Indonesia's highest Islamic authority is investigating reports that a boarding school is teaching a deviant version of the religion and is linked to a shadowy group campaigning for an Islamic state, an official said Tuesday.
"There have been reports that the school's teachings are against the Islamic code," said Umar Shihab, deputy chairman of the Indonesian Council of Ulema (scholars).
Shihab said Islamic scholars from the council and the ministry of religious affairs had set up a joint team to investigate the claims.
Shihab said the council had received complaints from students and parents that Al-Zaitun Islamic school in the Indramayu district of West Java province had transgressed in its teachings of Islam.
There have also been allegations the group is an arm of an underground militant organization calling itself the Islamic State of Indonesia (NII), he said.
"We will never tolerate the existence of the NII. If Al-Zaitun is proven to be a tool of the NII, we will call for its closure," he said.
Al-Zaitun could not be reached for comment.
Indramayu police chief Eko Hadisutejo told AFP that police were also investigating the claims but declined to give further details.
Al-Zaitun is led by Panji Gumilang, also known as Abu Toto. Gumilang had in the past denied his school was engaged in militant activities.
Religious Affairs Minister Said Agiel Munawar said over the weekend he would not hesitate to close the school if it were found to have distorted Islamic teachings.
Indonesia is the world's largest Muslim-populated nation but Islam is not the state religion and most people practise a moderate form of the religion.
NII followers say they are the new generation of a group called Darul Islam, whose leader Sekarmaji Marijan Kartosuwiryo proclaimed the establishment of an "Indonesian Islamic State" in 1949.
Kartosuwiroyo was executed by the government of then-president Sukarno in 1962 after several bloody rebellions on Java, Sumatra and Sulawesi.
The NII says people who do not subscribe to its belief that Indonesia should be ruled by Islamic law are non-believers.