There have been various controversies and criticisms of Pakistani textbooks for schools and universities. Many concern claimed inaccuracies & historical denialism. These inaccuracies & or myths are said to promote religious intolerance, Indophobia & have led to calls for curriculum reform. According to the Sustainable Development Policy Institute, Pakistan's textbooks among the nations school system have systematically inculcated as being anti-Indian discriminatory through historical omissions & deliberately been a bit of misinformation since as far back as the 1970s.
The revisionism can be traced as far back as the rule of General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, who instituted a program of Islamization of the country. His 1979 policy stated that the highest priority be given to the revision of the curriculum with a view to reorganize the entire content revolving around Islamic thought & giving education an ideological orientation so that Islamic ideology permeates the thinking of a younger generation in an effort to assist them with what he deemed the necessary convictions & an ability to transform society all according to Islamic tenets. In March 2016, Senate Chairman Raza Rabbani, from the upper house of the Pakistani Parliament addressed that since then, these same Pakistani textbooks have taught young minds more of the benefits of the performance of a dictatorship rather than that of an actual democracy.
Context During the first decade, following the Pakistan gained independence, also followed the partition of India, Pakistan considered its known history to be a considerably a larger part of India, a common and joint history, that in fact Indian textbooks were in use in the syllabus in Pakistan. The government, under Ayub Khan, however, persisted that a rewrite about the history of Pakistan exclude any references to India & tasked historians, within Pakistan, with the manufacturing a nationalist narrative of an all together separate history that erased any Indian past. According to Hussain Haqqani, only officially published textbooks have been used in Pakistani schools & colleges since the era of Ayub Khan. These textbooks are used by the Pakistani government to create an altered, but standard narrative of Pakistan's history. Elizabeth A. Cole, of the George Mason University School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, noted that these Pakistani textbooks eliminate any of the country's Hindu and/or Buddhist past, referring only to the nation's Muslim past as the monolithic entity, with focus being solely on the advent of Islam within the Indian subcontinent. During the rule of General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, is when this program of Islamization of the country began, including that among the education systems textbooks. General Zia's, 1979 education policy, stated that the highest priority be given to the revision of any curriculum with a view into reorganizing the entire content to be solely around the Islamization thought; therefore producing education as an ideological orientation so that Islamic ideology in an effort to permeate the thinking of the younger generations & helps with necessary conviction, as well as an ability to refashion society according to Islamic tenets". Since the 21st century, the contributions of Nehru, Mahatma Gandhi, Ambedkar, Patel and Bose to the Indian independence movement have been significantly reduced from and within the Pakistani textbooks.
According to the Sustainable Development Policy Institute, as far back as the 1970s, the Pakistan textbooks within the public education system have systematically inculcated prejudice towards India, as well as Hindus through historical revisionism. These textbooks incite strong emotional accounts among students and have even fostered extremism and fanaticism within the impressionable minds of the Pakistani youth.
The undermining of democratic values and of constitutionalism In March 2016, Senate Chairman Raza Rabbani, from the upper house of the Pakistani Parliament has acknowledged that the curriculum created under Zia's ruling, within the Pakistani textbooks was continuing to teach children about the twelve (12) benefits of a dictatorship compared to that of just eight (8) of a democracy.
Textbooks of religious education In Pakistan, since the 1980s Islamiyat (Islam) is a compulsory subject at every educational level. Since 2018 the Punjab province of Pakistan provided for Nazrah Quran (recitation of the Arabic text) to be an active part of the curriculum in classes I to V as well as the reading translation of the Quran in classes VI-XII to be made mandatory, as per the Punjab Compulsory Teaching of the Holy Quran Act 2018.
In Punjab, a board representing the Islamic clergy, known as the Muttahida Ulema Board held the right to censor any educational content. This curriculum and textbook board proposed and passed an (Amendment) bill, unanimously in 2020 providing them with additional rights to adhere to the pre-screening of any Islamic-related content within all Pakistani textbooks, to include those of: Islamiyat, Pakistan studies, history and Urdu literature. In June 2020, another Governor's decree passed of Quranic examination be mandatory before receiving any acquired completion of a university degree. According to Baela Raza Jamil, in June 2020 the legislative changes in the Punjab province of Pakistan, would compromise any education if based on freedom of inquiry and critical thinking in the nation, Pakistan. Huma Yusuf expressed surprise over the obvious misplaced priorities among the Pakistani education, wherein right-wing-washing of the educational content was being prioritized over an overall accurate education in the sciences, technology, engineering, mathematics and critical thinking.
A voluntary body of educators, known as Working Group on Inclusive Education (WGIE), expressed their serious reservations about the legislative measures there in the Punjab Pakistan province to be compromising diversity & any religious freedoms as well.
According to a study by Muhammad Azeem Ashraf, conducted at the Hunan University in Changsha, most of the teaching faculty members of those in Pakistan were to believe, Pakistan to be Islamic country and Islam to be associated with nationalism. As such, Islam can only be introduced through religious education, including for the most part as only Sunni Islam which leads to the exclusion of any minority religious thoughts and/or beliefs from education, Pakistani citizenship and their human rights.
The discoveries highlight the pervasive influence of the radical Islam procurement within the Pakistan nation and is a shedding light on a number of reasons behind the tendency to support, tolerate and/or possibly condone terrorism. The educational materials utilized there in the Pakistani schools and in the education curriculum have contributing role to the promotion of any prejudice & intolerance towards Hindus, as well as other religious minorities in the nation. Moreover, a significant number of educators tend to perceive non-Muslims as "enemies of Islam." Pakistani textbooks clearly depict the non-Muslim citizens of Pakistan in a negatively biased manner, often characterizing religious beliefs such as Pakistani Christians to be representatives of Western and/or British colonial powers while Pakistani Hindus are the minorities within the Muslim-majority population with affiliations to India. This portrayal fosters tendencies such as hostility & even animosity. These history books are contaminating, not to mention indoctrinating to the minds of the youth done so with a deliberate propagation of false narratives and rigid ideologies.
Textbooks of Journalism in Pakistan According to Dr Naazir Mahmood, textbooks on journalism in Pakistan fail to cover critical thinking, knowledge development, freedom of speech, gender studies, minority rights, human rights, democracy, and constitutionalism, as well as health education and other developmental studies. Mahmood says that, as a result, Pakistani journalists promote rather than question jingoistic, insular, narrow minded narratives, condoning and even promoting hate speech and sectarianism against religious minorities in Pakistan. Many senior journalists, and observers of the media in Pakistan often complain about new or younger media professionals who have become self-styled promoters of chauvinism, jingoism and sectarian tendencies in the country.
Criticism In a 1995, a segment published within the International Journal of Middle East Studies, focused on a newly invented subject of 'Pakistan studies, historian Ayesha Jalal noted a large extent of creative imagination in the creation of the state historiography, to carve out a national past based on hegemonic values. She remarked on Pakistan's history textbooks as being an example of the relationship that correlates between power & that of bigotry, in regards to the rigid state-controlled education system alongside the curriculum promoting a revisionist set of detailed history written to satisfy its national ideology.
These authors vastly vary in establishing the history of the Pakistani nation-state. Jalal goes on to deem this an example of basic narrative confusion that resulted from tensions between the ideology of Muslim nationalism & the geographical limitations of the Pakistani nation-state. While some pan-Islamic ideologists locate the time-frame to correspond with the birth of Islam on the Arabian Peninsula & intentionally choose to ignore the spatial while temporal distance between the two non-concerted happenings, others have opted for a sub-continental approach. An Introduction to Pakistan Studies, (a popular text-book which is compulsory reading for first and second year college students studying for an Fine Arts (FA) degree in history), claims that Pakistan is an Islamic State, governed by Allah & is not a mere geographical entity but more of an ideology reflecting a unique civilization and or culture that was born of an effort to resist the imposition of Hindu Nationalism on any Muslim masses to ward the unethical practices of Hinduism. Another textbook – A Text Book of Pakistan Studies goes on to claim that Pakistan "came to be established for the first time when the Arabs, under Muhammad bin Qasim, occupied Sindh and Multan & thereafter equates to the Indian subcontinent with Pakistan, their greatest ruler being subsequently deemed as Aurangzeb. Anti-Indian sentiments, coupled with anti-Hindu prejudices compound these issues. K. Ali's two volume history designed for Bachelor of Arts (BA) students, even whilst tracing the pre-history of the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent to the Paleolithic discussion of the Dravidian peoples as well as the Aryans, consistently refers to the post 1947 era of frontiers of the Pakistan nation. By the end, he supports the existence of the nation-state, reliant upon religious ideology, in light of the need to immunize themselves from, said to be, Hindu hostility that is displayed to the Muslims during an independence movement & the fact that the subcontinent was ruled by Muslims in previous centuries.