MIANWALI: State-run schools falling in NA-95, the native constituency of Prime Minister Imran Khan, have shown embarrassing and shocking ninth class results.

All the 62 students representing the Govt High School, Bangi Khel, failed. Out of 76 students of Govt High school, Tola Mangali, 71 failed. Similarly, out of 83 students of the Govt High School, Tabi Sar, 80 failed.

Official sources said identical results were expected from other state- run schools of the district where the data was still being compiled. Sources in the education department said the worst results have been reported from Isakhel, the constituency of the prime minister.

When Dawn approached Mr Waheeddudin Shah, the chief executive officer (education), Mianwali, to know the cause of this decline, he said he would be able to speak on the issue after three days as the results were still being compiled.

“Moreover, right now we are busy in preparing a presentation for the Punjab education secretary.”

Hameedullah Khan, chairman of the English Teachers Association, Punjab, told Dawn that there were many causes for poor results of the 9th class in the district. He said there was shortage of science teachers in most of schools beside absence of regular headmasters.

He said in state-run schools most of the students belonged to poor families and their parents did not maintain any liaison with teachers to know in time what their wards were doing. Khan was of the view that ‘no-fail-policy’ for the 8th class students was a major cause of such results because a large number of weak students were promoted to the 9th class. He also blamed the Punjab Education Commission for this sorry state of affairs at state-run schools.

Imran Khan Niazi, convener of the United Teachers Association, Mianwali, said out of 148 high schools in the district 78 had been running without headmasters since long. He said SST teachers were given acting charge in such schools but they lacked managerial and administrative skills.

Niazi said the schools without regular heads had been showing alarming results. He further said the 8th class exams by the PEC having no-fail-policy and introduced by the Shehbaz Sharif government, was a major cause of poor results.

“Penalties are imposed on teachers for poor results but high-ups never bother to look into the causes of poor results,” he regretted.

Published in Dawn, August 22nd, 2019