KARACHI: Accepting the demand of opposition parties, the Sindh Assembly on Monday finally formed a parliamentary committee to investigate the controversial results of the intermediate board in Karachi.

While announcing the formation of the committee, headed by Education Minister Syed Sardar Shah, Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Zia Lanjar assured the House that there would be no compromise on the issue of the future of children and said that competent and capable chairmen of education boards would be appointed very soon.

The committee, comprising Sadia Javed, Taha Ahmed, Shabbir Ahmed Qureshi, Yousuf Baloch, Wasim Ahmed, Farooq Ahmed as members, was constituted following a call attention notice given by the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan member Abdul Waseem.

The JI and MQM-P had been raising the issue of wrongdoing in the results of intermediate exams in the house since the start of the recent assembly session. They had strongly protested over the issue in the house as the party members were denied to take up the issue.

Education minister, six treasury, opposition members to conduct inquiry into students’ concerns over first year exam

Mr Waseem said that he had to move a call attention notice on the issue of the poor results as the party members were not allowed by the chair to speak on point of order.

He said that there were irregularities going on in the city’s intermediate board and a large number of students were affected by them.

The law minister said that he had already offered the opposition to hold talks on the matter. “If it is about the future of children, we would definitely resolve the issue amicably,” he assured the opposition.

Mr Lanjar told the house that interviews for the chairmen of boards across the province were underway. “Efforts are being made to ensure that good and capable people are appointed chairmen of the boards,” he added.

Increase in dog-bite cases

In her call attention notice, MQM-P’s Farah Sohail said that there was a huge increase in dog-bite incidents in 2024 and asked the minister concerned as to what steps were being taken to contain the menace.

She said as many as 18 people were killed in dog bite incidents in 2024, adding that 11 of the victims died as they did not get vaccine.

The MQM-P MPA said that Rabies Control Programme Sindh (RCPS) was launched in 2021 but according to media reports it was not functional due to paucity of funds. “There is helpline 1093 which is not active, while the RCPS website is also closed,” she said.

In reply to her notice, Parliamentary Secretary for Municipalities Siraj Qasim Soomro said that the RCPS faced shortage of funds due to Covid-19 and other financial constraints of the provincial government. He said that the RCPS office was properly working with the sanctioned staff and application was also there to lodge complaints of stray dogs.

However, he said that the towns and union committees were responsible to curb the menace of stray dogs. He shared that the over 13,500 stray dogs were neutered and over 25,000 others were vaccinated by the RCPS, adding that the anti-rabies vaccine was available at government health facilities across the province.

Bill to appoint bureaucrats as VC introduced

The law minister also tabled a bill to amend the universities law.

The chair referred the legislation to the standing committee concerned for deliberations.

Later, the house was adjourned to Tuesday (today).

Published in Dawn, January 14th, 2025