Category Archives: Education

Guess who came for breakfast?

Archive Edition, Children and Youth, Culture and the Arts, Economy, Education, Human Rights, Law & Order, Social Issues

By Zubeida Mustafa

64-26-05-1992  A few weeks ago we had some jninvited guests for breakfast. They were masked and armed and the breakfast they took was most unhealthy — gulab jamuns and Coca Cola. They also took away whatever cash they could lay their hands on and some valuables — to use the crime reporter’s terminology. But the most precious thing they stole was my peace of mind.

If there is one word to describe my experience of this armed robbery, it is “bizarre”. Of course I also felt terrified, but that came much later.

It all happened early in the morning, which is the worst time for such unwholesome intrusions — not that other times are better. In the morning your senses are not fully awake — apart from the fact that one is not even properly dressed to receive visitors, including the unwanted ones. Continue reading Guess who came for breakfast? →

Privatisation of higher education

Archive Edition, Children and Youth, Economy, Education

By Zubeida Mustafa

The Pakistan government is considering the privatisation of the universities. The new education policy, which has been on the anvil for an inexplicably long time, is expected to lay down the guidelines for the establishment of private universities and colleges.

This step is being taken at the prodding of the World Bank which perceives privatisation as the magic cure for all economic ills. Being totally dependent on the loans it receives from the aid-giving agencies, the Pakistan government feels it has no other option but to obey the Bank’s edict. But will this solve the problems the country faces in the higher education sector? Continue reading Privatisation of higher education →

The private sector in higher education

Archive Edition, Children and Youth, Development and Poverty, Education, Health

By Zubeida Mustafa

61-14-01-1992aTen years ago there was not a single private university in Pakistan. Today there are three. The policy of inducting the private sector in education in a big way has begun to produce a visible impact.

The Aga Khan University in Karachi which was chartered in 1983 and the Lahore University of Management Sciences (founded two years later) today enjoy a prestige in the field of higher education in Pakistan that no other institution in the country has ever known.

The Hamdard University which received its charter in 1990 still has some time to go before it becomes functional. In characteristic Pakistani style, the university failed to respond to some basic queries to which the other private universities were prompt in providing information. Continue reading The private sector in higher education →

To go nuclear or not is the question

Archive Edition, Defence and Disarmament, Development and Poverty, Economy, Education, Foreign Policy of Pakistan, Health, Human Rights, International Politics, Nuclear weapons, Social Issues, War and Peace

By Zubeida Mustafa

THE suspension of American aid to Pakistan has produced one positive result. It has for the first time brought into the open the nuclear debate in this country.

Given the categorical linkage Washington instituted between the flow of economic assistance to Pakistan and nuclear non-prolif eration, Islamabad never encouraged a public discussion on the atom bomb.

To use Stephen Cohen’s term, a policy of ‘designed ambiguity’ was adopted. In other words, the capacity and the will of the government to go nuclear are deliberately kept ambivalent. Continue reading To go nuclear or not is the question →

Privatisation of social sector: what it means in Third World context

Archive Edition, Defence and Disarmament, Development and Poverty, Economy, Education, Health, Housing

By Zubeida Mustafa

Is the State responsible for educating its citizens and providing them health care? According to Adam Smith, who believed in the supremacy of the marketplace, education should be “self-sustaining and supported by those who use it”. Karl Marx displayed greater humanitarian concerns though today he stands discredited owing to the happenings in Eastern Europe. He advocated “free education for all children in public schools”.

Which of these principles should apply in Pakistan, a Third World country where 35 per cent of the people live below the poverty line (UNDP’s estimate)? The dictates of social justice should not permit a State to leave the responsibility of providing education and health care entirely to the vicissitudes of the marketplace.

57-02-07-1991a

And yet a glance at the federal and provincial budgets for the incoming year shows that the present government is applying to the social sectors the Smithsonian principle under pressure from the Western-dominated financial institutions. As such very little money has been set aside in the public sector for the human resources development of the people of Pakistan.

 

After the nation’s experiment with the nationalisation of education in the seventies, the pendulum has now swung to the other end. The government wants the private sector to shoulder the responsibility of meeting the people’s health and education needs. Hence the relentless drive to get the private sector to open schools, colleges, clinics and even universities. Continue reading Privatisation of social sector: what it means in Third World context →