J&K education minister is playing with the future of students

"Exams will be held on time. Exams will not be postponed. The syllabus is likely to be cut. The syllabus will not be reduced. Exams will be postponed to March. Exams will not be postponed” - this has literally been the story so far for students of Classes 10 and 12 in Kashmir who are set to appear in the 2016 Board exams.

Education and evaluation have been reduced to a mere parable by the J&K education minister, and it’s a known fact that whenever the Valley is on the boil, the education sector takes the worst hit.

The periodic intifadas (tremors) of 2008, 2010 and 2016 have routinely brought the Valley's education system on its knees.

The condition of education here is, in medical terms, "of a patient who is on ventilator and needs a prick to abode hell or heaven as per his deeds".

2016 is altogether different from earlier years. This year has been record-breaking in terms of shutdowns and curfews, accompanied by terrible violence and oppression.

In the meantime, while all this was happening, government employees had their salaries credited to their bank accounts, businessmen somehow managed to keep their business going by finding alternate ways of selling products - either by opening shop via the "Hurriyat deal" or by occupying roadside pathways in the early hours.

These are the two prime occupations of people in the Valley, which would have been assumed to be affected the most by the current crisis, but that has not been the case. The only sector which has suffered terribly is education. It has been left in an imbroglio.

Post the militancy period, the education sector had been somehow trying to find its way out, but it has lost that completely now and it seems impossible to improve things messed up by our leaders.

We have all read the history of Indian independence and we know how brilliantly and astutely Mahatma Gandhi and his associates paved the way for exit of the British from India, without causing much damage.

Gandhi started the Non-Cooperation Movement. What was it aimed at? It was aimed at creating a mechanism by virtue of which Indians could stand on their feet. Did the Indian independence movement destroy the education system India had? No, it didn’t.

In fact, it paved the way for setting up of new institutions which Indians financed on their own and boycotted whatever the Britishers had set up. It paved the way for creation of institutions like the Jamia Millia University. Can we take such a step now?

No, because we can waste our money on lavish wazwaan (multi-course meal in Kashmiri cuisine) and splurge on weddings, even during turmoil, but we are not willing to donate for self-financed institutions.

State education minister Naeem Akhtar has grabbed his share of limelight in the recent uprising. He has been a major reason for all the negative publicity the ruling PDP has garnered by making irresponsible statements. The recent controversy due to confusion over the Classes 10 and 12 Board exams tops the list.

Akhtar has put the students in a spot by changing statements, and it seems he probably doesn’t understand what he is doing or saying. He is playing with the careers of millions of students.

The fact is that the student community is fed up with the political slugfest that going on. What’s the fault of the students? Akhtar says education saved his children from the fate of Insha and Junaid (blinded by pellets). Why did he not say his children are studying abroad or outside the Valley?

The suffering that Insha had to go through was because her father is not as well-off as Akhtar and could not manage to get her out of the clutches of the monsters ruling the Valley's streets in the name of security forces.

Akhtar should choose his words wisely to show that he really cares about the children of the Valley, but if really does so, he would have taken the lead and initiated a discussion on the Valley's dismal education system, at least on social media.

But he won’t do so because he knows the public mood is not in his favour nor in the favour of his party.

We do not care if they tear apart the syllabus or extend the school session to March, but what we want is that he should come clean on whatever he wants to do, and start a public discussion to ask for ideas from prominent academicians as well as parents and students on what they think would be best for students and education in the state.

That would settle the matter for now. A public discussion to settle the matter is the need of the hour and that is what the education minister needs to do on priority. There rests the case.

Mirza Ghalib's couplet fits Akhtar perfectly: Jab tawaqu hi uth gayi Ghalib; Kyun kisi ka gila kare koi? (When all expectation is shed, Ghalib; Why should one complain?)

Also read: End repression in Kashmir: Open letter from civil society