Lahore schools summer vacations

Summer vacations begin in Lahore schools
Lahore, June 01: The Punjab government on Monday rescheduled the annual summer vacation for the government schools and colleges. The summer break in public schools would be observed from June 1 to September 9 while the government colleges would have the summer vacation from June 12 to September 9. Officials in the Education Department said the new decision regarding the summer vacation was taken while keeping in view the ongoing extreme hot weather and the upcoming holy month of Ramazan.

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UHS employees stage protest rally along with children
Lahore: Employess of the University of Health Sciences along with their children held a protest rally from Punjab Assembly to Lahore High Court on Monday for acceptance of their demand of regularisation.

The employees are continuing protest demonstration and hunger strike on 70th consecutive day for not being regularised by UHS in, what they called, violation of Punjab government's orders and UHS Board of Governors recommendations in this regard.

More than 500 employees and their children lying down on burning strip at GPO Chowk under scorching sun blocked the traffic from all four sides causing immense inconvenience to the motorists, commuters and other road-users for over an hour.

They were holding banners and placards inscribed with their demands and raising slogans against the UHS administration for denying their right to regularisation. They condemned the UHS administration saying that they had terminated the services of all protesting employees instead of regularising their services.

The hunger strike and protest in sizzling heat by the UHS employees during two and a half months has so far failed to move provincial government authorities as none of the officials bothered to visit the protesting employees in order to give a sympathetic word with regard to regularisation of their services in the university.

"We have been made to run from pillar to post but nobody has turned up to listen to the genuine grievance of depriving us of a right of regularisation," the affected UHS employees regretted, adding that they had not been paid any salary and were unable to feed their family. "Our families and children are suffering from starvation," they lamented. They urged the Lahore High Court and provincial government to intervene and order UHS authorities to regularise the services of its employees from grade 1 to 15, which has already been implemented in all other government departments including all autonomous institutions under the Punjab government's policy of abolishing the contract policy in the province.

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Students protest Israeli aggression
Lahore: Various student organizations staged protest demonstrations against the deadly Israeli attack on a Gaza-bound aid flotilla.

Islami Jamiat Talaba (IJT) activists organized a protest demo at the New Campus, Punjab University, Lahore, to condemn the Israeli terrorism, urging Muslim Ummah to take a unanimous stand against the aggression.

Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf's student wing Insaf Students Federation (ISF) also organized a protest demo outside the Lahore Press Club, slamming the Israeli barbarity.

Carrying banners and placards, the ISF activists chanted slogans against Israel and urged the Muslim countries to get united and end diplomatic ties with the country. They also demanded the United Nations (UN) to play its role to stop the Israeli atrocities.

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PEF free summer camps
Lahore: The Punjab Education Foundation (PEF) has allowed its partner schools in 29 districts to hold free summer camps for students. These schools cannot receive any fee from the students. Director Foundation Assisted School programme Nadeem Masood while addressing the partner schools management of 11 districts here on Monday added that the partner schools were also allowed to operate two campuses besides allowing inter-tehsil migration of students, said a DGPR handout.

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Result-oriented research stressed
Lahore: Punjab Education Minister Mujtaba Shuja ur Rehman has urged the scholars to plan their research activities keeping in mind commercial benefits.

He was speaking at a national seminar on "The Role of Research and Development in Improving Access to Medicines" organised by the University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Health on the varsity campus on Monday.

Stating that funding research and development activities was an expensive business, the minister suggested that the funding for these activities was only possible if these would be result-oriented.

He said the researchers should also work to improve upon already available drug and got it patented.

The minister acknowledged that the UVAS was working in different scientific research areas under the able leadership of Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Muhammad Nawaz.

In the past, he said, this was a small institution that transformed into a relatively modern veterinary hospital and now for some years it had grown into a full-fledge university.

UVAS VC Prof Dr Muhammad Nawaz said the government was providing facilities to the universities along with funding but provinces remained unable in drug licensing and registration. He said the BeST Centre of the UVAS was working in areas of research development relating to drugs and innovations, saying BeST had become a unique centre of country.

He added that biological research must be focused but short of funds in this regard had also become a major hurdle.

Prof Nawaz said he and his faculty members became successful in making the UVAS a smoking-free campus and currently all teachers and students were discouraging the habit of smoking. The news

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Campaign against absentees launched
Lahore: Punjab Education Department (School Wing) has started vigorous campaign against absenteeism of subject specialists posted in the higher secondary schools following reports that hundreds of them were missing.

The campaign has been launched on the pattern of Higher Education Wing of the department, which found recently over 600 lecturers absent from duties since months and years whose services were terminated to recruit fresh incumbents.

The school wing of the department has issued notices to subject specialists (SS) and senior subjects specialists (SSS) through newspaper advertisements to report for duty, majority of whom failed to do so prompting action against them. It is reported that hundreds of SSS and SS are absent from duty from 500 boys and girls higher secondary schools in the province but are receiving salaries from the government exchequer.

As many as 17 SSS and SS are posted in a school. Due to their absence, the higher secondary school system catering intermediate classes have crumbled down. The three tier school education systems i.e elementary, secondary and higher secondary was evolved in 1970 but the third tier of higher secondary education has been jeopardised due to mismanagement.

The government plans to transfer intermediate classes from degree colleges to higher secondary schools but this plan is bound to meet a great set back due to non-availability of teachers in the form of SS and SSS. While most of them have secured other jobs, some of them managed to get themselves appointed on administrative posts in the Punjab education department and education wing of the City District Governments like Deputy Education Officers (EDOs), section officers & assistant directors etc in grade 18 and 19 and as headmasters/headmistresses.

The education department is short of administrative officers pending recruitment by the Public Service Commission and they have no other option but to acquire the services of teachers to cope with the rush of work.

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VC urged to withdraw decision
Lahore: As many as 35 shopkeepers of teaching staff colony of the University of Engineering & Technology, Lahore have urged the Vice Chancellor to withdraw the clandestine decision to invite bids for new auction of the shops.

In a statement they said that University officials have invited bids on May 2 for a fresh auction ignoring the sitting shopkeepers who had been running their business for the past 20 years and now they were being deprived of their allotments.

The affected shopkeepers have also secured stay order from the court of law and urged the UET authorities not to dislodge them in view of their services to continue the shops running despite low turn out of customers. The nation

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PU meeting
Lahore: The Punjab University (PU) Relief Committee held a meeting with 35 students belonging to Hunza Valley to assess the required monetary assistance, dry ration and essential articles of daily use for Attabad lake affectees. Those who held the meeting with the Hunza students included the relief committee chairman, Prof Dr Haris Rashid, the Center for High Energy Physics (CHEP) director, students advisor Iftikhar Ahmad Ch and students deputy advisor Zubair Akram. The committee held detailed discussion with Hunza students and finalized the detailed requisite relief goods for the affectees.

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Increase in education budget demanded
Lahore: Underscoring the importance of giving education sector a priority, speakers at a seminar demanded Monday substantial increase in educational budget at both federal and provincial level.

Senior educationists and people from different walks of life participated in the pre-budget seminar, organized by the Pakistan National Forum (PNF) here at a local hotel.

Political and defence analyst Prof Dr Hassan Askari Rizvi said that unless the present profile of the country, which he termed as security profile, was changed, the promotion of education was not possible. He said defence would always be a priority as long as the country had a big security profile.

ìIf we want to strengthen our society we need to change our directionî, he said, adding that the growing population could be turned into an asset with the help of education, citing Chinaís example in this connection.

He said the allocation of seven percent of the GDP for education sector in five years, as announced in the National Education Policy 2009, seemed impossible as the priorities of the government were different.

Punjab Universityís Dean of Education Prof Dr Hafiz Muhammad Iqbal said that no government in Pakistan had ever prioritized education sector, adding every government failed to meet its own target set for the enhancement of literacy rate.

He said the promotion of education was the only way to address social issues prevailing in the country. He said that, keeping in view the trend of allocations for education in annual budget over the years, it seemed impossible that the government could allocate seven percent of the GDP for education by 2015.

Former DPI (Elementary) Jamil Najam said the condition of government schools could not be changed unless the same were owned by those sitting at the helm. He strongly criticized the non-utilization of budgetary allocations while claiming a Punjab governmentís institute dealing with teachers training had recently surrendered Rs 350 million. PNF president Col (r) Ikram Ullah Khan, Air Marshal (r) Khurshid Anwar Mirza, and PU vice chancellor Prof Dr Mujahid Kamran also spoke on the occasion.

According to the invitations extended to the media, Federal Minister for Education Sardar Asif Ahmed Ali and Punjab Minister for Education Mujtaba Shuja ur Rehman were also supposed to participate in the seminar but they failed to attend the function. The news

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