Connecting in an Uncertain Environment
by Nikki Enright
Nikki Enright is assistant editor of Information Outlook.
Behind the Technology Curve 
For the average American, it seems unthinkable to wait for hours as a single e-mail message is processed. It also seems just as unlikely that the average American would travel hours just to send a single e-mail message.
But for Muhammad Yaqub Chaudhary, who is dealing with a sluggardly information system in Kashmir, these scenarios are truths.
"Sometimes it takes hours for me to send one e-mail. Sometimes it is easier for me to drive four hours to Islamabad to send e-mail," said Yaqub. "The connectivity is not good. You cannot imagine the environment."
Now imagine this being the environment for a special librarianbelonging to an occupation in which efficient connectivity can make a world of difference, sometimes meaning money saved or lost. While most information professionals rely on a wealth of electronic information resources, Yaqub belongs to a sect of the profession that is playing catch-up in the Information Age.
Yaqub serves as the chief librarian at the University of Azad Jammu & Kashmir in Muzaffarbad, Azad Kashmir. Azad Kashmir lies along the cease-fire line in Pakistan and is neither a province nor an agency. Although this region is recognized as independent by Pakistan, it is under protection of and has strong economic and administrative ties to Pakistan. And it goes without saying that this region is one of much international interest.
This June, Yaqub was able to stop by SLA headquarters and as a surprise, brought his son, Muhammad Umar Farooq, along. In addition to his son, Yaqub's wife, younger son, sister-in-law and one cousin also lie in the librarian lineage. Umar works in Islamabad, Pakistan, as a reference and research specialist at the Information and Resource Center for the U.S. Embassy, where information technology is much more reliable than in most parts of the nation. Umar and his father joked briefly about how Yaqub is still doing things the old-fashioned way, while his son is well versed in the tools technology now affords.
"For the new generation it is difficult to write even a single page, but I can do it on the keyboard," Umar said, motioning with his hands how familiar he has become with typing.
"I don't even use a calculator, I can calculate the old-fashioned way on paper. On a computer he can write, but on paper I can write," Yaqub said, laughing.
While Yaqub is slowly adjusting to technological change, he is not resistant to change in other areas. Although there is somewhat of a caste system still remaining in Pakistan, Yaqub does not apply any such rules to his patrons. He is breaking the mold.
"Everyone can use my services. In my library these things do not prevail [the hierarchical notion], but they prevail in society. Information is for everybody. What I believe and what is especially true in our environment is ill-informed or misinformed societies are the problem these days," Yaqub said. "If we are well-informed and really good in knowledge, then we will be less aggressive and there will be less terrorists. So we [Pakistan] need information technology more than the people in the United States do, because you are already an open, democratic society. So I think we need more information, more knowledgemore of these things."
A Tradition of Isolation
The Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a young nation, formed in 1947 by the partitioning of British India into India and Pakistan. According to the United States Department of State, the government of Pakistan estimated a population of 139 million on January 1, 1998, equating to a population density of about 175 people per square kilometer. This breaks down to a 32 percent urban-based population, with the remaining 68 percent living in a rural setting. The country has been challenged with unstable governments, civil wars and a fluctuating economy.
Currently, information facilities are spread out around the country, but mostly concentrated in the big cities. When you combine this with Pakistan's 39.4 percent literacy rate (as estimated by UNESCO in 1998) and the inability of a poor population to invest in information technology, you end up with unfavorable conditions that quell technological advancement.
But the government would like to change this.
According to the Pakistan 2010 Programme, a government initiative established by Minister Mohammed Nawaz Shariff in 1997, the promise of increased Internet use in Pakistan would ideally become a reality, offering up more opportunities for the information community (and the population as a whole). In a December 2000 report titled, The Internet in Turkey and Pakistan: A Comparative Analysis, Peter Wolcott and Seymour Goodman explain how the "Programme establishes the shift from material-based to knowledge-based production as one of the six key steps that define the program's Action Plan."
As Written in the 'Programme:'
A second shift is from material-based toward knowledge-based production. The international context has changed dramatically over the last fifty years, and comparative advantage has shifted from those with access to raw material to those with access to knowledge. Pakistan must be prepared to operate in this new scenario. To this end, policy must guide investment to high-tech areas, through support for information technology, technical education, incentives for knowledge production, provision of free and open access to information, opening up credit markets to knowledge industries, and generally creating [an] environment for research and technology development.
More recently, on July 17, 2002, the Roshan Pakistan Web Magazine published an article reporting, "The [Pakistan] government would offer its neglected but nascent information technology sector a major boost, aiming to increase software exports to over $1 billion annually within the next five years."
The article went on the say how Pakistan's Science and Technology Minister Atta-ur-Rehman has hope for the future of technology in Pakistan. Rehman believes the Science and Technology sector could prove to be an "engine of economic growth" for Pakistan. In the fiscal year that ended June 30, the budget for science and technology was increased to $76 million, up from the $1 million assigned the previous year, according to the report in Roshan Pakistan.
"Information technology is getting the highest priority because it is here we feel the maximum impact on the society will be. There is a very dramatic growth taking place right now in the IT area in Pakistan," Rehman said in the article, referring to 400 Pakistani cities, towns and villages that have been wired for the Internet in the last eight months, up from a mere 20.
Umar cites the total of those now actively using the Internet in Pakistan as 0.5 percent (or 500,000 to 700,000 persons), with the number of Internet users in Pakistan growing by 10 percent each month.
"The government of Pakistan is encouraging the private sector and government institutions to use information technology effectively for their respective operations and functions," Umar said. "Now the real challenge for the information experts in Pakistan is to bring this revolution into their professional circle. And there are two important steps for it: one, to update the curricula of library science schools in Pakistan. The purpose should be to educate the students on how they can use information technology in the library operations, functions and services; and two, to provide IT training to current librarians at government institutions, research centers, academic and public libraries."
Umar went on to say how the Internet is cheap in Pakistan. It is free in airport lounges and there are a number of Internet cafes in the streets of the big cities, giving proof to the growing Internet culture in Pakistan, he said.
An Information Conduit
Meanwhile, Yaqub is learning how to utilize the latest information technology with his son's assistance and through the "Information Partnership Program" provided by the American Embassy in Islamabad. Yaqub depends a great deal upon the services provided to him by the Information and Resource Center. With the information and tools available to him at the embassy, Yaqub becomes a messenger for the less technological-developed region of Kashmir in which he works.
"I am getting my information from them [the American Embassy]," he said. "They have given me so many thingscomputers, information, videos, books. So with the help of the American Embassy, I am supplying all these things to my clients, but outside of the university they cannot use this."
The clientele Yaqub serves at his university is small and consists mostly of those he calls 'specialty' customersincluding students and faculty at a university with approximately 2,000 students. However, since the area is still largely lacking the appropriate facilities in a place Yaqub describes as "small, backward and remote," he shares his facility and capabilities with othersothers including the prime minister and president of Kashmir, who Yaqub says are especially interested in information about conflict resolution in Kashmir.
"Since it is such a small place (geographically speaking), there are no good public libraries, so the public comes there [to his University]. Recently we are even permitting the army to come in, because they are there. Even some media people come in," Yaqub said. Yaqub's facility also provides reference services to those serving in the Azad Kashmir bureaucracy, judiciary, police force and the National Kashmir Committee.
Since the population wants to learn more and technology is usually limited to more developed areas, Yaqub collaborated with the Information and Resource Center at the embassy to hold a seminar for people from his university before the 9/11 bombings.
"We had over 80 faculty and students travel to Islamabad, on a four-hour bus trip. Some of them were using the Internet for their very first time," Yaqub said. He added that the Internet is fairly new to Kashmir, being activated for a period of time close to a single year.
Fortunately, Yaqub is not the only one who benefits from the embassy. Umar says the embassy also works with libraries throughout Pakistan to further their knowledge about current technological advances.
"We have an internship program at the Information Center, where we invite the librarians from the universities and public librariesteaching them how to use e-mail, how to use the Internet effectively, especially how to use online publishing," Umar said. "Also, they have no access from their libraries to these things, so they are encouraged to come into our libraries and use our Internet facilities."
A Change in Attitude
Like those of many Americans, the lives of Yaqub and Umar changed after 9/11. After the attacks in America, the Information and Resource Center at the embassy has placed stringent limits on the use of its Internet facilities.
"I get e-mails all the time asking when the Information Center will open again," Umar said. "After 9/11 my library was closed, so we had no communication with our public. We had many things to tell them, but no access to them. They had no access to us. Now we have access to only those with some kind of electronic communication unit. The majority of the people were coming to us before September 11. Now what do we tell them?"
Since the eleventh of September, both Yaqub and Umar say the subjects and topics requested by public and academic library patrons have changed.
"You see more requests for information on conflict resolution and terrorism, everyone asks about that. That is a change," Umar said.
Yaqub shared one particular experience that is also indicative of this trend. During a phone conversation, Major General Sardar Muhammad Anwar Khan, the chancellor of the University of Azad Jammu & Kashmir (who is also the president of Azad Jammu and Kashmir) said to Yaqub, "I am going to deliver a lecture at the National Defense College in Islamabad and I need the latest information on Kashmir conflict resolution."
"I did not have these things," Yaqub said. "I had to go to the Information Center and then I provided the information to him. So there has been also a client change. Before that, nobody asked me to deliver anything on the Kashmir conflict. And these are things that are not in books, but in electronic media."
Hence, the increased need for sufficient electronic information capabilities.
Tapping Into the Global Information Community
Through his membership with SLA, Yaqub has been able to increase his contacts, knowledge and understanding of the available information tools. Yaqub was particularly grateful for his acceptance as an attendant to the SLA Global 2000 Conference in Brighton, U.K.
In 1999, Yaqub began the application process, sending various letters of recommendation to SLA Headquarters. These letters reveal a story of their own, concerning Yaqub's desires to help develop information services and technology for his university and country. The University of Azad Jammu & Kashmir's Vice Chancellor Khalil Ahmed Qureshi wrote a letter of recommendation, saying:
it gives me pleasure to nominate our Chief Librarian Mr. Muhammad Yaqub Yaqub The University of Azad Jammu and Kashmir is situated in a very remote area of Pakistan The population served by this university has [a] literacy rate higher than [the] whole of Pakistan If given a chance to attend the SLA Global Conference 2000, I am sure our chief librarian will be more capable to run his special library for assistance [to] our research and academic program, according to the requirements of the 21st Century of Information Technology.
Stephen Mallinger, an information resource officer for the United States Embassy in Mexico, also wrote a letter appraising Yaqub and explaining how the conference in Brighton would strongly benefit the librarian. His letter reads:
It was my pleasure to meet Mr. Yaqub while I served as an Information Resource Officer with the American Embassy in Islamabad We formed an Information Partnership between the university library and the American Information USA Center. This was important for the following reasons: the university library was cut off from advanced information technology but both Mr. Yaqub and the university administration were anxious to advance their operation. Second, the library was the central information resource for Pakistani Kashmir It is of utmost importance that Mr. Yaqub's library be able to access information on the tense political situation surrounding the area It is difficult for anyone outside of Pakistan to fully appreciate the significance of new information technology for Pakistan's libraries I am sure the SLA conference will provide him with a network of professionals that will be invaluable for the whole of Azad Kashmir.
Yaqub wrote in his own essay how attendance to such a conference would bolster his ability to use and understand the latest services, in turn teaching others about them.
A portion of his essay for acceptance to the Brighton conference reads:
With the dawn of the 21st century, the holding of [the] Global 2000 Conference in England is an appreciable step. It is timely and important, especially for the professional librarian like myself who belong[s] to a developing country of the Third World. The advanced technologies used [by] information science today in the Western world are alien to this part of the world. By attending this important conference, I am sure to get [the] latest information about modern processes used in dissemination of knowledge and new electro-mechanical techniques used in librariesI feel this is also a golden opportunity of meeting, exchanging ideas, sharing views and knowing various problems and their solutions with other more experienced professional librarians of [the] advanced electronic age.
Unfortunately, on the way to the SLA Global 2000 Conference in Brighton, Yaqub's flight was hijacked. Though he downplayed this incident (and made it to the conference unharmed), he did mention, rather plainly, how this made him miss the pre-conference workshop. Ironically, the compensation from the airline enabled him to pay for the second year's fees at SLA, continuing his free first year membership. He even made it to Los Angeles this year, thanks to an award from the Sci-Tech Division that granted him a stipend to attend annual conference.
Yaqub credits much of his advancement in the latest information science techniques to his ties with SLA and his attendance to various seminars and conferences around the globe (he attended the IFLA Conference this year in Glasgow). He only wishes other information professionals could understand the conditions surrounding technological advancements in Pakistan. He says his professional colleagues are constantly asking him about methods for exploring grants and awards. When Yaqub tosses out the idea to host an international conference in Pakistan, it doesn't seem like such an inconceivable thought.
Maybe it is time for Yaqub to host an international conference of his own. 
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