In order to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), Rs 2 billion have been reserved for education for the current fiscal year as the Punjab government considers education as a tool to development, said Punjab Minister for Excise, Taxation, Finance and Law Mujtaba Shujaur Rehman while talking to a delegation of students and teachers of a Pakistan Institute of Fashion and Design on Sunday.
Shuja said that due to practical measures of the Punjab chief minister, the enrolment of students in government schools had been surged to 11.273 million.
He said that fashion and design, paintings and fine arts competitions help to polish talent of the youth. He said that the government is utilising all-out resources for the promotion of education especially in the field of technical education and an amount and huge amount is being spent for the promotion of education sector.
He said that Richard Montgomery, Head of DFID, has maintained that textbooks have been provided in schools for the first time before the start of new academic session which is a splendid achievement of the government and an example of good governance.
He said that British educationist Sir Michael Barber, while lauding the efforts of the government, said that the attendance of teachers in schools had improved considerably due to the reforms programme being jointly implemented by the government and DFID and the rate of attendance of teachers in schools of the province had reached up to the level of the British schools.