The Scarlet ‘L’

In an effort to escape the images of carnage on television screens, the vacuous and inane statements coming from every corner and the depressing discussions with the few people desperately trying to find a way out of the morass that has engulfed the nation, I turned for relief to a re-reading of favourite classics. After enjoying Jane Austen’s Persuasion all over again, I picked up Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. And as I settled down for a relaxing read, the news of the Punjab Assembly’s resolution against the media for coverage of the fake degrees scandal hit the airwaves. And immediately, my thoughts turned to demanding all legislators with fake degrees be required to wear a Scarlet ‘L’ embroidered on their crisp white kurtas. ‘L’ for Liars!

The saga of the fake degrees scandal  — and scandalous it is — goes beyond any resolution passed by the Punjab Assembly, media boycotts of assembly proceedings in the four provinces or the extreme reactions to media coverage of parliamentarians holding fake degrees or degrees from educational institutions without formal accreditation in their home countries.

At the heart of the issue is the simple fact that legislators, who signed application papers for contesting elections to the Election Commission, also swore that the information contained in their applications was correct and true. This means they committed a criminal offence and should face prosecution. People are perfectly free to obtain fake degrees to lie to themselves. They can even frame these fake degrees to display in their homes. But once these fake credentials are submitted to any institution, a criminal offence has been committed. Presenting a fake degree for a job would result in instant termination as soon as the fraud was discovered. And it is unlikely that person would receive employment with that organisation again. So why should the rules be different for legislators? They should lose their jobs and not get that job again.

The requirement for a college degree to be a parliamentarian was introduced by former President General (retd) Pervez Musharraf. For better or for worse, that requirement has been removed. But that does not absolve those who lied, to the Election Commission and to the nation, from the crime that was committed at the time the requirement was in force.

It would be interesting to see what the fake degree holders listed on their application forms for the computerised national identity cards issued by Nadra. While the card itself does not list educational qualifications, the application form does require that information.

Unfortunately, legislators who found themselves in hot water after the Supreme Court started hearing cases on the issue, some guilty legislators opted to resign — not from any sense of shame and embarrassment, but simply to contest the inevitable by-election since the requirement is no longer in force. Hence Jamshed Dasti is back in the National Assembly.

But now that the Higher Education Commission has started announcing the results of the verification of the degrees, the next step must be prosecution for lying on an official document and being barred from contesting elections on grounds of being convicted. Until that happens, I will always envision a large embroidered ‘L’ on every bulky bosom, heaving with unholy indignation at being proven to the world as a liar.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 11^th, 2010.