ISLAMABAD, Nov 24: The decision to paint school and college buses yellow in the city will bring no positive result but lead to wastage of funds.

This was stated by parents and teachers while talking to Dawn on Saturday.

“While there are other serious issues, the change of colour of the buses will put an unnecessary burden on the institutions, as on an average Rs80,000 will be needed for the repainting of a single vehicle,” they maintained.It may be recalled that Secretary Ministry of Capital Administration and Development (CAD) Riffat Shaheen Qazi on October 16 directed the principals of all educational institutions to paint their buses yellow.

While talking to Dawn, the secretary said it was her predecessor Asad Rauf’s suggestion and she only implemented it.

She said according to estimates provided to her, the cost of painting would be Rs40,000 each bus. “Because of yellow colour, it will be easy for the traffic police to know that a school bus is coming and they will give preference to the school buses. Female conductors will look after the students,” said Ms Qazi.

However, a teacher of Islamabad Model College H-9 requesting anonymity said the authorities apparently wanted to follow the West without considering the issues of Third World countries like Pakistan.

“The change of colour will not bring any positive change. By doing this, we will be putting the real issues in the backburner. The real issues in schools and colleges are crowded classrooms, lack of faculty, shortage of buses and accommodation problems faced by teachers,” he said.

The teacher was of the opinion that funds allocated for such an activity can better be utilised for the construction of classrooms and purchase of school buses.

Due to shortage of buses, students are compelled to travel on the rooftops of public transport vehicles, which results around three causalities a year, he added.

Maqbool Ahmed, the father of a student, said it was easier for children to identify their bus because of its particular colour. The uniformity of colour among the vehicles of all educational institutions will create problems for kids studying in lower classes.

“In almost all the colleges and schools, there are parent-teacher associations (PTA) but this elected body was not consulted before taking the decision,” he said.

The principal of a college requesting not to be identified said the way the process of repainting the buses was conducted showed something fishy. He said CAD had insisted on getting the vehicles painted by a particular brand. Secondly, the private party headed by Malik Jehangir, a painter at Pirwadhai, had initially demanded Rs36,000 per bus (without removing the old colour) but later increased the rate.

“As most of the buses are old and need a lot of repair work before repainting so the average bill may cross over Rs70,000. The principals were told by the authorities in a meeting to get the buses painted from Mr Jehangir for Rs36,000,” he said.

Talat Samiullah, the principal of F-7/2 College, told Dawn that there were five buses in her college. “I have sent one of the vehicles for repainting and will see if we can repaint the other buses too,” she said.

One of the teachers was of the view that replacing the original colour with the substandard yellow would destroy the originality of the vehicles.

The yellow colour will also give a very odd look. “It would have been far better had these buses been left with their original colour and the new ones to be purchased in future painted yellow.”

The Federal Government College Teachers Association suggested that instead of repainting the buses the transport problems of students should be resolved.