PESHAWAR, Dec 30: NWFP Governor Iftikhar Hussain Shah has said that 'politicization' of educational institutions and lack of disciplinary action against institutions showing poor results are the main causes of falling academic standards.

"The non-issues were made issues in these educational institutions to serve the purpose of certain political parties. The performance of educational institutions has been negatively affected by such factors," he observed.

Speaking at the inauguration ceremony of the Online System of the Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education (BISE), Peshawar, on Thursday, he said human resource development was necessary to meet the target of overall national development and the promotion of quality education was a must to achieve that goal.

The ceremony was also addressed by NWFP Minister for Education Maulana Fazal Ali Haqqani, Minister for Science & Technology Hussain Ahmad Kanju and chairman of the BISE Manzoor Iqbal Bangash.

The NWFP governor stressed the need of special measures to promote education in the country, especially in the NWFP, to bring about a change in the social and economic sectors. The other education boards and relevant educational institutions of the province should get connected to the BISE's online system, he said.

The introduction of computerized system is a joint effort of all the boards to solve the difficulties of students. He said the initiative had been taken to enable talented students to bear admission and other expenses required for joining institutions of their choice.

The conversion of both DMC and Provisional Certificate into a single document as well as their free of cost provision soon after the declaration of results; availability of original certificates within four months instead of two years, as was the past practice; waiver of the condition of submitting an affidavit on stamp paper as well as advertisement in the press for getting duplicate certificates and introduction of one-time registration with the board for all sorts of exams and other such measures were meant to facilitate students, he said.

The fee has been decreased on all accounts but in most cases it has been totally eliminated. The elimination of examination centre fee which was received at the rate of Rs10,000 for each centre on its first establishment as well as inspection fee of private educational institutions were some of the reforms meant to facilitate candidates.

Under the online system, scratch cards of different denominations will be provided to students through banks to enable them to pay their dues even while sitting in the comfort of their homes.

The facility of net cafe has also been made available within the premises of the board for students who desire to deal their matters on their own without contacting the relevant counters even after visiting the board. A separate counter has also been set up for girl students.