The Amir Jumat-i-Islami, Mr. Siraj Ul Haq, while unveiling the party manifesto for the next general elections stated that if they came to power; they will appoint PhD’s for teaching in primary schools in the country. This is a highly impracticable statement seeing the primary educational priorities in Pakistan in general and the Jumat-i-Islami’s approach to primary education in particular. Primary education has never being given its due importance in Pakistan. The budgetary spending is very low compared to secondary and tertiary education. The quality of primary education is also not satisfactory. It is due to these reasons that drop-ratio in primary education is very high.
Jumat-i-Islami being in power in Khyber Pukhtunkhwa for almost seven and half years in last twelve years concentrated only on uniform of students and contents of text books. The uniform in primary schools was changed from black to white clothes in MMA government in spite of much resistant from different quarters. In the present government it revived the contents of text books. Teachers training or appointing qualified teachers is never being a priority of Jumat-i-Islami.
The provincial governments need to focus on improving the quality of primary education. They should work on to eliminate the difference of education standards in private and public sector. The primary school teachers should be adequately trained not only in academics but also in child psychology. Thus, if our roots in education (primary education) become strong we will have little worries about secondary and tertiary education.
M SAYYAD ALAM KHAN,
Peshawar, December 7.