THERE is a faraway land where only locals carrying Watan Card are allowed to get in by the soldiers guarding the area.

There is no chance for an independent journalist to venture out in the land on his or her own. Despite being part of the land of pure for decades, the land is still named tribal areas and is inaccessible to outsiders first because of militants and now because of military’s control of the area.

The security forces are present there since they cleaned it of terrorists through a military offensive in 2014. The local population had to leave their homes so that they could come back and live in peace someday. They have come back now. Still their lives await rebuilding.

Despite restrictions and lack of facilities, people of tribal areas have learnt to use the social media to raise their voice by sharing pictures. Tough risky but some find it worth it because pictures speak thousand words for thousands of people of the tribal areas or still called ‘Ilaqa Ghair’ by some.

Damaged buildings of schools symbolise hurdles to education in tribal areas

The pictures and voices from the tribal area of North Waziristan reveal a lot and it is still needed to bring life to normal as there is shortage of some basic facilities like schools for children.

The pictures shared exclusively with Dawn show buildings having traces that they were once used as government schools. The broken furniture dumped in a classroom with faded blackboard, a closed room with science room written above the wall, fallen boundary walls and rusty iron gate with bullet holes are images of Government High School Hassukhel village of Mirali, the main town of North Waziristan Agency.

There are many schools in nearby villages of Mirali and Miramshah, the agency headquarters, and far off villages that have the same dilapidated condition and cry out loud for a good building, facilities and good staff and smiling children, local say.

“This is my school. There is no water, bathroom or electricity but I want to study so I come here,” said Ishra, a third grader at Government Primary school Jan Bader Kot, a small village in Mirali, in a recorded message sent to this reporter. The pictures show a dilapidated building behind her to which she refers as her school.

Ishra lives a bit away from the school and is walking back home with her two other mates. Pictures show her clad in a black shawl like her friend Fatima, a student of 4th grade standing right beside her.

Fatima has also conveyed her love for education but shared how disappointed she was when she returned from Bannu to her hometown Mirali after completion of Operation Zarb-i-Azb only to find her school was destroyed.

“I love to come to school but my teacher is mostly absent,” complains Fatima. She wants to study in a good school and have good teachers to teach her.

“My school has some 300 students and there are only four classrooms so on rainy days we don’t have a class,” says Shaista, a third grader.

The fallen and cracked walls of Government High School Hadirkhel in Mirali and rubble on its gate are symbols of the hurdles to education in the tribal land. Dilapidated buildings of government primary schools in Dossali and Khushali speak of incapacity of Fata Secretariat that has its offices in a bombproof fortified building on Warsak Road in Peshawar.

“Militancy had destroyed around 1,400 schools in Fata. We are trying our best to rehabilitate them all as 400 schools still need be repaired but we need resources. We have financial constraints,” says Azad Khan, deputy director at Fata Education Directorate.

This is despite the fact that UNDP and Unicef are assisting the directorate in many areas.

The government agencies fought hard to drive away militants from the tribal areas but they should also try to win hearts of the people of the land. Their voices should be heard and they should be accepted as one of our own as all they are asking is basic facilities like schools.

Published in Dawn, January 17th, 2018