Respecting religious diversity and promoting religious harmony is a must for peace and sustainable development in Pakistan . Text books taught in schools can play a pivotal role in this regard and SDPI would keep on contributing to the cause of strengthening religious harmony through its work on curriculum reform”, expressed Mr Ahmed Salim, (Pride of Performance) Senior Advisor SDPI on Education and Religious Diversity.
Mr Ahmed Salim was addressing the opening session on three days training held by Sustainable Development Policy Institute and Minority Right Group (UK) at Islamabad on Monday. The training is being attended by teachers of various religious faiths from the schools of Rawalpindi and Islamabad .
“All citizen of Pakistan irrespective of their faith should be treated equally as per the guarantee provided in the Constitution of Pakistan”, said by Mr. Salim. He mentioned that there shouldn’t be any discrimination on any ground at any cost. Introducing the training modules, Ahmad Salim mentioned that the existing text course in our schools is highly predisposed, which is the root cause of increasing prejudice in the society about various religious faiths. Humaira Ishfaq, Lecturer at IIUI, portrayed that the modules developed under MRG project are an attempt to curtail the abhorrence among different religions’ group and to bring tranquility and religious harmony in the society. She also highlighted the pedagogical methods that how these can be constructive in the class rooms to shun the development of repugnance. She also encouraged the steps of government to amend the ethics text in relevancy to these developed modules.
“The failure to provide adequate protection to ethnic, linguistic and religious minorities of Pakistan is an unfortunate aspect of country’s legal and political history”, highlighted Afshan Ahmed, Research Associate at SDPI. She said that the dilemma of our education system is meager curriculum development and the inflexibility of most of the teachers. She also mentioned that we don’t have any proper definition of “Minority” in the constitution and absence of impartial Governance in the affairs of religions turn the life of diversified religious groups miserable. She also highlighted social exclusion, denial of human dignity, partial teaching, abuse of law for self interest, lack of freedom, lack of tolerance and question of value judgment as the crucial factors which are polluting people minds and promoting extremism. She concluded that it’s the need of hour to promote justice, equality and respect across the different religions to foster peace and sustainable development in Pakistan .
Dr. Abid Suleri, Executive Director SDPI appreciated the role of steering committee of MRG project for their guidance on development of multi faith educational modules for grade 1 to grade 10 children. He assured that SDPI would carry on supporting all initiatives taken for religious harmony in the country. He also lauded Ms Sherry Rehman’s for floating a bill for an amendment in blasphemy law and insisted that path of religious tolerance is a must to curb extremism and militancy from the country.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
