Our curriculum may be out-dated, but it surely does not brainwash students into committing acts of terrorism

Millions of students are enrolled but only a handful have links with banned outfits, so how is curriculum the cause?

Pakistan is going through an extremely difficult phase concerning its current security situation. In my opinion, what is worrying about this scenario is that the numerous terrorists recently captured by law enforcement agencies are highly qualified individuals and are a part of the country’s prestigious academic institutions.

Whenever we hear of students involved in terrorism plots and acts, our politicians and government, instead of finding the reason behind students committing terrorist attacks, start blaming the curriculum of educational institutions.

Personally, I feel that our curriculum is perfectly fine. It may be out-dated and may lack discussions about recent scientific issues, but it surely does not glorify terrorists or terrorism. So how can it brainwash students into committing acts of terrorism?

Instead of attempting to get to the root cause of rising terrorism rates, politicians and analysts absolve themselves of their responsibility by blaming the curriculum. The curriculum alone can neither improve a person nor detract the student. Instead of focusing on the issue at hand, we need to view other numerous factors that are damaging our youth’s mind-set.

Let us begin with our society, which generally lacks tolerance and harmony. We are extremely intolerant towards each other’s values and beliefs, so much so that a particular sectarian group (Shias) refrains from offering prayers in mosques belonging to other sectarian groups (Sunni).

Our justice system needs a complete overhaul. The law of evidence should be revised and improved drastically. It is because of the prevailing system that criminals either go scot-free or when and if punished, the execution is delayed so much that it causes a lot of inconvenience for the defendant and his/her families. This only ends up damaging their trust in the system and the process.

Furthermore, primary socialisation agents have the most important role to play in this. Parents have a huge responsibility to protect their children from falling prey to these nefarious terrorist organisations. They need to be vigilant about their children’s activities and look out for any possible drastic behaviour changes.

If one reads Rehan Siddiqui’s statement, the father of absconding terrorist Sarosh Siddiqui, it is evident that he observed changes in his son’s behaviour for quite some time. He tried to guide his son away from an extremist mind-set, but unfortunately failed to do so. As hard as it may be for a father to do so, Rehan should have taken a bold step and informed the responsible law enforcement agencies about his son’s suspicious activities. This may have saved his son from committing a heinous crime.

Moreover, a few years ago, Saad Aziz, a student at Institute of Business Administration (IBA), managed to commit atrocious crimes. He first killed a social worker, Sabeen Mahmud, and later was involved in the Safoora Goth carnage. Furthermore, Aziz was also involved with various terrorist factions. Similar to the Siddiquis, Aziz’s family also observed a change in his behaviour, but did not think of speaking up. He was missing for four months and later it was revealed that he went to Afghanistan for training. It was the responsibility of his family to report his suspicious activities, and had they done so, numerous lives could have been saved.

Additionally, in this day and age, our youngsters are constantly playing various games or watching videos on their computers, phones and other gaming devices that promote violence. I feel parents should keep a vigilant eye on their children and discourage them from doing so. To an extent, they promote gun violence and other criminal activities that are not suitable for the youth since they may emulate the actions they see.

The commencement of gun culture can be traced back to the influx of Afghan refugees. This is because along with the refugees, Kalashnikovs were also smuggled into Pakistan and soon became increasingly widespread. The Afghan policy adopted by Pakistan in the late 70s is still haunting our nation. During that era, individuals were recruited to wage jihad in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union. Various terrorist outfits operating in Pakistan were formed and with the state’s support, they became so powerful that they started challenging the writ of the government. Now, in order to subdue them, law enforcement agencies are carrying out various mass scale operations to liberate the northern parts of the country from these terrorists.

Various globally conducted research projects highlights that mostly engineering and science students fall prey to terrorist outlets. Unfortunately, Pakistanis take pride in choosing science for further education. To root out terrorism, the government should collaborate with educationists and try to enroll more students in social sciences, arts, and literature programs.

The presence of a handful of terrorists in universities and other educational institutions does not automatically make these institutions a terrorist breeding ground. However, to eradicate this growing menace, reforms should be established and implemented in educational institutions.

Some people argue that restoring student unions can be helpful in preventing students from becoming terrorists. In my view, these unions can only be helpful if students, without the influence of any political party, run them independently. During its 1988 tenure, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) lifted the ban on student unions, but under political parties’ patronage, these unions were seen promoting a cheating culture and other negative activities, instead of promoting positivity on campus.

Furthermore, the lack of reading habits and healthy recreational activities can be a cause of rising intolerance in society. A large city such as Karachi has very few libraries or places where the youth can interact, carry out intellectual discussions and vent out their frustration about various issues.

Unfortunately, countless people blame religion for the increase in terrorism. I am of the firm belief that religion does not preach extremism, but some people, for their personal gains, manipulate Quranic verses to suit their version of Islam. It is the wrongdoings of these people that give religion a bad name.

At the moment, we have three or maybe four different types of education systems at school levels. If someone really decides to modify the curriculum, I do not know how they will manage to carry out such a difficult task.

Millions of students are studying in Pakistan and only a handful of them have links with banned outfits. This low number suggests that the problem does not lie in the curriculum or in our educational institutions, it lies somewhere else. We need to search extensively in order to find the root cause of our problems instead of knocking the tip of the iceberg repeatedly.