Rs620b set aside for education in budget

The Sindh government has allocated Rs620 billion for the education sector in the fiscal year 2026-27, covering both development and non-development expenditures for primary and higher education.

According to the budget documents, an additional Rs24.75 billion has been earmarked for ongoing education schemes, taking the total allocation for these programmes to Rs58.14 billion, up from Rs33.39 billion in the previous financial year.

The ongoing initiatives in the school education sector include the provision of free textbooks, payment of enrolment and examination fees for students of classes IX to XII, the Sindh Education Foundation programme, scholarships, and grants for religious seminaries.

In the higher education sector, funding has been allocated for major public universities, including the University of Karachi, University of Sindh Jamshoro, NED University of Engineering and Technology, Mehran University of Engineering and Technology, Jinnah Sindh Medical University, Dow University of Health Sciences, Shah Abdul Latif University, and IBA University Sukkur.

The School Education Department has also launched a new initiative, "Student Attendance Monitoring and Redressal System," a technology-based application aimed at tracking student attendance, improving enrolment, and enhancing teacher performance through monitoring. In its initial phase, the project will cover 600 schools across 12 districts.

Officials said the Education Department recruited over 74,000 teachers during the outgoing fiscal year, including 2,315 Secondary School Teachers.