The term brain drain was coined by the spokesmen of the Royal Society of London to describe the outflow of scientists and technologists to the United States and Canada in the early 1950s. Since then the term has become synonymous with human capital or the migration of highly educated individuals from the developing, mostly third world countries, to the developed ones.
Over the past few decades, more since Pakistan has been lurched full throttle into economic and political chaos, the phenomenon has become the bane of the society. The number of repining Pakistanis who wish to settle abroad is rising every year and the ones who are actually capable of breaking loose are coincidentally the educated ones, contributing alarmingly to the growing crisis of the Pakistani brain drain. To leave the country and settle abroad has become the zeitgeist of current day Pakistan.
Unfortunately either the government does not realize the severity of the problem or prefers to brush it under the proverbial rug like so many other issues. The migration of the Pakistani professionals to foreign countries, namely, US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand has increased considerably with young educated and skilled Pakistani such as doctors, IT Experts, scientists and other professional either already gone or planning to leave. The fact that workers from all skill levels are losing or have completely lost faith in the economic future of the country was revealed by the Gallup survey that indicated that even the semi-skilled and unskilled workers want to migrate outside in search of better prospects. 62 percent of the adults who were surveyed expressed the desire to migrate abroad while 38 percent said that they would prefer to settle outside permanently.
It is often thought that the transmittance of funds by the ones who leave the country as a result of brain drain is a good enough substitute for these individuals actually staying in the country and working. But that idea is valid only to a minimal extent as there can be no substitute for services these professionals could be rendering the country by staying within the borders and adding to a far rapid economic, scientific and technological development of the country. Again, that can only happen if the proper infrastructure is provided to them whereby the country could earn manifold the money it receives from transmittance from the migrated workers.
According to Dr. Fitzhugh Mullan of George Washington University every doctor who leaves a poor nation leaves a hole that cannot be filled. He says,
“That creates enormous problems for the source country and the educational and health leaders in the country who are attempting to provide healers”.
Research shows that at 20 countries export more than 10 percent of their physician work force to richer nations with nearly no reciprocation as the US exports less than one-tenth of 1 percent of its doctors. Economic factor is primarily responsible for this mass migration of the scientific community from poorer, host countries like Pakistan. In Pakistan the value placed for a scientist with an advanced level degree is Grade 17 which comes with a salary that is totally insufficient to meet the basic requirements of a family. So it is no surprise that the advanced countries are exploiting the situation by offering these individuals far more handsome incentives.
Asif J. Mir writes in ‘Pakistani Think Tank’,
“We cannot achieve long-term economic growth by exporting our human resource. In the new world order, people with knowledge drive economic growth. We talk a lot of poverty alleviation in Pakistan. But who is going to alleviate the poverty-the uncreative bureaucracy that created poverty? Hypothetically, the most talented should lead the people, create wealth and eradicate poverty and corruption”.
Phillip Bonosky, contributing editor of Political Affairs, writes in his book Afghanistan-Washington’s Secret War.
“Pakistan seems to have nothing but problems. Endemic poverty which was Great Britain’s imperial gift to the colonial world-a poverty on which the sun never sets-skilled (badly needed in Pakistan itself) abroad in search for jobs. Hardly any country has suffered more from the brain drain than has Pakistan. Nearly 3,000 (annually) graduates of Pakistan’s medical colleges are jobless; most go abroad. The educated see their future not in their home country but in any country but their own”.
According to a report in the The Observer, London,
“Pakistan is facing a massive brain drain as record numbers of people desperate to leave their politically unstable, economically chaotic country swamp foreign embassies with visa applications-The biggest number of applications for British visas are from Pakistan. Doctors, lawyers and IT professional and leading the exodus, but laborers and farmhands are joining the queues of malnourished people who gather daily outside the US embassy in Islamabad”.
The greatest effect of brain drain on any country is what is seen in Pakistan today; rampant corruption, poor administrations, lack of motivation and a fast diminishing nationalism. Unless there is nationalism there can be no collective progress and poverty and crime will continue to increase under the umbrella of plethoric apathy. Whatever the solution it needs to come fast and it needs to be come now otherwise - when the educated are away, the uneducated will play - as they are playing at the moment.
Photo Credits: Flickr.com. Clicking on the photos will take you to their source pages.
I think one solution is to change the way the educational system is run. The country might need to invest more into education in the short-term in order to get a return on that investment in the long-term.
Most people who are likely to leave the country can afford to do so. Yet education is possibly the single most important thing to Pakistanis, culturally, religiously, politically, however you want to view it. The average Pakistani’s dreams rise and set on education. We need to concentrate our educational system’s efforts on those Pakistanis whose dreams don’t include leaving Pakistan.
A greater amount of merit-based scholarships starting from earlier ages all the way through graduate school would ensure we’d have a professional class that would, at least for the time being, stay, work, and contribute to Pakistan. Simply because they can’t afford to leave.
I also think we need to take advantage of the madrassah system. While there are many basic madrassahs where kids go simply to learn Qur’an, I’m talking about the ones which offer actual traditional “degrees” (usually the ones based on the Dar ul Uloom Deoband model), starting from basic 4-5 year courses and all the way up to professional “takhassus” (Ph.D. equivalent) degrees.
These people, for the most part, are active, practicing Muslims who, for better or worse, will never seek to leave Pakistan. For one thing, Urdu has become one of the most important languages of Islamic study after Arabic in the world today, and for another, very few other countries allow them the freedom to live as Islamic a lifestyle as they please. Especially the women who observe the full veil or niqab, who simply have no choice of working in the US, UK, or Canada. Or in countries like Saudi-Arabia which are more Wahabi than traditional Sunni.
If the government instituted scholarship/grant programs to give graduates of these programs free rides into equivalent secular (or rather “arts and sciences”) schools. For instance, in many colleges in Pakistan, especially the government-run, there’s a substantial fee discount and lax admission standards for kids who have completed Hifz of the Qur’an. This program should be increased for those seeking to get into A/O-level programs (I’m not sure what they call that here, secondary schooling?). Those with the Alim/Alimah degrees and better should get free scholarships (provided they meet entry requirements) to undergrad/graduate programs in all fields, not just medicine or engineering, but philosophy, languages, etc. These kids are usually more committed to schooling and that Pakistani dream of education. Already there are so many women in government colleges at least who you can tell are from religious backgrounds, the more of them that are educated, the more jobs that will be created for them.
People might be afraid that the country might automatically “Islamicize” this way, with gender-segregated schools, hospitals, etc. popping up so women observing Islamic etiquettes of hijab/niqab can see only women patients for example or other things… but what’s wrong with that? More doctors are better than no doctors.
And the people from these backgrounds don’t necessarily need a good economy. Their trips through madrassahs are mostly free and many of them wind up working for free after they graduate because of how they are taught to avoid taking money for such things. It stands to reason they’d be a lot more affordable in the engineering, medical, civil service, sectors.
This would also root out and destroy all the causes of extremism, particularly those not rooted in traditional Sunni or Shi’ite schools. The government should selectively stick to Sunni and Shi’ite programs to endorse initially, and boycott all Salafi/Wahabi institutions. This would change the demographics of the nation and solve most of our current political problems. Not to mention it would finally accomplish Allama Iqbal’s vision of Pakistan as the vehicle of reconstruction of Islamic thought. We always talk about how Pakistan and Pakistanis are Allama Iqbal’s vision. Well, maybe it’s time we looked at his ENTIRE vision. The Muslim world is acutely aware of the lack of true Muslim professionals/scholars (i.e, practicing, with credentials in religion as well as worldly sciences… like the Muslims of old who made Islam the leading civilization).
This can only happen in Pakistan. Other Muslim countries are either too liberal (Turkey, Tunisia, etc. who ban Islamic activity altogether) or too conservative (Wahabi/Salafi-minded countries). We should embrace our true ‘moderate’ Islam, which is to say… straight up Sunni Islam, which is already moderate enough, even in the most strictest sense (even the ‘Deobandi’ style, despite having its reputation tarnished by the Taliban, is by doctrine much more liberal than the Wahabis of Saudi-Arabia yet that country enjoys a great relationship with the West and all the economic leaders of the world… religion is not the problem).
“It was Hazrat Omer (may allah be pleased with him) who said:
If a stray dog dies of thirst by the side of a river, then, even that is my fault!
We need a leader who thinks like THAT.”
Exactly.
A lot of Pakistanis abroad are looking to come back, dissatisfied with increasingly negative views towards Muslims and immigrants as well as an increasingly immoral culture.
I am one such person. I was born and raised in the States but I came to Pakistan for graduate studies and to at least get in touch with my family and to lay the foundations for possibly living and working here myself one day, as well as raising a family here, inshallah. I’ve still got a long ways to go to adjust.
A lot of recent government programs have made it easier, but the overall state of affairs (particularly on the economic front) need to continue improving. The unfortunate truth is, as long as the economy’s growing, most Pakistanis coming back in would love the opportunity to pay their way to get everything, justice included, since they’ve got plenty of money (and an advantage over many locals in that respect).
The reason there is a brain drain in Pakistan is because there is no justice in Pakistan. People who work and become successful are targeted by low lifes using the state machinery such as police and courts. The police and the judges can be bought and sold so there is no justice. Even if someone manages to get justice and takes himself out of the false cases he has been subjected to, then the police and the judges create hinderances to stop the law taking its course and punishing the false allegation of the accuser.
Why is this injustice here? Well, what do you expect when you do not dole out justice to the Judge, whom you pay a paltry Rs18,000 to Rs20,000 per month and then expect him to dole out justice when he himself is not getting justice… or take the police man, who is facing the same problem. These individuals wield a lot of power but are powerless to feed themselves and hold their body and soul together without buying and selling justice as if it were a commodity.
Cure. Give justice to everyone, and Pakistan will prosper
It was Hazrat Omer (may allah be pleased with him) who said:
If a stray dog dies of thirst by the side of a river, then, even that is my fault!
We need a leader who thinks like THAT.
Zindagi-ki-Diary,
you have again demonstrated the catch 22….unless the educated return and try to fix the situation, Pakistan will remain in the slumps but the educated won’t return until the country is out of the slumps hence Pakistan will remain in the slumps and the educated won’t return…..Who will break the latch on this catch?!
@ Zindagi Ki Diary …..
Docs specially have nothing to do with politics !
Good Law and Order cannot make anyone escape from death….the nighr in teh graveyard will not be spent on the face of earth…
9/11..7/7..and Madrid Train blasts..is their anything uncertain than death !
qualified professional can get reasonable money at end of month in pakisatn to live as an honurable man..but not minarates of pounds and dollars….but with 3rd class citizenship…..
I can sweep the streets of my own country…instead of being a 3rd Class Citizen of US..UK…or by hearing leave our land…and other racial…and filthy comments !
the same 1001 bahanais….we all are fed up now..by hearing these lame excuses. just if you dont want to serve Pakisatn..plz. dont add salt to our wounds by these crocodile tears….sorry to say !
Being myself a physician of Pakistani origin in USA, I can tell you - I myself tried 4 times in 15 years to return to Pakistan but political, law and order, economic or religious instability forced me back to USA.
As much blame we put on USA for global problems, we pakistanis have no interest and probably no clue of taking care of ourselves. There is a reason ‘paki’ overtime became a slur in west. Its heartbreaking but did we ever pause why our own cream wants to go away !
Lot of comments in this post makes a lot of sense and was a very important post - congratulations
@ Jamshed
Gaussian Curve represnts the same phenomenon….!
world is full of average ..low mentality..self-centred…dollar-lovers..materisltic approached mindset….USMLE crammers …runners….and consider it very “successful” life…with $8000/month etc etc….
but only few….will think about Pakistan..Islamic World…the rekindling the Bagdad..Cordava era…reburning and relighting the torch of Nishapur…Cairo..and Damasqus….
nothing new or special..as Gaussian Curve represents….only few diaomonds…falls in that category..rest all are coal mines by-products…..
Vultures and Crows fly in the same blue airs…but Hawks are seldom !
umm… who will fix? thats a good question.. i thought about it as well and I answer lies in economics 101.. apply the supply and demand rule .. the fact of the matter is that right now we produce ‘VERY FEW’ high class talneted individuals and ironically, most of them have the dream to go abraod or have already migrated like you said..
we cannot stop the brain drain but what we can do is increase our production so the remainig talent who opt to stay in Pakstan are in good numbers…. in addition to that out top nothc talent need to change their mindset to become produce “LEADERS” and not just followers.. Like when I sopke to some of the gold medalists of my time, they all wanted to go abroad and work for some Big 5 companies.. none of them had the ambition to be one of those Big 5 or be #6 at leat.. our bright doctors’ dream is to pass the USMLE and the top tier technologists wnat to get H1B visa.. they just cant think beyond that..
and talking about the average graduates, the majority of the students that graduate form our schools are, sorry to say, “NON-QUALFIED”… they are good for nothing.. the quality and standard of education in Pakistan is at all time LOW.. that needs immediate attention, we should have fixed it yesterday..