Educate Because You Can

Tahira looked up at me, smiling and tugging at the sleeve of my shirt.

“Aapi, aapi!! Look at this,” she waved the Oxford Dictionary in my face, threatening to squash my nose with it. I moved back hastily.

“Look!! Such a big book!! When I come back from school, I will read it every day!!!”

Her excitement was such that her voice vibrated and her eyes shone… all because she thought she might be able to read a dictionary…

A knot rose in my throat, and I turned away from the scruffy child, unwilling to reveal my watering eyes.

For I knew that Tahira would never be able to read any book- contrary to what she believed, she would not be going to school…

Ten year old Tahira was the new servant in our house. Despite my refusal to hire a child as a maid, my mum had persisted with the idea, finally winning me over when she said that we would send the girl to school.

When we broke the news to her, she was transformed into a study of ecstasy… for hours she would not stop chattering away about how she would grow up to be a distinguished surgeon, how she would get top marks in all her exams… it was overwhelming, her reaction. It put me and my tepid ambitions to shame.

Her mother, cradling a three month old tot, came to visit Tahira some days after.
By that time, Tahira’s admission process was almost completed- she would be going to school the very next week. My mum told the woman of her plans for Tahira’s education- she reacted by erupting into a paroxysm of fury. For close to an hour, she ranted and raved about how schools were merely places meant to “corrupt” and “modernize” innocent Pakistani children, how educating girls converted them into prostitutes, how studying gave one airs and graces- and ended by firmly declaring that Tahira would be married off in two years to an uneducated village boy and so our mum had better not meddle with the child’s mind.

I remember her parting shot, aimed as it was at me. “If you send girls to school, they become character less hussies bound for adultery - just look at that hoodlum there.”

None of us had the heart to tell Tahira.


That day, I finally realized the truth of a statement rendered ineffectual by the number of times I had encountered it in pamphlets, advertisements and whatnot- education changes lives. Tahira was born with the right to an education, she could have been a valuable asset to Pakistan- thanks to the ageless complexes of village society she would be deprived of it. I felt so helpless at the realization that there was to be another illiterate girl in the nation, I wanted to cry.

Tahira is only one such child- there are millions out there. Millions of little children thirsting for knowledge the way we, the educated, never did. Over the years, they will turn into a million miserable beggars, condemned to a life on the streets.

What are we going to do about it?

What I have come to realize is that ultimately, the responsibility to take the initiative lies with us, the educated masses- government schemes are bound to fail because they can never reach the very lowest levels of society. We, those who grandiosely call ourselves products of the New Age, must realize the responsibility lies with us. We can all do our tiny bit- IT MAKES A DIFFERNECE.

Take a step TODAY- teach the nearest uneducated child the alphabet. See that child blossom into a cornucopia of talent and ambition.