SIMI at home

After the ban, SIMI had to try surrogate means to increase its membership. Explains a former SIMI office-bearer: 8220;When you force an organisation with strong ideology to go underground, they take other measures to keep afloat. One method is running socio-religious organisations; another is banking on a hardcore religious or political organisation. They also focus on madarsas for new members.8217;8217;

Maharashtra has more than 3,000 madarsas and most of them are unregistered. Mumbai alone has some 500 madarsas. In the entire state, there are more than one lakh madarsa students and 5,000 teachers.

Otherwise, SIMI insiders say, it is not easy to stay afloat in Maharashtra. 8216;8216;There is little scope for running such organisations by stealth in the state. It8217;s a method that can work in Kerala or UP, parts of which has been traditional SIMI stronghold,8217;8217; says a former professor at Aligarh Muslim University. He is also unsure about the second method.

After the ban, no mainstream organisation has shown any interest in SIMI. Even the Jamat-e-Islami, which was once close to SIMI, has distanced itself.