Construction---Not
Subversion!
The
author is a historian of language policy in South Asia
Dr. A. H. Nayyar and Ahmed Salim have edited a report entitled A Subtle Subversion. This report argues that the textbooks of languages and social sciences (Pakistan Studies, social studies, history etc) are full of hatred for India and the Hindus, wrong at places and ignore or suppress the rights of minorities and women. The report has many contributions by people who have pointed out other flaws, inaccuracies, excesses etc in our curricula. The Ministry of Education, much to its credit, appointed a committee to examine the report. The Committee began its work on 08 March and the work is still going on the day this column is being written i.e. 10 March. On 10 March, however, Dr. Shireen M. Mazari wrote an article in The News entitled ‘A Not-so-subtle subversion’. This column is written in response to this 10 March article not in a spirit of criticism but in a conciliatory spirit. The main purpose of my writing is to remove the air of mistrust and misunderstanding which is building up as this will prevent any constructive changes from taking place---hence the title!.
I would never have presumed to mention names in this column---my readers know I hardly ever mention names---but for the fact that both Nayyar and Shireen are friends and colleagues. I have found myself disagreeing and agreeing with both and hope to continue to do so. I consider both to be honest and sincere in their views and I am sure that they both aim to create a better Pakistan for the future even if they do not agree about the way in which this should be done. The purpose of this writing is to remove miss understandings and either bring about a synthesis or an agreement to disagree with each other without doubting each others sincerity.
First, Nayyar is not the first person to point out that the lessons taught to our children tend to prejudice them in favour of conflict and against peace. They also tend to make them anti-India and anti-Hindu. Religion too is used to create militant and biased citizens in such a way that minorities feel harassed, humiliated, marginalized and ignored. This was pointed out in detail by our eminent historian K. K. Aziz in his book The Murder of History in Pakistan (1993). After that a number of writers pointed out how even the facts of history had been distorted. Rubina Saigol, a well known educational sociologist, pointed out how the books gave importance to the male gender belittling or ignoring females and created support for war rather than peace. I myself pointed out in my book Language, Ideology and Power (2002) that even in language textbooks language skills are given less importance than ideological messages. In short, changing the curricula has concerned many people in this country. What Dr Nayyar did was to find a group, financed no doubt as all such projects are, in order to point out exactly what is wrong.
If somebody disagrees with any aspect of the report; that is welcome. Diversity is always a source for moving on and so it is fine. If, however, somebody feels that Dr. Nayyar or the writers of the report are agents of a donor agency or fulfilling some secret agenda then that view needs correction. I would say that both those who oppose the report and those who favour it have points of view which they sincerely believe in. Neither one party nor the other has anything but the interest of the students, of the state of Pakistan, and of humanity at heart. They do have different approaches and different points of view but let us not doubt the sincerity or loyalty of anyone in this process. The moment one starts mistrusting the other person as being an enemy of common ideals (a prosperous Pakistan), one opens the way to an inquisition. And, in an inquisition truth, justice and humanity perish. Minds are locked and people turn to hatred, mistrust and conspiracy theories. Courage dies and cowardice is created. This is exactly what happened to Stalinist Russia, the Shah’s Iran and Hitler’s Germany. My purpose in writing this article is to save all of us---those in favour and those against the Report---from such an end.
If it is conceded that the report has been written with the best of intentions then we can move forward. Obviously, there are individual examples which we may not all agree with. However, if we think that Pakistan needs to build up its image as a civilized, moderate, peaceful, democratic country which wants to live at peace with its neighbours then there is a case for changing the curricula. The crucial question is what kind of change is advisable?
For this let us situate ourselves in the shoes of the Muslims in India at present; Arabs in Israel and Pakistanis in Western countries. In all such cases we would like our children to learn about citizenship, values common to all humanity but not about the specific religious or cultural teachings of the majority. This means that in Pakistan too we should teach Islamic studies (separate Shia and Sunni versions) to our children but we need not expect all other children to learn about our religion in textbooks of Urdu, civics, history, Pakistan studies and so on. This, essentially, may be one guideline for making textbooks in all fields of study.
In should also be pointed out that we may choose lessons from the Muslim mystics, intellectuals and other figures whose charity, love and justice will have universal appeal. Such inspiring figures will promote peace and should be used as role models. Similarly, in order to broaden the children’s minds, humanitarian role models---like Nelson Mandela---may be chosen from all over the world.
There is some misunderstanding about the ideology of Pakistan. The ideology is actually universal in its application. It is that all groups of people have a right to resist domination or exploitation by more powerful groups. The Hindu-Muslim case in pre-partition India is a sub-set of this general principle. The Indian Muslims, not wanting to be dominated by Hindus, mobilized themselves as a group and demanded their rights. As the majority did not give them all the rights and assurances they desired they created a separate country. No author of the report denies this. What some of them say is that this theory is used to deny that people can enter into treaties and co-exist in peace at present.
In fact, the creation of Pakistan was supposed to lead to peace. Moreover, the Quaid-i-Azam in his speech of 11 August made it clear that Pakistani Hindus, Christians and Parsis will be part of the Pakistani nation and no other. Similarly, he advised the Indian Muslims to live as citizens of India. Indeed, it was initially thought that there will be no mass migration of minorities on both sides of the border. The Muslim League even wanted that the Punjab and Bengal should not be partitioned. If the idea had been that Muslims and Hindus must always hate each other and can never live together these ideas would not have been given by the Muslim League at all.
If now the extremist Hindus interpret the two-nation theory as saying that Hindus and Muslims cannot live together and start throwing out Muslims from India can we imagine the results? If the Israelis throw out all the Arabs within Israel will that be a good thing? The point is that Pakistan is a reality and nobody has suggested anything to the contrary. All that the report says is that hatred should not be taught; only differences need not be played up; and, above all, children should be taught that peaceful living is possible. Those who agree with this may still find some faults with the report---they are welcome. Those who do not agree with it can come up with a different report---they too are welcome!
What should be done now is to commission textbooks from diverse groups and constitute a committee to decide which ones should be used. There is no point in discussing what was wrong in the previous textbooks unless we provide models for new ones. This is what we should be doing.
To sum up, this is the time not to doubt each others’ sincerity and not to resort to conspiracy theories. If Pakistan is to become a moderate Muslim country living at peace with its neighbours its children cannot be brought up on hate material. If this basic thing is acceptable we can all move forward whether on the basis of this report or others. The important thing is to agree that we may differ on the ways we want to make Pakistan a good country to live in for our children, but we do want just that---creating a special safe corner of the earth we can call home---Pakistan!