Daily Times

Pakistan was created in 1947 as a homeland for the Muslims of India and was initially envisaged as a moderate state where minorities would have full rights. Quaid-e-Azam, in his August 11 speech, also declared Pakistan a modern secular state. However, Pakistan’s minorities’ struggled and sacrificed but their role and achievements towards the building of Pakistan have been ignored and are being written out of history and our textbooks. Religious minorities who spoke out against intolerance have often been killed, seemingly with impunity, by militant sympathisers. Religious minorities are often portrayed in our textbooks as inferior or second-class citizens who have been granted limited rights and privileges by generous Pakistani Muslims, for which they should be grateful.

Many history scholars have mentioned in their writings that Pakistani textbooks have preached falsehoods, hatred and bigotry against the minorities. They have constructed most non-Muslims, especially Hindus, as evil and primordial enemies, glorified military dictatorships and omitted references to our great betrayal of the Bengali brothers and sisters who were the founders and owners of the Pakistan movement.

This history has been poisoning and brainwashing young minds with systematic and institutionalised lies, bigoted teachings and revisionist history for over four generations, bearing fruit in the form of radical Islamic extremism and terrorism in Pakistan. Throughout our textbooks, subtly or brazenly there is glorification of war and the capability to wreak damage and contain the ‘enemy’. What could be more damaging to young minds than imbibing half-truths and accepting violence as legitimate? A class five Social Studies textbook teaches: “India is our traditional enemy and we should always keep ourselves ready to defend our beloved country from Indian aggression.”

Recently, I went through some textbooks and was really depressed to see that Pakistani textbooks cannot mention Hindus without calling them cunning, scheming, deceptive or something equally insulting; in Social Studies textbooks it is mentioned that Hindus are extremists and eternal enemies of Islam, whose culture and society is based on injustice and cruelty, while Islam delivers a message of peace and brotherhood, concepts portrayed as alien to the Hindu. Secondly, these textbooks ignore the pre-Islamic history of Pakistan except to put the Hindu predecessors in a negative light. From grade five to 10, all the textbooks are full of historical errors and are teaching ‘prescribed myths’.

In our Social Studies textbooks it is written that India attacked us in 1948 and 1965 (class five) and that Kargil was attacked (class three, Meri Kitab). In fact, some textbooks say that we had almost won the 1971 war and that Bengali separatism was a result of Hindu teachers and traders. It is also written that “after the 1965 war, India conspired with the Hindus of Bengal and succeeded in spreading hate among the Bengalis about West Pakistan, and finally attacked East Pakistan in December 71, thus causing the breakup of East and West Pakistan.”

According to a class five book, “In 1965, the Pakistani army conquered several areas of India, and when India was on the point of being defeated, they requested the United Nations to arrange a ceasefire. After 1965, India, with the help of the Hindus living in East Pakistan, instigated the people living there against the people of West Pakistan, and finally invaded East Pakistan in December 1971. The conspiracy resulted in the separation of East Pakistan from us. All of us should receive military training and be prepared to fight the enemy.”

The students of class three are taught that, “Muhammad Ali Jinnah felt that Hindus wanted to make Muslims their slaves and since he hated slavery, he left the Congress.” At another place, it says, “The Congress was actually a party of Hindus. Muslims felt that after getting freedom, Hindus would make them their slaves.”

In addition to official school textbooks, there are thousands of unregulated madrassas (Islamic seminaries), whose curriculum is not discussed in this article but they teach their own Islamist and jihadi lessons, leading to hate campaigns against religious minorities in Pakistan. And many of these madrassas not only engender extremism among the Pakistani youth but have also emerged as training grounds for terrorists.

The National Commission for Justice and Peace (NCJP), a peace and human rights body, has released material on the issue of ‘religious discrimination in education policy’ and a syllabus, including specimens from Punjab textbooks. According to the NCJP, the curriculum and education policy in Punjab, and generally the whole of Pakistan, disregards Article 22 of the constitution “when it comes to hundreds of thousands of non-Muslim students attending schools in the province.”

The study highlighted the education syllabus and system in Pakistan according to the study arrangement of textbooks, and it is visibly discriminatory against non-Muslim citizens — it is a violation of Article 20 and 25 of the constitution of Pakistan, guaranteeing religious freedom and quality of life to citizens. Article 22 of the constitution states, “No person attending any educational institution shall be required to receive religious instruction or take part in any religious ceremony or attend religious worship if such instruction, ceremony or worship relates to a religion other than his own.” On the other hand, Islamic study is made a compulsory subject for all students from grade one to 12 in public schools by all five education policies since 1972. Sadly, the students belonging to religious minorities do not have the option of studying their own religion.

This biased material in textbooks is promoting prejudice, bigotry and discrimination towards other religions and nations. Non-Muslims are addressed as kaafirs (infidels) in the textbooks along with the statements that heaven is only for Muslims. Other religions are portrayed as false and believers of other religions are antagonists.

After examining several textbooks used at various levels of study, I am of the view that these textbooks supported military rule in Pakistan, promoted hatred for Hindus and other minorities, glorified war and distorted the pre-1947 history of Pakistan. The biased material in the syllabus is one of the major reasons behind growing religious intolerance and extremism. Secondly, it is in contradiction with the constitution of Pakistan. Any material considered ‘inflammatory’ or ‘discriminatory’ to religious minorities should be removed from the syllabus as the government should seriously take action on this matter. Secondly, unless and until young minds are encouraged to develop a critical mind and the willingness and ability to research and reach for the truth and facts, a country’s national ethos cannot become progressive with social justice and economic development of the citizen as the primary priorities.

The writer is a social, political activist based in Lahore and he can be reached at salmanali088@gmail.com