since I have been elected I have been making regular visits to the remote areas in my district,” she said. “I know how many autaq schools (being used as guesthouses by landlords) have been opened in areas that under the influence of an opposition party whose members are a bit too generous with their criticism.”
She accepted the contentious issue of teachers hired outside of merit by the previous education minister, Pir Mazhar-ul-Haq, who has now been sidelined from party affairs. “At least we own up to the problems. I don’t see anyone else doing that,” she said.
Before her, Muttahida Qaumi Movement MNA Dr Nighat Shakeel pointed out that though education was among the list of subjects labelled as “top priority” in the manifestoes of all parties, but when it came to actually doing something about it and chalking out plans for its implementation, political expediency always took precedence.
An MPA of the same party, Khalid Ahmed Khan, promised to do his bit in the Sindh Assembly for the formulation of the rules of business for Article 25-A. For bringing out-of-school children to schools, he suggested providing incentives to students who had completed their matriculation and then intermediate from government institutions. “Bicycles can be given to boys and sewing machines to girls who finish matriculation while cash prizes or laptops can be given to those who complete their intermediate,” he proposed.
“Even if parents end up utilising the cash prize, it is still a great incentive for poor sections of the society to send their children to school.”
Rural and urban politics
Earlier, Haji Shafi Jamote, a senior leader of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, opined that it was undue political interference and the tussle of rural and urban politics which had destroyed merit at all levels in the province’s education system.
“Sindhi-speaking people are promoted and appointed from rural areas and Urdu-speaking people are promoted and appointed from urban areas in competition with each other,” he noted.
Haleem Adil Shaikh, the president of the Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid in Sindh, called for a ban on teachers’ unions. However, he added, parents needed a platform especially in the background of the private schools’ controversy.
Aslam Ghuari of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl called for opening “maktab schools” by deputing a teacher at each and every mosque, and holding classes there for children as well as their parents.
The representatives of nationalist parties including the Awami Jamhoori Party, the Sindh National Party, the Sindh Taraqi Pasand Party and both factions of the Jeay Sindh Qaumi Mahaz also participated in the convention while Manzoor Beg and Salma Waheed Murad represented the Jamaat-e-Islami and the All Pakistan Muslim League respectively.
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