Poor and neglected condition of government schools throughout Sindh province can be judged from the fact that 22,000 schools are without facility of potable cold drinking water, 24,000 schools are without electricity, 19,000 schools are without boundary walls and 22,500 schools are without toilet facility.
During 2014-15, four thousand million rupees were allocated under education reforms programme for improving the conditions of school buildings but nobody knows where this amount was utilised.
As per a report of Alif Ailaan Pakistan, the condition of 71 percent schools in Sindh is non-satisfactory; hence, these buildings have become dangerous for the students and the teaching staff and their lives are at stake.
In Sindh province, 49 percent students of 5th class cannot read Urdu, 63 percent children cannot reach a single English sentence and 58 percent students don’t know how to multiply or divide with 2. This shows the standard and quality of education in this poorly governed province of Pakistan.
Alif Ailaan’s Larkana Region Coordinator Junaid Dahar told PPI that out of total budget of Rs 134 billion, 125 billion are spent annually on salary and non-salary account alone. He said there are total 46,724 schools in Sindh out of them 42,342 are primary, 2,336 middle/elementary, 1755 secondary and only 294 are higher secondary schools. For these schools, there are 151,557 teachers.
He said during the current financial year, Rs 150 million were allocated to train 6000 head masters of the province under education leadership program but none of them was trained due to which 80 percent primary teachers cannot write English and 36 percent don’t know mathematics.
Dahar said Rs 300 million were allocated for procurement of furniture for Larkana, Sukkur, Mirpur Khas, Hyderabad and Karachi division schools; however, this amount was not released.
Junaid said during the current FY, Rs 30 million were allocated for opening of 400 girls schools through RSP but not a single penny was released, adding that Rs 1750 million were issued to 49,500 schools as SMC funds which too have been misused. He revealed that European Union had already withheld announced aid of Rs 16 billion for improving education system in Sindh due to massive corruption in the Sindh education department.
He said that Sindh government allocated Rs 603 million for teaching students Chinese language but nothing was released for this project. He further said that Rs 427 million were allocated for establishing ShaheedBenazirBhuttoGirlsCadetCollege in Garhi Khuda Bux but the finance department did not release a single paisa.
Likewise, Rs 500 million were allocated for establishing a girls university in Sukkur but no money was released by the finance department. He said rupees one thousand million were allocated for establishing girls public schools on divisional basis but no amount was released to establish a single school at any division of the province. No money was released for establishing CadetCollege in even Sindh chief minister’s own hometown, Khairpur, he added.
He further said that the Sindh government did not release a single rupee out of allocated amount of Rs 300 million for GovernmentGirlsDegreeColleges of Thul, Gulshan-e-Hadeed, New Karachi, Zamanabad (Landhi), Matiari, Garhi Khairo, Kunri and GovernmentBoysDegreeColleges of Sobhodero, Bozdar Wada, Chachro, Golarchi, Garhi Khairo and Mirpur Bathoro. This non-serious attitude clearly indicates that rulers in Sindh are just wasting precious time of the people and indirectly compelling young generation of Sindh to remain illiterate in this age of information-based economy, he concluded.