Notwithstanding Article 25A of the Constitution that ensures a child’s right to free and compulsory education from the age 5 to 16 years, many children in Kohistan have to study in odd places — sometimes under the open sky and sometimes even in bathrooms.

This is a neglected part of the country. While it is the responsibility of the state to provide education, this core responsibility has been bulldozed by vested interests here.

Kohistan was divided into three districts by the PTI-led government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. I recently visited the neglected tehsil of Kandia in upper Kohistan, travelling over the extremely dangerous road from the Karakoram Highway’s Japan Bridge. The 96km road was entirely washed away by the flashfloods in the year 2010, and this new one was constructed subsequently by local people. Here, I saw students sitting in the toilets of a ruined basic health unit (BHU) building to attend classes.

The students had questions to ask of former KP education minister Atif Khan:

“Do your children also study in ruined bathrooms?” asks Shafiur Rehman of Grade 5 from the government-run Sairto Primary School. Both Sairto and Karang are shelter-less schools, and the students have been ‘temporarily’ shifted to the ruined BHU. Because of space issues, some have been pushed into the toilets.

“I teach 74 students in the Government Primary School (GPS) Thor, whose building was destroyed by the floods,” explains teacher Muhammad Taeeb Shah. “Later, the locals built a makeshift room with stone. But this too can be dangerous if the rocks were to roll down.”

Third-grader Khalilur Rehman chimes in: “After the rain, the school was filled with water, but we had no clean water for washroom or for drinking.”

Meanwhile in GPS Jashvi, about 200 students are enrolled in a ‘ghost’ school. With no building, the pupils receive schooling under the open sky regardless of whether it is blazing hot or snowing.

I saw that at GPS Gabralo and GPS Koz Gabral which were both being used by some local influential figures as their corral. And while 300 pupils are enrolled in GPS Bagh Gabryal, which is ‘functional’ yet also shelter-less, the students can’t read or write a single word of Pashtu or Urdu.

Local activist Mumtaz Sidiqi reveals that about 21 girls’ schools are completely non-functional in the Kandia tehsil. “There is a shortage of teachers, bad infrastructure, and a lack of buildings,” he says, “but there is also a lack of interest by the locals in sending their daughters to schools.”

Another social activist, Mehboobur Rehman, says that he saw no change or development for education was done by the PTI government. “I only hear about the education and health emergency of the provincial government on TV,” he says. “I read it in the newspapers, too. But I haven’t ever seen anything being done in Kohistan district. “The state seems to have no role in both the health and education sectors.”

Abdur Rehman, deputy district education officer for girls’ education in Kohistan, told Dawn that about 67 girls’ schools did not have buildings — some destroyed by natural disasters. After the 2005 earthquake, the Earthquake Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Authority (Erra) announced schemes but has failed to rehabilitate the schools so far.

“Many factors plague us,” says Abdur Rehman. “There is a dearth of female teachers, while some of the schools are located in far-flung places in the high mountains.”

He says they were striving to make the schools functional again but without local support, they could not.

Noor Muhammad, sub-divisional education officer for boys’ education in planning and development, says that about 263 schools are without buildings while the majority of them were destroyed during the earthquake. They were meant to be rebuilt but nothing has been done till now. Out of 263, approximately 35 were washed away in the 2010 flashfloods and other rain-related disasters.

District education officer Raaj Muhammad says he is well aware of the situation in Kohistan but it cannot be fixed in a day. It could take years because it is decades-old problem. “Kohistan is a hard area and accessibility to remote hilly areas is also a problem,” he points out.

But it’s not just Kandia tehsil where this is happening. All three districts of Kohistan are faring similarly. Even schools for girls along the international route of the Karakoram Highway are shelter-less and closed. Students study in the open air, but no tents have been provided to them for shelter.

The Pakistan Social and Living Standards Measurement survey says that 60 per cent of children are out of school in Kohistan district — 82pc of them are girls and 43pc boys. And according to the Annual Status of Education Report, 90pc of all the students in Grade 5 in Kohistan cannot read a sentence in English, 90pc of all the students in Grade 5 in Kohistan cannot read a story in Urdu/Pashtu, and 93pc of all the students in Class 5 cannot perform double-digit division. The literacy rate of Kohistan is just 5pc — the lowest in the country, reveals the non-profit Alif Ailaan in a 2017 survey. It’s the last-ranking district in the country and the province.

Fourth grader Attaur Rehman wants to be a teacher when he grows up. Perhaps the dearth of teachers has made him dream for it.

Published in Dawn, June 29th, 2018