To slay the monster of ignorance, the weapon of education is needed, which is buried under the dust of apathy
HUB: Being an inhabitant of the largest province of Pakistan, the conveying of a rightful voice by a downtrodden citizen to the mighty leaders is quite an intricate affair. But, I am still determined to put my efforts forward in order to shift attention towards some untouched problems, which have been affecting the fragile foundation of the province’s educational edifice. As I find myself standing in the unending queue of students of my country, I proudly take the onus of not leaving any stone unturned in making the country more prosperous. I have admiration in abundance for the government of Balochistan, particularly for trying to maintain a precarious law and order situation where people can breathe a small sigh of relief.
However, while formulating effective policies for the betterment of the province, the government has done little to show its sincerity to the cause of education in the province. It has practically done nothing tangible for bolstering the nearly-collapsing educational system. Some harsh facts continue to cause panic as 60 per cent of children are still out of school in the province. Women’s literacy rate is less than that of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and out of a total 5,000 schools on paper, hundreds of them don’t exist. Nevertheless, providing easy access to education is as important as announcing amnesty for disgruntled sections of the population who have taken up arms against the state. In fact, providing easy access to education will help crush the extremist mindsets of people. The conspicuous role of the Punjab government in enhancing the quality of education can be an example for us from which we can learn. The Punjab government has not only been striving for the betterment of education by launching various campaigns, such as distributing laptops among students and making primary education free for all, it has also been better than other provinces in terms of infrastructure development.
It is praiseworthy that the government of Balochistan initially strived to focus on primary education by acting against the culture of cheating; however, the effort seems to have proved insufficient. Furthermore, the problem is mainly due to apathetic attitudes towards checks and balances to maintain the effectiveness of any enacted law, in order to determine whether the desired result is being achieved or not. For instance, recently, members of the provincial assembly embarked on a mission to provide assistance to deserving university and college students of Balochistan — another step in the pursuit of stabilising the crumbling system of education. However, the initiative seems to have been quite flawed. Unfortunately, in practice, the word ‘deserving’ was converted to ‘favourites’.
Along with purging the country of terrorism, it is the need of the hour to initiate another Operation Zarb-e-Azb in Balochistan, not against any extremist horde, but against ignorance, which is, indeed, a monster and will keep engendering more monsters if it is not slain. And, to slay the monster of ignorance, the weapon of education is needed, which is, unfortunately, buried under the dust of apathy and corruption.
Ayaz Khan
Published in The Express Tribune, July 13th, 2015.
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