Daily Times

By the time this piece appears, a lot would have been written about the most gruesome act that resulted in lynching Priyantha Kumara and torching his mutilated body. It was heartrending to watch after the barbaric event when his wife, Nilushi, displayed his picture in which he held his graduation degree. And as far as his mother crying uncontrollably on seeing her son’s casket, only mothers would understand her anguish better. Priyantha’s killers not only took his life but also shredded the national honour into pieces.

Then the usual rigmarole who said what followed; inquiries and investigations ordered to bring the perpetrators to book. That’s always a long haul. However, it’s unnerving to observe how an extremism-based mob mentality has developed over the years. It culminates into rage and clouds the public minds, robbing them of the sense to discriminate between evil and good. Usually, illiterate and poor youngsters who see no promise in life turn to extremism.

In public-oriented democracies, policymakers think ahead of time instead of joining their heads together to examine the causes of the gory events when they had occurred. Now, the PM has “vowed that no one will be allowed to kill anyone in the name of religion and stern action will be taken against those”

One may however question why no stern action was taken when the TLP crowd murdered four policemen on duty and grievously wounded dozens? It’s so distressing to see their children looking for their fathers. No wonder that three policemen from Ugoki only stood by as spectators when the monstrous crowd lynched Priyantha. The PM has also pledged that he would not allow a repeat of such horrific acts of savagery in the future as long as he lived. Wish he realises his lofty dream!

The extremism-based mob mentality culminates into rage and clouds the public minds.

Much of extremism is attributable to the dismal state of education in the country where about 23 million children are enrolled in schools and the same number of them remains un-enrolled, according to a UNICEF report. The shortfall in government schools is made up by thousands of religious seminaries spread over the country. Some seminaries occupy green belts in the capital city – Islamabad. What’s needed is that vocational training must be made compulsory, along with religious education in the seminaries. Trained young men could later take up jobs in their respective fields to earn their livelihood, instead of being used as fodder by militant entities.

It’s our lopsided national education policy that needs urgent attention. Should the Single National Curriculum have a large mix of religion in it or should it be based on the modern education system? Isn’t it better to leave religion for the individuals to decide for themselves rather than being imposed on them? After all, every individual would be answerable for himself in the hereafter, according to our belief system. The boarding school I attended in the sixties in Abbottabad had students from all religious communities including, Sunnis, Shias, Christians, Ahmadis, and so on, but we never discussed religion and lived in the spirit of great bonhomie. Why can’t the same spirit be inculcated on the national level to develop a homogeneous society? Is it only a dream similar to the PM’s dream?

The dichotomy about the SNG became more visible when the education minister visited Saudi Arabia to seek information on the distance learning system adopted by the royal kingdom. About the same time, the foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi visited Belgium to “boost relations in the areas of trade, education, science, and technology.” Do the education systems in Saudi Arabia and Belgium have anything in common? Mr. Qureshi would make us wise. But his elbow-touch with Belgium’s foreign minister Sophie Wilmes reminds of his touching-heads gestures extended to Hilary Clinton with a twinkle of an eye. Qureshi knows the “ropes” of diplomacy.

Education and the right kind of education is the key to building a nation. The rest of the governance issues could be remedied with time but the education system once derailed will have lasting effects on the generation going through it. A class of society blames Gen Zia for derailing the education system and Bhutto for the nationalisation of industries; thereafter, both sectors have suffered immeasurably. I don’t agree with such fixed ideas. To reverse the damage done in the past, radical measures are always possible provided there’s a will to do it. It reminds me of the late Ardeshir Cowasjee who tirelessly emphasised upon – education – education and meaningful education in step with time.

The writer is a Lahore-based columnist and can be reached at pinecity @gmail.com.