The PM House turned university will only be a burden on the fragile economy of Naya Pakistan
GUJRAT: Recently, the Prime Minister House has been transformed into a brand new national university. This university would be focusing on research-based education, especially on the emerging technology, and is supposed to empower and enlighten the deserving youth of Pakistan. This new university would be only at a distance of five kilometres from Quaid-e-Azam University. Some analysts think there is no bigger reason to rejoice but others think it’s an increment in the burden on the shoulders of the state.
Imran Khan’s first priority is education, but in Kohistan district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa — where the PTI has been at the helm for more than five years — 354 schools remain without proper infrastructure and this situation is harming the education of 30,000 to 40,000 students every year.
This hasty step of converting the PM House into a public university is supposed to be beneficial for the country’s youth but the fact is that it will only be a burden on the fragile economy of Naya Pakistan where during the last 20 years, private- and public-sector universities had a mushroom growth but no real development.
The PM ought to change his priorities from quantity to quality. Most of Pakistan’s population hails from the middle class that is in need of an upward mobility and this new university will do nothing than serve the already-served social purpose of many universities — to cater to the elite by utilising the state funds. Khan should look down from his glass office so he could see the sprawling slums between the new university and Quaid-e-Azam University where poor children go through every vicious situation in the name of education.
Logically thinking, why would a country need a new university when there are a large number of universities, which have failed to deliver quality education? Why would a country require higher educational institutions when there are neither toilets nor proper buildings for schools? These are some tough questions that our incumbent government should answer.
Hadia Batool
Published in The Express Tribune, December 26th, 2018.
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