Two months ago, a steering committee of the Sindh education department had decided to waive exam fees for flood-affected students. Larkana’s BISE is charging Rs760 for class IX exam forms and Rs880 for class X forms. The deadline for these forms is December 31, after which additional charges will be added.
As the exam form submission dates creep by, thousands of flood survivors across Sindh are struggling to scrape together the money. Ten out of 23 districts in Sindh were affected by the flood and the education sector was severely damaged. In an effort to help flood survivors, the education department had decided to waive the exam fee for ninth, matric and first-year (intermediate) candidates who needed it. The committee of education boards had replied, however, that they were self-financed and they could not bear the financial burden of waiving the fees.
The Boards of Intermediate and Secondary Education (BISE) of Sukkur, Larkana and Hyderabad are the major boards offering an education up to the intermediate level in Dadu, Kambar-Shahdadkot, Jacobabad, Kashmore-Kandhkot, Larkana, Shikarpur, Khairpur Mirs, Jamshoro and Thatta. All three groups are still charging the students who qualified for the waiver. “The students of my school are very anxious about how they are going to pay their fees since their families don’t even have the money to buy groceries,” said a headmaster at a government high school in Jacobabad.
Sukkur BISE chairman Dr Mehboob Shaikh said that they had tried to compensate the flood-affected students but it was difficult for them to waive the fee completely as the boards simply did not have the extra funds. It might have been a viable suggestion had the government or another source given them grants.
Meanwhile, the Sindh education minister, Pir Mazharul Haq, could not be contacted for comment.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 22nd, 2010.
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