40 minor girls found locked in toilet of unrecognised Bahraich madrasa during inspection

The madrasa has been shut down, the officials said.

Payagpur Sub-divisional Magistrate (SDM) Ashwini Pandey, who led the administration team, said he has sent a report to the Bahraich District Magistrate (DM) with details of the search operation at the unrecognised institution.

The District Minority Officer too was asked to conduct an inquiry, he said, adding that police sent the girl students to their homes after noting down their details.

District Magistrate Akshay Tripathi told The Indian Express: “So far, no other illegal activity has been found at the unrecognised madrasa. Reports from the SDM and the DMO have been received. I am sending a report to the Principal Secretary (Minority Department) requesting for direction to act in the matter.”

The building owner, Khalil Ahmed, also the madrasa manager, had not provided the documents and details about the madrasa to the District Minority Officer (DMO) Mohammad Khalid by Thursday evening.

DMO Khalid said: “I reached the madrasa and asked the manager, Khalil Ahmed, to produce the documents of the institution’s management. Though he produced the admission forms of the 40 girls, he failed to provide details of the teaching staff except one Taqseem Fatima, who happens to be his daughter. I had asked him to provide all required documents today but he did not turn up till evening.”

Sharing details of the search operation, SDM Pandey said: “I received information about the madrasa being operated illegally. Initially, I sent a lekhpal (revenue clerk) there to get details, but madrasa manager Khalil Ahmed did not allow him to enter the premises. Then I reached there with a team around 4.30pm.”

“Khalil Ahmed was not even allowing us to enter the building. We searched all the floors and the terrace of the building. We were about to leave when our team observed commotion in one of the toilets on the terrace. The toilet was bolted from outside. We were shocked to find 40 girls were inside the small toilet. They were visibly scared. When asked why he locked the girls inside the toilet, Khalil said the girls panicked during the search of the premises,” Pandey added.

DMO Khalid said the madrasa did not come to their notice during an extensive survey in 2023 which was conducted on the orders of the Uttar Pradesh government to find the exact number of recognised and unrecognised madrasas in the state.

“We came to know about the madrasa only yesterday and need more time to find out if any illegal activity was going on there,” he added.

During the 2023 survey, 495 madrasas were found unrecognised in the district, the DMO said.

This year too, the state government had conducted an extensive exercise of identifying madrasas and mosques built illegally on government land in Bahraich, Shravasti, Balrampur and Siddharthnagar districts and got the encroachments demolished or sealed.