Drug use in top schools, colleges
Growing drug use in top schools, colleges to be monitored
Karachi, June 09: The Sindh government has, in principle, decided to "closely
monitor" all top private and government educational institutes to control the
growing narcotic activities there, official sources privy to this development
said. Feedback from the Education Department would also be
obtained for this purpose. This decision was taken at a meeting of the
provincial Narcotics Interdiction Committee (NIC), which was chaired by the
Chief Secretary of Sindh, Mr Fazal-ur-Rehman, held here recently. The
participants at the meeting reportedly expressed their deep concern over the use
of drugs in educational institutes. They called for enhanced
coordination between the law-enforcement agencies and other organizations to
curb the menace of narcotics in society, especially among youths. The
Secretary of Excise and Taxation, Mohsin S. Haqqani said about the
decisions made at the meeting about how to address the problems. He said
that a sub-committee, to be led by Home Secretary Arif Khan, was also
established to deal with the issues relating to narcotics. Meanwhile, the
President of Pakistan Society, Dr Saleem Azam, whose organisation has been
treating drug addicts since 1982, said that charas, marijuana, cannabis,
"ecstasy" tablets and "dating drug or club drug" (MAMD) were being increasingly
consumed by youths at an alarming level. A student from a prominent
private university said that 20 out of 30 students in his class were
taking charas. He said that every third girl-student in his university
smoked cigarettes, and some even took charas. He said that "depression and peer
pressures" were the main reasons behind taking drugs. Dr Azam, however,
opined that taking help from the LEAs would not be enough in dealing with the
problem. It also required informing the youths about the harmful effects
of drugs and this could be done through arranging visits to hospitals and other
centres where drug addicts were being treated. He also suggested
creating recreational facilities to take the youths off the drugs. Dr
Azam said that parents should spend more time with their children and counsel
them on the issue. He said that the `growing gap' between teachers and
students was unhelpful. The doctor said that religious scholars should
be encouraged to take up this issue in their sermons. He disclosed that
he knew about at least 50 dens in the city that sold charas, but the authorities
concerned had failed to crack them down. He lamented that the ban on
smoking at public places was not being implemented. Dr Azam wondered if
the authorities would manage to control drugs use in the institutes by deputing
cops there since they had even failed to control a lesser evil, namely, the
"copy culture". He regretted that charas was no more considered to be a
"bad drug" or an intoxicant. Instead it had become "socially acceptable" even
though "drug-induced psychosis, hallucinations and non-motivation" were some of
the harmful effects of charas. Dr Azam said that charas was even more
dangerous than some other drugs since its effects in the body lasted for up to
45 days. He opined that apart from peer pressure, the 'modern lifestyle'
was also a factor contributing to drug use. Dr Azam recalled that the
'hippy culture' was in vogue in the 1960s in USA whereas now a day called "420",
which fell on the 20th of April every year, was dedicated for drug use there and
this practice was penetrating in our society too. He said that ecstasy
was being imported from China, India and Thailand. He said that the
demand for the drug, which is also called a "designer drug", had gone up
manifolds and this could be gauged from the fact that around three years ago,
the ANF used to seize 80 to 100 such drugs, but now they were seizing hundreds
of such drugs at the airports. Dr Azam said that taking the "dating
drug" was also increasing among the affluent people. This drug triggered "rash
behaviour", which sometimes led to abuse and even rape.
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Govt school demolished by 'land-grabbers'
Karachi: A group of people demolished the building of a government school
in Federal B. Area on Tuesday, destroying several classrooms and other
infrastructure. The Modern English Grammar Government Boys Lower
Secondary School in Dastagir Block 9 in Gulberg Town was destroyed early in the
morning allegedly by one Tariq and accomplices, who claimed to own the property.
The headmistress of the second shift of the school lodged an FIR at the
local police station, accusing Tariq and other people of the crime. However, no
arrest was made till the filing of this report. In her report, she
alleged that ceiling fans, school documents and other valuables were found to be
missing from the school's building. It was an attempt to occupy the
school's building, she alleged. The Assistant District Officer-Male
(ADO-M), Education, Gulberg Town, Mr Taj Muhammad Shah said that
Tariq, said to be a resident of the area, had been threatening the headmistress
of the lower secondary shift, Ms Tabiba Aisha Hyderi, for some time. Ms
Hyderi said that Tariq used to visit the school regularly, claiming that he was
the owner of the building. "He wanted us to leave the building and hand
it over to him," she added. Some other members of the school's
management, who were present at the police station, said they had been
repeatedly threatened in the past to evacuate the said school building.
They said Tariq had never served the school management with a legal
notice, nor did he ever show them documents of ownership of the land or the
building to back his claim. The headmaster of the primary section, Mr
Aslam Rajput, alleged that Tariq often visited the school during his shift.
"He once came to see me and told me to shift the school somewhere else
as this building belonged to him," Mr Rajput said. He alleged that Tariq
had claimed that some influential people of the area had been backing him on
this issue. "He was just bluffing because I personally know those people
and they could never support a land-grabber," Mr Rajput further said. The
school was nationalised during the government of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in the
1970s. The person who had owned the school prior to its nationalisation
was said to have died a long time ago. The school reportedly had other
claimants to its ownership in the past as well. Some people had made an
attempt to occupy this building in 2006 also, and the matter then got referred
to the court. Habib-ur-Rehman had earlier lodged an FIR at the Jauharabad
Police Station against Akber Qadri, Saba Malik, Waseem Uddin and Muhammad Yaqoub
over the dispute of the ownership of the land. Police had arrested Qadri and
Saba, who were later released on bail, whereas Waseem and Yaqoub had got bail
before arrest. The accused in Tuesday's incident had apparently tried to
take advantage of the closure of the school due to summer vacations. The
premises were supposed to have been guarded by a watchman, but the school's
management could not say where the watchman was when the incident occurred.
The SHO of Jauharabad Police Station, Manzoor Siddiqui, said the police
would give priority to arresting the accused as it was a matter of a school and
its pupils. The News made several attempts to contact the EDO (Education) but to
no avail. Nor did the attempt to contact the accused bear any success.
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Teachers' demands accepted: Pir Mazhar
Karachi: Despite facing economic problems, the present government has
approved all just demands of teachers, including those about the time scale and
teaching allowance, on the pattern of Balochistan on the basis of Accelerated
Cost Recovery System (ACRs). This was stated by Senior Sindh Minister
for Education and Literacy Pir Mazhar-ul-Haq on Tuesday at a press conference
held at the Sindh Assembly Building. "As a result of acceptance of
demands, 1, 17, 835 schoolteachers would receive teaching allowance while 1, 16,
309 would get the time scale upgradation across the province. The treasury will
sustain a load of Rs2 billion in this context," Haq informed. "Leaders
of the teachers associations misguided the teachers' community and took them to
streets by telling them lies. The statements about rejection of summary were
nothing but rumours spread by some vested element. The teachers' community
showed unnecessary urgency on these issues. Now, we demand of them to work hard
to make up for the lost time and education process that lapsed due to their
strikes," he said. The minister further said that he had directed the
Secretary Education, Sindh to visit each district and identify the ghost
teachers and sack them. Haq said that the teachers got themselves
transferred to cities from remote rural areas and this created problems for
rural students. He said that his department was working on this issue
and he would announce some positive news soon. The news
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