Education or Graduation?

Ali Raza Momand

Facts, ideas and skills that are learned, either formally or informally, and that positively impact one’s attitude towards existence may logically be defined as education.

If one’s behaviour is not changed positively or a so-called educated still remains part of the engineered propaganda firmly staged against sections of humanity on some offensive religious, ethnic or even patriotic lines, this simply is something not more than the accumulation of the necessary data for getting a degree to run the concerned systems and no, any education.

Moreover, education needs liberal environment and the absence of constraints and control to flourish a culture of research and get the educated lot capable of navigating the pace of time.

Anything like a controlled syllabus and indoctrinating techniques in the form of injecting certain conservative thoughts into the tabula rasa of students are soul-killers for education. The realm and domain of education stands far above than those conservative and static mental landscapes.

The objective of education is to equip humanity with the knowledge to understand time and reality and thereby enriching its soul and intellectual faculty. For all practical purposes, education is above every effort aimed at organising it and overseeing its operation.

We are exposed here in Pakistan to a number of education systems: government-run educational institutes, military-owned garrison schools and cadet colleges, private sector institutes, and the madrassa system. Neither of them imparts education and all of them do nothing more than equipping students with the necessary information required for attaining degrees.

Sequentially, the first two kinds are propagating the schemed programme aimed at producing servants for state services, the other is fulfilling market demands and the fourth manufactures dictatorial clerics. You cannot have free thinkers out of any of the said systems who can otherwise be bringing positive changes in our society. In the first two kinds of educational institutions, students are indoctrinated in state ideology wherein anything, around the world, which is not conforming to the contents of the ideology is rejected or taken as a threat to the state.

History is engineered likewise for teaching purposes at the institutes as well as for propagating in the society in order to have a controlled, unquestioning, yes-boss, sociopolitical robots instead of rational and humane thinkers. In nutshell, the knowledge, what we have, devoid of research and analysis, is far more dangerous than ignorance.

The result of such manipulated schooling is that we don’t have authorities on any discipline of social or natural sciences nor art and literature nor we do have critical thinkers to question the status-quo and mould our sociopolitics in accordance with the demands of time.

Though, on contrary, we have an abundance of state servants produced annually in larger than large numbers. Similarly, private sector educational institutes here with us are established on material grounds designed

to produce a workforce for running industries and markets. They have nothing to do with art and literature, philosophy and other disciplines of social sciences for these subjects are considered worthless in job-markets.

As a result, we have business robots

here to produce. On the same pattern, our madrassa system teaches dogma and orthodox divinity devoid of critical questioning, research and the needs of the time. Madrassa of one school of thought teaches hatred for the other giving thereby an addition to our sectarian violence in the end instead of producing students with know-how to coexist and preach religion in accordance with what the time needs.

It can be concluded that in the absence of a researchoriented education system, our society and state haven’t been growing up rather down in terms of sociopolitical and economic thoughts and riches. Our education system has until date produced much the less of the graduates who can add something new to the established knowledge regime. All our problems are yet unresolved.

To make our society and state out of the existing static order into an operational growing one, we need to revisit and open our education system to research and critical thoughts.

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Divide and Rule, Careful Strategy of the SEA DOGS

 

Munaza Kazmi

Even today after more than Seven decades, it is hard to look back without horror at the savagery of once the magnificent, the richest and the most beautiful land, the Golden Sparrow’s vivisection, when rioting, rape and murder scarred this peaceful land, millions were uprooted from their homes, also billions of rupees worth of property were damaged and destroyed and the worse friendships destroyed, families ruined, geography hacked, history misread, tradition denied, and hearts torn apart. The greatest loss of love and humanity.

Divide et impera – divide and rule – has been written into the history books as an icon of military and political strategy. In simple terms, it refers to the attempt to fracture a large, unified opposition, rendering the fragments too weak to overpower their collective enemy. 

It’s led men from Julius Caesar to Napoleon to success in conquering nations and controlling populations. 

Caesar used the technique in his conquest of Gaul, exacerbating the divisions among the Gallic tribes by letting slip the fact that some rulers were accepting aid for cooperating with him. 

Distrust prevented alliances that might have been strong enough in manpower and training to defeat the Roman army – and Gaul fell.

British imperialists liked to model themselves on Rome. Hence, liked drawing lines on maps of other countries; they had done it in the Middle East after World War 1 and they did it again in Sub-Continent. The greatest division, and one that has changed the region forever.

The creation and continuation of antagonism between Hindu-Muslim was the most significant accomplishment of British imperial policy: the colonial project of “divide et impera” (divide and rule) fomented religious antagonisms to facilitate continued imperial rule and reached its tragic conclusion in 1947. 

However, I should say it never ended in 1947 as within months we started fighting on issue of Jammu and Kashmir, where the ratio of military personnel to civilians is the highest in the world. Many still die during gun battles, civilians caught in the crossfire. 

The consequences of which affect this region till today since it was pre-planned strategy of those sea dogs, to make this Golden Land to turn into dust by continuous war and terror.

The British came under the disguise of traders; East India Company a single business operation, based in one London office complex, managed to dismantle the Mighty Mughal Empire as masters of the vast subcontinent. First, they took our King, our riches, our precious Kohinoor and then our peace.

Till today we fight and maybe fighting continue for the end of our lives, why? because they not only made lines dividing geography butlines on our hearts. With time we are becoming more hostile, intolerant and unsympathetic. Why we cannot sit and do table talk, why compassion cannot house in our hearts?

Because colonial mindsets persevere in more ways than we recognize, but when we experience division – as Hindus and Muslims, or Indians and Pakistanis, or any other ethnic group with those we perceive as our ‘natural’ enemies – we should stop and ask ourselves who that division benefits.

However, the recent past witnessed some bounties of love, when Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan took the historic decision of opening the Khartarpur corridor and allowed visa-free entry to the Sikh pilgrim, besides another major step taken was the inauguration of Hassanabdal railway station for providing further facilitation to our Sikh fellows, where Imran showcased the world that Pakistan look forward for peace and good relations hence won hearts of several people. 

He madethe historian to write his name in golden letters as the “Leader of Peace”.

I believe if such steps could be replicated on the other side we could make this region once again as strong, as rich and powerful as the times of Akbar the Great and return the Golden Sparrow its glittering magnificence.

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Munaza Kazmi holds MPhil in Management Sciences (Bahria University Islamabad, 2020). She’s a travel writer, an author, & co-author of scientific contributions in national & international publications. Her main areas of research include tourism & quality management.

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The Karakoram Highway, 8th Wonder of the World

Munaza Kazmi

The Karakoram Highway is the highest and the lengthiest paved international highway of the world, it is also viewed as the 15th most beautiful roads of the world for its scenic beauty.

The Karakoram Highway was built by the governments of Pakistan and China in a long span of almost twenty years (1959-78) due to the region's unique topography, high-altitude mountains, snow-covered peaks and tough terrain.

The mighty road, manifesting the strategic relationship and geographical interdependence between the two nations – China and Pakistan – is also termed as Friendship Highway and it is referred to as the eighth wonder of the world.

The Karakoram Highway represented the undeclared beginning of CEPEC- a dream that is being realized after 50 years.

The magnificent 1300km road snakes through the Pamirs, Hindu Kush, Kunlaun Mountains, and Karakoram Range, to connect Kashgar in China to the northern provinces of Pakistan. At a maximum height of 4714 meters, it has the world’s highest border crossing at the Khunjerab Pass.

Whilst ensuring the most epic road trip ever, the highway is notorious for frequent land sliding, avalanches, and movement of glaciers under extreme weather conditions; the well-known Attabad Lake, that is now an attractive tourist destination is a living result of such land sliding.However, the highway was constructed on respective sides of China and Pakistan by their relevant organizations.

Construction at such a high elevation and harsh terrain defies conventional engineering wisdom. Hence, then government of Pakistan gave this task to the Army’s Corps of Engineers to undertake the work; thus, was born the Frontier Works Organization.

However, in the meanwhile 200 Chinese and over 800 Pakistani laborer and engineers lost their lives; some due to inclement weather, others to the harsh elevation of 4,693 meters (15,397 ft) above sea level.

To say inevitably the Karakoram Highway had a huge impact on the lives of locals, their economic conditions improved manifold, likewise it turn out to be an open gateway for them to the rest of the world.

One of the major benefits it came with is the uplift in adventure tourism, as it is the corridor to the stunning mountain range of Pakistan, namely the gorgeous Himalayas, magnificent Hindukush and the mysterious Karakorum. Furthermore, one can have a luxury of an uninterrupted and clear view of notorious Nanga Parbat and Rakaposhi.

Also, it is a gateway to the world’s largest glaciers, mainlyKhujerab, Passu, Minapin and Ghulkin. Thankfully now it is no longer difficult to access the many high mountains, glaciers, and lakes in the area.

The Karakoram Highway offers to its traveler a delightful experience of scenic beauty that would surely remain for life.  One would be travelling while witnessing the sights of world’s beautiful landscapes, the lands of fairies and djinns.

Moreover, it was deemed the third-best tourism site in the country and one of the most challenging engineering feats anywhere in the world.

Historically Karakorum Highway was a trade route, famously known as the ancient Silk Road Route, that relates to a lot of beautiful stories that I will be sharing in my next article, however it was used by Chinese traders on their journey toward the Middle East, Central Asia and Europe.

However, under the CEPEC, the Karakorum Highway has been upgraded as a motorway. It is the sustenance for the people of Gilgit-Baltistan besides the source of economic activities.

Moreover, Karakorum Highway can be viewed as the main channel of the CEPEC and its impact are evident in the whole region as a beneficiary of trade between China and Central Asia, the Middle-East and Eurasia through the Arabian Sea at Gwadar.

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Munaza Kazmi holds MPhil in Management Sciences (Bahria University Islamabad, 2020). She’s a travel writer, an author, & co-author of scientific contributions in national & international publications. Her main areas of research include tourism & quality management.

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Bad Parenting: Lifelong Consequence

Munaza Kazmi

Parents tend to underestimate the behavioral influence that they have on their children, however in developing countries the ratio exceeds. It can be understood that, no one can be the perfect parent, but there are certain parenting behaviors that can have serious and lifelong negative effects on children.

In 2011, the UK’s Department for Education found that children who are exposed to bad parenting are two times more likely to misbehave. Inconsistent disciplinary approaches, poor supervision and physical punishment are poor parenting attributes that can negatively affect children, regardless of their ethnicity and socioeconomic status.

You must have some colleague in your workplace harsh and unfriendly, this is in actual their inability to have long lasting friendships and relations.This mostly happens when a person during his childhood was not reprimanded or punished for the mistakes he made. The child therefore grows up knowing that he is in control and is ever right. He becomes a spoilt child who believes that he must always have their way in everything. This has negative effects on the relationships that the child gets into. Co-existing with others becomes difficult and such a child is more likely to make more enemies than friends.“A villain is just a victim whose story hasn't been told.”

The other quit common example is people preferring solitude, and the anti-social behavior, which is considered as psychological disorder, that also finds its roots to the early days. This happens especially of the child grows up in a family where there is a lot of abuse whether physical or emotional. This also occurs when a child suffers from neglect as a child. Such children may have difficulty in making friend and trusting people as they find it easier to push people away than to open up.

Depression, that you would found as an everyday problem and the poor souls having low self-esteem. Maybe one of your best friends to who needs your backing in his or her every decision, basically there was some disruption that still shows its signs. A child who is never allowed to make decisions, and who is constantly criticized, belittled and who goes through abuse is likely to have low self-esteem. Moreover, it becomes worse when the child goes through sexual abuse as a child. Such forms of abuse are also known to make children more prone to violent behaviors. Children who are exposed to abuse and violence are likely to become violent people. They grow up believing that violence is the only way to solve issues.

More to add, neglected children and those who are exposed to abuse are more likely to be prosecuted for juvenile delinquency. Other common effects of bad parenting include drug addiction, infamy, failure to thrive and poor growth and development both physically and mentally. These poor souls are the easy targets for wolves hovering around. If you are not a good gardener, then better not to flower.

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Munaza Kazmi holds MPhil in Management Sciences (Bahria University Islamabad, 2020). She’s a travel writer, an author, & co-author of scientific contributions in national & international publications. Her main areas of research include tourism & quality management.

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Google AdSense Anchor Ads Wider Screens Support Starting from Jul 19

Google Adsense announced that anchor ads, the AdSense ads that stick to the top or bottom of the page as you scroll, now are supported on wider screens. Google launched anchor ads on AdSense in 2013 and has expanded its features over the years.

Google said "Anchor ads now support a larger range of screen sizes. For sites that have anchors turned on, anchor ads will soon start to appear on wider screens such as desktop. Our experiments show that anchor ads perform well on wider screens."

Anchor ads will begin to show on wider screens after July 19, 2021.

Google said if you do not want anchor ads on your wider screens, you can turn this option off using the new "Wide screen" control in your Auto ads settings.

As a reminder; AdSense anchor ads stick to the edge of the user's screen and Google says they are easily dismissible. These ads mainly serve on mobile but can appear on desktop too. 

They appear at the top of the user's screen unless we determine that this would negatively affect the user experience, in which case we show them at the bottom. 

When shown at the top, anchor ads only appear after the user has scrolled down far enough, so that they never cover your site's branding or navigation.

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COURTESY seroundtable

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