The Lahore High Court on Monday directed AK Dogar, the counsel for Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, to come up with arguments on how the court can change the ‘VIP culture’.
Dogar, on behalf of the Jamatud Dawa, is seeking a court order that declared the VIP and VVIP culture as being unconstitutional. He says that the culture violated constitutional provisions of “equality of status”, “social and economic justice”, and the principle of democracy as enunciated by Islam.
On Monday, Dogar said the closure of roads for VIP movement was a violation of the fundamental rights of the citizens. Roads, he said, were public carriageways.
He said the presidency, the prime minister’s house, the houses for the governors, the chief ministers and all state functionaries should be declared as being against the principle of social and economic justice. Schools like Aitchison College must open their gates to children of the poor and the under privileged, said Dogar, adding that the children of the rich and the poor must study in the same class rooms and the same syllabus. The counsel argued that no privileges of any kind – including free electricity, gas, petrol, telephone – should be provided to anyone from the exchequer.
He asked the court to direct the government to follow the UK public office holders who travel in buses and trains.
Justice Ijazul Ahsan adjourned hearing till July 19.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 17th, 2012.
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Wishful thinking....not going to happen!
Also, I would like to point out here that Aitchison College may be considered to be an institution catering to the so called "elite" strata's of the society, but it operates two schools known by the name of "Campus Boys High School" & "Campus Girls High School" that operate within the boundaries of the school itself. It is currently catering to roughly plus students that are given free of cost education, books, stationery & uniforms. These students also have the chance to be a part of the actual school if they are able to achieve a certain level of academic excellence. The schools operate on levels which are definitely above par to the standards being provided by the Punjab Government. Looking them up on Google would help shed more light on the matter, Hence, it's immature of Mr. Dogar to argue that Aitchison has not opened it's doors to the financially less capable sectors of the society. Lastly, Aitchison College is not a public institution, the Punjab Government probably doesn't have adequate financial support to support the entire structure in general.
Lastly, people have argued that 20% quota should be given to Rural Punjab. If you look at the overall student body & the student population of the campus schools, I'm sure those figures are compensated as Aitchison College probably has the most nationally diverse student body of any school in Pakistan, atleast.
Suggest there should be a 20% percent quota for rural Punjab in Aitchison College to gradually bridge the divide. Good social engineering demands that the difference between the haves and the have-nots has to be reduced for achieving social equilibrium.
This type of education is a part of business,indeed an effective way of extracting the money from the rich.Though many of you might not agree with the idea I am sharing here ,perhaps if the richest and poor students are mixed in the same school, there are chances that the poor student will go through several physiological disorders.Imbalance of pocket money,clothings,PSP,iphone ,pick and drop on the AC cars and most importantly division among the students.Infact the poor will be a good friend of a poor to discuss his awful thoughts of his mind.What I believe is like dissolve like, a poor guy would be much happier in a government school than these lavish classes.Also talent is not being measured by furniture and the building and luxury classes.
Skeptical I remain. But at least he said something which makes sense.
Somehow the young seek hope in Grammarians, Aithisonians and Oxbridge grads. They think the very people who are the beneficiaries of the social seggregation would somehow work towards eliminating it. Students at KGS discriminate against their classfellows if they haven't been with them before their A-Levels, and somehow these educated folks are expected to change the mess in our culture.
You have to admit this is a start. I think this is the easiest way to force people into dropping the vip ideology. Law is the only thing in history that has forced people into acceptance of ideas. Great example. Slavery. Bring something into the law, enforce it and slowly but surly the people will change.
Wishful thinking , but we need something like that
its not their gates but the hearts and minds of students as well as parents that need to be opened....would any parent tolerate their driver's son going to the same school/class as their own son? i think not, unless you have systems similar to convents...where the Nuns made sure nobody dared to show their wealth in school!