Dear All

Those of us who condemn mullah for establishing madrassas and the downtrodden class for sending their children to be “educated” there do not realize that it is a matter of simple economics. The poor masses have no choice except free-madrassas. Secular education in Pakistan is a luxury and available only to those who have tesha-e-zar.

It is a failure of our corrupt secular ruling class (equally corrupts like mullah in robes) that has been ruling Pakistan. They steal public money and get the corruption cases NROed. They have been wasting resources on military adventures like Siachen and Kargil but have no funds for education. This is what Mortenson wrote in his book Three Cups of Tea when he visited a “school” in a small village called Korphe in Baltistan’s where he ended up after a failed attempt to reach K-2. (The way that villagers looked after an ill and frost bitten white Christian American is a story worth reading.  They may be poor and illiterate but they have human values and the heart of gold. I sometime doubt that we who are living in the west and concerned by the square footage of our homes and mortgage interest rates are really that civilized.  Many of us have not even seen those places in Pakistan but we have the audacity to pass judgment on the intelligence of the people from our centrally air-conditioned houses.) There was no school building and no teachers. Children were sitting on the ground under a tree . They were using sticks and dirt for writing as a piece of chalk and a slate was a luxury. The experience was so heart wrenching for Mortenson that he decided to do some thing. The rest is history. Since mid-nineties he has established more then 100 schools in the most difficult terrain.  Contrary to the common belief, Mortenson has been enjoying full support from the villagers who frequently climbed for miles with heavy building material on their shoulders and provided free labour for building schools. Also it is interesting to note that the villagers were keen to educate their daughters.

It is wrong to assume that Pakistan's poor people do not want to give modern education to their children and prefer madarsssa education. The fact is that primary education is unaffordable and the successive governments have abdicated their responsibility, leaving the field to profit driven private schools or free “education” by mulla-run schools. Pakistan is now reaping the bitter harvest of those ill-considered policies.

I recommend that those who have interest in the subject should read Three Cups of Tea. They will find that our poor people are hungry for real education and how callously they have been deprived of this basic right. The book is available in all public

Regards

Anis Zuberi