Mohsin Ali, who topped the BA examination in 2012 as a private candidate, surprised almost everyone. Mohsin’s hallmark was commendable. The education message got a wider audience on account of massive media coverage he received. It is quite pleasing when such bright youth occasionally remind the socioeconomically deprived people of Pakistan, in general, and those of his surroundings, in particular, that education has no match.
However, whereas our bright students are setting examples of hard work, our politicians are playing politics with them. Though the way Chief Minister Punjab, Shahbaz Sharif embraced the topper and awarded him One million rupees was appreciable, political benefits that he and his party intended to reap through such a show of benevolence were not highlighted.
To begin with, the PML-N has been facing a tough challenge from the PTI. Since Khan’s party has constantly been touting to be pro-youth, targeting them as potential voters at the upcoming general elections, the Sharifs devised a similar strategy to approach and ally with the youth particularly the students. Hence, whereby the PTI sells the ‘World Cup and hospital’ to the young audience, the PML-N distributes laptops, often bypassing merit. In other words, the Shahbaz government is killing two birds with one stone.
Mohsin’s village, Mian Rahima, is located roughly five minutes’ drive from Burjdara. The latter has been a hub of local politics in District Hafizabad for over three decades. Liaquat Abbass Bhatti, the former federal minister for housing and works in the PML-Q government, hails from this small village. His political rivals both Bhattis and Tarars belong to the PML-N. Little wonder, Saira Afzal Tarar, state minister for national health services, along with CM Punjab did not waste time to capitalise on the achievements of this kid from this very crucial constituency. The CM visited Mohsin’s village in 2012 and announced it to make it a “model village”, with upgraded educational, health and other facilities. Four years later, when I visited Mohsin’s model village and in particular the local schools, I could not spot any structural and meaningful change in the makeup of the area. The local schools still lack trained and punctual faculty and staff. The majority of the rural folk lack financial resources to send their children to higher educational institutions after matriculation. Same is the situation of Medicare and law and order.
In order to bring sustained and meaningful change in the lives of the rural people of this neglected area, the following measures must be the top priority of the Punjab government. The existing high/secondary schools in Mian Rahima and Sukheki need to be upgraded to college level with competent faculty, staff and facilities ensured. The Sukheki-Jalalana-Punj Pulla road needs urgent reconstruction. Hundreds of students, who daily commute to Hafizabad for schools and colleges, face many difficulties to catch a van on time due to poor road conditions.
The road, school and gas facilities are to be provided to the villages, which are in the vicinity of Sukheki Service area on M-2. These villagers, being illiterate, unaware and resourceless are unable to negotiate their basic rights with local politicians who unfortunately visit the constituency (NA-103) only at elections time.
The concerned PML-N MNA Shahid Hussain Bhatti has never visited this part of his constituency in the last four years nor did Saira Afzal visit any hospitals in Sukheki subdivision despite being health minister and a parliamentarian from the same district. The district lacks state of the art hospitals due to which many private hospitals have mushroomed. Mian Rahima, Sukheki and Kot Sarwar public hospitals need urgent attention with respect to the provision of quality medicines, and importantly, availability of staff.
The above needs to be materialised if the Sharif-led Punjab government wants to genuinely promote the pro-youth image and win votes in the coming election. The failure, in this regard, would further widen the existing socio-economic and intuitional disparity even in central Punjab. Until the current provincial and federal government take due measures, the youth’s disenchantment would have serious repercussions for Pakistan’s public policy, security and socio-economic development.
The writer is Head, Department of Social Sciences, Iqra University, Islamabad. He is DAAD, FDDI and Fulbright Fellow. He tweets @ejazbhatty