Balochistan cabinet: Bill adopted to make private schools accountable

It will keep check on unnecessary school fee hike and ensure quality education

QUETTA: The Balochistan Assembly has approved a bill to make private education accountable and improve the quality of education in the province.

The provincial cabinet on Wednesday adopted Balochistan Private Regulatory Bill 2015 aimed at setting up an authority to keep a check on implementation of laws, unnecessary school fee hike, provision of required facilities and quality education.

The cabinet members met with Chief Minister Dr Abdul Malik Baloch at the Chief Minister Secretariat.

It has been suggested in the bill that an authority should be constituted which will check if teachers are adequately paid and quality of education is maintained besides ensuring that mother tongue is being made obligatory and taught.

It will also prevent those elements who only want to make money while running private schools. The authority will ensure that the school fee should not be hiked unnecessarily.

The provincial assembly has also approved setting up Balochistan Food Authority which will be responsible for enforcing the law across the province. The food authority will monitor the quality of the food and punish restaurants or shops selling hazardous or expired food.

The meeting has approved the Defence Housing Authority (DHA) Act 2015 which will soon be tabled in the assembly. The cabinet has deferred the approval of Labour Policy Act 2015 until the next meeting of the cabinet.

Dr Baloch urged ministers to expedite their efforts for legislation in order to ensure smooth transfer of powers to the provincial government from the federal authorities under the 18th amendment. “We have to focus on legislation so that people of the province get benefit from the devolution of powers, which I believe was a historic move.”

Published in The Express Tribune, September 17^th,  2015.