Flowers for the Women Wearing Veils - Volume I — Page 304
! ! 304 government has now imposed a condition for men, which forbids th em from taking the private exam, however this condition does not apply to women. Before Punjab Universi ty applies this condition to women, we should produce a large enough population [of graduates] to educate our future generations and fulfill our educational needs. I have pondered over this extensively. U nless women become involved in our work, we cannot be successful. The majority of issues involve women , including the matter of our children’s mo ral training , which specifically relates to women. T his cannot be addressed until women are educated and they are put in charge of this task. N o matter how educated a woman is or how well she trains her children inside the home, she cannot be successful [on her own] because children are influenced by the children in their surrounding s and the only way every child can be well trained , is if a large number of educated women come together. Boarding homes for young children should be established and put under the supervision of women , so that they may instill good manners in them in childhood. When these children are grow n , the ir character can positively influence o ther ’ s character s. Success cannot be attained without this united effort; neither speeches, nor lectures, nor sermons can produce success. National character will only be achieved when such boarding hom es are established. Those whom God has given the ability , should enroll their children in them. Their supervisors should be women. Young children should board there, starting from an early age to the age of seven or eight years, during which good morals w ill be instilled in them. This group will then impress their characters up on others. Keeping t hese boys and girls together in one place for training up to the age of seven or eight can cause no harm but [conversely] c ould prove to be extremely beneficial to the nation. If we can establish such boarding homes and thus, develop good morals, such training would distinguish our Jama'at from others. However, this goal cannot be achieve d without enough educated women , which is why I believe women’s colleges are more important than men’s colleges. This does not mean that we do not require men’s colleges. We do need t hem, but at present, we are un able to fulfill the official requireme nts pertaining to them. However , in my opinion, even if we could fulfill th ose requirements, a women’s