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October 5 was the World Teacher's Day, sponsored by UNESCO. We saw
many dignitaries of the country in quarter page advertisements saluting
the teachers with reverence. It was a heart-warming gesture. Teachers
are in the noblest of all professions; they are the architects of
nations, the custodians of the intellectual and moral grooming of
the future generations. The debt a society owes them can never be
repaid.
But what about the education system? Let us bare the facts first.
Leaving aside the elevated and the esoteric concepts, the system is
failing to deliver the very basic minimum purpose of mass education.
i.e. to make people literate enough to become economically useful
in today's world. We are too well aware of the frigid statistics;
so much percent literacy rate, up from so much percent in the past;
so much percent being spent on education as against a desirable target
of so much percent and so much drop out rate at primary levels, the
gender gap in literacy and all that. All such marginal measures are
inconsequential to the larger problems of the general education system
in the country.
More than the quantitative deficiency, the qualitative deterioration
is far more venal in current impact and future prospects. The predominant
trends of the educational system have become contra-productive morally
and vocationally. From the very start of admissions at primary level
right up till the highest doctorates attainable in the country, the
lofty ideals of education have degraded down to the supply and demand
rules of a black market. Educational credentials, which are certificates
of competence in every sane society, have become a marketable commodity,
like other banal necessities of life, say soap, ghee or onions. Whereas
education is supposed to cater to the needs of the market requirements,
in our society it has done one better: It has embraced the vulgarity
of our markets itself!
Teachers are there to earn a livelihood, institutions are there to
trade in certificates and students are there because they are at a
age when they should be students it fits in to the scheme of things,
no more! John Fowles, a western radical novelist complains, "At
present almost all our education is directed to two ends: to get wealth
for the state and to gain a livelihood for the individual. It is therefore
little wonder that society is money-obsessed, since the whole tenor
of education seems to indicate that this obsession is both normal
and desirable." We, as emulators of form, have forgotten the
first end and concentrated solely on the second. Even in that, we
circumvent the basic criterion of learning, which has become incidental
to holding a credential. You may use Safarish or hard cash, the object
is to get the certificate; and then you are eligible for the rat race.
Every sensible student or parent is swept away in this mad rush of
the majority to subscribe to the charade of education.
The cruel economic disparities in our oligarchic political system
are a social stimulant, which instigates the commercialisation (distinct
from privatisation) of education. The other, even worse, influence
originates from the political administration. The redistributive combines,
a term that Hernando De Soto uses to describe the ruling elite of
the third world countries, are zealously protective of their monopolies
to make wealth; and this includes employment opportunities too. As
education is the basis of employment, its territory too becomes a
natural extension of the domain of the ruling elite. The informal
sector is compelled to submit to the power of the elites in every
field of education. Appointment of educational Staff, admissions to
institutions of learning, activities of students, syllabi of Boards
and Universities, the setting of examination papers, the marking criteria,
all these functions are controlled overtly by those in power.
Besides subverting the essence and standards of the educational process,
the external manipulation casts another profound influence on the
psyche of the students. Their concept of Justice is permanently gnarled.
The high flung ideals - especially with theological doctrines incorporated
- of the text books do not translate lucidly in to the real life around
them. They are quick to perceive that their parents or the teachers
do not themselves endorse the contents of the books; teachers are
at the mercy of other temporal forces; parents worship money and power,
examinations can be fixed, certificates can be bought (or in many
cases must be bought); education is a charade to be completed with
power, wits and money. Hypocrisy is the essential ingredient of our
education. Morality and idealism can not survive in the youth under
persistent hostility; it needs sustenance through evidence, however
scanty it may be. In our society the deceitful norms are all pervading
and the deviants are punished ruthlessly. Honesty and proficiency
are mere abstractions of human weakness; they have little practical
utility. Hence the objectives of education are put on odds with that
of the life around. The general educational institutions have resolved
this conflict in the most convenient way possible: They have embraced
the drift of the society at large.
As a consequence, the type of persona produced by our education system
can be divided in to four categories. 1) A timid, compliant and resigned
mass of unimaginative individuals who get through. This type is the
stable output of our system. They become committed to the game of
snakes and ladders in our capricious socio-economic milieu. 2) The
intelligent, sensitive types who drop out of the system because they
are not up to the manipulations required to survive the system. 3)
The mass of average dropouts who did not have the means to pull enough
strings, pay for tuitions or cheating at the examination centers.
This group forms the large majority of youth who waste their precious
years in pursuit of undefined, unattainable objectives. Some of them
join the next category as militant followers. 4) The strong willed
intelligent, aggressive types who turn in to rebels and with the sourness
of their disillusionment they join the menacing Kalashkinov culture
with a vengeance. Like man-eating tigers, having tasted human blood,
they can never revert back to a more natural diet; they are doomed
to a predatory existence, be it as revolutionaries, jihadis or dacoits.
The problem of the last category of students is beginning to adopt
foreboding proportions. This element is most amenable in becoming
sinisterly instrumental in the hands of megalomaniacs - ideologues
and extremists. Under the garb of political and theological idealism,
the legal fabric of society is being torn to shreds in the hands of
militants in various pockets of extremist cultures all over Pakistan.
Police, being ineffective as it is in dealing with ordinary criminals,
is helpless against these well armed and motivated young men. In desperation,
the police sometimes resorts to horrifying infractions that erodes
its moral authority further.
Exceptions are there of course. Institutions for professional education,
like law colleges, military academies and management institutes remain
immune from the malaise to a large extend, as are prestigious public
schools. Because of limited capacities and high entry barriers few
are fortunate to join such clean institutions. They join the well
educated elites to create more disparity in society.
Education the bedrock of civilisation, the cornerstone of progress,
the torch that illuminates the heart of darkness, the liberator of
minds and souls has, it seems, slipped in to the lap of fallen angels
as darkness grows around us. I salute the teachers in Pakistan for
having to hold the candle in the wind.
Iqbal Mustafa
1251 words
08 October 2004
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