Srinagar, Apr 21: Dismayed at continued student protests, Minister for Education Syed Muhammad Altaf Bukhari on Saturday asked the students to control their emotions and attend classes even as he sought cooperation of the larger society for ensuring disruption-free academic activities in the Valley.
Speaking to media here, he said the students were given chance to give vent to their emotions after Kathua incident. “Enough is enough, you have registered your protest, now let court decide,” he said while appealing all the political leaders to spare education from politics.
“We can’t afford to have a generation of illiterates and uneducated [people]. So I request all, particularly students to make schools functional.”
The minister said as per government rules, there will be no compromise on attendance of students in the schools.
“I would like to tell students to stay in classes, because they would be treated as rowdies if they keep coming on roads. And if they still want to come on roads then we will close educational institutions forever and students will be responsible for it,” he said.
“I ask one last time children not to hit streets; if you take to roads then you will be treated as rowdies,” he warned.
Campuses have erupted against the rape-and-murder of a minor girl in Kathua. Dozens of students have been injured in clashes with the government forces during past two weeks.
Schools and college administrations have to see how to maintain discipline in educational institutions and “we will also see how discipline has been maintained,” added the Education Minister.
Commenting on the government’s decision to shut certain schools and colleges in the wake of protests by students against the rape and murder of a Kathua girl, Bukhari said the government is forced to close the educational institutions to ensure safety of the students in view of the frequent protests.
“Now the case is in court and we should look up to the judiciary to provide justice and ensure that the guilty are punished,” he said.
The Minister said unfortunately education has become the biggest casualty of the prevailing situation in Kashmir and “it is our collective responsibility to think over the terrible consequences of the loss of education of our children.”
He said he is pained to see students taking to streets instead of focusing on their education.
“Ironically, we have come to a time where we are systematically disempowering ourselves, educationally, intellectually, economically and physically,” said Bukhari adding that every right-thinking person in Kashmir including those with differing political ideologies shall have to seriously think over the grave issue, before it is too late to recoup the great loss.
The Minister pleaded with all sections of society to keep education out of politics.
“I also appeal leaders to exempt students from protest programs and instead counsel them to resume their classes as their education has badly affected,” added Bukhari.
He said that all the emancipated men and women subscribing to any school of political thought are in favour of continuation of education and “it seems some mysterious elements are hell-bent upon blocking the smooth functioning of the schools to render our children educationally disempowered.”
The Minister said while the Kashmir’s affluent class has already started shifting their children outside the State for education, it is the middle-class and the poor whose children are losing out on education because of the recurrent disruptions. He also requested the parents to convince their wards against protests and not to waste their precious time.
The Minister asked the heads of the educational institutions to treat their students as their own children and counsel them for their better future.
