When right of education is denounced” Education is a universal, fundamental human right, recognized by the universal Declaration of Human Rights, and reaffirmed In International human rights conventions. In this era of technology, advancement and globalization, education Is the key to success and peace. Education Is considered as the cheapest defense of a nation. But the worst condition of education In Pakistan reflects the fact that It Is unable to defend its own sector.
Though 62 years have passed and 23 polices and action plans have been introduced yet the educational sector Is walling for an effective educational reforms. With respect to Human Development Index, Pakistan has been placed by UNDO at 36th position, lower than some of Its regional neighbors Like Sir Lankan, Maldives, India and Manner mainly due to Its low literacy rate and low primary level enrolment. In different reports the Ministry of Education claimed that literacy in Pakistan is over 50%, but open sources disagree with it and they say that it is merely 35%.
Ratio of budget indicates the level of importance given by a nation to the education. Historically, Pakistan has been spending less on education, as compared to other countries in the region. Pakistan spends less than 2% of its GAP on education which is less than Iran, India, Nepal, Bangladesh and Maldives the neighboring countries of Pakistan, the world standard stands at 5% of the GAP. With such non serious attitude towards Education, there remains a dearth of well educated and skillful individuals. Among the SCARCE Nations, Pakistan is at the sixth and at the 1 59th position among the 174 World countries.
Pakistanis Constitution, framed in 1973, declared the country’s commitment to providing education for all. According to Article 37, “the State shall:- Remove illiteracy and provide free and compulsory secondary education within the minimum possible period. Make technical and professional education generally available and higher education equally accessible to all on the basis of merit”. Recently, through a Constitutional Amendment No 18, free and compulsory education for the children aged 5 to 16 years has been declared a fundamental right.
Article 25- A of the Constitutions provides that; “The state shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age evolve to sixteen years In such manner as may be determined by the law. ” From the reports prepared by UNESCO and the literacy data prepared by Statistics Dolls, Pakistan Bureau tot Statistics, Gobo. Of Pakistan It Is evident that as a nation we have been deprived off from our basic right to education, as a result today we stand towards the end in the line of literate nations. What had been are problems and what are the barriers, confronting our way to literacy, are some of the questions need our attention.
In the following paragraphs we examine the critical situation and costless Tanat we race today In tens regard Poverty is the biggest disadvantage and the largest obstacle in the development of our country. Pakistan is classified into the 3rd World countries mainly due to poverty with education or Literacy Rate. Our country is an agricultural country therefore more than 68% of the population is engaged in farming and its byproducts. The people in this category are unable to feed their families fully and as a result, development stops while on the other hand population increases.
The people where 40% of population is below the poverty line cannot think of sending their children to schools. According to EUNICE, 17. 6% children work and support their families. So, in such conditions, role and support of Government becomes inevitable but Government is continuously paying no serious attention to these demands. The ever increasing population of the Pakistan is another hindrance in the correct and efficient caring of the family. That is why many people are unable to provide such level of education to their children and so the literacy rate of the country on the whole decreases.
Also the main problem is related to people living in villages and other small places. It is said that the population of the villages is many times more than that of the urban people and have meager resources. That is why the people cannot teach and train their children and the number of illiterate children keeps growing in the country. Pakistani politics is governed by feudal system. Feudal lords and wader system is a big hurdle in the realization of dream of better literacy rate. Statistics show that there are tremendous disparities in the country on the basis of gender, class and regions.
There is overall a miserable literacy rate and to further worsen it, women eve even less representation. On national level, their literacy rate is less than half compared to that of men, and this gap attains magnitude when we turn to rural areas where it is 5%, the lowest in the world for any class or gender. These feudal lords, and waders enjoy political power and using it as a strong weapon in depriving the people from getting education; as is evident from Appalachians and others areas of Punjab and Kinds. They are doing this all Just for their personal benefits and by doing so they make the people serve them and be loyal to them.
At present, Pakistan is among those twelve countries of the world which are spending less than 2. 1% of GAP on education, whereas, china is spending 2. 82%, India 3. 5% and countries like USA, I-J, Japan and Italy are spending more than 5% of GAP on education. The Government of Pakistan should come out of hibernation and lethargy and should allocate at least 4% of GAP. According to Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2008 by UNESCO, Pakistan is spending 2. 4 per cent of its GAP on education against the UNESCO-recommended standard of a minimum of 4 per cent.
India is spending 3. 8%, Maldives 7. %, Iran 4. 7% and Nepal 3. 4%. Female education in Pakistan has never been a priority because of the corruption and lack of interest that the government has given on this issue. In a tribal-feudal structure, Owe to ten oppression over women, we see a Nell dropout rate AT galls at primary level, and the huge number of girls never end up at schools, “out of 500 girls, 22% never attended to school, on various reasons, 26% left because of financial constraints, 18. 7% because they lost interest” (a case of study of female literacy in Pakistan).
Women are being humiliated and deprived from the right of going to school, because of the government being afraid to oppose the religious leaders and separate religion from politics. Some of the most notable barriers to female education are the lack of parents’ education; another obstacle that Pakistani women face to get education is poverty. A low level of income results in denial of their right of going to school. More education among females means more progress of society. The consequences that women have to pay by being illiterate are disastrous.
There is a decrease on the quality life for the whole family, for the whole community. The effects of illiteracy often negatively impact a nation’s ability to develop its human resources. Countries with a high illiteracy rate are more likely to be disadvantaged in the global economy. If a populace is not literate, it cannot be as involved in high tech jobs. New careers in the sciences, mathematics, and technology are primarily established in countries that have literate populations. Another major effect of illiteracy is not having access to basic information that is distributed via books, newspapers, or the Internet.
This type of information could include practical advice o increase the quality of life, such as how to participate in magnificence projects. In short, illiteracy does not encourage positive social change, personal growth, or the preservation and development of language and culture. Pakistan is at a crucial Juncture as it struggles to contain rising extremism, achieve political stability, and uphold the rule of law. The extremist and Taliban, in their systematic war against education, have barred girls from “western style” education. The violence and threats have led thousands of girls to quit schools.
These extremist element have created an atmosphere, where women would live confined within the four walls of the house without access to education. More than 96 schools have been destroyed by these extremist forces since 2009. No regime or institution in Pakistan, whether military or civilian, has demonstrated any will to confront religious extremism within the country. However in individual capacities people have stood against these forces, Mall Yugoslavia is one such example she doesn’t Just represent one young woman, she speaks out for all those who are denied an education purely n the basis of their gender.
Pakistan is a developing country, with a number of problems seeking solutions; education being the most important and crucial. One of the best solutions to solving the stubborn problem of illiteracy is to teach parents to read, so that they can in turn teach their children. If the adult women are educated first, each generation will be able to read and write, since mothers are the first educators of children. Some other measures can be used, which are:- Availability of physical facilities (sheer existence of schools or sufficient numbers of lassoers, correlated Walt ten adequate under AT teachers).
Increasing Youth Literacy through Formal Schooling and Non-formal Education. Rightly using the funds given by foreign donor financial institution. Government should ensure check and balance in usage of these funds for rightly purpose. Non-formal Education for Young Adults and the Workforce. From Policy to Action: Implementing the Strategies: the government should implement the policies and strategies. For this purpose the policy makers should partnerships with UN and other international organization and seek help from them.
At last the political parties of Pakistan should take extremism as a serious issue and take instrumental steps to increase the literacy rate if Pakistan is aiming to progress in real terms. Even poor countries have shown that where there is the political will, much can be achieved. Cuba was able to immobile nearly 270,000 adults to reduce illiteracy from 23 to 3 percent within a few years. The only problem with Pakistan is that we can’t formulate a proper plane which can be implemented for few years. Rather we kept on changing planes from year to year.
