Pakistan’s Literacy Gains Lag Behind Population Boom

Nadeem Tanoli

Islamabad: Pakistan’s deepening education challenges came into sharp focus in Parliament on Friday as the Ministry of Education acknowledged that literacy gains remain far too weak to keep pace with the country’s rapidly expanding population, while federal colleges in Islamabad continue to operate with hundreds of vacant teaching posts.

Responding to two separate questions, Federal Education Minister Dr. Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui conceded that literacy has increased by only 1.8 percent over the past six years — rising from 58.9 percent in 2017 to 60.7 percent in 2023 — even as the population has grown at an annual rate of 2.55 percent. Lawmakers warned that the trend reflects a worsening imbalance: Pakistan is producing more new citizens than new literate ones.

Read More: https://thepenpk.com/data-reveals-deepening-inequalities-in-higher-education-system/

Despite highlighting initiatives such as the TeleSchool mobile app, the upgradation of 167 schools, nearly 180,000 literacy centers run by the National Commission for Human Development (NCHD), more than 1,000 non-formal education schools, 1,720 Basic Education Community Schools for 62,000 out-of-school children, and a National Non-Formal Education Policy covering 1.29 million learners, critics said these scattered programs have failed to produce meaningful, system-wide improvement.

In a separate exchange, Senator Nuzhat Sadiq raised concerns over mid-session transfers of faculty from ex-Federal Government Colleges to Model Colleges, warning that abrupt reshuffling was disrupting classes and worsening existing teacher shortages.

The Minister defended the transfers, describing them as “limited” and carried out with the consent of principals, insisting that no academic discipline had been discontinued. 

But official figures disclosed to Parliament underscored the severity of staffing gaps: 212 teaching posts remain vacant across the ex-FG Colleges Wing, straining an already understaffed system.

Read More: https://thepenpk.com/parliament-slams-cuts-to-higher-education/

So far, only four male and 34 female teachers recommended by the Federal Public Service Commission have joined duty. 

Only two faculty members have been temporarily attached to Model Colleges, but the vacancies — combined with delayed recruitment — have continued to stretch the system thin. Requisitions for 174 posts have been forwarded to the FPSC, with another 38 to be submitted soon.

The twin disclosures — negligible literacy growth and severe staffing shortages — paint what lawmakers called a “troubling and unsustainable” picture of Pakistan’s public education system, raising renewed questions about long-term planning, institutional accountability, and the state’s ability to implement meaningful reform.