Sunnah. This is because they have never thought about using force for Islam. This is what they are taught here, that force shouldn’t be used in Islam.

Forget about Terrorist ideology, i couldn’t find a single student who was of violent nature. I tried to know if any of them had the concept which the Critics of Islam talk about. But i couldn’t find a single person with that concept. Truly, the message of Islam preaches Peace and that is why we don’t find anyone with such concepts here. Check this incident that took place when i was trying to break open a coconut. I started smashing the coconut on a big rock nearby, expecting it to break. One of the students who was passing by came near me and said, “stop”. I asked, “why, what happened?”. He said there are ants walking over the stone, you might kill them! I was like “Whatttt!!!! “

Our classes went pretty well. The most important thing we learnt from this course was the importance of offering Tahajjud prayers and doing Zikr all the time. Prior to this, we never realized the power it holds in resolving our issues. What an easy way to have our Dua’s accepted! Unfortunately the entire Ummah “as a whole” have forgotten the importance of both Tahajjud prayers and Allah’s Zikr. Besides learning, we also taught a lot of new things to these scholars which (inshallah) will help them in their endeavor.

During nights we had to take care of our work back home, as we couldn’t leave it to fall down for so many months. Every day after Asr prayers, we were left to ourselves. We spent the evening hours taking care of our work. Thanks to Allah, we could get good Internet wireless connection from Jamia campus.

Besides studies, Brother Nabeel had another interesting past time. He kept exploring the campus in detail. Check out one of his discoveries below :

Jamia Darussalam‘s campus is huge and lovely. There is a Mosque within the campus that itself is a mark of beauty. It was build by a wealthy businessman from Gulf. It has one tall minaret which is the highlight of the entire mosque. Besides the mosque which is at the center of the campus, many buildings extend over the entire area. The right side buildings on the campus are for children while the left side buildings are for higher studies. There is another mosque outside the campus which is also used for offering prayers. There are two huge playgrounds on the campus, one at the entrance while another behind the IT building. This IT building actually opens just for one month every year. IT isn’t a mandatory subject for the students which is unfortunate. The weather was initially very hot, but later in the month it was wonderful. There are lots of coconut trees planted on the campus. Check out some of the snaps of the Campus:

During our visit to Jamia Darussalam, Oomerabad, we met up with many esteemed scholars who gave us knowledge on various subjects of Sharia. We spent time with them, tried our best to serve and help them with their daily tasks, traveled with them and visited their homes.

All in all, a great Journey to one of the most renowned Islamic University of India. The Journey to Jamia Darussalam, Oomerabad, not only gave us an insight of what happens in the Madrasas, but it also gave us a new experience which is totally different from our daily life. This trip also boosted up our moral since we saw the claims of Anti-Islamic forces, fall down to utter pieces. Their claims that Islamic Madrasas or Islamic Universities are producing Terrorists is nothing but a Big LIE which has been systematically spread across amongst the masses. In reality, these Madrasas are places where Peace Makers are produced in the form of Islamic scholars who are not only assets for our country, but who will also,Inshallah, make our society a better place to live in.

Hope you all had good time reading through the experiences of my Journey!

Assalamalaikum (Peace be upon you)!

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