Balochistan’s ghost schools

Dawn Editorial
Balochistan’s education minister has disclosed that there are approximately 3,500 ghost schools in the province. This means that nearly 25 per cent of educational institutions for children exist only on paper.

While the existence of ghost schools has been a national phenomenon for several years now, it is nevertheless distressing that the province which needs schools the most should not have been spared either. With a literacy rate of only 42 per cent — female literacy is barely 22 per cent — the Baloch badly need schools to educate their children. Being the largest province territorially Balochistan can make schooling accessible to all its children only if the number of educational institutions is relatively large, with preferably at least one school in every village. On the contrary, the picture that has emerged from the minister’s statement is a bleak one of inadequate schools, many of which lack basic facilities such as boundary walls, roofs, toilets, etc. The crisis is compounded by the corruption that enables large sums of money to be drained away from the education department for schools that exist only on paper.

The provincial education minister has done well to order ‘missing’ teachers to report to the education department, though unsurprisingly most of them have not responded. It doesn’t have to be emphasised, but they must be dismissed from service after the due process of law has been observed. What is more important is that a strictly independent mechanism should be instituted to inspect schools and ensure that they function normally.

It is obvious that the education department has failed in its duty to see to this and it is futile to expect it to ensure that ghost schools are eliminated. Its functionaries are hand in glove with errant teachers who are offered protection by those whose job it is to keep an eye on them. Wouldn’t it be more effective if an independent system were in place with non-bureaucrats acting as a check at different levels? Meanwhile, the stakeholders, that is the parents of children who need schools, should be encouraged to approach offices that should be easily accessible to register their complaints.