ISLAMABAD, Sept 7: President Gen Pervez Musharraf on Tuesday assured religious leaders that the government would not interfere in the affairs of madaris and would resolve the issue of degrees issued by the country's leading religious institutions.

He was talking to a delegation of ulema of the Ittehad Tanzimat Madaris Deenia (ITMD), representing five prominent religious institutions, who met him for over three and a half hours at his Rawalpindi camp office.

President Musharraf made it clear to the ulema that there was no foreign pressure of any kind on his government to harass or control religious schools in the country.

He said the government was grateful to these institutions which were playing a pivotal role in teaching, feeding and providing jobs to hundreds of thousands of youths in the country without seeking financial assistance from the government.

The government, he said, had no intention either to subjugate religious institutions or pressurise ulema and added that they were free to perform their duty. He said the government's campaign to eradicate terrorism of all kinds and manifestations from the society was in the best interest of the country which it would not abandon under any pressure.

The president sought the support of ulema in solving the problem in tribal areas, especially in Wana where clashes between militants and security forces had taken place in the recent past.

The ulema asked the government to provide them a detailed briefing on the situation in Wana and actions that the Pakistan army had so far taken there before they could adopt a line of action or provide any support to the government.

The president assured them that in future no government agency would raid any religious institution without taking the institution's head into confidence and that the sanctity of religious institutions would be protected. He said he would soon issue a directive to the agencies concerned in this connection.

The ITMD scholars who met the president included Mufti Munibur Rahman, Qari Hanif Jallendhari, Maulana Abdul Malik MNA, Allama Riaz Hussain Najafi, Maulana Naeemur Rahman and Hafiz Hussain Ahmed of Mardan.

The president was assisted by Minister for Religious Affairs Ijazul Haq, Education Minister Javed Ashraf Qazi, Minister of State for Education Ghulam Bibi Bharwana and Minister of State for Religious Affairs Dr Aamir Liaquat Hussain.

Later talking to Dawn, Maulana Hanif Jallendhari said: "The meeting was held in a cordial atmosphere in which a number of issues were discussed and it was agreed that the issue of religious would be resolved".

He said the president constituted a committee comprising ministers of religious affairs and education to resolve the issue by holding meetings with the people concerned.

Maulana Jallendhari said the president had also promised to ease visa formalities for foreign students and held out an assurance that ulema from leading religious institutions would be taken into confidence while finalizing the syllabus for Madressahs.

He said the president expressed the desire that religious schools should adopt modern techniques of imparting education and include subjects of science and computer in their curriculum.

When asked whether the president also sought support from ulema on the issue of his uniform, he said: "It was purely a political issue while our meeting was totally non-political and no such thing came under discussion."

The president, he said, assured ulema that he would keep in contact with them in future to take them into confidence on various national issues. He said the delegation told the president that most of the religious institutions had already included subjects taught at the matric level in their curricula.

The government and ulema agreed to accelerate the registration process for religious schools. The president on the occasion announced a grant of Rs10 million as compensation for people killed in recent sectarian and terrorist attacks in Karachi.