Mulla Omar didn’t study at Haqqania, but many other Taliban leaders did

PESHAWAR: The 80-year old MaulanaSamiulHaq was a steadfast supporter of the Afghan Taliban, but this

isn’t true that the Taliban supreme leader Mulla Mohammad Omar studied at the DarulUloomHaqqania headed by him.

Mulla Omar mostly studied at small madrassas in Afghanistan’s Urozgan and Kandahar province.

However, many other leading Afghan Taliban figures including the Haqqani network founded MaulanaJalaluddinHaqqani studied at DarulUloomHaqqania and proud affixed the word Haqqani to their names.

MaulanaSamiulHaq became the head of the DarulUloomHaqqania in 1988. His brother MaulanaAnwarulHaq also taught at the madrassa. The institution was founded by their father Maulana Abdul Haq.

MaulanaSamiulHaq also remained a member of the Senate for at least three terms.

His son, MaulanaHamidulHaq was elected MNA from Nowshera on the ticket of the six-party alliance of the religio-political parties, MuttahidaMajlis-i-Amal (MMA) in the 2002 general election.

The JUI-S won a number of assembly seats from the MMA platform in that election.

The late Maulana became close to Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) when the latter was in power in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa from 2013-2018. They even made a pre-election alliance but it didn’t last long.

The DarulUloomHaqqania received a grant of Rs300 million from the PTI government in the province and another substantial grant was announced by it for the madressa later despite countrywide criticism.