The education syllabus taught in the schools across Pakistan is a fundamental reason of religious intolerance and hatred in the society. The curious and innocent minds of the children are filled with distorted narration of history in which the minorities are side-lined. The role of the minorities in creating and defending Pakistan is unabashedly marginalised by not mentioning their achievements and struggles.
The education syllabus taught in the schools across Pakistan is a fundamental reason of religious intolerance and hatred in the society. The curious and innocent minds of the children are filled with distorted narration of history in which the minorities are side-lined. The role of the minorities in creating and defending Pakistan is unabashedly marginalised by not mentioning their achievements and struggles.
According to a report, ‘Connecting the Dots: Education and Religious Discrimination in Pakistan’ by United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), “The religious minorities are often portrayed as inferior or second-class citizens who have been granted limited rights and privileges by generous Pakistani Muslims, for which they should be grateful, and to whom religious minorities should be subservient.”
This Islamisation of the textbooks began in 1979 when General Zia ul Haq introduced his National Education Policy with a mission of manufacturing ‘Good Muslims, Good Pakistanis’. His education policy stated that “The highest priority would be given to the revision of the curricula with a view to reorganizing the entire content around Islamic thought and giving education an ideological orientation so that Islamic ideology permeates the thinking of the younger generation and helps them with the necessary conviction and ability to refashion society according to Islamic tenets.”
The syllabus which was designed during the implementation of this policy was in clear violation of Article 22 of the 1973 constitution which states that
“(1) 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.”
After 1979, a process began which is described by Rubina Saigol in her article, Knowledge and Identity: Articulation of Gender in Educational Discourse in Pakistan in way that “Almost all the official sites of the production of knowledge were put to the task of re-imagining an Islamic nation in an exclusionary exercise, which involved the diminution of the citizenship of non-Muslim and female citizens of Pakistan”.
Now the textbooks taught in schools across country teach children right from the beginning that this state was built on the basis of religion that’s why they don’t have tolerance for other religions and want to wipe-out all of them, writes Mubarik Ali.
Similarly the above mentioned report by USCIRF states that “Pakistan and Social Studies textbooks are rife with negative comments regarding India and Great Britain, but Hindus are often singled out for particular criticism in texts and in interview responses, together with Ahmadis, who consider themselves Muslims but are not considered so by the Pakistani constitution.” In this report they interviewed students from schools and madrassas across Pakistan and found that “a large portion of public school students could not correctly identify religious minorities as citizens, and many were sceptical about the potential for religious minorities to assist in the development of Pakistan.”
The Center for Research and Security Studies in its report, Curriculum of Hate, argued that our primary and secondary schools have produced three generations of Pakistanis brimming with militancy, animosity and fanaticism. The report further states that our primary and secondary school environment has been consciously manufactured to nurture terror, promote prejudice and breed extremism.
Government of Pakistan is working on a new educational policy that will be unveiled in 2016. It is important that the textbooks syllabus should be revised to instil tolerance and harmony among the nation’s future. A report, ‘Education and Fanatic Literacy’ by National Commission of Justice and Peace recommends that “The current curriculum and education policy should be reviewed to remove policies, teaching materials and practices that are discriminatory and inflammatory especially against the minority faiths / religions.” and “Besides imparting knowledge, the textbooks and teaching at schools should focus educating young minds on universal humanity, dignity of human beings and responsible citizenship.”
