KARACHI, Nov 16: Despite lapse of over one year, the Sindh government has not finalized the appointment of about 650 teachers for 179 upgraded middle schools.
Sources in the education department said that pending recruitment of oriental language teachers and physical training instructors in primary and high schools had been delayed, as the government was in the process of allocating funds for their salaries.
The teachers are to be appointed for schools in question, under the Sindh Middle School Project (MSP), which was initiated in 1994 with a funding of Asian Development Bank.
Under the project, a number of primary schools have been upgraded to the status of elementary schools, while new middle school buildings have also been raised at a number of places in the province, said a source privy to the MSP.
During the years, 282 junior and 143 higher school teachers have been recruited through the Sindh Public Service Commission (SPSC) as part of the project, while the remaining faculty members were to be hired through a process of written test and interviews, which started in 2002.
The teachers appointed through the SPSC had not been paid salary for the last three months, as the MSP tenure had terminated. The liability of the project and schools, established or upgraded under MSP, would now be taken over by the Sindh government under non-development fund, added the source.
An official of the education department maintained that the matter pertaining to salaries of commissioned teachers and other candidates who had been selected by the provincial government’s recruitment committees had been taken up with the high ups and it was expected that salary issue would be resolved in December.
Apart from the 282 junior and 143 higher school teachers recruited through the SPSC, the MSP had received 10,000 applications against the left over vacancies in 2002, which were processed accordingly and written test for the post of HST, JST, OLT and PTI were conducted in January 2003. The short-listed about 4,000 candidates were to be interviewed by the committees of education department, but, that could not be executed as per schedule due to certain controversies within the department on the recruitment process.
In the mid of this year, the chief minister approved the formation of different recruitment committees comprising senior officials of the department, i.e. additional secretaries, representatives of the MSP, EDOs and DOs of education.
As envisaged earlier by the government, the committees were supposed to finish their jobs pertaining to appointment of 26 HSTs, 255 JSTs, 179 OLTs and 179 PTIs within a month. Moreover, letters to the candidates selected by the committee were to be delivered prior to the termination of summer vacations (before August). However, the things could not be realized as per plan.
In the meantime, applicants have started losing hopes, as they fear that the recruitment could fall prey to political gambit. However, insiders claim that people at MSP were not expediting the selection list as they fear that any single handed processing could land them into trouble in future, particularly in the name of accountability and corruption. The lists, after totalling of marks obtained by a candidates in their respective written test and interviews, have been prepared.
However, the MSP officials wanted to get these authenticated by the provincial education secretary for future safeguard, added the source.
When contacted, MSP Director Mahmood Ali Lakho said that any apprehension on the issue was baseless, as he had already prepared district-wise lists of candidates selected for the appointments, which would soon be handed over to district education department.
