ensure that students of one discipline have an general concept of the other streams, each of the stream have a subject (General Science for Humanities and Business Studies and General Social Science for the Science students) that gives an overall idea of the core topics. In case of religious education i.e. madrasa education, Bangladesh has mainly two kinds of madrassas – Alia and Qawmi. In Alia madrasa, students read Bangla, English, Mathematics and other basic subjects along with religious subjects. The Alia madrasas deserve recognition of imparting education up to degree level, meaning that after passing Alim (HSC), Fazil (Degree) students can enter general education system. At present, the Directorate of Secondary and Higher Education monitors Alia madrasa.92 The Madrasa education has its own curriculum focusing on Islamic disciplines such as Holy Quran, Hadith, Tafsir, Fiqh, Usul and Arabic language and literature. 93 Similar to the secondary education, higher education has three streams: general (covering theoretical and applied sciences, social sciences, humanities and business studies), religious studies and technology studies. The technology education includes agriculture, engineering, medical, textile, leather technology and ICT.94 Alternative Educational Streams Streams Besides the above mentioned streams, a number of alternative streams of education are prevalent in the country. These streams do not come within the main educational framework, because they exist as supplementary avenues for accentuating the access to education for those people who do not enjoy their right to education due to poverty, lack of communication, age gap and on 91 The core subjects for the Science stream is Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Higher Maths; for Humanities Economics, History, Geography, Civics and Home Economics, for Business Studies Business Administration, Management, and Accounting Mushfique Wadud, ‘Directorate soon for madrasas’, Dhaka Tribune (Dhaka 19 April 2014) <http://www.dhakatribune.com/education/2014/apr/19/directorate-soon-madrasas#sthash.Vc5JnITs.dpuf > accessed 28 May 2014 Bangladesh Bureau Of Educational Information And Statistics ( BANBEIS ),Education System in Bangladesh, Publication n. 58, (January 1987)) 9 M. Mustafizur Rahman (n 46) 92 93 94 Page | 32