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Reforming student politics | Managing campus security
Reforming student politics
April 2008: "WHEN politics is defined as the relational work of redistributing power and
resources, negotiating differences, strengthening communities, and working
together with others to influence or alter societal institutions, then the
connections between service and politics can be made more readily." - The New
Student Politics: The Wingspread Statement on Student Civic Engagement
(2002)
Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani has announced that the ban on
student and trade unions is to be lifted. This decision has been widely lauded
with some analysts terming it as a historic step that takes democracy back to
the streets, factories and campuses.
A quick overview of student politics
in Pakistan underlines its substantial role in influencing mainstream political
discourse in the country. Campus politics served as a nursery for national
leadership.
The National Students Federation (NSF), espousing a leftist
ideology, was a pioneer in the field. It was in the forefront of student
activities in the 1960s and 1970s. Having a visible electoral strength in
various colleges and universities of the country, the NSF led the student
movement against Ayub Khan's martial law in 1968.
It is also believed
that the NSF injected radical politicisation into the educational environment by
launching ideological debates on polity, the economy, culture, art, literature,
history and so on. The intellectual landscape of the academia was conducive to
critical thinking and idealism that sought structural changes in the
country.
In 1972, came the People's Students Federation (PSF) - the
student wing of the PPP. Being closer to the NSF ideology, this student outfit
remained in electoral coalition with the NSF and other leftwing student
organisations under the United Students Movement and Progressive Students
Alliance in the 1970s and the 1980s.
At the same time, the Islami
Jamiat-i-Tulaba (IJT) - the student wing of the Jamaat-i-Islami - emerged as a
counter-left outfit. The IJT massively manned the anti-Bhutto movement in 1977
and is believed to have introduced rightwing militancy on campus. Some reports
suggest that the IJT was behind the firing incident at the NSF rally in Karachi
in 1979 and that it established strategic links with the establishment by
supporting the official jihad policy of the government oin Kashmir and
Afghanistan.
The All Pakistan Mohajir Students Organisation (APMSO) -
which later led to the formation of the Mohajir Qaumi Movement - was established
in 1978. APMSO and the IJT have had an acutely adversarial relationship as they
competed to capture the Karachi University campus. This has been viewed as a
conflict between ethnic and religious militancy as each party sought to
establish its base in Karachi's student community.
Under Zia's martial
law, student unions were banned in 1982. But intriguingly, the IJT was allowed
to operate with the tacit support of the regime. It also gave secure space to
its workers and leaders which allowed them to influence the decisions of the
education administration in colleges and universities. Resultantly, the IJT
cadre was able to establish its stronghold not only within the student
community. The education administration and faculties also opted to side with
the rightwing outfit for their own reasons of political expediency.
Thus
the culture of democratic and ideological debates that had emerged was turned
into a monolithic and unidimensional ideology inspired by the thoughts of
Maulana Maudoodi. In Punjab University, for instance, forced segregation between
male and female students was enforced by demarcating seating spaces for men and
women in the classrooms. Holes were made in the dividing curtains as a mark of
mute protest against unsolicited gender separation and the restriction on
male-female interaction in the classrooms of Punjab University.
Benazir
Bhutto's first government revived the student unions in 1989 creating space for
pluralistic politics in educational institutions but this failed to neutralise
the entrenched hold of the IJT significantly. Rival candidates were abducted,
threatened and harassed, and a culture of violence re-emerged in educational
institutions leading to the ban being re-imposed and political space being left
to the well-organised IJT.
It is suggested that this trend led to a
massive de-politicisation of the student community which replaced the romance of
ideological debates and intellectual enterprise with parochial, conservative and
at some point criminal dispositions apparent in student politics. Campuses
became the dens of proclaimed offenders, undesirable elements and trigger-happy
youth. The spirit of vibrant student activism lost to power-driven interest
groups and universities became infertile, and could not produce political cadres
with democratic and pluralistic training.
It is assumed that the skills
required for healthy student politics include political knowledge, critical
thinking and relations-building and negotiation skills. But during the Zia years
and after, student politics damaged the very core of students' organisations
that degenerated into entities resorting to group violence and showing community
intolerance. These patterns were capitalised on by political parties who now
used their student wings merely for personal lobbying and individual security
purposes.
It was observed that many politicians employed these student
'activists' as their private bodyguards or front men for their political
businesses. Some of these student wings are now involved in the real estate
sector, placing their weaponry skills at the service of syndicates of land and
property dealers.
Against this backdrop and as a follow-up to the prime
minister's announcement on student unions, it is suggested that the incumbent
government needs to deliberate upon reforming student politics in the country.
Primarily, these reforms can be focussed on:
1. Developing a code of
ethics for student bodies by engaging existing organisations at the national,
provincial and district levels.
2. Setting up a multi-party/parliamentary
commission on student affairs as a facilitating body to inform, educate and
orient student organisations towards democratic, pluralistic and tolerant values
and practices in politics.
3. Develop a consensual policy of student
politics by effectively discouraging violence on campuses and creating a better
interface between politics, intellect and service at the student community
level.
4. Putting in place mechanisms for redressing grievances and
resolving conflicts at educational institutions by engaging faculty members and
reputed academics.
5. Linking student unions with regional and
international student bodies to enrich the content of politics at
home.
6. Developing a leadership curriculum for student organisations in
order to enhance their skills of debate, negotiation and interest and to demand
articulation.
It is feared that without large-scale reforms, student
politics will continue to unleash lethal violence on the campuses and polarise
the academic atmosphere in accordance with the priorities of groups with vested
interests.
By Amjad Bhatti (Dawn) - amjad@rdpi.org.pk
Managing campus security
In a show of defiance, the Rangers abandoned their security duties at the University of
Karachi campus last Friday. Until Thursday, they had refused to return despite
repeated requests. In the intervening week, there has been a clash between
student groups on the campus and the teaching process has remained suspended for
the last four days. The paramilitary force functions under the directives of the
university administration and on the orders of the provincial governor, who also
happens to be the chancellor of the university. That being so, the Rangers could
not have refused to continue with the assignment even if they wanted to. This is
how military discipline works. That the force left its positions without even
intimating the university administration, as such, is an act of gross
indiscipline and needs to be handled with the asceticism that is the hallmark of
an existence in uniform.
The plea taken by senior Rangers personnel in
their meeting with the vice-chancellor a day later also needs to be seen in due
context. In their words, they had moved away because teachers were demanding
their removal from the campus in the wake of an ugly incident in which the law
enforcers had thrashed an associate professor. The teachers, naturally, were
demanding a phased withdrawal. And, then, the Rangers did not intervene when the
students clashed even though they were very much on the campus, resting. It was
a clear case of blackmail to underline their indispensability.
The
biggest loser in this unfortunate tussle between the teachers and the
law-enforcement agency happens to be the body of students that has lost crucial
days at a time when the current semester is about to end. Though the university
is set to resume functioning from today, it is not clear if security on the
campus will be taken care of. There have been attempts to get some alternatives
in place, but nothing concrete has emerged thus far. Life at the campus, as
such, will remain jittery and uncertain for some time to come. If there is one
lesson to be learnt from the episode, it is the simple fact that the university
is in dire need of a full-fledged security apparatus of its own. It is all the
more essential in view of the revival of student unions that was announced by
the prime minister in his inaugural speech. Dawn
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| Education News | | Updated: 09 Feb, 2012 |
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