Daily Times

Parents send their children to school, contemplating that eventually they will be able to fend for themselves once they graduate. Parents make sacrifices for their children dreaming of a brighter future for their children, which they couldn’t possibly have. Yet they strive for and work hard by spending huge amounts of money on private education in hopes of giving their descendants the lifestyle they could not possibly live.

Every parent dream’s to see their child prosper and lead the best life a person could lead. Despite tremendous amounts of odds placed against them such as patriarchy; racial discrimination; sexual orientation; age; ethnicity; gender discrimination; poor health care and poor public education, to mention a few.

The day comes when their child graduates and finally it’s the graduation day. Parents and children dream of finally reaping the benefits of their years and years of hard work, yet they are unaware that the ordeal has just begun. Their dream is about to turn into a nightmare.

In our society, it’s almost impossible to be gainfully employed without someone of power making a phone-call on one’s behalf. I accept that there are people who make it into an organisation through their own covetous abilities, yet that proportion is negligible. In Pakistan, without the reference of someone of influence, it is difficult to even successfully submit one’s resume at an organisation, without everyone looking down upon you. It is as if the person looking for employment — without the right contacts — is a burden, a bug to be squashed.

It is as if the person looking for employment — without the right contacts — is a burden, a bug to be squashed

A child of a labourer has odds placed against him the moment he enters this world. No matter how hard that child tries, no matter, if he excels in school and goes on to graduate the top of his class, that child will and is looked down upon and will not be able to live a lifestyle he could have lived if born in a family of privilege.

I concede that there are anomalies in our society, and many born into underprivileged families have and will continue to make something of themselves, but the struggle they face is of a very high level. The amount of hard-work individuals put in deserves a standing ovation. But it is something that most hard-working people from working class families will never be able to achieve.

They will not be able to achieve this because of unfair societal norms formed by the elite in our country. They will not be able to live their parents’ dreams, because in the first place, they will never be able to be employed according to the effort they have put into their lives; lacking the necessary contacts to be able to land a job and learn what it takes to live and enter the real world. The real world is different from the world of the school and requires other soft skills, to move up the ladder of progress.

How will a son of a labourer — who graduates and becomes an economist-be able to provide for himself and his dependents if he is never provided with the opportunity to make use of the knowledge he spent years in school studying for. When he is never given an opportunity to apply it in the so-called real world; the society with sham degree holders, who happen to be people of influence, are given the top positions and a person who has studied hard all his life is not even given an opportunity to make use of the knowledge he has gained through the prayers and sacrifices of his parents? How is it possible that an economics graduate is coerced into selling ice-cream and a person who has not even studied till the fifth grade is appointed at a position of power and influence in our society? I have come across many such graduates in my lifetime. It breaks my heart to see the tremendous divide and unfairness in our society.

I detest such societal norms, as I come across such people on a daily basis, and it is a part and parcel of our society. Only people who have not had to go through or have not come across such social injustice, will disagree.

The writer is a corporate lawyer and an alumnus of SOAS, University of London. He specialises in corporate governance issues and operates a law practice in Lahore called Sami Shah & Partners with offices in Toronto, Canada and Palos Verdes, California, USA. He can be reached at sami@samishahpartners.com

Published in Daily Times, September 28^th 2017.