Universities are universal institutions. They generate knowledge. Students and scholars across the provinces from various backgrounds assemble and celebrate the diversity. In these institutions, instead of sword and gun pen is hailed. More than war peace is glamorised. Human dignity is held in high esteem. Science, rationality, and art are promoted so that intellectual development can make its way. This diversity and educational insights are imparted for the production of creative minds who love to see their fellow beings flourish and society progress.
Unfortunately, such a picture cannot be witnessed in the educational institutions of Pakistan. Here, some groups have a monopoly over the code of conduct in these public universities. They won’t allow anything to happen if they don’t deem it right. The previous year, some students announced the Abdul Salam Science Festival 2024 at Qaid-e-Azam University. This festival is aimed at the promotion of science, education, and scientific thought. There were art exhibitions, scientific modules, astronomy nights, music concerts, and competitions. The other day Voice chancellor appears and cancels the event after meeting with a religious group at the university. I still remember the day at Peshawar University when the Spring Gala event was in full swing, and a religious group-affiliated student appeared and vitriolically held a renowned professor’s collar for allowing the students to play music. The matter was later resolved but the miasma disturbed the very fabric of cultural celebrations and social gatherings in the coming days as the students feared attacks by these groups.
There are western universities where students stage protests in favour of Palestinians and block the whole campuses, halt the operations, and ask for a ceasefire and human rights violations whereas, in the same days, a student named Musa at Malakand University is penalised for bringing Rabab into the university. Subsequently, the depressed Musa succumbs to death. Because in KP Kalashnikov has been romanticised more than the Rabab. People in the aftermath of the war on terror would love to say “topak zama qanun da”, the gun is my law. Hatred and exclusivity are more prevalent than love and harmony. And that’s why Rabab and the songs of love are despised. Brutality and violence are like now. A few years back at every wedding function “Khudkasha dhamaka yama” song would be sung; I am a suicide bombing. It shows how the Pashtuns were made to love violence. Kalashnikov didn’t intimidate the powerful, the Rabab did. The voices of peace tarried as the love for Kalashnikov thrived. The powerful always tamed Rabab, scientific festivals, rationality, and reason as they beget questions that cannot be answered by the power-holders.
Stagnant universities are expensive and ineffectual monuments to a status quo which is more likely to be a status quo ante, yesterday’s world preserved in aspic
Public universities are not playing their due part in the socioeconomic development and intellectualisation of society. They have now become places of inequality and elite hubs where only those can be allowed who can pay more than a lac for a semester fee. And that’s why getting higher education has become a pipe dream for the underprivileged classes. The faculty in the public institutions are incentivised by the HEC for the publications leaving the student's fate to the visiting teachers. Talented students from the peripheries and marginalised regions could only dream of stepping into the university as most of them have been ostracised by the financial burdens. The HEC too is a grievant of diabolical resource allocation. In such a despondent environment these institutions cannot produce theorists, scientists, artists, and engineers of international level.
Moreover, according to reports, 58 harassment cases are reported in seven Islamabad-based universities with 41 complaints Comsat leads. Recently, a student from Malakand University filed a harassment case against the Pakistan Studies department lecturer disturbing the already shambled situation of girls’ education. The harassment cases in higher education raise many challenges including the future of girls’ education however the institutional procedure for handling these cases is inefficient and leaves such crucial matters in the doldrums.
Globally universities play a key role in social transformation and change. Historically, these public institutions are supposed as ideological apparatuses and hubs of socialisation where individuals are trained and assimilated into the dominant elites. But now these institutions in Pakistan are not market-oriented and do not contribute anything to the world knowledge economy. They are stagnant. And according to Darendorf, “Stagnant universities are expensive and ineffectual monuments to a status quo which is more likely to be a status quo ante, yesterday’s world preserved in aspic”. These universities and higher education must adapt to the changing character of other institutions. They should prioritise the economic needs of the modern world and play their role as leading progressive institution in bringing about wider changes in society.
The government needs to privatise public institutions or provide them with more resources so that every citizen gets an equal opportunity to get higher education. The curricula and science-oriented attitudes also need to be updated and roomed.