| May 27, 2005 | Friday | Rabi-us-Sani 18, 1426 |
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Arresting dropout rates
More jail violence
AMNESTY International’s report for 2004 presents a bleak human rights picture worldwide and holds some leading democracies guilty of some of the worst kind of abuses. Throughout Asia, Africa, the Americas and Europe, the report says, the year 2004 saw gross human rights violations, including torture, illegal detentions, disappearances and the denial of due process of law. The rights body is harshly critical of Pakistan. Besides referring to sectarian violence, arbitrary arrests, including those of some journalists, and extra- judicial killings, the report speaks of the blow to democracy suffered last year when the army consolidated its political role and the National Security Council came into being through an act of parliament. The report dwells at length on violence in Pakistan and points out that at least 25 people were “criminally charged with blasphemy” in an atmosphere where such allegations could endanger their lives. The government ought to take note of this, since it has done nothing to scrap the Hudood ordinances or to amend them through an act of parliament to strip them of the anti- woman bias contained in laws enforced by decree by Gen. Ziaul Haq. No wonder, violence against women in the form of honour killings should have caused 600 deaths last year. Non-government forces in the tribal area were no less guilty of abuses, for the report notes that eight members of the Frontier Corps were shot at point-blank range, with their heads bound behind backs.
The report refers to human rights violations by the US, Israel and India, the last one with regard to abuses in occupied Kashmir and the failure to take action against those involved in the Gujarat massacres in 2002. Russia, for HR abuses in Chechnya, besides Egypt, Israel, Nepal and Uzbekistan all have been indicted for continued violations of human rights. However, it is at the US that the most scathing part of the AI report’s criticism is directed. It calls the Guantanamo Bay the “gulag of our times” where hundreds of those arrested after the war in Afghanistan have been in detention without a trial and been subjected to torture. This is in addition to the horror that was Abu Ghraib — though the report fails to mention the torture to death of two Afghan suspects at Bagram, possibly because the report was received late.
However, the report notes how the “war on terror” has been has been used as a cover by the US to mount an attack on human rights and how the US military has developed an entirely new jargon to justify torture — like “stress positions” or “sensory manipulations”. This way, AI accuses the US of granting “a licence to others to commit abuse with impunity and audacity”.
While the attack on the World Trade Centre was a crime of monstrous proportions, many governments have found the US-led war on terror a convenient tool for consolidating their hold on power and stifling all dissent, Uzbekistan being an example. Many governments, including Israel and India, have also used the post-9/11 rhetoric to delegitimize freedom struggles and brand them as terrorist activities. That the attack on human rights should be led by the US is indeed a tragedy. Regrettably in this post-cold war world, the sole superpower faces little opposition to its use and misuse of power. As the AI report says the international community has shown a lack of will and the means to prevent rights’ abuses throughout the world.
LATEST figures from the Sindh education department reveal that despite efforts to reduce the dropout rate, the figure for 2003-4 was up by two per cent from the previous year’s 19 per cent. Further details show that the average dropout rate for boys and girls in the urban areas stood at nine and four per cent respectively while in the rural areas, the rate was 26 and 27 per cent respectively. This depressing scenario is not restricted to Sindh as other provinces are facing a similar situation. Despite initiatives like free primary education in Punjab or the distribution of free textbooks elsewhere, little has been done to reduce dropout rates. The principal factor is the absence of schools in many areas as well as the poor state of many of those that exist. Many of the schools that are there do not have basic equipment and facilities just as there is the very real issue of a lack of teachers, many of whom are ill-qualified. No wonder, the attendance rate which started improving in 1999-2000 declined again in 2002 and shows no sign of going up. Only 10 per cent of school-going children complete 12 years of schooling; around 25 per cent leaving after eight years at school and 15 per cent dropout by grade X.
The onus of the situation rests with the governments — civil and military — which have failed to promote education as a priority. Unless this government shows a real will to follow through on their initiatives, the education sector will remain mired in apathy and inefficiency. Parents, who want to educate their children in proper institutions, will opt for alternatives and enroll their children in madressahs, which may teach them how to read but does not equip them with the skills required for jobs. An increase in the literacy rate is not enough of an indicator to show that the country is progressing. It needs to be matched by the emergence of an educated people whose skills will contribute to that progress.
GIVEN the generally harsh treatment meted out to prisoners in the country and the denial of their rights, it is hardly surprising that within a fortnight, Sukkur jail should have witnessed two violent protests by its inmates. The previous episode, which took place in Central Jail-I, left at least one dead when clashes broke out between prisoners and the jail staff. The second incident on Wednesday saw jail staff at Central Jail-II being held hostage by angry inmates for 10 hours. This came in the wake of a recent search at Jail-II during which prisoners alleged that they had been tortured. This charge was in addition to several other complaints regarding extortion by jail staff, poor prison conditions, difficult access to justice, etc. As reports show, prison riots and jail-breaks are on the increase all over the country. Unless conditions are improved for prisoners, there is no possibility that such episodes will taper off.
The blame rests squarely on the government which, instead of viewing prisons as centres of reform, considers them as punitive dumping grounds for all manner of criminals, whether petty offenders or hardened criminals. Various jail commissions, tasked with investigating prison conditions, have either not come up with the right remedies or have simply failed to have their recommendations implemented. As a result, prisons have turned into overcrowded hovels, where petty offenders are put in the same cell as hardened criminals, and where under-trial detainees have often to wait for years before their case is decided. Moreover, with money changing hands between inmates and jail authorities, prisons have also become dens of vice where drugs and even prostitution are rampant. There has been incessant talk of making changes to the jail manual and building more prisons to reduce overcrowding. The question is whether all this would make any difference so long as officials continue to view prisoners more as beasts than as human beings.