KASUR: The Government Girls High School of Hussain Khanwala, Chak 8, in Chunian tehsil of Kasur, speaks volumes for the interest level of the district education authorities to promote education in the rural areas.

There are 264 students in the school with two classrooms and 13 teachers. Girls from about a dozen villages are enrolled in the school and are studying in hard conditions.The school administration finds it hard to enroll new students despite the instructions of the education high-ups to increase the number by 10 percent.

According to locals Hanifan Bibi, Naseem Bibi and Shamim Akhtar, the school faces a shortage of rooms and the situation favors the private sector. Hundreds of students have been studying in the open for the last several months (even before Covid-19) as three rooms in the schools have been sealed by the education authorities since 2019, due to their poor condition.

The authorities, according to Hanif Azhar, Shafiqur Rehman, and Imran Rafiq, failed to build new rooms forcing the students to brave hot and cold weather under the sky.

A student said that in case of rain, they stay home for a want of rooms. A teacher requesting anonymity said that the school had three acres where new rooms could be built but the school administration had no finances.

Chief Executive Officer Naheed Wasif said that the department was facing a shortage of funds to build new rooms. She also said that the school management could resolve such issues from its non-salary budget (NSB) without seeking financial help from education authorities.

Saba Zafar, acting headmistress of the school, said, the school had only Rs230,000 in the NSB head that was a meager amount to build three classrooms. She also said that she had repeatedly asked the district authorities to get new rooms sanctioned from building department in the larger interest of students.

Students, their parents, villagers and teachers demanded that Chief Minister Usman Buzdar look into the matter.

Published in Dawn, July 1st, 2021