Imagine a bank that has mismanaged a loan for decades, only to blame the borrower for the bankruptcy. Picture a corporation that has recklessly polluted a village's water source for years and then shifts the blame to the residents for their ensuing health crises. Envision a water system that deliberately delays repairs for leaks, only to accuse consumers of overreacting when they demand action.
This is the stark reality of Pakistan’s education system, a realm marked by dysfunction and neglect for far too long. Education debt constitutes the cumulative historical, economic, sociopolitical, and moral burden resulting from generations of unequal educational opportunities afforded to marginalised groups. Its repercussions include persistent inequality, poverty, social exclusion, and the forfeiture of human potential.
After COVID-19 and the floods of 2022, analysts argue that Pakistan is suffering from a polycrisis—a situation in which multiple, distinct crises (educational, economic, environmental, geopolitical, social, or technological) occur simultaneously and interact in ways that amplify each other, deteriorating outcomes more severe than the sum of the individual crises.
Education debt is a foundational fault line that undermines the stability of our society. It turns small, local issues into bigger, ongoing, and self-reinforcing polycrises. When marginalised communities lose access to education and economic resources, they become more vulnerable to environmental and technological changes. This makes it easier for small problems to grow into larger, society-wide disruptions. Over time, education debt does not just add to other crises—it helps cause them. This keeps inequality in place and makes it harder for us to solve the serious challenges we face today.
In May 2024, Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif declared an education emergency—an acknowledgement that came only after harrowing statistics revealed that 26 million children are out of school and that the World Bank (2022) ranked Pakistan among the lowest in education performance. Disturbingly, in the same year, Pakistan allocated less than 1% of its GDP to education.
This prolonged educational crisis has rarely been viewed as a comprehensive issue. Instead, Pakistan's educational challenges have been tackled piecemeal, missing the opportunity to address the interconnected and systemic problems that have long troubled the country. The visionary American education scholar Gloria Ladson-Billings (2006) introduced the concept of "education debt" in her landmark 2006 address to the American Educational Research Association.
Those in power manipulate resource allocation to safeguard their interests and shape their future while masking reality with the deceptive rhetoric of meritocracy and achievement
She used education debt as a metaphor and posited that this accumulated debt manifests in historical, economic, sociopolitical, and moral dimensions. Furthermore, she argued that focusing solely on measurable "gaps" obscures the far more damning narrative of how this debt was created. While her framework originated in the United States, it fits Pakistan's educational crisis with unsettling precision. The country is burdened with deep-rooted education debt, compounded daily and systematically ignored by those in power.
The historical debt is a powerful testament to the consequences of deliberate, systemic exclusion, continually reinforced by those in power. Pakistan’s education historical debt has its origins in colonial rule, when the foundations of the present system were designed not for liberation but for stratification.
Colonialism resonates not merely through the introduction of an education system to South Asia; it crafted a knowledge framework that entrenched hierarchy and created divisions that still resonate today. English-medium education emerged as a symbol of progress, a ticket to social mobility, and ultimately a gatekeeper to power, perpetuating long-term inequalities that divide urban and rural communities.
What transforms this legacy into debt is the political leadership's failure to dismantle this problematic structure. Instead, they have preserved and reinforced it through a series of reforms cloaked in euphemisms—comprehensive schools, model schools, public schools, Danish schools, cadet colleges, and more. Those in power manipulate resource allocation to safeguard their interests and shape their future while masking reality with the deceptive rhetoric of meritocracy and achievement. They are acutely aware of the significant barriers marginalised populations face in accessing these opportunities.
Economically, Pakistan’s education system is grappling with profound underfunding. Historically, the country has allocated around 1.5% of its GDP to education, falling drastically short of its commitment to the international community, which mandates a minimum of 4%. A 2024–2025 economic survey reported that education spending has plummeted to a mere 0.8% of GDP.
Education in Pakistan is legally mandated to be free and compulsory for all children aged five to sixteen. Yet, shockingly, 38% of children remain out of school, with the numbers for girls skyrocketing to 43%
The federal education budget was slashed by 44%, dropping from PKR 103.8 billion to PKR 58 billion in FY 2024–25, all while Prime Minister Sharif proclaimed an "education emergency". This is not merely a matter of poverty; it reflects a failure to prioritise. Schools often operate without walls, toilets, books, and in some cases, teachers—and this is what the government defines as education. With the number of out-of-school children on the rise and achievement gaps widening, these figures are not just statistics; they are confessions of an impending education crisis.
Ladson-Billings defined sociopolitical debt as the extent to which communities are excluded from the civic processes governing their education. In Pakistan, this exclusion is glaringly clear. Marginalised communities—including girls, particularly from rural backgrounds, and children from various religious, ethnic, and linguistic minorities—have been stripped of any meaningful voice in shaping the education that dictates their futures.
Education is not merely a private or social good; it is a positional good. Along with personal development and societal benefits, it also constitutes an asset that individuals leverage in competition for employment, income, and social status. The entire education policymaking process has been outsourced to technocrats, stripping away the democratic essence of meaningful engagement in the sector.
The moral debt we owe to our children is perhaps the most challenging to quantify, yet unmistakably palpable. Education in Pakistan is legally mandated to be free and compulsory for all children aged five to sixteen. Yet, shockingly, 38% of children remain out of school, with the numbers for girls skyrocketing to 43%.
This is a moral indictment. The law is in place; the children are present; yet the state looks away, opting instead for empty promises. Is this not a debt of conscience? Furthermore, we deem all languages other than Urdu and English inferior, thereby eroding our children’s confidence and robbing them of their imaginative potential. By suggesting that our history, customs, and civilisation are irrelevant or inferior, we accumulate yet another layer of moral obligation.
Safety, health, and well-being concerns, social norms, and unevenly distributed educational levels—Pakistan has roughly 78 per cent primary schools, 11 per cent middle schools, 10 per cent high schools, and 2 per cent higher secondary schools, and less than one per cent intermediate colleges—leave millions of children ensnared in a relentless cycle of illiteracy and poverty, their potential stifled before it can even begin to flourish and complete their transition to the next academic level.
Reports on out-of-school children by the Pakistan Institute of Education show that in many regions, children exist, but there are no schools for them; where schools do exist, a lack of qualified teachers denies them education. With each passing year, our nation accumulates this mounting moral debt.
It is not merely a financial issue; it is a profound ethical reckoning regarding whose futures we prioritise. The educational debt we owe our children cannot simply be wished away. Rhetoric will not absolve us; emergency declarations will not suffice. The children are waiting—they have always been waiting. It is time for us to act decisively.
We cannot ask for another extension; we must repay this historical debt by decolonising our education system. We must meet our economic obligations by increasing financial resources and fostering civic participation in education, particularly from historically marginalised and minoritised communities. And we must honour the moral commitments we have made. The time for action is now.