The federal education minister, Lt-Gen (retd) Javed Ashraf Qazi, is a former DG of the ISI who is known for speaking bluntly. He has often fallen foul of the mullahs because of his relatively moderate and enlightened views. But a recent statement from him deserves to be highlighted because of its profound and welcome implications.
Speaking at a two-day conference on Pakistani culture in Islamabad last week, General Qazi talked about how the government’s education policy sought to bring harmony in society as well as face up to the emerging challenge in science and technology. He explained why “Islamic Studies” or religious studies would be taught from class 3 and not from class 1. In so arguing he seemed to fall half way between the ignorant mullahs and the opportunist prime minister, Shaukat Aziz, on the one hand, who wanted the subject taught from class 1, and the respected religious scholar Dr Javed Ghamidi on the other, who thinks that class 5 is a more appropriate starting point.
But more significantly, Gen Qazi said that in the new curriculum the subjects of Geography and History would reflect Pakistani culture. He noted that “Pakistan had a rich culture of an old civilization” and stressed that “our culture did not begin from the creation of Pakistan or with the arrival of Muhammad bin Qasim in the subcontinent; rather that it began from the Indus Valley civilization, going on to Taxila and the Ashoka period.” He was sorry that most students were ignorant about the “real history” of the country. “The Pakistani nation has an ancient history dating back thousands of years BC, such as the Gandhara civilization, Mohenjodaro and Harrapa, of which we are proud”. Gen Qazi added that “every Muslim country had a different culture…Pakistanis are free to practice their own religion… there is no significant difference between the cultures of the Hindus and Muslims because the followers of both the religions belonged to the same region… culture is part of history because it is the creative result of men’s actions. It involves the manners, tools and literary production of society…”
This is the boldest and most lucid statement on the relationship between religion, national identity and culture ever posited by a Pakistan government functionary. Since independence and the fostering of the rigid two-nation theory, generations of Pakistanis have been falsely taught that the idea of Pakistan began with the advent of Islam in the subcontinent through Mohammad bin Qasim, and that Islamic religion remains the sole determinant of Pakistani culture. In this bigoted and suffocating environment we have lost all contact with our ancient history and geography and been reduced to a singular, violent identity in an increasingly multiple-identity, complex world. Now Gen Qazi is saying something profoundly different and contemporary. Why is that?
Gen Qazi pointed out that some text was being deleted from the current crop of religion textbooks because it was not conducive to harmony in society. He stressed that Islam teaches tolerance and brotherhood. “We have to prepare the new generation according to the teachings of Islam and boost Pakistan’s image in the world as a moderate country .” If this is the case, two questions arise. One, is the statement mostly rhetorical, aimed merely at putting a gloss on the image of Pakistan, at re-branding Pakistan as a moderately enlightened state instead of a bigoted and violent Islamic state that it is perceived to be by its international detractors? Two, is it a manifestation of the Musharraf regime’s earnest desire to actually change the ground realities to meet the global challenge of modernity (science and technology) that Gen Qazi alluded to in his speech?
The fact that the Musharraf regime has hired a team of earnest “strategic” thinkers to manage the international media and construct a new brand image for Pakistan suggests that it is mostly about changing foreign perceptions rather than radically altering domestic ground realities. Certainly, the fact that nothing significant has been done inside Pakistan to roll back the political and cultural manifestations of violent political Islam that so hurt Pakistan’s image – like the Hudood laws – attests to the political opportunism of the besieged Musharraf regime in Pakistan. But the consistent personal stance of Generals Musharraf and Qazi to liberalise the cultural environment in the country and reduce intellectual suffocation at the hands of the mullahs testifies to their desire for mainstreaming and modernising Pakistan. Starting with the reform of education policy is the right way to go about de-ideologising the singular identity of Pakistan.
Dr Ghamidi has argued that children need to be taught ethics before they are taught religion in order to instill in them a sense of humanism and civility. His argument is that religious education, without formal education from an early age, tends to produce religious and sectarian extremists. Gen Qazi seems to agree with Dr Ghamidi. But he is only prepared to go only half-way in order to thwart any negative political fallout from the prickly mullahs. Unless he backtracks on his utterances, we should be grateful for small mercies if Gen Qazi’s statement serves to show the way forward.