KARACHI: The Sindh edu­­cation department would send 200 primary school students from the rural areas of the province to Islamabad to study at the A.Q. Khan Schooling System for seven years and would bear all their expenses, according to a memorandum of understanding signed here on Thursday.

The MoU was signed bet­ween the Sindh Education Foundation and A.Q. Khan Schooling System by managing director of SEF Naheed Durrani and A.Q. Khan Schoo­ling System representative Dr Nasir Iqbal.

Sindh Minister for Educa­tion Jam Mehtab Hussain Dahar said at the signing ceremony that the Sindh government was striving hard to provide better education facilities to students of rural areas.

Under the agreement, the test for selection of students would be conducted in the second week of May, he said.

The students who had passed class five would have to appear for a test in Urdu, English, mathematics and science and the successful students would commence their studies in Islamabad from July 1 this year, he said.

In reply to a question, the minister said the Sindh education department would pay Rs15,000 quarterly for each student which included tuition fee, lodging and boarding till they completed their higher secondary education.

Published in Dawn, April 21st, 2017