As many as 40,000 ghost teachers are working in Sindh and over 5,000 schools are lying closed throughout the province.
Many ghost teachers have left for Saudi Arabia and Dubai but they are drawing monthly salaries regularly. Sindh Education Secretary Dr Fazalullah Pechuho revealed this while addressing a news conference in Larkana Press Club on Monday.
He said if he failed to bring these absent teachers back to their duties, he would resign from his office. Pechuho said over 99,000 teachers were working in Sindh and many of them were drawing monthly salaries while sitting at their homes. Many had left abroad, he added.
Pechuho said some education officers were also involved in allowing them remain absent from the schools, however, action had been initiated against all such teachers. He said 5,775 schools were closed in Sindh and in an attempt to re-open them, the education department had been bifurcated into two sections.
He also confessed that one-hour teaching was also going on in many schools, especially in rural and remote areas, which would never be tolerated. Pechuho said for ensuring punctuality of teachers, a call center and a Sindh education management information system were being established and data was also being collected wherein the CNIC number, mobile number and monthly pay ID of every school headmaster and teacher would be entered and he would himself monitor their presence in schools.
The secretary warned of initiating a crackdown against ghost teachers in the province. He said PPP chairperson Bilawal Bhutto Zardari wanted his voters to be educated and denied that he was under any political pressure. He said only a brave officer could run the education department.
