Contemporary challenges to Islam and the ways to

tackle those

The Islamic world

The challenges:
1. Division of the Islamic world on sectarian differences mainly Sunni Islam and Shia Islam
2. The concept and relevancy of militancy in Islam with reference to religious extremism and
intolerance, and terrorism
3. Non-incorporation of scientific education in the Madrasa educational curriculum
4. Non-adherence to Islamic moral principles and practices in general and particularly those at
the helm of affairs.
5. Non-democratic and authoritarian regimes in most of the Islamic world.
6. Low literacy rate
7. The corrupt political and bureaucratic elite
8. Very weak or totally non-existence of ‘institution of public accountability.’
9. Nonperformance of the OIC
10. Non boosting of mutual trade and investment
11. Little emphasis on Scientific Research and development
 At present, there are 57 Muslim states in the world with a total population of 1.8 billion.
They make around 25% of the world population constituting the second largest religious group
after Christianity. About 62% of the Muslims live in the Asia-Pacific region (from Turkey to
Indonesia). The largest Muslim country is Indonesia followed by Pakistan. The 57 OIC countries
have a combined GDP on a PPP basis of $18.6 trillion. By per capita GDP, Qatar is the wealthiest
country with per capita income fluctuating between $66,000 and $88,000.

The birth of OIC and its performance:

To benefit from each other and formulate a collective strategy to deal with their issues they
created the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in 1969. That happened when Israel
defeated Arab states in the June 1967 war, and burning incident of Al-Aqsa mosque took place in
1969. However, this organization could not bring any notable change and achievement. The
member countries were not united as they vowed to and were supposed to be. They remain divided
on various counts including sectarian differences like Shia and Sunni. They develop individual
affiliations and links with the superpowers and multiple countries of the world as suit to their
national interests. Their divide surfaced first time during ten years long war of attrition (1979-89)
between Iran and Iraq, and a second time during Middle East crisis involving Syria, Iraq, and
Yemen supported by Saudi Arabia and Iran to the opponent groups on the fault lines of Shia Islam
and Sunni Islam. OIC badly failed to play any role in resolving differences among the Muslim
states what to talk about the issues confronted by the Muslim minorities around the world. Syria
sought support both from Iran and Russia while Saudi Arabia supported the Sunni groups fighting
against Basha ul Asad. The USA supported Saudi Arabia and also became the largest supplier of
American weapons to Saudi Arabia after Israel. Hence, Iran’s tilt towards Russia, China, and
France was evident about inviting them to play their role to build various developmental projects
including defense-related purchases in Iran.
Pakistan always had strained relations with India and fought three wars with it mainly on
the issue of Kashmir, but many Islamic countries including Iran and Saudi Arabia established quite
friendly relations with India as these suited to their national interest. This way whole Islamic world
remained driven by their respective national interests than the dictates of the OIC charter.
The OIC was supposed to address the human rights issues confronted by the oppressed
Muslim populations/minorities all over the world particularly in Palestine, Kashmir, and Rohingya
Muslims in Myanmar, in which it failed to perform any significant role.
The OIC also was unable to boost any mutual trade and investment in addition to Scientific
Research and development among the member states. It did create few institutions and agencies in
this regard including the Islamic development Bank but without any significant achievement. The
OIC, in the beginning, was considered as an emerging future politico-economic force like the
European Union (EU). But with time the expectations dampened.
The Muslim world as a whole failed to make any promising performance in the domains of
economy, mass, and quality education, curbing corruption, crime and violence, religious
extremism and intolerance, and terrorism. This all made their youth hopeless and frustrated
ultimately making desperate journeys towards Europe, USA, Canada, and Australia like countries
to build their future.

Education domain:
The Islamic world is yet to enter into the scientific age and develop the knowledge-based
competitive outlook, the door of which they have shut for the last 400 years. Not a single Islamic
head of state up till now has shown any keenness to establish a world-class university. Their
preference for a quality education can be judged from the fact that there is not a single university
in the whole Islamic world amongst the top 100 universities of the world. Only one institution has
placed the Middle East University of Technology Ankara, Turkey at 76th position.
The literacy rate of any country sufficiently helps its economic development. At present
except Turkey, Central Asian, Caucasian states, Malaysia, Iran and Indonesia, and few others
almost whole the Islamic world is quite below the world average in literacy percentage. Around
40 percent of the Muslim world cannot read or write according to a report of the International
Islamic News Agency (IINA). Their adult literacy rate is around 72 percent which is less than the
average of the world 86.3 percent. According to The Islamic Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization (ISESCO) illiteracy rates in the Muslim world is 40 percent for males, and 65 percent
for females. This is undoubtedly the leading cause of their backwardness in the comity of nations.
Against the world average of 86.3 literacy percentage of some of the Muslim countries is as below:
Afghanistan=38.2, Bangladesh=72.8, Egypt=75.2, Iraq=43.7, Morocco=72.4, Nigeria=59.6,
Pakistan=56.4, Sudan=53.5, Yemen=70.1.
Research & Development: Expenditure on R&D in some of the Islamic countries in billions of
U.S. dollars PPP is as under:
Turkey= 15.3, Malaysia= 10.6, Egypt= 6.2, Pakistan= 2.4, Indonesia= 2, and Saudi Arabia= 1.8
Whereas it is $511 for USA, $451 for China, $66.5 for India, and $33.7 for Taiwan.
This shows that education and R&D is still a non- priority in the whole Islamic world. Hence,
it does not seem to be promising performers in the field of science and technology at least for the
coming 20 years.

Quality of life:
As regards the quality of life that is good health, education, housing, money, etc. the
Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) researched by looking at a
range of indicators across 41 countries. Rating countries on 50 indicators on two categories, i.e.,
material conditions (income, jobs, and housing) and quality of life (work-life balance, health,
education, personal safety and environmental quality) OECD observed that the U.S. leads the
world in material conditions. Other strong performers in material conditions are Canada,
Luxembourg, and Australia, whereas the leading country in both areas, i.e., material conditions
and quality of life was Norway with other strong performers Switzerland and Sweden; while
Slovakia and Estonia in Eastern Europe are coming up speedily. There is not any worth mentioning
Islamic country except Turkey comparatively performing better on material conditions.

How to tackle?
Briefly speaking only two counts can bring a fundamental change in the ongoing dismal
scenario. Number one is their adherence to the Islamic faith and principles in letter and spirit which
enshrines to hold the rope of Allah with a firm grip and not to fight among themselves. Number
two is disdaining and rejecting all other considerations including the sectarian differences for the
mutual economic growth and wellbeing as has been done by EU, ASEAN and SCO like
organizations.
However, it is expected that after the ongoing war of attrition among the Islamic belligerents
and the resultant mutual economic bleeding in addition to the substantial human sufferings they
will learn a lesson which was learnt by the European imperialist powers after fighting the two
world wars.
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