While developed countries around the world expand the learning horizons of school children through rigorous academic and extracurricular opportunities, hapless students in Sindh's government schools are once again expected to complete their coursework without the most fundamental tool for school education - textbooks.
With a new year just around the corner, government school students in Sindh face yet another impending textbook shortage during the upcoming academic year, after the recent haphazard decision of the Sindh Textbook Board to suspend the printing of textbooks from publishers.
"On December 12, we received an order from the Secretary of Schools to cancel the tenders with publishers and suspend the printing process for the time being," confirmed Nusrat Parveen, former secretary of the Sindh Textbook Board.
According to sources privy to the matter, the Sindh government has cancelled the tender with publishers for printing textbooks since it now plans to reassign the task of course book printing to the Industries and Commerce Department.
"This decision has been taken for the betterment of the school network," responded Rasheed Channa, Spokesperson for the caretaker Chief Minister of Sindh, upon being quizzed on the haphazard transfer by the Sindh Textbook Board at a time when textbooks were to be published immediately.
"The Sindh government has now decided that no publisher would be given the contract to print textbooks, since our Industries and Commerce Department has the required machinery to get the job done," added Channa.
However, the fact that the decision was taken at a time when the new academic session starting April 2024 is only four months away, naturally means that students across Sindh will have to spend much of their year without books once again.
Read CM suspends Sindh Textbook Board chairman
It is worth recalling that the previous government of Sindh could not provide the required number of textbooks to government schools on time for the ongoing academic year, resulting in a shortage of over 2 million textbooks, due to which countless students of various grades had to share books with their classmates until November of this year, when the books were finally available.
Amidst the growing discord among students and faculty, the caretaker provincial Education Minister Rana Hussain presented the idea of book banks in schools during his recent visit to the Sindh Textbook Board. However, experts claim that the idea appears to be beyond feasibility since school students are not trained to use books in such a way that incoming students can use them again. Moreover, as per the experts, such a scheme was introduced at the college level in the past but failed miserably, and soon after book banks were abolished.
It is pertinent to mention that another happening which has deepened the controversy surrounding the Sindh Textbook Board is the recent appointment of the current Secretary, who despite being removed from office in February earlier this year due to various allegations, was reappointed for the post.
In an attempt to inquire further on the controversy, the Express Tribune tried reaching out to Shireen Narejo, Secretary of Education, but did not receive a response.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 25th, 2023
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