MIANWALI, April 28 The local government college for boys is offering classes up to MA English, but its English Department comprises only three regular faculty members, one assistant professor and two lecturers, who are burdened to teach 1,300 students of two sections of postgraduate and 10 sections of graduate and undergraduate classes.

Locals have showed concern over the paucity of English faculty members, and said it was pathetic that English, being compulsory subject up to degree classes, was being given a meagre importance as far as faculty's strength was concerned. Four teachers, one retired and three fresh MAs in English, are sharing the workload free of cost with the regular faculty members.

This scarcity once pushed the college administration to close down its MA English classes on which people reacted swiftly and a federal minister had to intervene to prevent the college authorities from doing so. The minister had promised that he would take up the issue with the Punjab chief minister to make the deficiency of faculty up, but this did not happen till the tables got turned after Feb 18 general election.

Disciplines of MA English and MA political science were launched in 1992 on the directives of the then prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, in fulfillment of pre-election vows made by National Assembly aspirant Maulana Abdul Sattar Khan Niazi.

Initially, the number of faculty in the English Department was raised to eight and suitable incumbents were appointed to all the eight slots.

The classes proved a great success as the local teachers worked with a missionary zeal. However, erosion in the faculty started in late 1990s with the retirement of some teachers one after the other, and the posts vacated by them could not be filled up in due course of time.

The college principal kept requesting the authorities concerned to fill the vacancies up, but to no avail. And now one post of associate professor and four posts of assistant professors are lying vacant at the English Department alone.

One of the retired teachers and three MA English teachers are working voluntarily on the request of the principal to share the workload of the three regular teachers without charging a penny for their public service.

It is due to this shortage of teachers that the college has so far failed to qualify for award of permanent affiliation with the Punjab University. Thus, the college has to pay Rs25,000 for provisional affiliation every year before submitting admission forms of students to appear in MA exams conducted by the university.

Despite repeated demands through the Statement of New Expenditure (SNE) in budgetary proposals submitted by the college every year, the education department has not sanctioned even a single post of teacher for the English Department in this college for the past 15 years.

None of the local MNAs and MPAs seems interested in pleading this case at any higher forum.

One of the quixotic claims of the perhaps bygone phase 'enlightened moderation' was to promote one of the colleges in each district every year as a model college. So, this college was also elevated to the status of a 'model college' but, ironically, this college has become a model of the government's alleged slackness and indifference.

Out of 67 sanctioned posts of teaching staff, 17 have been lying vacant for the past several years and four more will fall vacant with the retirement of incumbents during the next couple of months. Similarly, 22 posts of non-teaching staff out of 42 sanctioned ones are lying vacant.

The slot of librarian too is lying vacant for around 10 years and a part-time lecturer is handling over 40,000 books voluntarily. So is the case with the post of director physical education (DPE) lying vacant for the past many years, making conduct of sports activities almost impossible.

The college has become a classic example to gauge the penetration of the mega programme, 'Parha Likha Punjab', launched by the previous regime. Gravity of the situation demands immediate remedial measures, Prof Muhammad Saleem Ahsan, a retired teacher of the college, says and recommends that engaging a few fresh MAs in English and one or two more retired teachers on a contract basis will be the convenient method to overcome faculty shortage at least tentatively.

With the establishment of the PML-N government at the provincial headquarters again, locals are pretty hopeful that the rulers will not let the tree planted by the late Abdul Sattar Khan Niazi and Nawaz Sharif whither away.