- SBI chief Naheed Memon says project to be constructed on 8,000 acres area in Karachi’s suburbs
KARACHI: Sindh Board of Investment (SBI) Chairperson Naheed Memon has said that the provincial government would start construction work on the Education City project on 8,000 acres area in suburbs of Karachi from January 2018.
She stated this as the chief guest at the inauguration of a purpose-built school building in Rehri Goth area on Saturday. The ceremony was organised regarding the launching of long-awaited Education City project with an estimated cost of one billion dollars on the link road between the National Highway and the M-9 Motorway.
The school will accommodate over 400 students of the impoverished rural area who will get education up to Class 10th on payment of highly subsidised fee. The Green Crescent Trust (GCT) hosted the event, which undertook construction of the school building while later it would also run the school purely for uplift of the fishermen community of the area.
As per the policy of GCT, a large number of prospective students of the school will be given a complete fee waiver. While rest of the students of Rehri Goth school after due evaluation of socio-economic status of their parents would pay a quite nominal tuition fee for their education mainly to ensure sense of participation of their families in the entire schooling process meant for the backward area.
The school building, which will accommodate both male and female students of the fishermen community, was completed in just four months’ time. The GCT is credited with construction of 165 schools having enrolment of 33,000 students in most remote and risk-prone areas of Sindh as construction and later management of these schools all are being done by the trust completely on charitable basis.
The construction of the school building in Rehri Goth is basically meant to be part of a programme to properly upgrade an existing charitable school of the area in private hands to uplift both its civil infrastructure and academic facilities. Once the school is upgraded with construction of new building, the number of students enrolled there will be increased to over 400 from present 218 while number of teachers will be doubled from 15 to 30.
The school is now equipped with modern science, computer laboratories, library, and staff rooms for teachers. The construction of new school building was done with the total cost of Rs 13 million all donated by the donors associated with the GCT most of whom were present on the occasion. Most of the construction and upgrading work took place at a very swift pace during the last school summer vacations so to cause least interruption to education of students already enrolled with the school.
THAR ON CARD: Naheed Memon appreciated services of GCT in the arena of education especially in remote areas of the city. She acknowledged that the Sindh government had still much to do to safeguard future of children of such backward areas. On behalf of the Sindh government, she announced full support for future endeavours of GCT in the field of education.
She said that she would soon talk to relevant authorities to get resolved serious issue of municipal waste in Rehri Goth area. Speaking on the occasion, GCT Chief Executive Officer Zahid Saeed said that the trust had a long way to go to make a last impact in the lives of children of backward areas.
“After inauguration of this school building, we are soon going to launch a similar educational facility for children of Thar area as we have resolve to cover all areas of the province, which are far away from urban centres so to uplift their dwellers,” he said.
A plantation drive was also conducted on the occasion as 150 tree saplings were planted at the school premises and in its surroundings to promote greenery in the mostly barren land.