Chitral's un highlighted problems

1. I wish to share my opinion on an issue which has never came to the limelight at any forum, may it be the leadership, educationists, social worker or NGO etc. Chitral is far-flung area of KP. Although, primary schools are established almost in every village/town; but the Middle and High Schools are not. On average one Middle School is dependent on 5-6 Primary schools to fetch the students, similarly a High school is dependent on 2-3 Middle schools to maintain requisite numbers of students. Ironically, the Middle/High Schools, at places are unreasonably far away for the student to attend. At places students have to travel for 4 to 6 hours on daily basis over the rugged terrain, with a turn round distance of approximately 20-25 kilometers. This results into:-
a. Those who financially afford to educate their children in private schools or requisition their living in town areas do not prefer their children to undergo this physical stress. Therefore strength of students in govt schools gradually reduces instead increasing.
b. Students who are not well off discontinue schooling at Middle/High level in the face of these difficulties.
c. Those who have the urge to gain further education but can,t change their location for education purpose whatsoever the reason may be, do continue in the face of these inevitable inconvenience. These students do exhaust their time and energy in covering long distances for schooling. They have less time to study and rest to remain healthy, hence can not perform well because of daily marathon between school and home.
 

 2. Here, I take the situation in one valley as an example, although the problem is similar to most part of Chitral.
a. Sunich is 12 Km away from Shoghore. A student of class 6th has to travel 24 km on daily basis over the rugged terrain to attend the school.
b. Parsan is 11 km from Susum. Here a student has to cover a distance 22 Km daily to get education.
c. Hinjil is 9 km away from Shoghore, a student has to travel about 18 km on foot.
 

3. Obviously, a standard strength of students in a class is required for up gradation of a school but if this tendency continue we will never be able to achieve requisite number of students because of depleting strength of students in the govt schools. The ultimate sufferers are the poor students who are dependent on these schools. Therefore, to facilitate the poor and ensure extending education to all segments of society in letter spirit, there is a dire need to up grade more number of schools depending upon the remoteness of the area and distances involved. This is possible if existing policies governing up gradation of schools is relaxed for Chitral.
 

4. In my humble opinion addressing these problem confronting the future of our new generation and poor people of the society is the need of time; I request our MNA and MPA to highlight the issue at appropriate level. We may take FATA as a reference, where expand of area is the dominating factor and get preference over the number of students for up gradation/setting up the schools. It is also highlighted that Chitral was PATA till late seventies due its inaccessible and peculiar nature of terrain, but our peace loving nature made Chitral a settle district of KPP without any unrest.  --Muhammad Uzair Ul Islam, Rawalpindi, 04 Aug 10.