Pakistan’s Lurch Towards Ultra-Conservativism Abetted by Saudi-Inspired Pyramid Scheme

Abstract

Generations of graduates of madrassas as well as other institutions of religious learning coupled with successive Pakistani governments willing to play politics with religion as well as debilitating conflict have helped create a significant segment of Pakistani society that is ultra-conservative, intolerant, anti-pluralistic, and often supremacist. It is a segment that can easily be whipped up to adopt militant causes as the popularity of militant groups among different strands of Islam, including both Barelvis and Deobandis have demonstrated. No social group or class, including Pakistan’s political and military elite, has proven to be immune to the spread of ultra-conservatism because of Pakistani government policies and Saudi encouragement. Al Huda International Welfare Foundation, a religious school with branches and franchises in numerous Pakistani cities as well as in North America, Europe, and the Middle East has emerged as the leading institution in persuading large numbers of upper and middle class Pakistani women, many of whom had adopted liberal lifestyles, to change their ways and adhere to an ultra-conservative interpretation of the faith akin to Saudi ideology that Al Huda projects as the only true Islam.