One landlord bucks the trend, turns autaq into school

A flooded school near Khairpur had nowhere to go.

SUKKUR: Abdul Karim Baladi is a rare instance of a landlord who has let a school use his land after the rains left two feet of water standing in the area.

Waderas and jagirdars, Sindh’s landed and influential gentry, are better known for holding local school property hostage. Their will unchecked, they turn school property into Autaqs or hang-out joints, cattlepens or warehouses, depending on the need of the hour. Villagers often have little choice but to send their children to a school in a nearby town to get an education.

On a visit to the flood-affected areas of Nawabshah and Khairpur districts, however, The Express Tribune encountered an open-air school by the roadside. About 60 children were engaged in a lesson. Nazar Hussain, their teacher, said that their school, the Government Primary School Nihal Khan Baladi, and its surroundings had come under two feet of water. It is located between Khairpur and Pucca Chang in an area called Aqri.

When the children had nowhere to go, landlord Abdul Karim Baladi intervened and kept their schooling from being interrupted. He allowed the teachers to take their classes in his autak. The first day, they took their classes outdoors, under the shade of a tree.

Hussain’s students were horrified at the prospect of school being closed which is why their joy knew no limits when an alternate was made possible. Ayub Baladi, a student of Class III, told The Express Tribune that he and his classmates were grateful to ‘Chacha’ Abdul Karim for giving them the space.

Hameeda, a student of Class IV, said it was because of him that she could continue to go to school, which meant a two-hour respite from the drudgery of housework. If she were at home, she said, her mother would make her scrub the utensils, clean the house, cook meals and look after her two-year-old stepbrother.

Even though this decision meant the world to the children, their reaction only bemused Chacha Abdul Karim. He laughed when told that as a landlord he was ‘expected’ to convert schools into autaqs, rather than autaks into schools. “I am considered an elder in my community,” he explained. “It is my duty to provide whatever relief I can to my people.” He said that as he did not know when the administration would be able to drain the water from the school, he allowed the school to be run on his land rather than let the children sit idle.

Could it be that the elder Baladi was an educated ‘wadera’, who had reformed his ways? “I have never been to school, because I used to pass all my time with my friends,” he quipped.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 30^th,  2011.