Khyber Pakhtunkhwa decides to establish private schools regulatory authority

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa cabinet on Monday passed many drafts of several crucial legislations particularly the most awaited Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Private Schools Regulatory Authority Bill 2012. The legislation will be presented in the provincial assembly soon. The meeting of the provincial cabinet was held here with Chief Minister, KP, Ameer Haider Khan Hoti in the chair. It was 52nd meeting of the provincial assembly. The meeting was held in the Cabinet Room of Civil Secretariat.
The meeting besides reviewing the implementation of the decisions taken in previous meeting and also discussed other matters and took several decisions. Briefing the media about the decisions taken in the provincial cabinet, KP Minister for Information, Mian Iftikhar Hussein said that six different bills included KP Private Schools Regulatory Authority Bill 2012, Tameer-e-Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Programme Guidelines Amendment Bill, Draft Travel Agencies, Hotels, Restaurants and Tourist Guide, KP Judicial Service Rules (Amendment), Utilisation of 5 per cent oil and gas royalty for districts having well-heads of oil & gas, Naming Football Stadium of Bannu Sports Complex after Ziyad Akram Durrani and Labour Laws.
The provincial minister said that the draft of KP Private Schools Regulatory Authority Bill 2012 was presented in the provincial cabinet on March 7, 2012. But, the cabinet directed the department of Elementary and Education to in collaboration with the department of law review its different sections including members of the authority, penalty for violators. Therefore, it was once again presented in the provincial cabinet and after approval it will be presented in the provincial assembly.
According to the bill the authority will be comprised of 13 members with Provincial Minister for Elementary and Secondary Education as its chairman. The members will be included Secretary Elementary and Secondary Education, Secretary Higher Education, Secretary Finance, Secretary Establishment, chairman BISE, Peshawar, while the managing director and four other representatives will represent private schools, which will be nominated from a period of two years. Half number of members will convene a meeting through filing application.
The authority will be responsible for registration, regulation and looking after of private schools. Furthermore, the authority will also monitor syllabus, fee, curricular and co-curricular activities of the private educational institutions. Education qualification for teachers of private schools, training, salary and supervision of the service of teachers will also be carried out by the authority.
Under the rules of the authority, registration for all private schools will be compulsory for private schools and in case of unregistered education institution included high schools, higher secondary schools, intermediate level college or other equal institution could be fined Rs 0.2 million or one year imprisonment or both punishments.