Youth and Education

Some of the bacteria lurked into my throat, incurred cell growth, worsened my immune system and irrevocably left me with no voice. This is the present condition of the youth of Pakistan. Today’s headline which concocted my mind to blog on the youth was ‘Students manhandled teachers when they refrained them from cheating’.

The sixteen years of my education have apprehended this fact to me that the youth of Pakistan is divided into two sects. The factor which makes them fall into two distinctive categories is nothing but the education standard, rather different hues of education prevailing in the current era. Here, the catastrophe is Pakistan doesn’t have its own specified education criteria. Education in the primary and secondary level is either Cambridge system or the Pakistan board system which is further divided on provincial levels. Fortunately or unfortunately, I have been a part of both. Moreover, my secondary school used to offer two board exams simultaneously, Punjab and Sindh, so somehow I have seen the difference densely. It is very remorseful to write here and I won’t prefer any non-Pakistani to read this blog but Pakistan boards have given us nothing but cramming and cheating. This is the consequence of the malfunction of Pakistani education system that students end up hustling and jostling their invigilators if they are not allowed to cheat. Here, the point of concern is what forces them to do this? Obviously, they are neither being taught this nor it is present in Pakistani curriculum. Ask any question to a student from Cambridge board, he would give answers and would justify his answer with logics and reasons. On the other hand, if you would ask same thing to someone from Pakistan board, his instant reply would be, Oh! We have not been taught this or this is out of our syllabus. 

Now, if we go to the university level, the criterion of admission in every university is different. Few universities have quota system due to which students with the urban domicile have to face tough competition for the entrance exam and many of them loose their seats albeit they score higher than the students from rural areas. Political influence in few renowned universities has made the education system worse. Sometimes, studying in such universities make you feel that pariah system is still a part of the sub-continent and nothing has changed in these 65 years when you hear linguistic riots broken out in the domes.

Just after the university, practical life becomes much more biased for more than half of the students. Graduates from few top burger universities of Pakistan get jobs as the pieces of cakes and rest of the students spend their days and nights stipulating in front of companies and industries to hire them. This sounds funny but these are the students who take IELTS and GRE exams, get scholarships, go abroad, serve other nations and when they are questioned for not being in Pakistan, their reaction is, ‘Pakistan mein rakha kya he’. I, sometimes, but this is just sometimes, consider their stance to be justified.

I am not here to identify the different standards of education but at this stage I am more concerned about what we actually have now and what these different fonts have given us. Neither the entire write up points toward the flaws of the youth nor does it say that whatever happens is due to teachers or the courseware being taught in Pakistan board. The problem is with the system and the woeful truth is that we are the ones who have made this system, we are the ones who have let the system prevail and affect our youth and we are the ones who are left with no voice and gesture to stand against it. 

Sometimes, at the back of my mind.

Finally, it is 6 now. I know nobody was there to wake me up in the morning today. I still remember myself as brat when making me go to school was the toughest task I used to give to my dad. School, college, university and now work, I was a grown up guy now but sometimes growing up doesn’t mean you are mature but no I guess it does. It actually reveals certain realities and bitter facts of life which one could never understand being child. Yes, I was a child and I still wanted to be a child.

‘You are a sophomore now and it’s the time when you should understand that life is a race divided into laps of time. You have been running for long but now laps are going to be difficult. Sometimes, you will have to sacrifice your needs and goals according to the twist and turns of the road. Sometimes, looking back will give you nothing but tickling anguish in your heart. Sometimes, betrayals, sarcasm and biased attitude will make your living obnoxious. Sometimes, fighting for the right cause will diminish your relations. Sometimes, you will be mocked for pleasure. Sometimes, for the sake of nothing, you will lose your loved ones. Sometimes, your own reflections will bother you. Sometimes you will look bizarre to your own self. Sometimes, your antics will be questioned. Sometimes, the tough time would deflect your faith. Sometimes, you will wait for a moment to feel a real giggle in your heart. Sometimes,’

Alarm tone grabbed me back to present. ‘Yes dad, sometimes, you look for the reason of your existence. Sometimes, you look for the right place for your soul and you find nothing but the silence of your inner’. I said it to myself, turned off the alarm clock and bucked myself up for the new time of that some of the times.

This Time for MUET TROLLS

Let’s take a paranormal tour to MUET TROLLS. 

Yes, having the name of my university, there are trolls. After spending couple of years in MUET, I have a secret conviction that I am being graduated from the place where nothing could be learnt without trolls. crossing IT building, visiting ITC’s, standing near the cart of makai wala pathan, buying ice cream at audi and yes how can I forget our oldie goldie brohi’s canteen, thus, no place is left where we could stand without cracking jokes, mugging our own friends, ragging our juniors, staring the hotties, whistling at our crushes and then fighting for mera wala, tera wala and meri wali, teri bhabi. And then our forefather’s ritual, BOYCOTTS, the most awaited moment by us where we could poke our teachers and give them the lolling gesture.

Wasn't that closed enough? :))


And then few, le derps, finally came up with the idea of MUET TROLLS, the social platform where we love to mock ourselves and pull many legs together publically. Our monsters, Mehran Khan and Faizan Mateen, oops sorry guys, our lovely admins of MUET TROLLS have made us realize conclusively that even we are Engineers, we hardly clear Calculus, Differential and NACA our biggest nightmares but we still have something special with us i.e. our sense of Humor. We laugh at others and then we laugh violently at our own selves. Yes, are Mehranians and yes we, all together, are the part of MUET TROLLS. 

TECHNOLOGY, INNOVATION AND WE, THE BIO-MEDICAL ENGINEERS

Think, think again, think once again, and now create it. Yes, you are an engineer. Let’s reach the peak of it. I would not initiate my article by defining the intradisciplinary fields of Bio-Medical neither would I tell you that Bio-Medical merges medical and technology on one platform. I would not discuss an ongoing research in some renowned university of USA neither would I talk about the pioneers of this field. I am here just to make your vision more broad, make your sight more accurate and appropriate and make you look at the other side of this picture. Pioneers had done what they had to, scientists have resources, field has started and being studied but this is the time of brainstorming that what else can be done, what else can be performed and how the field can be more enhanced.

Technology and innovation are interrelated with each other. If you differentiate innovation, you derive technology and if you integrate technology, resultant will be innovation. It is since the beginning that Bio-Medical has the close relationship with technology and innovation. Thus, the core point of this article is to create an innovator among us. What is done, is being done, cannot be done again. Let’s try something new. Discuss your ideas and make them bright. Find one inspiration and create your own. Study it and elaborate it with your own ways. Grasp the thoughts, conceive the plans and highlight them. Indulge yourself in research and revolutionize them. Thus, dream up and make up, think of it and do it.

This field is not about studying theory and cramming syllabus. To understand the technique and generate your own logic is the theme of this field. To uplift your ideas, originate something new and to create your own identity is the motto of this field. So let’s join our hands together and welcome each other in the world of technology, in the sea of ideas and in the jumble of innovation. Let’s begin our day with the conception and let’s end it by accomplishing it. Let’s be the technical, let’s be the innovator and let’s be the part of Bio-Medical world. Good luck J

Democracy

Few days back, I came across the website “Right To Information”.  It’s an Indian organization whose vision and objective is to create awareness in the people about their basic rights. Their concept made me flabbergasted about the question rose in my mind that is our nation really unaware about its own rights? My mind said no but my conscience bowed down in front of their idea.

This is very unfortunate with the two biggest countries of the largest continent that they are being deceived with the name of being democratic. The word democracy, sometimes, put me in bittersweet state. Is this a democracy that I cannot go to my school in the days of boycott or when strike is called? Do I live in democratic country where my urdu speaking fellow is being persecuted in the hands of sindhi fellow or vice versa? Do we really call it democracy where people are being killed brutally and then left in the baggage at trash? Is this the value of democracy that extortionists have spread terror all over the city?  What is the use of that democracy that even after having one of the largest army in the world, we cannot control the law and order situation in the city and deweaponize the country? Is this a democratic country where inflation is created on wheat, rice and sugar to make more profit by exporting them? If swearing upon Quran, blaming an individual or one political party for the created fuss and expressing truths while using slangs and abusive language shows democracy and if the person in the drunken state, sings burkay mein rehnay do while dancing and calls himself the leader of peace and democracy then it is better to live in autocracy than being the citizen of democratic third world country. You might not agree with my conclusion but I, like many of the Pakistanis, am in the dilemma about where are we going and where is our country heading us towards? 

This blog is not about democracy v/s autocracy but what actually forced me to type these words here is the thought, prevailing in my mind since last few days that the above mentioned acts of these so called leaders do not represent democracy but some Mohalla type politics and we are trapped in it. Their politics in the guise of democracy, is ailing rather snatching our rights of living. I cannot blame Pakistan specifically for that because it is also accompanied by its neighbor in this race but the acceptance of Lokpal Bill and the promotion of many organizations like Right to Information have showed that it is running to counteract the adverse effect of so called democracy. It’s the time to modify our vision about politics. We have to realize that democracy is far beyond of what actually showed to us on press conferences and addresses. Thus, it cannot be achieved by singing a song of calling your country democratic.

Reflection

This blog is all about the inspirations we take in our daily lives. Reflection and inspiration play the vital role in setting up our moral, social and religious values. Reflection is the image and the Perception is to take inspiration from that image. However, sometimes, these are our inspirations which take us towards the downfall.

We all have grown up while answering this question very often, Who do you fancy? Most common replies are: my parents, some religious scholar or any of our national heroes. We take inspirations from their lives to set our lives according to them but at that time we actually neglect the authenticity of those reflections.

The world we see now and the world they lived in past, prevailed in very different circumstances. They had fresh food to eat and we rely on tin packed frozen items. They were brought up in the era where politicians were the leaders. They saw the film stage as the world of fantasy but we are seeing bitter truths being performed as dramas. Moreover, they just heard about the natural calamities but we are in the time where those calamities are being revealed. Thus, taking inspiration from their lives is nothing but insanity. On the other hand, the authenticity of their righteousness is always in doubt.

Till the 16^th century, the Muslim world was progressing well and Islam was the fastest embracing religion. However, the advent of 17^th century, besides modernizing our lives, took us away from our inspirations. Being muslims, those inspirations were nothing but Quran and Hadiths. These are the two most important and authentic sources of Islamic laws. From the birth till the day of judgment, they comprised all the problems which a person could come across. Ijma, Qiyas and Ijtihad were the supportive sources for the exceptional cases. But industrialization, weaponization and modernization also modified our point of views and today we have arrived at the stage where these sources are sitting at the back seats and considering some renowned scholar leads the religious sources.

Thus, we all have to realize that our sources are not authentic, our reflections are wrong and if our reflections are wrong, how our perceptions can be right? And if our perceptions are not right, our lives have no meaning in this world and even in the world hereafter.

Standing for the cause.

The other day I was going through some foreigner’s analysis report on the current anarchy in the country. Usually I don’t like any non-Pakistani commenting or giving his opinions about Pakistan but his conclusion was apposite. According to him, the problem with Pakistani nation was not religious or social but psychic.

It’s not easy to call a complete nation psycho but if we start analyzing our attitude from the very first day, we would agree with his statement. We have always supported the leader of our own race no matter how asinine he is. It is flabbergasted to realize that we gave votes to the party who had already lost its leadership. We thought we are paying back the prize of its leader’s life but we were actually selling our country in the hands of culprits. We were happy on the coalition of different political parties and on the formation of mutual government but in real we actually love dramas and our ruling party was making most of it. We were contented on the restoration of judiciary without realizing that they have set the biggest example of protest, riots and looting in the history of Pakistan and at present the same judiciary is lost somewhere. They have not come at the front at the present deteriorated law and order situation. But why would anynody do that? Why would anybody unite the racially divided nation?

We, as Pakistani nation, occur in different clusters. We believe in blind love and promises which shatter us. We, at the end of the day, shoot off our own mouth for the same person who once deceived us.  And, yes we don’t have the courage to stand for the right cause. We don’t have the power to save our neighbor from being killed brutally or to protest for him. We don’t have strength to name the real mischief-mockers even when we are persecuted at their hands. We deny the truth that we actually act as puppets and our strings are not even in the hands of our beloved leaders but controlled by the ones for whom we are actually terrorists. They are the real puppeteers as they exactly know how to dramatize our lives.

This is the stage at which we have to realize that the act of revolution cannot be performed, it has to be created and this would not be done by any leader or the political party but should be accomplished by us. We all have to play our own role individually. We have to create guts in ourselves to call right in front of the right and wrong in front of the wrong. Yes, this is the time when we all have to stand up collectively and united for the cause and that cause should not be other than PAKISTAN.