LAHORE: The major chains of private schools in the city will remain closed on Friday in connection with security measures for Pakistan Super League final on Sunday.

Other private schools will observe holiday on Saturday.

“All branches of Lahore Grammar School, Beaconhouse, LACAS, Allied Schools, Educators, American Lycetuff will be closed on Friday,” a spokesman for the Pakistan Education Council told Dawn on Thursday. These schools have five working days routinely.

On the other hand, the All Pakistan Private Schools Federation said schools in the city will be closed on Saturday “due to security for PSL final on Sunday”.

“We are closing schools for one day, a day ahead of PSL final, owing to security measures on the request of the government,” said APPSF President Kashif Mirza.

“The attendance in most private schools has reduced since some terror acts in the city. In such a scenario when the government is neither asking us to close schools nor providing better security we have to observe holiday in connection with PSL-like events,” a representative of private schools association told this reporter.

He said the recent wave of terrorism had created panic among parents.

On Thursday, most schools in Defence Housing Society were closed. Last Thursday (Feb 23) a blast at Z Block DHA claimed 10 lives. The government had termed gas leakage as cause of the explosion.

Meanwhile, Punjab Schools Education Minister Rana Mashhood Ahmad held a meeting with the representatives of public and private sector schools.

The school education department told the meeting that all heads of public and private sector schools had been issued directions to make security of their institutions ‘foolproof’ to cope with any untoward situation.

A participant in the meeting told Dawn that the minister did not openly direct them to close schools on Friday in connection with the PSL final but “we read between the lines.”

“We told the minister that observing holidays was not a permanent solution to deal with security issues. There needs to be a coordinated effort to address the issue of schools security,” he said.

All Pakistan Private Schools Association President Adeeb Jawadani said the school guards could not counter trained terrorists. “It is the duty of the government to provide security to private schools as it was receiving hefty taxes from them,” he said.

The minister said the schools management should pay special attention to the monitoring of their institutions through CCTV cameras.

Rana Mashhood said the department had constituted special teams to review security measures adopted by the public and private sector schools in the province.

Lahore Mayor Mubashir Javed, EDO (education) Tariq Rafique and SP (city) Muhammad Naveed were also present.

As the matriculation examinations are under way, security at around 800 centres has been beefed up.

Published in Dawn, March 3rd, 2017