Al Jamiatul Ashrafia

It started off as a madrasa called Misbah al-Ulum in 1898 in the town of Mubarakpur of what was then British India. It was named 'Ashrafia' after the most prominent Saint of not only the subcontinent but the world Ala Hadrat Shah Ali Hussain of Kichaucha. After struggling for many years and moving locations several times, a new building was constructed using funds raised by Hafiz Abd al-Aziz Muradabadi. This was the site for the school now known as Dar al-Ulum Ahl-i Sunnat or Misbah al-Ulum. Realizing that the site was becoming too small, Hafiz Abd al-Aziz organized an educational conference in May 1972 to discuss moving Ashrafiyya to a larger campus. Scholars of the Barelwi Movement like Mustafa Raza Khan son of Ahmad Raza Khan and Allama Arshadul Qaudri laid the foundation stone with the mission of making it a University for Sunni Hanafi Islamic Ideology in 1972 at a site outside the city of Azamgarh. Key figures such as Allama Ziyaul Mustafa, Allama Arshadul Qaudri, Allama Mumtaz Ahmad Ashrafulqadri, Mufti Abdul Mannan, Maulana Shafi, Janab Qari Yehya Sahab and Qamaruzzaman Azmi worked hard with Abd al-Aziz Muradabadi to raise the required funds to build the institution.