By Ravi Nitesh
Her writing a diary, the daring decision to continue schooling inspite of the warnings, her announced desire to ensure schooling for many like herself, her stand on the issue of female education (that may be viewed as gender activism too), her reporting and observation skills which again boils down to her passion for education and rights and most importantly, the positive energy that kept her going really makes her a young but fierce struggle for peace and ofcourse, female education. But is she the only one? What about the other Malalas?
This world is full of “ists” and “isms”. Many people ascribe to one or more than one ideology. But for me, all the ideologies are a part of humanism. However, regardless of whether it is Marxism, Maoism or Gandhism, it is the humanity that associates and joins the hearts. Malala, in this case, directly comes with ideology of Humanism. Children at her age never think about the society and its problems but Malala did. But this was because Malala had to face these problems so we can say that she was forced to think on these issues. There are so many children who are still facing the same problems like Malala and many are there who are in more threat than her. These children belong to all conflict zones of the world. Be it Swat Valley, African countries, Syria, Palestine or J&K. These children are facing more or less the same physical/psychological troubles owing to the ill-treatment and practice of Government as well as anti-Government forces. We talk about Taliban, which is undoubtedly an extremist group and must be opposed, but what about legalized terror? Are these legalized and government sponsored agencies not responsible for these situations? Why don’t we oppose and highlight the attacks on thousands of innocent children who lost their lives in Drone attacks in the similar way? What about the young students who have been killed in Kashmir and other conflict zones?
Malala stood for education, but more than that she had stood against injustice. If at one point, we forget the reason, the action is “to stand up against Injustice”. In my view, the action is more important than the reason because it is the action which brings about the change. This action must sustain. Malala Yusufzai has all prayers of ours for her courage, thoughts and action. On the similar path, there are a lot of other reasons but with the same underlying motive to stand against injustice that may force another young person to take action and I hope that we understand and highlight that struggle as well. The struggle may not be against Taliban but maybe against the injustice caused by our own people and own Government. I hope that we may understand the action of these people who may come out for change through democratic and peaceful way.
