As education suffers
By Abrar Kazi & Zulfiqar Halepoto
WHILE the print and electronic media are pursuing the NRO and memogate controversies, the people of Sindh are debating the closure of their premier educational institution, the University of Sindh.
This university, which has more than 25,000 students (another 70,000 are affiliated through colleges), 57 disciplines, 500 faculty members and more than 3,500 administrative employees, is truly the mother of all educational institutions of Sindh. Before most professional colleges turned into separate universities, including Mehran Engineering and Liaquat Medical, they were under the administrative and academic control of Sindh University.
Unlike Karachi, which has many public and private institutions, this is the only university which caters to a very large number of students belonging to the rural and remote areas of the province. More importantly, this university is the fountainhead of the Sindhi people’s intellect and consciousness. For example, the majority of the current Sindh Assembly members have been educated in this institution. Therefore when the university is closed it brings grief not only to its students and their parents, but also impacts on long-term intellectual development in Sindh.
In the year 2011, classes were conducted, off and on, for only about 40 days. Continuing the trend, to the enormous dismay of students and their parents, it has remained closed for practically the entire month of January. And there is no sign it is going to open soon.
The immediate reason of the suspension of classes is the teachers’ boycott, following the murder of the director of student affairs, who was himself a teacher. This is comparatively a new phenomenon in the troubled academic history of Sindh University. Heretofore it was the rampant interference of political parties in student affairs that kept the classes suspended.
The last two years have been eventful in this institution. The prolonged controversy over the appointment of the vice chancellor, the mushrooming of student wings of a number of political parties, many of them disowned by the parent bodies, and their violent confrontation with each other, gross mismanagement of the university’s affairs by an inefficient administration, all added to the turmoil in which four students lost their lives.
The ensuing hue and cry from parents, civil society and concerned citizens forced the administration to hold a conference, in which all the stakeholders came together. A painstaking exercise was carried out in which all political parties, the university administration, the teachers association and civil society participated and a code of conduct was formed the primary goal of which was not to allow the suspension of classes under any pretext.
The exercise was generally welcomed and it was thought that at long last a solution had been found. A monitoring committee was formed with broad-based consensus to implement the code of conduct. In spite of the fact that the university administration, the teachers’ body and the political parties of the student associations signed the code of conduct, the teachers broke the code in the first instance of violence, pushing the whole academic environment back to square one.
The long-term solutions for the improvement of the educational environment of Sindh University, or for that matter any institution of higher learning in Pakistan, are not very complicated. Foremost among them is the selection of the head of the institution, in this case for the post of vice chancellor. The present selection procedure is overly fraught with political considerations and favouritism rendering the whole process controversial from the beginning.
The second solution is addressing the insecurity of life and the threat of physical harm experienced by the teachers. Following the murder of a colleague, the present boycott results from a sense of insecurity — although a large amount of money is spent on the deployment of Rangers and police. One suggestion is that rather than these ineffective and expensive forces, a dedicated superintendent of police and a magistrate be assigned to ensure the protection of life and property of teachers, employees and students on the university premises.
The third solution is the immediate revival of student unions which can then regenerate academic and extracurricular life which is present in universities worldwide but that has long been absent from Sindh University given the smoke-filled atmosphere of gunfire and squabbles among the administration, faculty and the students of Sindh University.
Two students (belonging to both genders) can be nominated from among the most meritorious of each faculty to look after the welfare and needs of the student community in the university. This will eliminate the disruptive influence of political parties through their respective student wings.
In the short term, however, the resumption of academic activities must start and the teachers should end their boycott and resume classes so that society has a reason to join hands to work towards long-term solutions.
It is regretful that the people of Sindh have very little sympathy with the teaching community, most members of which are considered as the major reason behind the abominable state of education in the province. Society becomes much more unsympathetic towards the teachers when the latter abdicate their primary mandate of teaching our children by way of boycotting classes.
Although there is a general decline of morality and a sense of duty in all spheres of society, the decline in education and the administration of justice should not be tolerated at all as they affect the very basis of the social structure and ethical development of society.
The writers are members of the Sindh Democratic Forum.
Source: Dawn
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