The road to hell

The road to hell, they say, is paved with good intentions. And there is no purer intent than that of the lion of Mianwali. He roars at the elites, he rails against the corrupt, and he retches against injustice.

Now he’s coming for your children. Indeed, he’s going to educate them, save them from themselves, and fashion them in his mold.

They will be good Muslims, all – yes, even the non-believers – and nationalistic Pakistanis. No more of this privatised elitist nonsense (Aitchison College be damned) that churns out brown-sahibs like his former self. Who needs more Ivy league professors like Aasim Khawja or Atif Mian when we have the example extolled by the Taliban’s uneducated education minister of an entire government of illiterate experts – no doubt destined to recreate the lost glories of Islam by literally taking us back to that era. The Afghans, as our prime minister insists, have thrown off the shackles of mental slavery.

It took the Khan a good part of two decades of inner conflict and public climbdowns to metamorphosize from player to puritan. Now he is on a mission to spare others the agony of backtracking. Our kids will start as caterpillars and remain as caterpillars.

Because, you see, when it comes to children (ours, not his), the Khan is a leveler, not a builder – he will level the playing field no matter what structures get dismantled in the process.

Sound familiar? We’ve been down this road before. Been there, done that, one can almost hear Mr Bhutto yell from the grave. A charismatic scion of the elites who took on the elites.? Check. Nationalized our universities, socialised our education, and left mediocrity in its wake? Check.

Who would have thought that Zaman Park would provide succour to the pipliya chant (bless their believing hearts) “Har ghar se Bhutto niklay ga!”.

But at least Mr Bhutto had the vision to engage men of substance to devise and execute his plans. A Hafeez Pirzada here in education, a Dr Mubashar Hasan there in science and technology. One may disagree with them – many vehemently – but there was little denying their professional competence and personal probity.

What the Khan has instead – and there is no clever way to put it – is rather embarrassing. His education minister in Punjab, the testing lab of the Single National Curriculum, fancies himself a ‘Doctor’ along the lines of the late Dr Hasan. But when you buy your degree in a priceless Mastercard moment, it just doesn’t feel the same as Dr Hasan braving the Iowa cold for years to earn his stripes.

But of course, one must not begrudge the Minister-Doctor his credentials, he surely paid good money for them. But can we at least cry foul when a gentleman with his educational provenance is given the reins of reeducating our children. It would be concerning to find out that the neurosurgeon set to crack open your skull faked his credentials. Just so happens that the Minister-Doctor is flexing his muscles for neurosurgery on an entire generation, and all I can think of is…ghabrana nahin hay!

It didn’t have to be this way. It still needn’t be this way. Our prime minister has all the right feelings. He just vocalizes them with the wrong ideas. What happened to piloting a curriculum before ramping it up? Start with Lahore and shove it down Aitchison’s throat if it gives you such satisfaction, but don’t roll out something nationally that appears to have been sprung untested out of a magician’s hat. Pilot, refine, scale. It’s not rocket science.

And the books, oh the books. Forcing fifth graders to study second grade English will certainly equalise the playing field between the public and the private, but the end result in learning outcomes may only appeal to the Taliban’s pedagogy-denying education minister. So why not have a transition period where existing books compete with the new SNC books – a contest of ideas – all held together with proposed national exams testing outcomes. If the SNC books can produce better outcomes, surely schools will gravitate towards them. And if they can’t, why would we wish to force them (I’m looking at you, Minister-Doctor Raas).

I guess it ultimately is rocket science after all – do we fashion ourselves to go up like a rocket, or do we prefer to keep digging down to hell.

Editor's Note: The News welcomes other views on this subject.

The writer, a former aide to UN Secretaries-General Kofi Annan and Ban Ki-moon, tweets @aliahsan001