The head of India’s largest organisation of Islamic clerics has opposed girls, Muslim or non-Muslim, being sent to co-ed school and urged “rich people” to open all-girls’ schools.

“We have formulated a policy under which we will ask rich people of the country to start girls-only schools as co-education is affecting the lives of families because of obvious reasons,” Maulana Arshad Madani, president of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind, told reporters in Hapur, Uttar Pradesh, on Tuesday.

Madani, considered a liberal in the Jamiat, added: “We are not against the education of girls but disturbing things have happened because of co-education. Whether Muslim or Hindu, girls should go to all-girls’ schools. The Jamiat will meet rich people soon for the realisation of its plan.”

A Jamiat source said the organisation would first reach out to Muslim industrialists. “However, we will welcome rich people from other religions, too, once we have come out with the plan.”