Lahore, Pakistan: In a school-level debating competition, an eighth-grade student raised some questions that would need serious consideration. She asked:
If the traffic flow on every major highway is affected, then what is the point of having traffic police?
- If crime is going on unabated in every street, neighborhood and city, then what is the point of spending on policing?
- If clean drinking water has to be purchased by the public, then what is the point of water supply institutions?
- If our markets are full of various illegally imported goods, then what is the point of deploying customs staff at the border?
- If there is no solution to the basic problems of the people, then what is the point of public representatives?
- If the employees of government institutions are cutting the roots of their own institutions, then what is the point of paying salaries to such government employees?
- If government schools and colleges are unable to provide quality education, then what is the point of their existence?
- If government hospitals lack treatment and care facilities, then what is the point of allocating billions of rupees to the Health Department?
There could be a long list of such questions but they were those she raised in the age of hardly 12 years.
