Why are campuses more dangerous?

If four “graduates” of prestigious educational institutions are really involved in the heinous crimes like massacre of 47 Ismailis and murder of human rights activist Sabeen Mahmood, the war against extremism can be far more challenging than war against terrorism, in the presence of dangerous tendencies on campuses. Do we have a strategy to save the future generations?
The extremism, which initially started in the mid 60s, with wave against communism that resulted in the killing of the communist Poland’s deputy foreign minister by a PIA employee at the Karachi airport has now taken its roots and may take years if not decades to have a different political discourse.
In this context one has to take the speech of Army Chief General Raheel Sharif at Staff College Quetta more seriously. He clearly stated that tougher decisions need to be taken as this war against terrorism can’t be fought in a conventional manner.
If he claimed big success in operation “zarb-e-azb,” in North Wazirastan, what he means when he asked for strong “political decisions” for success in operations in the major cities. The burden now is on the political leadership led by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.
If our educational institutions particularly in Karachi, Punjab and Kyber Pakhtoonkhaw have these tendencies there is a need to address the issue more seriously. There is a general appreciation from the prime minister to the army chief over the arrest of suspected militants in the above mentioned cases, but at the same time it has also created sensation that they were from Institute of Business Administration, IBA, Karachi University and Sir Syed University.
Though in the last few years there have been cases in which well educated boys were found involved in criminal activities, the surprising part of this gang was this that it is multi ethnic in nature and has no direct link with any outlawed groups. This makes the situation far more alarming that they had taken “inspiration” only from al-Qaeda. No wonder, we may soon have groups who can take inspiration from Daish or any other group, if we continue to behave in a conventional manner in the fight against terrorism.
Our complete focus on madaris in the last one decade had been due to many misconceptions. The technology and social media have been used more effectively by the extremists then by the moderates and policy makers.
The kidnapping and murder of US reporter Daniel Pearl was the first high profile killing after 9/11 in Pakistan. All those arrested and convicted were educated people. The prime suspect Ahmad Saeed Sheikh alias Sheikh Omar, now facing death sentence, was a graduate from London School of Economics, while the other suspects were local graduates.
But, none of our agencies ever took notice nor we developed any mechanism to address this issue. The focus of former president and ex-army chief General (retired) Pervez Musharraf was on “madaris reforms.”
We did not even learnt from the incident at the Islamic University, Islamabad, where one of the student of the faculty had blown himself in the Canteen killing several people including two female students.
Even if in the court of law these suspects led by mastermind Tahir denied the allegations leveled against them by the police or got bail or acquittal from the court, the fact remained that such tendencies have taken roots in the public and private colleges and universities.
As the focus of civil and military leadership during the past two decades remained on madaris, they ignored life on the campuses. The causes of these tendencies on the campuses should be looked from the larger perspective. Apparently, there are three or four reasons.
(1) Ban on the student unions in 1984. It not only closed the door for competitive politics but also healthy activities like student week, debating competition, musical concerts, Mushairas, convocations etc. According to some professors, despite some violent incidents, which could have been checked, the students had outlets and they get themselves involved in different activities.
(2) The mushroom growth of private colleges and universities without any proper registration or regulations have made their campuses and hostels more vulnerable to the outsiders.
(3) Teacher-student gap has also widen and the teachers had lost the kind of impact which they once had on their students.
Only weeks back an Associate Professor of Karachi University, Yasir Ali, was assassinated, the second high profile murder after the killing of Dr Shakil Oaj.
In the recent past there have been dozens of incidents around the country, which reflect the tendencies of extremism among the graduates and undergraduates, some relate to the campus life, others to their outside activities. .
If a madarsa student committed any offence like suicide bombing or target killing, it could have been as a result of “brain washing,” but if a foreign graduate or someone from institution like IBA, allegedly killed someone equally educated, it could be because of his own “conviction” or due to lack of reasoning.
In this regard the reported statement of DG Rangers Major General Bilal that some madaris gave “arms training” is highly significant and if it is true it needs to be checked. But activities in other educational institutions must also be monitored.
Millions of students go to madaris as well as to private and public colleges and universities in Karachi alone. No one knows whether some madaris or some universities and colleges have become “nurseries” of dangerous tendencies. In the last 20/25 years, the alleged terrorists and extremists could be found in both institutions.
The psychological analysis of these suspects from universities may give you a better idea of what is “cooking up” in our colleges and universities. If what IGP, Sindh, said is true, it’s a gang of 125 people, many of whom were from educated class, which is an alarming situation.
Why a student, who had completed his masters from top educational institution indulges in extremist activities. He might be facing problems of employment, and secondly it may br impact of injustice with Muslims, without realizing that in the process he had killed his own brothers and sisters, with whom he may have difference of opinion but does not mean they should be killed.
Yes, madaris need reforms, proper registration and transparent audit and it is the responsibility of the state to look into the aspect of the presence of any suspect. But, the same criterion should be for the private educational institutions and check on their mushroom growth. There are many models around the Muslim world how mosques and madaris were managed.
So, what we need is a complete “education reforms,” both for public, private educational institutions as well as for madaris. The state needs to fulfill its prime responsibility of providing education to all.
The writer is a senior analyst and columnist of Geo, The News and Jang.