The object of education
All discussion on education is meaningless if there is no clarity on what Pakistan wants its citizens to become
By I. A. Rehman

The philistines (Pakistan brand) have descended on Lahore’s educational institutions in force. This is the result of a campaign instigated by a TV show host against certain school courses and the provincial government’s panicky and irrational surrender to bullying.

One of the targets of the self-chosen morality brigade is a chapter, ‘Reproduction in Humans’ in the Cambridge Checkpoint Science Book II (for class seven) that is prescribed in all schools preparing students for Cambridge University’ ‘O’ and ‘A’ level examinations. A special committee of the Punjab Education Department was hurriedly set up and it displayed indecent haste in pronouncing its verdict on the subject of obscenity that sane heads will do only after careful, cool-headed and extended deliberation.

The committee condemned the lesson under reference as “obscene material” and the provincial government promptly banned the book and ordered its forfeiture. Obviously, the authorities did not wish to follow the example of prudes in certain school managements who used to tell the students that the impugned lesson was not in their course or simply tore the relevant pages out off the book.

A case can easily be made out for basic sex education for school students, including girls. First, boys and girls aspiring to take medical courses need to learn sex matters quite early, preferably in schools. Secondly, girls should have good understanding of sex in order to be able to protect themselves against molestation, particularly in a society where rape of minor girls is common and even five-year olds are not safe from predatory sex fiends. Thirdly, it is better that children learn about sex from teachers in a controlled environment rather than from internet and vulgar narratives in different media and in situations of serious vulnerability.

Yet, there may be some room for debate on the propriety of introducing seventh grade students to the reproductive process but none for the arbitrary and high-handed attitude of the provincial authority. It seems it is obsessed with false notions of moral propriety and has been unduly influenced by conservative elements’ calls for suppression of what they describe as obscenity and vulgarity. These pseudo-puritans have long declared music, dance, theatre, TV drama, painting, sculpture, et al, to be obscene. Any authority that yields to such elements courts the risk of being forced to banish a large part of modern and folk arts and culture from the lives of its people.

These misgivings are strengthened by reports that are received every now and then about objections being raised to any scheme for offering sex education to girls.

The other target of attack is an innocuous course in comparative religion, designed to briefly introduce students to Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism and Hinduism. The provincial authorities have taken a school to task for allegedly replacing the compulsory subject of Islamic studies with the study of Islam and other religions.

It has been claimed on behalf of the Punjab government that under the Pakistan constitution no Muslim citizen should be taught a religion other than his own. It seems the Punjab government is guided by a special text of the Constitution because in the books available to ordinary citizens no such restriction has been noticed. In any case, the teaching of comparative religion has been banned.

The principal of the school under attack has made a coherent and cogent defence of the school policy. It deserves to be shared with readers:

“We must clarify what this subject (Comparative Religion) is and why we teach it. Our institution believes in inculcating values, such as tolerance and empathy, in all our students. Comparative Religion is essentially a history of religion. It is not merely comparing religious; we aim to educate our students about Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, and Hinduism and their fundamental teachings. Doing so, we believe, will enlighten our students about the importance of peaceful coexistence.

“Islam teaches us to broaden our minds; In fact, it asks us to seek knowledge from the cradle to the grave. Learning and understanding other religions and cultures will not and should not threaten our personal beliefs; rather it should strengthen them. We staunchly believe that this course helps develop better citizens, informed Muslims and enlightened Pakistanis who are secure about their identity.”

Unfortunately, the doors to knowledge are being closed on Pakistan’s youth in the name of belief. But it is doubtful whether those objecting to study of various religions have properly read the Holy Quran that says that human beings have been created through a non-denominational process, involving a male and a female, and have been born into different communities and tribes so that they may identify one another. How do people identify one another except by learning about each other’s beliefs, customs, ways of life, their aspirations, their achievements and their failures?

Then, Muslims are often reminded of the injunction that they must acquire knowledge even if they have to go to China for that. Now, during the early days of Islam, China was not known for research in hadith and fiqh and the Muslims going there could have only acquired secular knowledge.

The banning of the study of Comparative Religion in Pakistan in 2013 reminds one of the decision by a university to ban any mention of some scientists and philosophers (Newton, Darwin, Freud, Marx and Einstein) on the campus and the burning of books, including J.S. Mills’ On liberty during the Ziaul Haq period. Verily, the ghost of the dictator has found a desk in our rulers’ chamber.

All this raises a basic question regarding the object of education in Pakistan. Where does one find a declaration of the Pakistani state’s educational philosophy?

One cliché-ridden statement is available in the latest Economic Survey: “Education is the most important factor, which plays a leading role in human resource development...” Let us look at the National Education Policy of 2009. One should like the educationists to define the central purpose of education. Laymen should also look around, delve into the history of humankind and analyse the rise of nations through acquisition of knowledge and skills and it may not be impossible to fix certain goals that should inspire Pakistan’s philosophy of education.

The first principle that will need to be established is that education must cater to the needs of both the individual and the community and that its benefits should be available equitably to all citizens, regardless of their belief, race, gender, social status or domicile.

Acceptance of this principle will oblige the controllers of affairs at the various levels of authority — federal, provincial and local — to ensure that every child has the possibility of discovering and refining whatever talent she or he has, has maximum opportunities of realising herself or himself. At the same time, the education system must enable the community to develop and manage its resources in a manner that it can secure the greatest good of the greatest number by guaranteeing peace, progress and prosperity.

The individual’s aspiration for self-development and community’s demands for collective uplift both call for a system that offers the youth access to humankind’s store of knowledge gathered after centuries of endeavour to which various communities and peoples have in different ages contributed.

Thus, each community must offer its youth the latest and most developed disciplines in both physical and social sciences.

All individuals and collectives have their identities and a pluralist society must use education to ensure frictionless co-existence for all the identities in its fold. This will require a shared understanding of the community’s past and a true assessment of its successes and failures at the various turns in its history. For instance, it will be necessary in Pakistan to treat the history of all the peoples who have ever lived on its territory as a single, unbroken narrative and accept the various religions adopted by them, in Babar’s words, as changing reasons.

One hopes Pakistani educationists and scholars have fully become aware of the cost paid for persisting with the colonial model of education that excluded instruction in democratic politics, people-friendly governance, and justice for all classes. This was necessary to prevent people from participating in the management of their affairs.

Today, education must transform the passive subjects of the state into active citizens, capable of finding their way in a highly competitive world.

A system of education that does not equip the people with the ability to develop cordial relations with their neighbours will make them permanently vulnerable to war-mongers and compel them to waste their resources on developing more and more lethal weapons.

It is the system of education that determines what one generation passes on to the next. The most fundamental question in Pakistan is whether the present generation will leave for the next generation an order based on the universal values of freedom, equality and justice or a tradition of communal and sectarian strife and abuse of technology for mass murders.

All bad things do not originate in politicians’ chambers or generals’ caucuses; much of the rot begins in our educational institutions. All discussion on education is meaningless if there is no clarity on what Pakistan wants its citizens to become.

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