One of the worst scandals unearthed in a UN-funded primary education for girls project has blown the lid off the scale of corruption in the education sector in Pakistan. The schoolbags meant for the poor and deprived children from Sindh are being sold in the provincial metropolis, Pakistan Today has learnt.
Some Sindh Education Department officials sold around 80,000 schoolbags prepared with UNICEF funding to a Lahore resident. Now these schoolbags bearing the UNICEF logo are being sold at public places all across the city. A Sindh Education Department official, who asked not to be named, told Pakistan Today that these bags were prepared under a program titled “Dakhal Theenr Jo Tohfa” aimed at improving the literacy rate for girls in the interior of Sindh with UNICEF’s support. He said the schoolbags being sold in Lahore were meant for primary students and had to be supplied to those districts that were destroyed by last year’s floods. He said such scandals were rampant in the Sindh Education Department as only last month books meant for poor students were sold in the market by corrupt officials.
Malik Babar, an elderly man, who was selling the schoolbags at King Edward Medical College, told Pakistan Today that his nephew bought 80,000 such bags from Karachi. He said that he was selling these bags for Rs 15 apiece while in universities a single bag was selling at Rs 25. Babar was adamant that he was the competent authority to purchase these bags, claiming he could provide 30,000 bags immediately. Babar claimed the Sindh government’s officials had sold these bags to his nephew.
Muhammad Ali, coordinator of the Sindh education minister, said he did not know if these bags were being sold in the market. On the other hand, Sindh Education Foundation Director Aziz Tabbani rebuffed allegations that the Education Department was involved in corruption.
Students and educationists were shocked to learn of the new scandal. KEMU student Beenish said that she and her colleagues were shocked when they saw these bags at KEMU. She said the UN and the World Bank were doing a lot for the country’s education sector but corrupt officials were failing the country. She said the prime minister should take notice of the scandal.
Marium, also a KEMU student, said the country was facing allegations that officials here embezzled foreign aid. She said Sindh Education Minister Pir Mazher-ul-Haq should hold an inquiry and bring the corrupt officials to book.
