• Moot discusses challenges facing liberty to express ideas
• Prof Mukhia says history is being distorted in India everyday
• Europe destroyed academic freedom in its colonies, says Dr Sarah Ansari

KARACHI: Concerned over decline of academic freedom world over due to growing curbs imposed by governments, historians and experts at a conference urged people to play their part in the struggle to achieve the liberty to write against, question and challenge those trying to suppress progressive thoughts.

They were speaking at a conference — Academic Freedom — organised by Szabist on Tuesday.

Renowned historian, activist and scholar Dr Mubarak Ali was the first speaker. He joined from Lahore via video link.

He said academic freedom was a modern concept in nature as there was no such freedom in old times. In the medieval era, the state had almost total control on educational institutes and on what could be written and published and what not, he added.

The effort of the state and the church that very much controlled the state was to curb novel ideas and innovative thoughts.

Even Aristotle’s philosophy was Christianised, which continued to be taught and studied in that way for around a thousand years until Francis Bacon challenged it, Dr Ali said.

He added that it was from this point onwards that freedom in writing gradually began and started to spread. Seeing such suppression, scholars in Europe found different ways through which they could express themselves freely. One way was that if a book was not allowed to be published in one country, it was published in some other country and then smuggled to other countries, he added.

Another effective way was to deliver lectures, which were attended by the public as well as students because universities were under state control and did not allow complete academic freedom, he said, adding that renowned thinkers and philosophers like Martin Heidegger, Jean-Paul Sartre, Michel Foucault and other delivered such public talks to freely express and communicate their ideas. By all these ways, academic freedom spread and strengthened.

He said similar situation was in the Indian subcontinent in the middle ages (Ehd-i-Wusta). Academic freedom came here gradually through Persian and Urdu poets, who wrote against the state, their kings and armies and were even killed for this sometimes.

Speaking about academic freedom in Pakistan, he said there was a lack of such freedom as, at times, certain book were either not allowed to be published or were banned after publication.

Joining from London via remote video link, Dr Sarah Frances Deborah Ansari, professor of History at Royal Holloway, London University and editor of Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, spoke about the global condition of freedom in academia.

She said academic freedom was in a decline in the global context. “Academic freedom is in a retreat,” she said and quoted a recent research that said 22 countries now enjoyed less academic freedom than they did before.

Discussing the issue in the context of colonialism, she said European colonialism had destroyed academic freedom in its colonies. In South Asia, she said, colonial powers put restrictions on universities and educational institutes and also banned books.

The effects of such colonial restrictions continued and could still be seen in Pakistan. The ‘selection’ of vice chancellors and other leaders of educational institutes went back to same colonial desire to control what should be free.

Dr Harbans Mukhia, an Indian political historian and professor of Medieval History at the Centre for Historical Studies, elaborated on the actual meaning of academic freedom and its current state in India.

He said the story of academic freedom was very sad in India. History was being distorted in the country and everyday new regulations were brought in for this purpose.

Prof Mukhia said the academic freedom basically meant question; questioning of and challenging received knowledge and wisdom and going beyond and exploring.

He said it also meant challenging all institutions of power: family, caste, creed, religious norms etc. And, therefore, retaliation was inevitable from those powers. So-called honour killings, unjust punishments and such oppressions happened due to such questioning, challenging and defiance of existing powers.

“However, despite all this, society advances by asking such fundamental and challenging questions,” he said, adding that it was through such efforts that society advanced from monarchy to democracy, from theocracies to secularism and better economies.

He concluded by saying it was a social obligation and duty of everyone to question, challenge and critique power institutions, and above all, the state, to gain academic freedom, which ultimately leads to other forms of freedom; freedom of religion, of self, body, and so on.

Speakers at three other sessions in the conference included Dr Syed Jaffar Ahmed, Prof Dr Syed Wiqar Ali Shah, Dr Nazir Mahmood, Dr Tauseef Ahmed, Dr Farid Panjwani, Prof Dr A.H Nayyar, Dr Irfan Aziz, Dr Aurangzeb Alizai and Dr Rashid Hussain Mughal.

Szabist Dean Faculty of Social Sciences Dr Riaz Sheikh welcomed the guests and institute’s president Shahnaz Wazir Ali presented vote of thanks.

Published in Dawn, December 13th, 2023