Dying to learn

The new report by the US-based rights watchdog Human Rights Watch puts some rather shocking facts before us. The report, titled “Their future at stake” describes the death of at least 22 teachers in Balochistan between January 2008 and October 2010, the transfer of at least 200 teachers and professors either to Quetta or out of the province and the fact that due to militant violence, schools in Balochistan opened for only 120 days in 2009, compared to 220 in the rest of the country.

In the context of the ethnic and nationalist violent stalking Balochistan, the report shows that the group most adversely affected by the attacks on education are the Baloch, as opposed to the groups that nationalist forces target. The operations of extremists in the region add a further complexity to the problem.

The issue is one the Baloch nationalists, and other political forces with a following in the province, need to take up as a matter of urgency. Balochistan cannot afford for its children to be left so far behind those elsewhere in the country. There are too few schools, literacy levels in some districts fall to below 20 per cent and far too many Baloch children lack access to education. It is only when these shortcomings are corrected that there can be any real development in our country’s most under-developed province. This development is vital to the future of Balochistan and its people. All those with an interest in the welfare of the territory must find ways to end the violence which holds it back. The target killing of teachers must end and an environment created which allows others to take up work in an area that desperately needs their services. Unless this happens the province will continue to slip further and further into the age of darkness and all the many problems that come with this. This process must be stopped before it is too late to do so.

Published  in The Express Tribune, December 19^th, 2010.