Axis A4 · scored on 18 books
National-narrative closure
When something went wrong, is anyone inside the country responsible for it?
Tested mainly on the handling of 1971, military rule and Islamisation. The strongest single indicator is whether any Pakistani actor is criticised anywhere in the book.
How the five bands are defined
Fixed before any book was read. A score without cited evidence is not a score.
| Score | Operational test |
|---|---|
| 1 | Multiple actors; internal causes admitted; failure and wrongdoing acknowledged. |
| 2 | Nationalist arc with substantial internal criticism. |
| 3 | Standard nationalist arc with some internal criticism. |
| 4 | Largely closed; internal fault mentioned but not pursued. |
| 5 | Externalised blame; no internal fault; providential inevitability. |
Board means English-medium only
Urdu and Sindhi material is theme-grade under this project's evidence rules and is excluded from every mean. Means over small n are shown with their n and should not be quoted without it.
| Board | Mean | n | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Khyber Pakhtunkhwa | 3.00 | 2 | |
| Balochistan | 3.40 | 5 | |
| Federal | 3.50 | 2 | |
| Punjab | 4.40 | 5 | |
| Sindh | 5.00 | 1 |
Lowest is Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (3.00), highest is Sindh (5.00). A gap this size may be an artefact of curriculum vintage rather than province — the synthesis separates the two.
Distribution across the corpus
| Score | Books | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 0 | |
| 2 | 1 | |
| 3 | 5 | |
| 4 | 9 | |
| 5 | 3 |
Poles are descriptive, not evaluative. A high score is a measured property of a text, not a verdict on a board, an author or a teacher.
Books at the top of this axis
| Score | Book | Board | Class | Vintage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 | 8th Class History (UM) Textbook in PDF by Punjab Board | Punjab | 8 | SNC 2022 |
| 5 | 9th Class Pakistan Studies (UM) PDF Textbook by Punjab Board | Punjab | 9 | SNC 2022 |
| 5 | Social Studies VIII (2022-23) | Sindh | 8 | Federal legacy (Middle School Project) |
| 4 | 6th Class History English Medium Text Book by BTBB | Balochistan | 6 | National Curriculum 2022-23 |
| 4 | History - Grade 6 | Balochistan | 6 | National Curriculum 2022-23 |
| 4 | 7th Class History (EM) Text Book by Balochistan Board | Balochistan | 7 | National Curriculum 2022-23 |
Books at the bottom
| Score | Book | Board | Class | Vintage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | History - Grade 8 | Balochistan | 8 | National Curriculum 2022-23 |
| 3 | Pakistan Studies 10 UM KPK | Khyber Pakhtunkhwa | 10 | National Curriculum 2006 |
| 3 | Pakistan Studies 10 EM KPK | Khyber Pakhtunkhwa | 10 | National Curriculum 2006 |
| 3 | Pakistan Studies 9 EM KPK | Khyber Pakhtunkhwa | 9 | National Curriculum 2006 |
| 3 | Pakistan Studies - Grade 10 | Federal | 10 | Single National Curriculum (federal) |
| 3 | Pakistan Studies - Grade 10 | Balochistan | 10 | National Curriculum 2006 |
Where this axis is weakest
It is scored on 18 of 167 current books. Coverage is uneven by design: a lens reads the books where its question is live, so a science volume may carry three axis scores and a Pakistan Studies volume seven. That means board means on this axis rest on different books from board means on another, and the two are not interchangeable. The full per-book tables, with page-cited evidence for every score, are in the history lens report.