Daily Times

Education is a global human right and every country has a moral obligation to afford its citizens access to at least a basic one. Sadly, Pakistan’s education system is on the verge of collapse. According to a survey, approximately seven million children are not in primary school and half of the children aged 6-16 are unable to read even a single sentence. In rural areas, only one in three women have ever attended school.

According to the Pakistan census of 1951, the total population (of what is now Pakistan) was 33 million, out of which the overall rate of educated people was only 15 percent. Now, with the estimated population of the country at around 170 million, 48 percent of which are women, only half of the population is literate. According to a 2009 UNESCO report, Pakistan has the largest out of school population in the world after Nigeria and India, accounting for seven percent of global absentees.

Furthermore, planning commission estimates of the overall dropout rate from 2009 suggest that only 30 percent of students continue beyond the primary level. Pakistan still enrolls 83 girls for every 103 boys in primary schools. The primary completion rate for girls is only 58 percent as opposed to 70 percent for boys. Of the 6.8 million currently estimated to be out of school in Pakistan, at least 4.2 million are girls (World Bank, 2008). Only 35 percent of rural women above the age of 10 have completed primary education (PLSM, 2008). According to another report, the literacy rate in FATA is in very deplorable condition, with 29.5 percent males and three percent females being literate.

Pakistan is placed 119th out of 127 countries in EDI ranking by the EFA Global Monitoring Report 2011, even lower than Bangladesh (112th). Furthermore, the Human Development Report places Pakistan at 136th for having just 49.9 percent of the population educated. According to the 2011 Human Development Report of the United Nations Development Programme, approximately twice as many males as females receive a secondary education in Pakistan, and public expenditures on education amount to only 2.7 percent of the GDP of the country. These statistical facts and figures show that since the inception of Pakistan, the education system has remained in a pathetic state of affairs. In fact, it is worse than before.

Article 37 of the Constitution of Pakistan stipulates that education is a fundamental right of every citizen, but gender discrepancies still exist in the educational sector. Moreover, in Article 37 (b) and (c), it is mentioned that the state shall remove illiteracy and provide free and compulsory secondary education within the minimum possible period, make technical and professional education generally available, and higher education equally accessible to all on the basis of merit. Section nine of the Constitution (Eighteenth Amendment) Act, 2010 inserted a new Article 25A, which says of the right to education that the state shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age of five to 16 years in such manner as may be determined by law.

Following the above facts and figures, a few reasons have been dug out for the deplorable state of the education system in the country. There are many reasons why children, particularly girls, are absent from school or drop out early. Distraught infrastructure is the cause of dropout in the rural areas of public schools. Gender disparity is also the major cause of the failure of the education system in Pakistan. Poverty and hunger act as obstacles for rural girls to be educated. In some rural areas, the existing feudal system and conventional thought are also the main reason why girls’ education is resisted. Moreover, government attention to education is on the verge of vanishing. It has now practically become the norm that the share of the budget allocated to education is at its minimum level. Having a sufficient number of schools for both boys and girls is also a prerequisite for access to quality education. According to the Ministry of Education (2010), the total primary schools in Pakistan number 146,691. Of these, 43.8 percent schools are for boys, 31.5 percent for girls and the remaining 24.7 percent schools provide mixed enrolment for both boys and girls. Thus, Pakistan has fewer schools for girls than for boys. At the provincial or country level, there are also more boys’ schools than girls’ schools. This situation is leading towards the destruction of girls’ education in Pakistan. The promotion of girls’ education is the guarantee for having a developed society and an economic boom in the country. The new government is faced with the challenge of devising new strategies for the development of the education system in the country.

For the promotion of girl’s education, civil society organisations, non-governmental organisations, the government and even the common public has to play their role with the strength of integrity. Besides, more schools should be constructed; teachers’ regular attendance must be made mandatory and a monitoring and evaluation mechanism must be established to eliminate the corrupt elements that disrupt the education system. Teacher training also needs to be organised so that the teachers are in a position to play a motivational role for their students.

The writer is the project supervisor of the organization, Right To Play