JK News Today
December 02 : There is absolutely no doubt now that girls’ education in Pakistan and Pakistan occupied territories is under attack , and the latest attack on a girls school in South Waziristan on Thursday confirms the ominous trend. It is also confirming that how the education system is being kept hostage by the radical elements in the neighbouring country , who are driving their agenda of keeping schools shut to achieve their objective of shutting schools .
A chilling reminder of the attacks on schools came on Thursday when terrorists opened fire from surrounding mountains in Azam Warsak area of South Waziristan . Their target was Army Public School for Girls where Parents’ day celebrations were on. The attack left a passerby dead and security official injured .
Though Pakistani media reports said that none of the students, staff and the parents who attended the school function remained unhurt , yet it left a trail of panic and fear among them, and the local people at large .
This is not the first instance in Pakistan where schools have been targeted by terrorists . A few days ago , the terrorists had burned a girls’ school in Gilgit Baltistan area . That school is yet to be reconstructed . The people have stated it very clearly that the authorities have not learned any lessons from the 2014 terror attack at Peshawar Army Public School , in which more than 140 children and staff were massacred . The safety of the school going children in Pakistan is at grave risk .
The recurring terror attacks on schools in Pakistan are indicative of deeper malaise prevailing in the political and social system of the country. As the country is locked in a grave political turmoil wherein the politicians are spending most of the time in calling each other , there is no direction . The government has lost control over its institutions . Its writ is under threat . The military is fighting its own internal battles and it is sitting at odds with the political system of the country . It has further complicated matters in Pakistan where terrorists and their supporters have started their own actions and narration – the government system is weakening by day . As a result they are losing faith in the system .
There are certain parameters in defining the civilized society. Education is key to basics of civilized behavior and action . The civilized people want their children to get educated and rise in their lives . But the radicals sit on the opposite side of the fence . The radicalism that has grown by leaps and bounds in Pakistan , That is attributable to Pakistan’s courtship with the extremism , which graduated to the new level under Zia-ul-Haq regime from late 1970s to 1980s.
Now Pakistan is paying price – children in schools are under threat, especially girls.
