Side effect

Source: The News

Date: November 5, 2010

The prime minister said recently that every member of parliament will get a plot of land if opposition agrees. His statement reminded me of my school. Twenty eight years ago, I matriculated from a school which had adequate number of classrooms, qualified teachers, basic furniture, electricity, large watercoolers for teachers and students, functioning toilet facilities, a canteen and a tuck shop, two hockey fields, one football ground, a cricket pitch, science labs and a large library. It had a beautiful dome structure and a huge carpark for privately-owned contract vehicles which would bring us to school and for the cars that would wait for the relatively more affluent students. In addition to the main school, the premises housed a separate secondary section for girls, an intermediate college and a few residential quarters for staff. 
There were extracurricular activities organised for students, a representative Students' Council, all students divided into four houses for sports and other competitions, and a bilingual magazine published annually. The school would also host inter-school sports and debates competitions at the city, provincial and national levels. The school produced many significant people who reached the highest possible levels in the country and abroad in the areas of commerce, industry, bureaucracy, military, sports, art and culture, journalism and politics. I am sure of my reader's surprise if I start naming some of them. 

But to the disbelief of many today, this was a government-run school, fully subsidised, multi-class and competitive in terms of its educational standards. The only things that made it look like a government school were pale yellow walls and some broken windowpanes. These large, open windows helped some of us jump outside into the field and bunk a few class periods. Even this, I am told by my seniors, was not possible until the 1970s. 
The school was established in the 1950s by the naval cantonment's municipal administration. In the 1970s, it was taken over by the federal government and soon put under the Cantonment and Garrison Educational Institutions during the martial-law years of General Zia. But the ownership remained with the federal government's ministry of education which later shifted the school's administration to the Federal Government Educational Institutions. 

View details: http://www.thenews.com.pk/05-11-2010/opinion/13899.htm