Salim Mansur Khalid is a selfless and well-meaning soul. In this age of self-glorification and ostentation, Khalid is a freak -- extremely modest, erudite and very sure of his ideological preferences.
For seven years, we were colleagues at the F.C. College in Lahore. Despite being polar opposites on the political spectrum, our relationship remained unimpaired. The Jamaat-e-Islami was his passion and I, though caught up at that stage of my life in political ambivalence, was quite sure of my abiding indifference for the Jamaat.
Our relationship, based on mutual respect, never waned.
Though he taught (in fact still teaches) Punjabi literature, he was passionate about political movements and education. The book that he compiled on madrassa education in Pakistan contains an invaluable wealth of information and insight not only for academics but for lay readers too.
Just a few days ago, while surfing e-resources, his article ‘Pakistan: the State of Education’, published in the quarterly The Muslim World, caught my sight. M. Fayyaz Khan from the Institute of Policy Studies, Islamabad is the co-author of this article. A constructive critique of that article forms the central aim of this column -- which may enable us to dust the cobwebs off our minds regarding the education system.
The ‘nation’s belief system, culture, civilisation and (national) values’ are the fundamental objective of the education system. This assertion is based on assumptions far removed from reality. Pakistan has myriad cultures, civilisations and sub-sets of belief systems and in such circumstances, standardising culture or civilisation is a perplexing proposition. We have already seen the disastrous impact of standardisation in the form of the cession of East Pakistan.
The evolution of culture and civilisation invariably has a different trajectory vis-à-vis the belief system. This belief system, too, evolves but at a different pace. Thus, culture and belief system, more often than not, find themselves in the state of confrontation. A belief system becomes a strength for a society only when it is amenable to culture -- which happens only rarely. Given this extremely complex situation, it may become a perplexing task to specify the exact configuration of any civilisation in our part of the world.
Here, one must not lose sight of the fact that ‘civilisation’ as a social category was introduced to us by the western academia in the 19thcentury.
Besides, the concept of education as a public good, and therefore a right of all citizens, is a modern concept which gained currency only in the wake of the industrial revolution. Importantly enough, an individual came to be re-defined as an instrument for economic enhancement in an age of industrialisation, for which proper instruction was a sine qua non.
Another aim of education was to ‘discipline’ the individual, in the Foucauldian sense, into a submissive (read ‘law-abiding’) citizen. Thus, imparting of education was made obligatory, and citizens were disciplined through ‘law’, not through culture or civilisation. ‘Culture’ and ‘civilization’, as discursive categories, were used by the colonial powers to define the colonised people -- the carrying out ethnographical surveys.
While tracing the historical background, in the pre-Muslim period in India, Brahmin dominance has been highlighted. It is a fact that cannot be denied. But often authors commit a faux-pas when they refer to it as the affirmation of a ‘class system’. It ought to be pointed out that the dominance of the Brahmins was the affirmation of a ‘caste system’ rather than a ‘class system’.
The same was the case in the Muslim-Indian society. The Ashraf, or the ruling elite, of the Muslims of non-Indian origin had the privilege of education. Ajlaf, or the local converts to Islam, mostly remained bereft of education. The introduction of Persian as an official language served as an impediment for the universal dissemination of knowledge in the subcontinent. Subsequently, Hindu Kaisths learnt this language and became valuable to the Mughals as court officials.
The fact remains that indigenously produced knowledge, which could only be channelled through local languages and dialects, slowly percolated into the epistemic mainstream. Such knowledge was articulated by Sufi poets and tazkaras in the medieval age.
With the advent of the British, however, the local system(s) of knowledge were consigned to the margins. Punjab, in particular, was the most unfortunate region in this particular regard. The introduction of English provided a fresh lease of life to class differentiation. English replaced Persian as a symbol of prestige and status, the privilege that it epitomises even to this day.
The authors of the article have also broached the issue of the medium of instruction -- calling for English to be replaced by Urdu. That, according to them, will act as the most effective antidote against an education system which foments class-difference among the populace.
This assertion is worth pondering on. But the problem that the state authorities might confront is two-fold: The first concerns the capacity of Urdu to act as a viable substitute to English as a medium of instruction -- can the sciences or even social science be effectively taught in Urdu or is Urdu prose developed enough to do what is required? One must take a dispassionate view of the range of vocabulary that Urdu currently possesses. The second concern is the acceptability of Urdu among different ethnicities. Unfortunately, Urdu has come to be perceived as a cultural signature of the Punjabis, which has never served Urdu well.
The thorny nature of these concerns must be appreciated before making any recommendations.
At the end of the article, the authors have furnished 10 suggestions which are extremely valuable and should be taken seriously by those in the saddle.