Headmaster suspended for selling children’s books

15,000 textbooks recovered by police from a junk shop.

GUJRANWALA:

A government school headmaster was suspended from service on Wednesday on charges of selling 15,000 textbooks, provided by the provincial government to be distributed amongst the students.

District Coordination Officer Nabeel Awan told The Express Tribune that he had issued the suspension orders for Headmaster Fazlur Rehman following the recovery of the books from a junk shop.

The shopkeeper, Basharat, and the man who allegedly supplied the books, Dilawar, were held by Peoples Colony police for interrogation. No FIR has yet been registered in the case.

SHO Sarfaraz Anjum said the police could not register the FIR on their own. He said the Education Department needed to send an application for the registration of an FIR against the school staff. Anjum said the raid was conducted after a citizen called them to report the matter. He said the shopkeeper and the supplier had said that they were not aware that the books were not meant for sale. “They said they routinely collected a large number of old books, notebooks and papers and could not inspect all of them,” he said. Awan said the two would be released once police were convinced of their innocence in the case.

DCO Awan said an FIR would be registered on Thursday against the headmaster after an initial inquiry lodged by EDO (education) Ghazanfar Ali Sani was complete.

Earlier, MC School for Boys Peoples’ Colony headmaster Fazlur Rehman admitted that he had sold the books for Rs5,000. He told The Tribune that it was a routine for the school to sell old books.

The books, however, had been sent to the school two months ago to be distributed among the students.

They also had provincial government’s ‘Not For Sale’ stamps on them.

When asked about the stamps, Rehman said the curriculum was changed after the books were given to the school. He said the books were useless and that selling them was beneficial for the government. “We deposit the funds collected by selling old books with the government,” he said. However, he could not support his claim with a proof.

EDO (education), however, rejected that the curriculum had been revised since the books were sent.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 26^th, 2011.