MITHI, Oct 11 Lack of interest by successive governments has left some 2,100 villages out of the 2,300 villages in district Tharparkar without electricity facility.

Residents of these villages feel frustrated and call themselves 'owls' for living in complete darkness. Thousands of students feel themselves aliens in this era of 'global village' as they don't know how to operate computers due to power deprivation. When they would be able to take advantage of computers is a question haunting their future prospects.

Some 2,762 primary and secondary schools out of the registered 4,278 have buildings with 1,518 without a shelter, 747 closed with 49 existing only on papers, revealed a survey by Dawn.

There are only two degree colleges in the entire district one for men and the other for women in Mithi, besides 34 boys' and seven girls' high schools, 25 boys' and 15 girls' middle schools, 736 branch high/middle schools where Class IX & X students are imparted education, four higher secondary schools and 3,317 boys' and 649 girls' primary schools.

Most of the school buildings in many villages of Thar are in poor state and in need of immediate repair while a considerable number of schools are functioning in thatched structures with thorny fences acting as compound walls, observed this correspondent while visiting various villages.

The seriousness of authorities for the promotion of education is evident from the dilapidated condition of oldest school building in Thar, the government high school in village Janjhi of taluka Chhachhro renamed as the Sachal Government High School by the Education Minister Pir Mazharul Haq. The school has no compound wall of bricks but of thorny fence and had been twice visited by the minister who promised of a new school building but in vain.

One of the students told Dawn that though the students of Thar are well talented but their talent could not be cultivated as 90 per cent of the villages here are without electricity.

He appealed to President, Prime Minister and the minister concerned to immediately announce electrification of these remote villages and put the youths of these places in 'global village' meaning computer education for himself and his likes.