When students become litigants

On June 4, around 10am, with the sun in its full glory and a hot breeze making it impossible to stand outside, I was in a courtroom of the Lahore High Court awaiting my turn. As I stood there, I noticed teenagers, around 16 to 17 years of age, standing in the courtroom looking baffled. I wondered what reason had brought them here. My curiosity subsided when the reader of the court called out a case and a crowd, including these teenagers, walked towards the rostrum. They were students of FSc/FA/intermediate, fighting for their right to education guaranteed under Article 25-A of the Constitution of Pakistan, when they should have been studying for their exam scheduled to be held on June 6.

These students were not issued statement of entries/roll number slips by the Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education (BISE), Lahore. According to the board, the educational institution had failed to get the students registered with the board and, therefore, the board had refused to issue roll number slips to the students. The lawyer representing the board stated that the said educational institution was given a period of almost a year to get the students registered with the board, despite which, the institution failed to do so.

The representatives of the educational institution were also present and a plethora of accusations were hurled across the courtroom. Amidst this, the innocent students stood there looking worried, silently awaiting their fate. Eventually, the case was adjourned, with the following directions by the honourable judge to the representatives of both the educational institution and the board:

“The matter must be resolved before the exam, that is, June 6, 2013, otherwise, the principal of the educational institution will be called to the court, and if he fails to justify his actions, appropriate proceedings shall be initiated against him.”

The next day, despite having no professional engagements, I was drawn to the same courtroom again, which was engulfed by an overwhelming urge of wanting to know the fate of the students. I was disappointed because no concrete decision had been given, and once again, a direction was given to resolve the matter amicably. The atrocity of the matter is the suffering of students due to the negligence by educational institutions that are established solely for minting money and playing with the careers of the youth. At the end of the day, the authorities at these institutes walk out scot-free, with fatter wallets and the students are the ones who pay the price.

Who is responsible for such futile administration? Is it the students, whose futures are at stake, or the parents, who have paid exorbitant amounts of money to these educational institutions in hopes of providing a bright future for their children? Or should it be the educational institution and governmental administrative authorities for whom education is just a business and which have failed to fulfil their obligations towards the students?

The answer is pretty clear. The purpose behind the establishment of the BISE was to facilitate the students and to administer the educational institutions, which are affiliated with the BISE. This was not the first time that such an incident took place, and once again, the students were caught between the blame game played amongst the institution and the board. We live in a country where the literacy rate is below 50 per cent. Despite this, education is being denied to our students by the institutions that claim to provide a platform for disseminating it. Instead, they have made a mockery out of the system.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 10^th, 2013.                                                                                        

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