ISLAMABAD, Sep 18 (APP):Chairperson for National Commission for Human Development (NCHD),
former Senator Razina Alam Khan Tuesday said education is the best remedy to all the
problems prevailing in the form of extremism, poverty, inequality and social
injustice in the society.
“We can only overcome country’s socio-economic problems when
we have a literate society along with skill development”, said the chairperson
NCHD in a Senior Management Meeting, held here.
She said that, there was need to devise policies which could
address the causes such as social inequality, gender disparities, ethnic and
linguistic disadvantages and gaps between geographic areas.
“Providing an equal education opportunity in the remote
areas is the basic right of all the citizens of the country”, she stressed.
Providing free and compulsory education to the poorest which is engrained with
good quality will make sense, while flexible approaches towards learning and multi-grade
teaching through Non-formal education in remote areas can cut the cost to the
lowest and most effective in the under-developed countries, she observed.
She said, NCHD had adopted a two pronged approach to address
the issues of illiteracy in the country, Adult Literacy (for age group 14 and
above) and Primary Education both Formal Education (for age group 5-9) and
Non-Formal education (for age group 10-14) to achieve 90 per cent literacy rate
in the country.
NCHD has made literate to 3.96 million since its inception
and providing education to 335,164 children in NCHD 5,949 Feeder Schools in the
remote areas to the marginalized group, she briefed.
She added that, NCHD has exercised a number of innovative
approaches to reach the marginalized group; we are working in jails with the
aim to provide education to the convicts and make them useful citizens. NCHD
had approached to the learners in seminaries with reforms and introduced primary
education along with religious education in order to bring them in the
mainstream of higher education, she said.
Currently, NCHD is successfully working in 100 Seminaries of
former Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK),
Gilgit Baltistan (GB) and Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT), she further added.
In collaboration with Japan International Cooperation Agency
(JICA), the commission had launched a model of Non-formal School system where 20
schools are functional in order to provide education to the children of age
10-14 who could neither be admitted to the primary school and nor belongs to
adult literacy, she informed.
She said that, we the nation of 207 million, where one
fourth or 22.6 million children of 5-9 age groups are still out of school and
40 per cent of adult population are illiterate hampers development and progress
of the country.
It is the obligation of government of Pakistan to provide education to all the marginalized groups
of the society, she further said.
NCHD had formulated a National Plan of Action (NPA) under Federal Ministry of Education and Technical Training to achieve 90 per cent literacy rate in the country, she added.
This NPA will envisage that the provincial authorities will use the plans to transform policy decisions into action at the ground level, she added.
NCHD established National Training Institute (NTI) to ensure quality education in its feeder schools and adult literacy program along with other projects, she informed.
NTI will build capacity of the professionals working in the field of literacy and non-formal education, she further informed.
NTI will also prepare Accelerated Learning Modules and condensed
syllabus that would provide (OOSC) a second chance or opportunity to take part
in educational activities, she maintained.