Pervez Hoodbhoy (b. 1950), professor of physics at Quaid-i-Azam University, a strong supporter of peaceful uses of nuclear technology, and an environmental and social activist, is an outspoken critic of the treatment of education by successive governments. In his 1991 book Islam and Science he is particularly critical of General Zia ul-Haq’s plans to Islamicize all education. He argues that an excessively narrow interpretation of Islam, rather than Islam itself, has prevented Pakistan and other Muslim states from becoming strong and modern.
There are, on paper, 133 science and technology institutions in Pakistan. … Equipment is generally plentiful, salaries are 30–50% higher than in neighbouring India, and perks such as foreign travel are common. The organizations maintain public relations offices, have good access to the state media, send employees for overseas training, and organize conferences all year round. On the face of it these are signs of busy, productive, and effective activity. But, with some exceptions, their scientific research output is minuscule by any reasonable standard, and the impact on the technology that exists or the national economy imperceptible. …
Many causes are commonly attributed to the ineffectiveness of Pakistani research and development organizations. The principal among these is an open door import policy enforced by foreign aid agencies which discourages the indigenization of technology and forestalls any increase in the tiny numbers of highly skilled scientists and engineers. The validity of this last point can be gauged from seeing that the total number of Ph.D.’s throughout the country in natural sciences and engineering is only about 1,000. The corresponding number in India is estimated to lie between 70,000 and 80,000. Given that per capita income in Pakistan ($350) and India ($300) are not so very different, the huge discrepancy in levels of scientific attainment must be sought elsewhere. The explanation lies in education. …
Scientific research and development—and hence the growth or decay of science as an institution in society—are inescapably connected with education. In fact, the ultimate expression of the philosophy to which a society subscribes is to be found in the manner by which it educates its young. It is here where one faces squarely the question of whether education should be a means of transforming and modernizing society, or whether it should principally seek to conserve tradition. … A recent report of the World Bank gives an accurate, but gloomy, picture:
The unusually low educational attainments of Pakistan’s rapidly growing population, particularly the female population, will become a serious impediment to the country’s long-term development. The weak human resources base on which Pakistan’s economic development is being built endangers its long-term growth prospects and negatively affects the distributional benefits to be derived from such growth.
Seventy-five million Pakistanis can neither read nor write. Pakistan government figures put the average (both sexes) literacy rate at 26 per cent, and the female literacy rate at only 15 per cent (1991). While these figures are low even by Third World standards, the actual situation is probably considerably worse. Independent sources estimate that the true figures may be 30–40 per cent lower than stated. …
No government in Pakistan, whether democratic or military, has ever given education any reasonable status in the list of national priorities. But the military regime of General Zia stands out particularly. A damning indictment of this regime’s [Zia’s] achievements in the field of education is to be found in a report by a US research concern, which was given a contract in 1986 by the government to analyse the state of education in Pakistan. The report concludes that:
Most dramatic was the difference between the projections of the 5th five year plan and actual performance during this period (1978–83) which fell over 50% below the planned level and represented the lowest level of national effort in support of education in the independent nation’s history.
In earlier periods of Pakistan’s history, such low levels of attainment in education have been admitted with quiet shame, but the objectives of education were tacitly taken to be essentially universal, modernistic ones. However, following the coup of 1977 which brought General Zia-ul-Haq to power, the military government, in alliance with political parties of fundamentalist orientation, declared its intention of creating an Islamized society and a new national identity based exclusively on religion. Education immediately became a key instrument to be used towards this end. Consequently, a number of important changes were officially decreed. These included the following: the imposition of the chadar [head covering] for female students in educational institutions; introduction of nazra (reading of Qurʾan) as a matriculation requirement; … the recognition of madrasah certificates as equivalent to master’s degrees; … the grant of 20 extra marks for those applicants to engineering universities who have memorized the Qurʾan; … introduction of religious knowledge as a criterion for selecting teachers of science and non-science subjects; [and] revision of conventional subjects to emphasize Islamic values.
[Pervez Hoodbhoy, Islam and Science: Religious Orthodoxy and the Battle for Rationality (London: Zed Books, 1991), 35–37.]
Pakistan has three kinds of educational institutions. The first is government schools and colleges, which use Urdu or a regional language as a medium of instruction, have very minimal fees, and cater to the majority of students. Then there are private, usually English-language, institutions, which range in level from kindergarten through universities and professional schools, which charge very high fees, and where admission is much sought after.
The third kind includes religious schools of many varieties, collectively called madrasas, which focus on traditional Islamic education. These madrasas range from small institutions that teach Quranic reading and basic Islam to children, to formally structured institutions for religious education based primarily on the famous nineteenth-century “Dars-e Nizami” curriculum. Some of these madrasas issue formal degrees and certificates, but with some exceptions these degrees are not accepted for government jobs. These institutions have minimal tuition fees, and provide free board and lodging to their students. Such institutions are financed through charity, voluntary donations (local and foreign), and endowment income. Only a small number of madrasas accept government funding.
Students in such madrasas are taught to defend Islam against those attempting to undermine it or to attack Muslim lands. A. H. Nayyar (b. 1945)—a modernist scholar-academician and researcher on social issues whose 2003 report for the Sustainable Development Policy Institute on textbook content in Pakistan’s mainstream public school system eventually led to the government’s revision of school curricula and textbooks—has also focused on madrasa education. Here he provides a useful discussion of the madrasas of Pakistan and their place in Islamic society. See also General Musharraf’s account below about religion and terrorism; many people are proud of those students from Pakistani madrasas who fought for Islam in Afghanistan against Americans, and in Kashmir against Indians.
1. RESURGENCE OF MADRASAHS
The decline of the vast Muslim empire [in India], the occupation of the land by foreign forces, particularly the defeat at the hands of these forces in the 1857 war of independence, the onslaught of the Christian missionaries, introduction of a different educational system by the colonial power, and the failure of the Muslim population in general to accept the available alternative (and hence to be accepted in the employment of the colonial power) forced a large section of Indian Muslims to fortify their religious identity. This led to a new wave of madrasahs in the second half of the [nineteenth century], many of which piloted a new movement for Islamic education, and which proved standard-bearers of the present-day madrasah. The great names in this category were Darul Uloom Deoband (established in 1867), Nadwatul Ulema Lucknow (established in 1894), Darul Uloom Mazahirul Uloom, Saharanpur (established in 1898). … They were distinguished from the earlier madrasahs by the mode of teaching, organization, regularization of the curriculum, introduction of a system of examinations on the pattern of the British system, and a system of awarding formal certificates and degrees.
What stands out as a distinguishing characteristic of the madrasahs established in the later half of the nineteenth century is that they were conceived to be free of obligation to the state. The earlier schools had almost always had state endowments in the form of land grants to sustain the teachers and students, as well as for books and other essentials. The founders of Darul Uloom Deoband introduced the practice of running their institution on community funds, collected in person by teachers and students, either in cash or kind, with great humility. For them this practice meant several things. Besides freeing them from the whims of rajas, nawabs, or governments, it brought into the community a sense of participation in the process, and instilled in both the teachers and the taught a sense of obligation towards the people, rather than towards any rich benefactor. The founders of madrasahs were strongly anti-imperialist, and communicated this spirit to their students. Many of the founders were in the forefront of the independence movement and had a nationalistic political outlook. They viewed the imperialism of the West more as that of Christendom, and the modern technology brought in by the imperialists as a tool in the hands of an adversarial religious force. As such, they remained strongly opposed to modern ideas produced in the West. This attitude has not changed since then. In this respect, Deoband is rightly called the fountainhead of the present Sunni madrasahs.
2. MADRASAHS IN PAKISTAN
The Afghan war provided a different kind of opportunity to the religious parties. Millions of Afghan refugees in Pakistan provided fertile ground for expansion in madrasah education. Supported by the USA, Saudi Arabia, and the Persian Gulf states, and aided logistically by the Pakistani military agencies, religious parties with madrasahs got their cadres trained and battle-hardened. The Taliban are truly a madrasah phenomenon. They consist of Afghan refugees who rose from the Deobandi madrasahs in the provinces of Balochistan and the NWFP, and, allegedly supported by Pakistani state institutions, have now become a major factor in the fratricidal war of Afghanistan. The madrasahs also hosted fellow mujahideen from various Islamic countries, providing an opportunity for fostering a truly international link for the “holy cause.” This, in fact, ushered in a new phase in the politics of religious parties. They were now ready to fight for Islam anywhere on the globe, be it in Afghanistan, Kashmir, Bosnia, Tajikistan, Algeria, Chechnya, Philippines, or with the Uighur people in the Xinjiang province of China. The posture was never so militant, and the century-old dream of Pan-Islamism was never so realizable. After Ramzi Yusuf, an accused in the World Trade Centre bombing case in the USA, was arrested from Islamabad and was found to have been associated with the International Islamic University, the Minister of Interior in Benazir Bhutto’s government openly charged that the University had become a hideout of international Islamic terrorists. …
The madrasahs have, not surprisingly, become a source of hate-filled propaganda against other sects and the sectarian divide has become sharper and more violent. Complete suppression of Ahmedis has become an article of faith with all the sects. The Shiʿas, a minority in Pakistan, organized themselves to safeguard their religious rights following Ziaul Haq’s Islamization policies. The Iranian revolution of Imam Khomeini was their source of strength. They turned militant after dozens of them died in bloody clashes with the police in 1985. Both Shiʿa and Sunni madrasahs have since become a breeding ground of militants to fight against each other. Shiʿa militant wings Sipah-e-Mohammad [the Army of Muhammad] and Sipah-e-Abbas [the Army of Abbas] were formed to combat the Sunni SSP [Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan, Army of the Friends of the Prophet]. All the organizations are heavily armed and are believed to be generously funded by Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States and Iran respectively.
To conclude: the failure of the Pakistani state to provide adequate opportunities for education to all is the principal cause creating those objective conditions which have led to the rapid rise of the madrasah system. It will be crucial to undo these conditions because the mindset created by this system is extremely divisive and will destroy the social fabric by fanning sectarian hatred. The state must exercise control on the content of madrasah education, against the resistance of the ulema if necessary, if it wishes to avoid a situation of civil war in the future. However, it must be realized that this will be only partially effective. In the final analysis, improvements in the mainstream system of education alone can make madrasah education less attractive and make a dent upon its present rapid growth.
[A. H. Nayyar, “Madrasah Education: Frozen in Time,” in Pervez Hoodbhoy, ed., Education and the State: Fifty Years of Pakistan (Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1998), 224, 226, 241, 243, 246.]
General elections were held in February 2008. These had originally been scheduled for early January, but had to be postponed in the aftermath of the assassination of Benazir Bhutto on December 27, 2007, as she was returning from an election rally in Rawalpindi. Her assassination caused rioting in parts of Pakistan, especially in Sindh.
The February elections were a major setback for the pro-Musharraf political party, the Pakistan Muslim League–Quaid-i-Azam; the party lost the elections by a large margin, which was viewed as the popular rejection of Pervez Musharraf. The most successful party was the PPP, led first by Benazir Bhutto, and after her assassination by her widower Asif Ali Zardari and their son Bilawal. The second major party was the PML–N led by Nawaz Sharif, which won a majority in the Punjab but came second after the PPP at the federal level, in the National Assembly.
The PPP leader, Yousaf Raza Gilani, was elected prime minister in March 2008 to head a coalition government at the federal level. The PPP established coalition governments at the provincial level in Sindh and Balochistan. In the Punjab it joined the coalition led by the PML–N. The NWFP government was headed by a PPP ally, the Awami National Party (ANP).
Though Musharraf had lost political credibility, he refused to quit the presidency, claiming that he would complete his second five-year term, 2007–2012. When Musharraf did not heed the calls for his resignation, the PPP and other political parties decided to impeach him in a joint session of Parliament. Before the impeachment motion was taken up, however, Musharraf decided to step down (August 18, 2008). In September Asif Ali Zardari, co-chairman of the PPP, was elected president with an overwhelming majority.
The PPP controlled all the major state offices at the federal level, but it performed poorly in addressing socioeconomic issues; this failure lost it the support of the common people. But it was able to develop a consensus with the top brass of the military for launching military action against the Taliban and other militant groups entrenched in the Malakand and the tribal areas (northwestern Pakistan). The Swat/Malakand operation, undertaken jointly by the army and air force in April–July 2009, freed the area from Taliban control. A similar operation was launched in the tribal areas in July–August 2009.
Pakistan’s economy remained weak, ravaged by the Taliban insurgency in parts of the country and their suicide attacks and bombings in the major cities during 2007–2009. Pakistan relied heavily on international financial institutions and friendly countries, especially the United States, for an economic bailout. Relations with the United States, however, remain strained—particularly after May 2, 2011, when American operatives on a stealth mission found and killed Osama Bin Laden in a compound near a Pakistani military encampment outside Islamabad.
Pakistan’s return to civilian rule has been viewed as a positive development. However, it is difficult to suggest that democratic institutions and processes have developed strong roots. Given the destabilizing effect of Islamic extremism and terrorism, a badly performing economy, the failure of the government to provide economic relief to the poor, interprovincial disharmony, and violence and insurgency in parts of Balochistan, the future of democracy remains uncertain. Many political analysts outside Pakistan continue to call it a “failed state” that could collapse altogether. This claim is contested by the Pakistani government and many scholars and analysts, although these analysts view Pakistan as a state facing enormous political, economic, and internal-stability problems, as well as severe external security challenges.
Pakistan’s national identity continues to be debated both inside and outside the country. The debate revolves around three issues: the part to be played by Islam in the identity of the nation and the state; the nature of Pakistan’s historical and cultural roots; and the role of the military in the political process.
As we have seen in earlier chapters, the pre-Independence Muslim League organized around Muslim identity, rights, and interests, as distinct from those of the majority Hindu community. In order to mobilize the Muslims of British India to fight for a state of their own, the League had invoked a separatist vision of Islamic identity.
In the post-Independence period, the debate necessarily focused on defining the precise nature of the relationship between Islam and the Pakistani state, and on how to create political institutions and processes that reflected the consensus, if any, on these issues.
A section of the educated elite now argues that the Pakistani state should not identify with Islam, or engage in religious advocacy. Their perspective seems to have been attracting more attention since the Taliban’s attempt to enforce Islamic orthodoxy by intimidation and coercion in parts of Pakistan in 2003–2009.
Jinnah’s address to the first session of Pakistan’s Constituent Assembly on August 11, 1947, maintained that the Pakistani state would extend equal treatment to all citizens irrespective of religion, which would not have anything to do with the affairs of the state. However, others of Jinnah’s statements seem to indicate that Islam is relevant to state identity. The Objectives Resolution of 1949 combined modern notions of the state, democracy, and constitutionalism with the principles of social justice, equality, and participation, as enunciated in Islam. All Pakistani constitutions advocated a modern democratic state with an ethical basis derived from the teachings and principles of Islam. They also suggested that the state should play the role of an “enabler” rather than of an “enforcer” of Islam.
Most religious leaders favor a conservative Islamic state that implements traditional Islamic laws and punishments, although they differ among themselves on the precise details of such a state. General Zia ul-Haq’s military government used the state apparatus to implement Islam as demanded mainly by Deobandi-Wahabi religious leaders, thus deepening Islamic-denominational fault lines in Pakistan.
The second unresolved debate pertains to Pakistan’s main historical and cultural roots. Does Pakistan belong to the South Asian subcontinent, or should it seek its ancestral roots in the Arab Middle East, especially Saudi Arabia? General Zia’s government consciously encouraged increased Saudi influence on the Islamization of Pakistan, which caused resentment among those who did not share Saudi-Wahabi Islamic traditions. During his time various changes were made in the course contents at the junior and senior school levels, to socialize young people into religious orthodoxy and militancy. By the beginning of the twenty-first century one Pakistani generation was indeed socialized into a mindset that valued Islamic orthodoxy and reflected the influences of the conservative Arab Middle East.
The influence of the Arab Middle East also increased as millions of Pakistani workers and professionals found jobs there and sent remittances back home. Increased identification with Islamic orthodoxy in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, further polarized Pakistani society on religious and cultural lines.
The third major aspect of Pakistani identity pertains to whether the military will sustain its role as the dominant political player. Some political analysts argue that criticism of the military top brass in the wake of the 2007 street protests has minimized the chances of the military returning to power. Others argue that the military has entrenched itself in the state system and the economy to such an extent that it can dominate policy-making from the sidelines.
Until the civilian leadership creates a credible and coherent civilian alternative to the military’s influential role, and until Pakistan’s internal security problems and external tensions can be eased, the military will retain the potential to manipulate, through direct or indirect means, the political life of the country.