KARACHI:
Nearly Rs80 million destined for scholarships was siphoned out of the government’s accounts by one officer and put in the accounts of another, audits have showed.
“The office of the education secretary informed us that the funds were transferred for scholarships. But they failed to provide the records,” Audit Director-General Ghulam Akbar Sohu said in front of the the Public Accounts Committee on Friday as it went over the department’s horrifying books. From 2006 to 2009, Rs34.1 million in scams were detected by the audit team. “We have settled only three paras worth Rs1.6 million,” said the DG. The education officials were able to produce records for some of the points and have been told to either produce the paperwork for the rest or deposit the missing money into the treasury by the next meeting.
Sohu said that the same officer who was working on the finances and management of the education department drew Rs61 million from the office of the accountant general Sindh in 2008. This money was transferred to various institutions as grants-in-aid without any approval.
Education officials also committed fraud by ordering vehicles worth Rs96 million in 2007 and 2008. Neither have the vehicles been purchased nor has the amount been taken back. Parveen Rajpar, who works for the Sindh Elementary Teachers Trainings Project of Karachi funded by the Canadian International Development Agency said that the then project director had ordered them to acquire foreign vehicles instead of locally made ones. The money was released, but the vehicles were not delivered. The case has been referred to NAB, which has recovered Rs10 million from dealers with motor vehicles companies and the rest is expected to be extracted within six months.
In another case, Education Secretary Mukhtar Soomro was told to investigate how the district education officer of Kamber Shahdadkot had taken off with money. MPA Ghulam Mujadid Isran, a member of the committee, brought it up. Isran, who belongs to the same district, had pointed out that this bureaucrat had even beaten teachers in Kamber Town. “No one even can beat a peon,” he said. “How dare he beat teachers?” The secretary responded that he would look into it.
The accounting watchdog’s chairman, Jam Tamachi Unar, had asked the secretary what they were doing about the deteriorating standard and the fact that schools have been turned into warehouses and autaqs where landlords can gather for a chat over a cup of tea.
“Our education system seems to be on the verge of collapse,” said Unar to the secretary. “I want to ask you people who else will come to fix it?”
The secretary said that the department was thinking about forming clusters of schools in areas where they are short on teachers. They will get one headmaster and their teaching staff will be pooled. According to Soomro, the World Bank and USAID have been funding the education sector and have started monitoring the work. “They keep a vigil on how schools are built and teachers appointed. In this situation there are slim chances of irregularities,” he added. Unar suggested the secretary also consider hauling up development for girls and ensuring there were schools in villages with a population of 500.
Earlier the audits of the agriculture department was postponed as the secretary was not present and other officials were not well prepared. DG Sohu complained that agriculture officials misbehaved with the audit teams when they were verifying the accounts, making it difficult for them to do their job properly.
Published in The Express Tribune, September 8th, 2012.
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