Hindu Vivek Kendra
A RESOURCE CENTER FOR THE PROMOTION OF HINDUTVA
   
 
 
«« Back
Lessons in hate on streets, in books

Lessons in hate on streets, in books

Author: Farah Zia
Publication: The Times of India
Date: February 14, 2010
URL: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/amankiasharticleshow/5571664.cms

My son's birthday that falls on February 4 is like a weekend every year, because the next day - February 5 - is a national holiday, declared as "Kashmir Day" (instituted by Nawaz Sharif when he was the prime minister of Pakistan) ostensibly in support of the Kashmiris. For the common people, though, like other gazetted holidays in Pakistan, the day is less about remembering Kashmir and more about getting a midweek break - time to relax. We usually throw a lunch on Kashmir Day to celebrate my son's birthday after which it is time for me to leave for office. This year was no different.

On my way to office in downtown Lahore, it's not unusual to see banners all around or to come across a rally or two, demanding an early resolution of the Kashmir issue. This time, apart from the Shabab-e-Milli and other such 'religious' organisations, there was a sequence of banners on Mall Road carrying pictures of Nawaz Sharif and his brother Shahbaz Sharif. Most of them bore the usual inane versification. One banner that caught my eye read "Hindu bania muzammat se nahin murammat se maney ga" roughly translating as "the Hindu money-lender will not mend his ways through persuasion but will have to be physically fixed".

It made me angry. Or angrier, should I say. I was already feeling really agitated about an lesson called "Yom-e-Difaa" or "Defence Day" that my son had to do in his Urdu class a few days back. As I read it out for him, I found it a pack of sheer lies and a classic case of how young impressionable minds are being indoctrinated through textbooks. I could make the connection between the Urdu lesson and the banner on display and how difficult it is to yearn for peace in such a scenario.

My son, a student of Class VII, goes to a private school. I find his history book quite amazing, so different from what we were taught as kids. It is reasonably neutral, academically conceived and quite knowledgeable. It moves logically from one civilization to the next, without exception.

I have no problems with his Islamiat course either. Most of it is about rituals and Islamic history. It does not instill fear in his mind the way ours did, though the teacher has strange views that I find totally unnecessary. It is his Urdu syllabus that I find most dangerous. He has two books - one is a selection of literature and the other prepared by none other than the Punjab Textbook Board. The latter is compulsory for all children in mainstream school systems. Children in private schools read it partially.

The students are being fed a strange concoction of half-Islam and half-patriotism in the name of Urdu. Once again the Islam part is innocuous; some stories about the life of prophet are actually inspiring. The patriotic stories are scary, to say the least. This is what the Yom-e-Difaa lesson was all about. The way it constructs the 'enemy', distorts facts and creates a false sense of superiority is bound to stay in the minds of impressionable young children and turn them into inflexible conservative adults who refuse to move beyond their extreme views.

We in Pakistan have made a mistake of looking only at madrassas as seats of indoctrination. Our mainstream schools, private and public, and the very textbooks prepared by our textbook boards are where we need immediate reform.

The Aman ki Asha will be realised if we stop building war scenarios and worshipping war heroes in our textbooks. Only sensible citizens can question the political parties that simultaneously glorify peace and war.

- The writer is an editor with The News on Sunday.



Back                          Top

«« Back
 
 
 
  Search Articles
 
  Special Annoucements