KARACHI: Asif Hyder Shah, the chief secretary of Sindh, gave the authorities instructions on Tuesday to make sure that the more than nine million students enrolled in the province’s more than 50,000 public and private schools receive their textbooks on time.
While presiding over a high-level conference aimed at assessing the progress of the health and education departments, the chief secretary pledged to transfer the funds needed for textbook printing to the Sindh Textbook Board (STBB).
Over 5.23 million students were enrolled in 40,978 government schools and over 3.9 million students were enrolled in 11,736 private schools throughout Sindh, according to information provided by School Education Secretary Zahid Ali Abbasi to the Chief Secretary.
In a similar vein, he reported that 51,354 new instructors had been hired by the education department via the Institute of Business Administration, Sukkur.
CS requests that officials guarantee clean water and furniture in the province’s roughly 40,000 government schools.
A statement released following the meeting stated, “The chief secretary reiterated that access to education is the basic right of every child.”
He put a lot of emphasis on the necessity to give out-of-school children access to non-formal education and to clean water and furniture in schools.
In addition, he guaranteed that the STBB will receive the money required to guarantee that students receive their textbooks on schedule.
The province has 63,000 nurses and about 14,000 doctors.
At the conference, Health Secretary Rehan Iqbal Baloch said that the province’s health department employs 14,089 physicians and 63,000 paramedical personnel, and that more than 1,000 ambulances are stationed in various hospitals throughout the province.
He told the CS, “In addition, the Sindh Integrated Health Services is offering free services in various parts of the province through over 300 ambulances.”
It stated that in order to attain the best outcomes and guarantee that every child has access to vaccinations, the chief secretary demanded that the immunization program receive extra attention.
Additionally, he gave the secretaries of health and education instructions to guarantee that physicians and teachers show up for work and to upgrade hospital amenities and treatment rooms.
In order to alleviate the burden on those who frequently had to go to Karachi or other large cities for medical treatment, the committee decided to improve treatment facilities at the district and divisional levels.
