LAHORE, Sept 10: The Punjab Higher Education Department performed far better than its school counterpart in terms of utilising its development budget in the fiscal 2012-13 despite its slashed development allocation.

This was stated by Institute of Social and Policy Sciences (I-SAPS) senior research fellow Ahmad Ali at a post-budget policy dialogue on ‘Effectiveness of Education Financing for Financial Year 2013-14’ organised by the institute in collaboration with the Department for International Development (DFID) at a local hotel on Tuesday.

Mr Ali said the School Education Department was allocated Rs23.5 billion development budget in 2012-13 but it utilised only Rs1.717 billion – the seven per cent of the budget. However, the department has been allocated Rs26 billion development budget for the current financial which is 11 per cent higher than the previous year allocation and 1,415 per cent higher than the last year spending.

The Punjab Higher Education Department was allocated Rs13.65 billion development budget for 2012-13 but it utilised Rs8.169 billion – 60 per cent of the allocation. For the current financial year, the department has been allocated Rs9.17 billion development budget, which is 33 per cent less than last year’s allocation.

Mr Ali said the School Education Department also spent Rs1.325 billion on four budgeted schemes, while the Higher Education Department spent Rs433.56 million on 14 non-budgeted schemes in the last financial year. He also revealed that both school and higher education departments did not spend a single penny on 53 and 55 budgeted development schemes in 2012-13.

The research fellow also said that some 28 per cent of four to nine years of age children and 9.3 million 5-16 years of age children were out of school in Punjab. Regarding missing facilities, he said, 12.5 per cent of primary schools were without drinking water facility, 42 per cent without electricity, 18 per cent without toilets and 18.9 per cent without boundary walls.

Referring to PEAS data on the academic performance of Grade-IV students, he said, only five per cent of them showed excellent performance in mathematics, one per cent in Urdu and four per cent in social studies. He said the PML-N government this year decreased block allocations.

Punjab Labour Minister Raja Ashfaq Sarwar said that the questions about budget allocations and utilisation needed to be answered. He admitted that it was sad that the government was not able to utilise the budget but he had addressed the issue of missing facilities in schools in his constituency in Murree.

Former education minister Mian Imran Masood said it was a minister’s role to get his department’s budget released and utilized, adding that bureaucracy and P&D always resisted releasing funds.

He said that during his tenure in 2002-2008, he was able to introduce the initiative of free education and free textbooks in schools. He said that he utilised maximum Rs7 billion development budget for three successive years.

Mr Masood favoured the concept of block allocations, saying that politicians sometimes needed to make announcements to launch certain projects. He said the budgeted money go in the hands of bureaucracy. He, however, said that it was crime to spend on non-budgeted schemes. He said that Daanish schools were a good initiative but not a solution to a big problem. He stressed that MPAs should have a close watch on budget releases and demand budget releases’ statements on quarterly basis.

PTI MPA Dr Murad Rass said that he had talked on the budget allocations and utilisation issues on the Punjab Assembly floor but did not get any answer even after the passage of two months. He said that he would also demand that budget statements should be provided to all members on quarterly basis. He said the treasury bulldozed all initiatives taken by the opposition.

Punjab School Education Department Deputy Secretary Qaiser Rasheed said the government had allocated Rs206 billion for the School Education department comprising Rs165 billion for districts and Rs41 billion at provincial level.

He said the department would be piloting a project in nine districts by providing non-salary budget to the tune of Rs3.5 billion. He said the enhanced non-salary budget would be provided to 18 districts next year and 36 districts in 2015-16.

Referring to the quality of education in public schools, he said that almost 100 schools in Sargodha board showed zero per cent results in Class-IX board examination. He said that a school fielded 200 candidates and all failed.

MPA Saira Iftikhar, I-SAPS’ Naeem Sidhu, teachers’ leaders Rana Atta and Chaudhry Azhar also spoke.