For the other Dullards, with love

Many moons ago, when Pakistanis still suspected the earth was round and our schools did not have barbed wire on their walls, I was what is called ‘an indifferent student’. I started school late because I failed the kindergarten entrance exam. People boast about how they were the first in their family to go to college; I was the first in my family to drop out of college. In secondary school, my report cards were festooned with ‘lacks the ability to concentrate on her work’ and ‘must try harder to focus’. For teachers, my name itself conjured despair. One in particular took to raising her eyes from my copy and sighing, “Shandana…”, managing to distil into that exhalation all the disappointment of all the teachers in the world. I was happy the first time she did this. She had finally got my name right.

Till then, she had been calling me Tanya, the name of my older sister who — mere years past — had burned through the same halls like an academic comet. I finally blurted, “But Miss, I’m not Tanya!” She replied, “Yes… you’re definitely not Tanya.” The point is, all I learned from formal education was that I didn’t know anything; a lesson for which I remain grateful. It seems to me the greatest catalyst to violence of our times is the idea of certainty.

I speak of the certainty which acts as the pivot on which our murderous world turns; certainty of knowledge that leads to one nation invading another, certainty of belief that leads to one sect attacking another, certainty of action that drives one human being to dominate another. Each of these protagonists step into the fatal trap of thinking they stand on solid ground instead of quicksand. When I say fatal, I do not mean fatal to them.



Recently, a warden shot a mentally ill man imprisoned for blasphemy, another man was hacked to death with an axe by a policeman, a mob beat and then burnt to death a couple — the woman pregnant with their fourth child — in the brick kiln where they used to work, for blasphemy. Intellect is impotent in the face of horrors like these. So I must thank my teachers, for already instilling in me a sense that mine is flawed. Had I thought I possessed the tools to conquer the tragedies of my country with reason, I would long have been a broken woman.

Since I am not a scholar, a psychologist, or even a logical thinker, I can turn easily away from consideration of hands that wield the gun, the axe, the will to shove a living being into an oven, pleading ‘beyond my comprehension’. Perhaps the ones who enable them with silence might be easier to understand?

Here, too, my learning fails me. I have an awareness of their sense of rightness, of deserved punishment, of the world as they have been told it should be revealing itself. But, in my unrefined rawness, I feel an awareness too of what they must have given up to reach such a state of complete abdication, of surrender. Surely, to seek the safety of a herd is to think you cannot survive on your own? Here again I must bow to the wisdom of those who told me I wasn’t good enough. In trying to break my spirit, they led me to suspect I had one.

Can it be so simple though, so TV drama, so ‘safety of conformity’ storyline? What are they risking, exactly, the men who sit through incitement during Friday khutbas? The women who nod along to others speaking through a principled posterior? Surely, they must sense the injustice of the shell around them? Are the millions Muslim Pakistanis spend on philanthropy blood money, a guilty conscience assuaged? Might they just be, perhaps, lazy? That is the accusation I faced, from a sport coach yelling, “You can move faster Minhas! You can hit harder!” Respect to him. Loud respect, because I think he moved to Canada. Or wherever it is our minorities — the ones still alive — go when we break their hearts.


Speaking of this reminds me of another reason my life to date has been ceaseless offerings of disappointment and failure. It wasn’t just that I didn’t have the right answers; it was also that I didn’t ask the right questions. For example, early on I wanted to know why dark Pakistani Christians were considered subhuman, and white foreign ones a super-species. Good thing I learnt to stop asking and love the bomb, or our elected leaders might have to ignore one more voice asking why they can fly to Europe and America with spread hands and submissive posture, and not immediately drive 60 kilometres to share in the grief of other Pakistanis. Time passes differently, I suppose, depending on the fire at the end of it.

Pakistani education, huh? Thank god it is now in safer hands. Witness these extracts from a letter the Executive Director of the Higher Education Commission of Pakistan sent to degree-awarding institutions on October 28, 2014:

“Universities and Degree Awarding Institutions (DAIs) have a great responsibility of promoting ideology and principles of Pakistan through teachings, dialogues, meetings, conferences, formal and informal gatherings and societal discourse. Demonstration of such rightful perceptions promotes nationalism, dispels confusion and infuses beliefs and principles that brings harmony in a society, and bolsters unity and performance.

“Regretfully, it has been observed that a few activities that are either directly or indirectly hosted or sponsored by Universities or DAIs include discussions or presentations contrary to the ideology or principles of Pakistan, perhaps due the fact that programme details are not reviewed and approved discreetly by the Universities/DAIs. Such instances not only tarnish the image of an institution but fortify negativism and chaos.”

I don’t know. Knowing I don’t know has been a friend to me. When I inhabit this state, every moment of survival is victory, every conversation a revelation.

Certainty, it can kill people.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 8^th, 2014.