Chicago hiccups

May 22nd, 2012

As one would have expected, the Nato summit in Chicago seems to have run into quite a few hiccups, especially as far as Pakistan and America are concerned. Their bilateral relationship has, of late, been clouded by the Nato supply routes closure issue and it seems that leaving it unresolved was perhaps not such a good idea for Islamabad. President Asif Ali Zardari met US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the body language that could be seen in the photographs of the meeting was one that showed the Pakistani side playing on a relatively weak wicket. The message sent to Pakistan is clear: either open the Nato supply routes immediately or prepare to face the consequences. More than a billion dollars in coalition support fund rest on our playing ball with the US, while reopening the supply routes will allow us to earn around one million dollars a day in tolls and fees.

For now, the main sticking point appears to be an apology for the Salala attacks. At this point, Pakistan should try and understand that it is unlikely to receive any apology. This is a presidential year in the US and Obama has already been slammed by his opponent Mitt Romney for always apologising for America. An apology for Salala will only make Obama seem weaker and unfortunately Pakistan will have to bear the brunt of this reality. The other outstanding issue is drone attacks. The Parliamentary Committee on National Security demanded an end to drone attacks as a precondition for reopening Nato supply routes. This, too, is an exercise in futility, not least because several drone strikes have taken place in recent weeks following the committee declaring its demands. Drones, America says, are a key feature of its war on the militants, and are feared as such by the latter. So perhaps, what Pakistan can demand is joint ownership or a joint monitoring mechanism. Besides, had we not allowed the sanctuaries to exist in parts of Fata and had shown the will to take them out, perhaps we wouldn’t have had to deal with the drones issue in the first place. We should realise that time is running out and that the rest of the world will move on, without us if it needs to. The endgame in Afghanistan has already been set into motion and Pakistan will find itself cut off and isolated should it not be open to compromise.

When to close schools

May 22nd, 2012

The Sindh government’s notification that the summer holidays for schools will start in July and last till the end of August makes sense since it will coincide with the particularly long summer fasts during the month of Ramazan. However, the decision does not take into account the needs of the hundreds of schools in the province that follow the Cambridge system, as their school year ends a month earlier. This has been an issue on previous occasion and one would have thought that by now various stakeholders would have resolved this problem. To announce the decision towards the end of May, when parents have already scheduled vacations and school terms are winding down, shows a complete lack of foresight on the part of the Sindh government.

By taking the decision so late in the school year, the Sindh government has essentially rammed through a choice they knew would be controversial. The issue of the end of the school term arises every year and every year authorities hold off on resolving it once and for all. Ideally, we should have a system of education in the entire country with all schools having the same school year in terms of duration. Pakistan’s education system, however, is far from ideal and the bulk of the problems extend well beyond this issue. Until then, it is incumbent on the provincial government to make such decisions only after consulting all the different schools.

It would be unrealistic to expect the Cambridge-system schools to follow the Sindh government’s last-minute decision. Academic calendars are planned well in advance and to change them right now would lead to a disruption in the school year. Such a decision could only have been implemented had it been taken before the academic year began. Rather than trying to ram through this decision, the government would be well served to quickly make a decision for the next school year after discussing the matter with everyone who is affected by it. Education is not like other matters where the government can force everyone to follow along with its whimsical dictates.

Assault on temple

May 22nd, 2012

The state of madness we have slipped into as a society is rather deplorable and the descent has taken a toll on ethical and moral values. The degree of hatred directed towards minority communities demonstrates just how depraved we have become and the extent to which we have alienated ourselves from all sense of rationality and logical reasoning.

The latest of many incidents of persecution against minority communities came in the Gorgathri district of Peshawar, where the 160-year-old Goraknath Hindu temple was vandalised when unknown individuals entered it in the early hours of morning, on May 20. When it was opened for prayer in the evening, the place had been ransacked. Sacred statues, Holy Scriptures and pictures placed inside had been destroyed, while the perpetrators were able to escape undetected. The police have lodged an FIR on the basis of complaints by the Hindu community. The historic temple, which had remained closed for 60 years, had opened only recently in October last year, following a ruling by a two-member Peshawar High Court bench arguing that despite the existing dispute over ownership, people could not be denied the right to worship at the temple.

But this basic right to practise one’s religion has now been snatched away by men who took matters into their own hands. It is not known who they are, but one can only assume they most likely had extremist links. It is difficult to fathom what they hold against a miniscule religious minority which presents no apparent threat to them and had been engaged with the temple, quietly and peacefully over time. The degree of intolerance we have built within our society is frightening and the incident in Peshawar is the latest manifestation of this. The demonstrations of hatred we see every now and then, at increasingly regular intervals, are still growing and will not end until the culprits in this case — and others like it — are apprehended and penalised under the relevant laws in order to deter others from taking similar action.