An interesting article in the Christian Science Monitor recently caught my eye, discussing anti-Indian bias in official textbooks in Pakistan. Two contrasting view-points are presented.
According to Pervez Hoodbhoy, a physics professor at Quaid-e-Azam University in Islamabad, the “Islamizing” of Pakistan’s schools began in 1976 under the rule of the former dictator, the general Zia ul-Haq.
An act of parliament that year required all government and private schools (except those teaching the British O-levels from Grade 9) to follow a curriculum that includes learning outcomes for the federally approved Grade 5 social studies class such as: “Acknowledge and identify forces that may be working against Pakistan,” “Make speeches on Jihad,” “Collect pictures of policemen, soldiers, and national guards,” and “India’s evil designs against Pakistan.”
“It sounds like the blueprint for a religious fascist state,” says Professor Hoodbhoy. “You have a country where generations have grown up believing they are surrounded on all sides by enemies, they are the only righteous ones, and the world is out to get them.”
It is this siege mentality that led to some of the head-in-the-sand reactions by the Pakistani media and public in the aftermath of Mumbai, he suggests.
However, Dr Rasul Baksh Rais, of LUMS, does not fully agree.
But Rasul Baksh Rais, a professor at LUMS, argues that every nation has the right to construct its own historical narrative as part of the legitimate process of nation-building. “Perhaps they [the critics] simply don’t want us to be on that track at all or they want us be a very confused nation. It’s a negative attitude toward Pakistan,” he says, adding he has yet to see proof of anti-India or anti-Hindu bias.
“The roots of Pakistani resentment toward India lie in causes such as the conflict in Kashmir and the ongoing oppression of Muslims,” says Mr. Rais.
