Sindh ranks seventh in education facilities in Pakistan

Not a single district of Sindh among top 60 in primary schools' infrastructure

HYDERABAD: As the nation commemorates the third anniversary of the carnage of innocent students and teachers at Army Public School, Peshawar, the day also reminds us of the government's unfulfilled commitment to strengthen security at educational institutions. In the flurry of official reactions that followed the December 16 attack, schools, colleges and universities were handed over a list of security measures.

Raising boundary walls and lining them with barbed wire, maintaining separate entry and exit gates, installing closed-circuit television cameras, keeping visitors' records and setting up security offices at the entrance were cited as necessary safety benchmarks. But three years down the line, during which some other educational institutions also witnessed episodes of terrorism, the Sindh government has failed to provide even the most basic facilities to thousands of schools in Sindh.

A recently published report of Alif Ailaan, a non-profit organisation working for educational reforms, has revealed the poor state of facilities and standards of learning in Sindh.



As many as 155 districts of Punjab, Sindh, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, Balochistan, Islamabad, Gilgit-Baltistan, FATA and Azad Jammu and Kashmir have been listed in the ranking. The report's infrastructure parameters include electricity, water, toilets, boundary walls and building conditions while the education scores comprise learning, retention and gender parity.

Regrettably, not a single district of Sindh is placed among the top 60 on the count of primary schools' infrastructure. With a 77.5 score, Karachi’s District East is ranked at 61st place and happens to be on the top in Sindh. But even in that district are around three dozen schools without walls. In the category of middle schools, District South is ranked at 57.

Districts South and Central follow at 63rd and 64th place while Larkana is at 65th. In Sindh's second largest city, Hyderabad, around 150 primary and middle schools are without boundary walls, based on comparison of Alif Ailaan's district ranking and data of the Sindh Education Management Information System. The district is ranked at 68 in the primary segment and 62 in the middle.



Sujawal, which finds itself among the lowest ranks at 143 and 148 in the primary and middle categories, has an estimated 1,000 schools which do not have surrounding walls. Likewise, among more than 4,000 government schools in Tharparkar, another district of Sindh at 112 and 128 place, 57% primary and 30% middle schools are without walls.

Similarly, 57% primary and 26% middle schools out of 1,500 in Thatta district and 60% primary and 31% middle schools out of 1496 in Kashmore district also lack the compound walls. Up to 54% primary and 32% middle schools in Mirpurkhas and Jacobabad, 52% and 36% in Badin, 44% and 40% in Umerkot and 40% and 20% in Tando Mohammad Khan do not have walls.

There are more than 9,800 government schools in these five districts which rank from 91 to 131 in the report. The situation in Dadu, Ghotki, Sanghar, Benazirabad, Khairpur and other districts vis-a-vis the walls does not appear better.



The boundary walls, besides being one of the security prerequisites, also help improve attendance and enrollment. The parents of female students feel particularly concerned about sending their daughters to such schools.

The districts of Sindh scored low even in the assessment of education standard. Only two districts – Karachi’s West and Malir - made it to the top 15 with the former securing 14th and the latter 15th positions. The two are distantly followed by Hyderabad, ranked at 59th place.

Naushero Feroz, Matiari, Ghotki, Kashmore, Sukkur and Mirpurkhas are ranked between 79 and 85. Tharparkar, Karachi’s districts South, Korangi, East and Central, Sujawal and Umerkot are at the lowest positions from 151 to 128 ranks.

Among the eight contenders for as many positions, Sindh is ranked at seventh in education and fourth in infrastructure.