KARACHI: Opposition on Tuesday slammed the government during the Sindh Assembly session for poor education system, high dropouts and rising illiteracy in the province but treasury called for billions of rupees funds to rebuild the flood-ravaged school structures.
The house debated an adjournment motion tabled by PPP’s Sharmila Faruqui on “measures required improving literacy rate in the country”.
PTI’s Firdous Shamim Naqvi advised that the government should first run the existing schools effectively then it may consider building new structures.
He alleged that the school structures are primarily built to bag kickbacks and not to improve the quality of education. The kickback system has destroyed the entire education system, he added.
The country should have a 100 percent literacy rate, he urged, adding accentuating on the female education should also be the government’s priority in its policies.
MQM’s Javed Hanif linked the poor education to a class-based social system, saying that about 60 million people in the country are still illiterate with 20 million in Sindh.
Sindh is the only province that has met with a fall in literacy rate, he said, adding that children are found at farms or automobile workshops to help maintain their families.
GDA’s Abdul Razzaque Rahimoon urged the government to provide a bigger stipend to teachers imparting education in Thar and sought scholarships for poor children. He said that the government-run schools lack basic furniture
Sharmila Faruqui told the house that over 20 million kids are still out of schools in the country, saying that the flood ravaged over 19000 education facilities.
In the post-Covid 19 era, she said, t about one million children could not make it to schools. For rebuilding school structures, she said, the government needs about Rs139 billions.
PPP’s Imdad Pitafi said that the government could not do much for the development of education system, adding that “attaining education is everyone’s right”.
He blamed the military dictatorship for “ruining” the country’s education system, saying that undemocratic rules banned the students unions.
Giving a presentation in the house on education and literacy, Sindh Education Minister, Syed Sardar Shah said that floods destroyed over 2000 school structures.
Among the damaged school structures, he said that the government has undertaken repairing over 7000 immediately. He claimed that his party’s rule is making efforts to improve quality of education.
He proposed to the house that the primary school system should be replaced with an elementary one for a better education of children.
The government is going to appoint some 1564 teachers for different subjects, as details in this regards have been submitted to the Sindh public service commission.
A total fiscal budget of the education department stands at Rs252 billion of which Rs192 billion are spent on pensions and salaries, he said.
About Rs44 billion are non-development spending while Rs15 billion are allocated as the development expenditure for the education system, he said that each school receives only Rs300,000 budget per year.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2022
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