Children show the way


Express July 12, 2010

LAHORE: School children from seven districts of the Punjab gathered on Monday at a conference titled The Future Belongs to You and shared their views on gender inequality, minority rights and peace.

The event organised by ASR Resource Centre was also attended by educationists and human rights workers.

The first session of the conference was on ‘Women’s Rights and Gender Inequality’. Adeel, Saba, Hurma and Zubair introduced the issues. Later, the discussion was joined by experts including Dr Farah Masood, the additional secretary (Schools) and Dr Fareeha Zafar, the SAHE executive director. Nighat Saeed Khan, the ASR executive director, was the moderator.

Adeel said that he had witnessed gender inequality in his family. “One of my cousins was very intelligent but her parents stopped sending her to school after she finished primary school reasoning that she would eventually be married of and did not need further schooling,” he said.

Saba mentioned that no one in her village paid attention to girls’ education despite the fact that they usually got better grades than boys.

Hurma and Zubair shared similar experiences and suggested that there should be no discrimination among boys and girls.

The experts said that they were overwhelmed by the children’s observations on the issue. “It is very difficult for me to speak after listening to these children,” Dr Fareeha Zafar said.

“They have already said everything the grownups need to understand and act upon. Though we are older, we need to learn from children sometimes,” she added.

Dr Farah Masood said that girls could perform wonders in any field if given an equal opportunity. She said that gender is a socially-constructed concept and has no meaning otherwise.

The topic for the second session was ‘Minority Rights and Equality of Citizenship’. Norez, a child from Toba Tek Singh, said that being a Christian he sometimes faced discrimination at school. He said, “Although we are told that Christians and Muslims are brothers, rarely does this reflect in practice.”

Uzma, another student, referred to the Gojra riots and said that the incident had terrified the entire Christian community in Toba Tek Singh district.

Gulnar Tabssum, the former Women Action Forum (WAF) convener, said that the children had raised some very important points. She said that there was a dire need to define the word ‘minority’. “We should not call someone a minority citizen on the basis of their religious beliefs. We need to redefine the concept of citizenship and ensure equal status for all citizens,” she said.

Usman Alvi, the Minority Affairs Department additional secretary, said that he agreed with the points raised by the students. He said that the government had increased the minorities’ welfare budget by up to four times over the past year. He added that he would bring up the issues raised by the students in his meetings with high ups.

The last session was titled ‘Peace and Peaceful Resolution of Conflicts’. Sana, Samar and Iqra spoke on the topic first. Sana mentioned her hometown, Multan, and said that it was inhabited by people belonging to several ethnicities. She said that there was no major conflict among these ethnicities but they preferred generally to vote for candidates from their ethnic group and disregarded merit.

Samina Rehman, the Lahore Grammar School director, said that several language and ethnic groups were part of Pakistan and added to its diverse beauty. She said, “We should live as Pathans, Punjabis, Sindhi or Baloch but we should never forget that we all are Pakistanis as well.”

Speaking on the occasion, Nazish Atta Ullah, the National College of Arts (NCA) principal, said that the curriculum taught in public schools tended to confuse people. She said, “The mindset that ‘enemies are trying to damage our country’ needs to be changed.”

We should be aware of and try to rectify the flaws in our own conduct. We should respect others’ opinions and acknowledge their services.”

Concluding the conference, Nighat Saeed Khan said that the idea behind organising the conference was to gather school children on a platform and give them a chance to speak up on important issues as well as listen to others’ opinions.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 13th, 2010.

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