RAWALPINDI, March 2: The Punjab government will strictly check the use of unfair means in the examinations to improve the quality of education, provincial minister for education Imran Masood said on Sunday.

He was responding to the queries of the reporters after attending a bilingual declamation contest as chief guest at the Fatima Jinnah Women University (FJWU). The event was held in connection with the International Women’s Day.

“Most of the countries do not even recognize our educational degrees owing to the low standard of education system, untrained teachers, outdated teaching methods and faulty examination system, thus, putting the future of our talented youth into jeopardy,” the minister said.

The government, he said, had constituted committees at district levels to check cheating at examination halls and to point out the members of the examination teams involved in such malpractice.

Mr Masood said the government would soon purge the examination boards of the mafia, which leaked the examination papers and was busy destroying the country’s future for money.

He said he would rid the schools of the teachers who held fake degrees or were not performing their duties professionally.

In a total of 63,119 schools in the province, about 0.6 million staff members are serving, he said. That is why education is the biggest ministry and its further development is vital to provide education to the masses at grass roots level.

However, he ruled out the possibility of permanently employing about 27,000 teachers, who were serving on contractual basis.

The reporters informed the minister about the leakage of scholarship examination papers for Class-V, on which he said the persons responsible would not be spared. He also appealed to the masses to inform him about the malpractice in the education department and various schools so that action could be taken against corrupt employees and staff members.

He said he would stay in Rawalpindi for two days and visit various schools to check teaching standards. He said he would also hold meetings with the officials of the Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education, Rawalpindi, and executive district officer (education).

The minister also showed interest in expanding the campus of the FJWU, which, according to him, would provide more opportunities to the girl students in getting admission to the university. He also promised to build an auditorium at the Viqarun Nisa College as it was still deprived of the facility.

He told reporters that the government would soon establish a regulatory authority to check standard of private schools and persuade the latter to either decrease their fees or offer 10 per cent admission quota to poor students.

The regulatory authority will also discourage establishment of low-standard private schools, he added.