Sindh’s education situation remains stagnant despite massive allocation

KARACHI: Despite receiving the lion’s share of the overall provincial budget, education in Sindh has not shown any improvement as the number of out of school children, drop-out students and levels of learning of school-going children still show no progress.

For the last few years, the Government of Sindh has increased the budget for education with each successive year; in fiscal year 2016-17 28% of the total budget was allocated for education, which was an increase of 11% from the 2015-16 fiscal year.

This year, the school education department is getting the highest Annual Development Programme (ADP) allocation in any sector, within an increase of around 40% from Rs8 billion in 2016-17 to Rs11.2 billion in the 2017-18 fiscal year, said Schools Education Secretary Abdul Aziz Uqaili.

Speaking about the new schemes, he said that the upcoming budget will have a total of 340 schemes, with 228 ongoing and 112 new schemes. “We are also certain that 211 of the total schemes will be completed by June 2018,” he shared.

As soon as incumbent Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah took charge last July he declared an education emergency in the province to improve the quality of education and implement the Article 25-A to provide free and high-quality education to everyone till 16 years of age. To work seamlessly after the education emergency, the education and literacy department was bifurcated into the college and schools education departments with a separate secretary for each.

Despite such a huge change in the department, the fate of the many projects in the budget books has seen no changes. Just like every year, many projects from the section of new schemes remain untouched and unapproved, as their funds were never released, while the ongoing projects are still in limbo due to the same issue. Certain schemes from the schools and special education sections have seen some ray of hope in the form of paperwork but there is a lot to do before work actually starts.

Culture dept wants inclusion of music, performing art institute in budget

A few schemes in the budget that are have been awaiting completion for the last few years are multi-purpose halls, upgrade of primary schools to secondary schools, curriculum development for the year 2014-17, establishment of cadet college in Gadap, construction of education complex, office building for Chinese language, ILMI infrastructure development, Cambridge schools scheme and new appointments.

Despite the yearly increase in allocations, the schemes have not seen the light of day. The ADP for schools and colleges was increased by Rs3 billion in the 2016-17 fiscal year to Rs13 billion and now schools education department is getting an increase of around 40% but the question of when the projects will be completed remains the same.

According to the statistics shared by the former secretary, last year, 80% of the budget was allocated for ongoing projects, while 20% was fixed for new schemes.

Solar energy for schools

The department has come up with a new scheme for solarisation of schools all over Sindh. “We have decided to runs schools on solar energy and the scheme includes 25 to 27 primary schools in each district while 70 to 80 high schools will be run on solar energy all over Sindh,” shared Uqaili. Initially the project will cost Rs100 million.

Upgrade of schools

Sharing the details of schemes, he said the upgrade of schools is to be done on a priority basis this year. The upgrades have been in the budget since 2013 but the department will sub-divide it because the previous schemes were being done in umbrella schemes and faced administrative issues for fund allocations, said Uqaili about why the schemes are being repeated. “We will complete the 10 umbrella schemes by 2017-18,” he said

Cambridge school scheme

One of the most glorified projects in the education budget for the last four years is the establishment of English medium schools as part of the Sindh in Cambridge system from nursery to O-Levels. The project, which was approved in 2013, has only seen the completing of five buildings in five districts of the 25 that were to be constructed. The target of completion is June, 2017 in the current books. Earlier the completion date had been set at June, 2015. One unit that was completed and inaugurated by former education secretary Fazlullah Pechuho in 2016 is still not functional and after the project director, Sattar Jatoi, left the scheme seems to have stalled.

Uqaili, while sharing the status of the English medium schools, assured that the schools that have been completed will be functional by this August. A total of 12 schools from the 25 will be completed by June, 2017, while three more will be completed by September. Uqaili also shared that three comprehensive schools will be completed by June and another three will be completed by September.

Multi-purpose halls

The scheme for multi-purpose halls was included in the 2015-16 budget but was repeated in the new schemes list in 2016-17 because it was left unapproved due to a few clauses. The project has yet to be started and its fate is uncertain.

Uqaili said that they are not sure about the project and will see if they need the halls need to be constructed or if they are even useful.

The purpose was to create halls where examinations can be conducted and can aid in controlling cheating and improving examination system in rural areas.

With the repetition of the scheme, the cost has also increased, as in 2015-16 the project was estimated to be completed at a cost of Rs700 million in three cities – Sukkur, Shaheed Benazirabad and Larkana -while in 2016-17 the scheme has only one hall in the plan for Sukkur at a cost of Rs697 million.

ILMI infrastructure development

The department’s message complaint cell, which was the brain child of Pechuho, has also come to a halt after his transfer. To settle ILMI, the budget has six infrastructure development centres for it to be set up in different divisions. Each centre was to cost Rs40 million.

Talking about its fate, Uqaili said that ILMI is a very big project and its centres were to be done in the second phase. The project, which was mentioned in the budget last year, was not taken up but will be taken over in the upcoming fiscal year, he claimed.

Source: The Express Tribune