No Education for Girls in Bajaur

Fazal Rahman

Bajaur: There are 265 villages in Bajaur district where there are no primary schools for girls or boys or for both, according to the District Education Officer (DEO) Shireenzada.

There are some villages, for example, Islam Gut, where no government school has ever been built since the founding of Pakistan. A non-governmental organisation has set up a temporary school between four villages, including Islam Gut which has around 1,000 families.

Islam Gut is a border region rich in natural beauty, about 35 km from Khar, the headquarters of Bajau, but access to it is made difficult by poor roads and challenging mountain crossings.

265 villages in Bajaur district have no primary schools either for girls or boys and in some cases for both.

Fear of Talibanisationis also one the main factors for the low literacy rate of girls in Bajaur

General Counsel Lal Muhammad, who is a resident of Islam Gul, explained that the school is sometimes closed and other times opened. When the teachers are not paid from the project,village teachers are paid on a self-help basis so that the children’s education is not affected.

Muhammad Tahir, a resident of the area, said, “We have repeatedly requested the government to establish a school in our area because our children are deprived of education. After receiving primary education in a temporary school, due to not having a middle school, most of the children leave their education incomplete, taking up work at home or abroad.”

Tahir, who works in Saudi Arabia, said that the residents of this area do not have health and education facilities.

Mohammad Yar, who was 16 at the time, acquired his primary education at Islam Gut Project School and is currently a class 10 student. He said that when he was in grade one, there were 76 students with him, and by the fourth grade, only six remained.

As many as 86,640 children are out of school, of which 82,135 are girls and 4,505 are boys: Education Survey 2022

Yar said, “They all knew where we would go after primary school. After passing primary school, I was left with only one friend, Saad, and we both enrolled in the Government High School, but Saad also left school in the eighth grade. Since there are no roads in the area, he is pursuing his schooling by walking for an hour each way every day. Muhammad Yar told said that his friend Saad was not ready to make this journey on foot every day, which is why he left school and went to work in Karachi.”

DEO for Bajaur Sherinzada explained that the Education Department classifies areas deserving of a school with a population of more than 800. He added that, apart from 265 villages, there are several small villages. These are not recommended for a school because, in accordance with the policy, the school will only be built in a village with a population of at least 800.

No education for Girls

Hina Gul from the Dabar area of ​​tehsil Mamond of Bajaur dropped out of school after studying up to the fifth standard because there was no middle school near her village. The primary school that she was studying at was also 2 kilometres away from her village.

Hina Gul said, “I had a wish that I would become a doctor, but due to the lack of a school nearby, my wish was not fulfilled.”

This story is not only of Hina Gul but of almost thousands of girls living in remote areas of the Bajaur district who are deprived of education due to lack of middle and high schools for them in their respective regions.

According to the information obtained under the KP Right to Information Act 2013, there has been a clear decrease in the enrolment of girls after primary school in Bajaur, owing to the lack of educational institutions in the district.

District Schools	No. of Girls Enrolled
Primary schools	40509
Middle schools	4370
High school	1322
Higher secondary schools	448

Source: Education Department’s 2022 Report

In this regard, DEO Bajaur Sherinzada said, “There are four main reasons for the low literacy rate of girls. Firstly, our is a conservative society in which girls drop out of school after primary school; secondly, early marriages; thirdly, a lack of schools or absence of schools nearby; and fifthly, a lack of awareness among most of the parents regarding the importance of female education.”

According to the information obtained under the RTI Act, the number of primary schools for girls in the district is far less than for boys.

No. of Schools	Boys	Girls
Primary schools	360	184
Middle Schools	64	42
High schools	35	14

Source: Department of Education in Bajaur

The number of children between four and 10 years of age in the district is 274481, of which the number of girls is 139985 and the number of boys is 134496.

Out-of-school children

According to the 2022 survey of the Department of Education, 86640 children are out of school, of which 82135 are girls and 4505 are boys.

Abdul Jawad, a resident of Navagai Sharif Khana, said, “For my sister, I pay more than Rs10,000 per month to a Suzuki driver just for transportation.”

Jawad said that people in Sharif Khan want to equip their daughters with the jewel of education, but the government has not yet established a girls’ middle school in this village. He further said that most of the children in this village go to school on foot because there is no appropriate transport in this area.

A senior journalist from Bajaur, Anwarullah Khan, says, “Under Article 25A of the Constitution, the state will provide free and compulsory education to all children between the ages of five and 16, but thousands of children are deprived of education due to a lack of schooling. He further added that due to lack of educational institutions in remote tribal districts, girls are unable to schooling.

One of the reasons is that most of the residents are away from home for work in other cities of the country or in the Gulf countries, so it becomes difficult for these girls to make special arrangements for going to school.Accordingly, girls continue their education after puberty only in those areas where high school is close to them.

Apart from this, in areas where there are no roads, transport has been a major problem and many people do not send their girls to school due to adequate transport.

Under Article 25A of the Constitution, education compulsory for all children between the ages of five and 16 and  state is responsible for providing it free of cost. Yet, thousands of children are deprived due to lack of schools in the district: Journalist Anwarullah Khan

 

Child Rights Committee Official Hanifullah said, “Inflation is one of the reasons for dropping out or not enrolling because most people cannot afford the cost of education. The cost of transportation for girls can be  five thousand per month which  is not affordable for everyone. Most  of the girls collect dry wood and paper in the area to burn the stoves of their homes.”

Regarding the lack of middle and high schools for girls, Provincial Minister for Social Welfare Anwar Zeib Khan, “The proposal for 40 new primary schools in district has been finally approved. Apart from this, 12 schools are currently under construction, including nine schools for girls and three schools for boys.”

AnwarZeib said, “Our priority is to promote women’s education which has not been given attention in the past. The majority of the schools we will build will be girls’ schools.”

Founder of an organization that spreads awareness of women’s education, Vigma Feroze, explained that the fear of Talibanisation is amongst many reasons for the low literacy rate of girls in Bajaur. “Because in the past girls did not go to school because of the Taliban and that fear still remains among some people. Also, the regional customs in the merged districts are also an obstacle for women to get education.”