FATA’s Merger with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa: An Historical Analysis

Nation-building is an evolutionary socio-political process. It not only provides security, dignity and ownership to a community, but also ensures democratic participation of people within the state to claim rights and perform duties. It enables a state to defend its sovereignty, achieve economic goals, and protect national interests at regional and global levels. Since 9/11 incident, terrorism has become a global challenge. To counter this menace Pakistan also aligned and provided land routes to foreign forces to get access to a landlocked Afghanistan. Across the Pak-Afghan border, through the tribal belt known as FATA, terrorism has spilled over Pakistan. The exclusive status of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), in the past seventy years of Pakistan’s history, had deprived fundamental rights to the people of FATA. These tribal areas were governed by a separate law known as Frontier Crimes Regulations (FCR) made by the British in 1901. This law has proved as the main obstacle in bringing FATA in to the mainstream of Pakistan. After examining the historical and geographical aspects of FATA, the article shows how FATA remained outside the nation-building process in Pakistan. In this connection it seeks to see the position of FATA in the constitutions of Pakistan, including state initiatives to own this western belt and obstacles faced in merging FATA with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK). It narrates the events that led to the merger of FATA with the KPK and high lights future challenges as well. It recommends that FATA’s merger would help establish a strong line of defence against terrorism. ______

A Study of the Causes of Students Conceptual Problems in Learning Algebra

The main purpose of my study was to find out some of the conceptual problems and their causes in learning algebra. The study was conducted in three stages, Pre-Intervention, intervention and post-intervention stages, in one of the government schools. Two teachers and ten students from class VII-A and VII-D voluntarily participated in this study in order to provide relevant information. To collect required information, non-participant and participant observation, semi-structured interviews and reflective journal were used as techniques. During the pre-intervention stage of study, the causes of some conceptual problems in learning algebra which include lack of teachers' content knowledge, teachers' misconception about algebraic terms, gap between students' existing and current knowledge, Urdu algebraic terminology, and wait time for students were identified. The teachers appeared to be unaware of these causes of the problems. To work with the teachers as a mentor in order to improve their classroom practice and help them to overcome these problems to some extent, an intervention of instructional strategies was introduced. The findings of my study reveal that the teachers found the mentoring process helpful in improving their classroom practice and further helped them to some extent to overcome these conceptual problems. The teachers thought that the group work and A.V aids contributed to effective teaching of algebra. These views were also confirmed by the students. Further, teachers thought, if such professional support continues they can update the content and enhance the pedagogical knowledge which might help them to make students' learning in algebra interesting and meaningful.