Director of Education: If I Don't Sell School Uniforms, They'll Call Me a Terrorist

It is now July, and not all high school graduates have received their certificates or diplomas confirming the completion of their 11-year education.

This situation creates an unforgivable problem, especially for young people who want to study at universities outside of Tajikistan. Many of them cannot obtain this document by August or September, which means they lose the opportunity to continue their education and are forced to turn to labor migration instead.

Why has this problem arisen? The issue is not the lack of certificates in the country. All educational departments in the country have these documents, but they do not have permission to issue them to graduates.

A head of an educational department in one of the districts of Khatlon Province said that the price of one certificate is equivalent to the cost of a school uniform for a first-grade student. He mentioned that his school will admit 200 first-grade students this year. "We were given 200 sets of school uniforms for first-grade students and were told that until these uniforms are sold, no one should be given their certificates," he added.

I asked him who brought these uniforms and why he had to sell them. "I don't know," he replied, raising his hands to the sky and adding, "It was an order from above!" He also added that if he told me the details, he would be dismissed before he even reached home. "Then the government will announce that this head of the education department had ties with terrorists, and in the future, I might even end up in prison. After all, we live in a constitutional republic. The government can bring any calamities upon the people using its democratic methods and ideals," he added.

From the words of the head of the education department, I realized that not only the people but also government officials are afraid of the so-called democratic policies of this republic.

The government of Tajikistan officially requires schoolchildren to wear uniforms. Every year, parents must buy school uniforms for their children. These uniforms are produced by factories owned by people close to the government.

The cost of school uniforms, whose quality is so poor that it's even a sin to think about it, amounts to billions of dollars across the country. Since no one buys these uniforms in the markets, their sale is assigned to the heads of educational departments in exchange for issuing certificates. On the other hand, school uniforms sold in markets are not made in Tajikistan. The government has also resisted these foreign-made uniforms, meaning that wearing them in schools is prohibited. Despite this, foreign-made school uniforms can still be seen on students. Parents who have money buy these uniforms and, for accountability to school principals and inspection commissions from the education department, also purchase a set of domestically produced uniforms.

Thus, as September approaches and students return to school, the issue of school uniforms is forgotten. This situation continues until July or August of the following year. However, due to the disputes over the sale of school uniforms, young people are left without certificates, effectively wasting a year of their lives. Some even abandon their education altogether. Some go into labor migration, while others push carts in the markets of Dushanbe.

You see, for the sake of selling a uniform produced by someone close to the government, the fate and dreams of hundreds of young people and their families are changed and ruined. In such circumstances, the patriotism of young people and their respect for the state and its system diminish.

It's as if Abulkasim Lahuti said this for a reason:

"Life will end, slavery is unnecessary,
If slavery is required, life is unnecessary."

It is due to the negative policies of the state that no young person dreams of anything other than money and a good car. This very policy of the state, which is considered democratic and based on the rule of law, has become an obstacle to the development of the republic in all sectors, especially in education and science, in today's Tajikistan.

Hikmati Darvesh