Three rooms for 500 students in Dir school

Children have to sit under the open sky in the scorching sun

In Government Primary School Tango Manzai, Rabat Dir Lower district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P), there are only three rooms for a total of 500 students.

As a result children have to sit under the open sky in the scorching sun in July.

Talking to The Express Tribune local residents said that among the 500 total students, there were 450 regular students who are enrolled while another 50 go to the school without enrolment.

“There are around 500 girls and boys in the school and three rooms could not accommodate them so in the event of rain students are asked not to come to school,” they said, adding that despite the large number of students, there were only three teachers at the school.

“How can just three teachers teach 500 students whose number is increasing with each passing day,” they said, adding that sometime ago construction of a room was started at the school and even walls were completed but these walls remain without a roof till date as the construction work was stopped for reasons unknown.

“The PTI government often claims that they have reformed the education system but these reforms are not visible on ground as far as schools in our area are concerned,” they said, adding that neither any attention had been paid to the basic facilities at the school nor was there any effort to increase the number of teachers at the educational institute.

Locals said there were so many such schools in Lower and Upper Dir districts where even basic facilities were not available. And this goes without inviting any attention from the quarters concerned.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 30th, 2021.