Huffaz at Vision Academy blend faith with modern study in Phulat

What Happened

A boarding school named Vision International Academy (VIA) operates in Phulat village, Khatauli, along the Delhi-Dehradun Expressway, near Muzaffarnagar. It was founded by philanthropist Ameer Ahamed, a Kerala-born former Gulf-based entrepreneur who restructured sick units before turning to social work. The school hosts hundreds of Huffaz—students who have memorised the Quran—who are engaging with both religious and modern education. A 14-year-old Hafiz Abdus Samad from Mewat, Haryana, expressed a desire to join the Indian Foreign Service and to work in the UAE, arguing that India can accommodate religious diversity. The institution aims to show that science and mathematics do not conflict with Islamic teaching, and it has implemented a bridge course with AMU and Jamia to fuse spiritual training with secular education.

Staff and students describe a broad spectrum of aspirations. Some students want to move from the madarsa to universities or the Gulf for work, while others want to become professionals such as doctors, engineers, or chartered accountants. The school emphasizes a broader cultural education, including knowledge of the Indian Constitution and comparative religion, and it allows occasional dress-down days to expose students to different social contexts. The project, however, is set against a troubled local backdrop: Phulat is noted as a place connected to historical Islamic scholarship and more recently to a life-imprisonment conviction in 2024 of Maulana Kaleem Siddiqui for forcible conversions, with Siddiqui having offered the land for some madrasas that later joined VIA.

Ahamed acknowledges that changing mindsets will take time, but he asserts that the campus has begun to broaden horizons beyond traditional madarsa confines. Wasi Miyan Khan, a senior teacher with a PhD from Jamia Millia Islamia, emphasizes using students’ strong memory to help them excel in board exams while nurturing curiosity and inquiry. The school’s philosophy includes teaching about the country and its Constitution and promoting a respectful understanding of multiple faiths.