The opposition members in Khyber Pakhtukhwa (KP) assembly, on Wednesday, strongly criticised the PTI led coalition government for recruiting teachers in education sector through a private sector organisation named National Testing Service (NTS).
The house admitted the question of PPP’s Sardar Hussain Chitrali for debate. He said that the government had completely authorised the NTS, a private sector entity, to recruit candidates for the government jobs.
He said that 310,650 candidate had applied for the posts of teachers from which 39,000 managed to get through. He questioned that why the private entity had collected a total of Rs149 million fees from these candidates. He expressed that this had put a big question mark on the efficiency in the education sector.
Parliamentary leader of ANP Sardar Hussain Babak termed the NTS a business oriented institute and said that the government should explain why they had selected NTS and authorised it for recruitment. He said that a PhD scholar had to pass the NTS test to work for a government organisation.
PML–N’s Shiraz Khan alleged that there was no transparency in NTS and he informed the house that many incompetent candidates were preferred against candidates who secured high marks in NTS.
Defending NTS for the appointment of government jobs, Provincial Minister for Law and Parliamentary Affair Imtiaz Shahid Qureshi alleged that in the previous regimes, candidates used to pay three to four lac rupees in order to enroll themselves in government jobs and now, he claimed, the KP government has made the process transparent and merit based as the candidates now get the same job after payment of Rs300 NTS registration fee.
PPP’s Fakhre Azam Wazir drew the attention of the house towards non regularisation of 821 teaching assistants appointed on merit three years ago. The concerning standing committee had recommended regularisation of their services but no heed was paid till date.
JUI-F’s Munawwar Khan initiated a bill in this connection to regularise the jobs and urged the chair to expedite the process for tabling of the bill in the current session of the house. QWP’s Meraj Humayoon supported the mover.
Minister for Local Government Inayatullah Khan said that he personally wanted their regularisation since the matter involved finances, therefore, the chair should constitute a committee in this regard. Deputy speaker constituted a committee and asked for the report within two weeks.
Later, the opposition staged a walk out from the assembly as parliamentary leader of ANP Sardar Hussain Babak on a point of order complained that his adjournment motion regarding Khyber Bank was not being made part of the agenda item. The government also did not present ehtisab commission report, he added. The chair adjourned the session due to lack of quorum. Session would meet again on Friday at 3:00pm.
