FAISALABAD: Ramzan has to daily erect a tent-fabric wall around a specific area in a ground sans boundary wall that serves as a collective classroom for some 200 girls and boys who study at the Government `Model` Primary School at Kot Farid Kathia, Jhang.

`I have to do this daily so that the two female teachers could have some privacy, as the school has been without any boundary wall since its inception some two decades ago,` the peon says, while handling the arduous task at hand.

Meanwhile, seven-year-old Mushtaq Ali, a Class III student, brings a wooden bench, carrying it on his back, to place it under one of the trees in the ground which are the only shelter the students have there.

`Every day, before the school starts, the students carry benches stored in a nearby room that was once used as an office by agriculture department, to sit on and at closing time they carry them back,` Ramzan says.

Co-education started at the school a couple of months back when the education authorities decided to merge two institutions, one each for boys and girls, where enrollment was low.

The school building comprises only two rooms that have no roof.

`The roof was dismantled because it was dilapidated and might collapse anytime,` Ramzan says, adding that two new rooms were being built but the pace of work was very slow. The contrac-tor says the construction will be complete in three months, he says.

`No body bothers about the boundary wall that is a must.

Thieves keep stealing various items, including the small bamboos I use to erect the tent-fabric wall for teachers,` he laments.Ramzan says that education officials as well as the elected representatives were well aware of the school`s condition but nothing has been done to improve it.

Mushtaq Ali complains about absence of toilets for students.

`Students have to go into nearby fields if they need to go totoilet during school timings, because the only toilet built in the school is used by teachers,` he says.

Maryam, a girl student, says teachers resort to corporal punishment even for minor mistakes.

Ijaz Ahmed, husband of one of the two female teachers, saysafter merger of the two schools, the one-kanal piece of land meant for boys school has been lying vacant, apprehending it may soon be grabbed by local land mafia.

Ahmed says there were only three teachers for some 200 students and `you can well imagine how burdened they are.