July 2, 2003	Wednesday	Jumadi-ul-Awwal 1,1424

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ISLAMABAD, July 1: Zakat and stipends do not go to the deserving people but those who have access to the disbursing authorities, said Education Minister Zobaida Jalal at the launch of Pakistan National Human Development Report (NHDR) 2003 here on Tuesday .

“We have planned social safety nets to stop this practice,” the minister added. She said it was easier to propagate the government’s commitment towards poverty alleviation but difficult to actually do something in this regard.

“We may have achieved decentralization but devolution is still a challenge,” Ms Jalal observed.

“We had planned holistic rehabilitation of schools for quantity and quality, but we found that it was only physical rehabilitation, which was the jurisdiction of the district governments.” The quality aspects of training are looked after by the provincial authorities,” the minister said.

She maintained that similarly, mobilization of school councils and communities had also been planned to participate in decision-making but mistrust was practically more dominant.

Of child labour, the minister said the labour ministry, in collaboration with ILO and partner organizations, was active in developing a strategy, as Pakistan was a signatory to the ILO Convention.

The author of the report, Dr Akmal Hussain, said the country was at a crucial stage of its history, as it was faced with a multifaceted crisis of human condition.