RAWALPINDI: To separate the education department from the municipal corporations and the district councils, the Punjab government has decided to establish district education authorities soon after the formation of the local governments in all the 36 districts next month.

Under the 2001 local government system, education and health sectors remained under the district government.

But under the 2013 local government Act, the two sectors would come under the direct control of the provincial government.

Each district authority will be running schools and basic health units and the tehsil headquarters hospitals in theirrespective jurisdiction.

A senior official of the education department told Dawn that the homework for the establishment of the authorities had been completed and the recruitment of the staf f almost done.

However, he said the decision to appoint the chairman of the authority would be made after the election of the mayor and the District Council chairman. `Under the devolution plan, the post of the chairman will be filled by a local political leader but the chief executive of ficer (BPS-18) of the authority will be from the education department.

He said the government had asked the education department to submit names of educationists and people having good repute for the governing body which would be announced soon after the mayor`s elections.

The building of the Government Khan Boys High School at Chandni Chowk has been vacated for the establishment of the District Education Authority office. The school has been shifted to a rented building at Data Gunjbaksh Road near Shamsabad.

The of ficial said earlier the government wanted to bring all the schools under theambit of the education authority but later it decided that elementary schools would be under the authority while the secondary level schools would be looked after by the directorate ofeducation.

`As many as 1,857 government schools in the Rawalpindi district will be divided into two groups. The 1,450 elementary schools will be transferred to the education authority while the remaining 407 secondary schools will be directly supervised by the education department.

He said the school staff and teachers were facing an uncertainty about their future. `The government did not clear its policy about the newly-recruited teachers whose services will be regularised after three years.

He said about 16,500 teachers were working in the schools in the district and more than 8,000 of them were posted to high schools. The division of the teachers will be a tricky issue as it is not clear if the District Education Authority chairman will have the power to hire and fire the staf f,` he said.

Punjab Teachers Association District president Chaudhry Saghir Alam told Dawn that the education authorities were being formed to accommodate local lead-ers of the ruling PML-N.

He said the provincial government should manage the department without bifurcating it. `The government should improve the standard of education in the schools by providing them all missing facilities besides arranging refresher courses for teachers instead of wasting resources on the establishment of such authorities,` he said. He also said senior teachers should be included in the authority.

When contacted, Executive District Officer (EDO) Education Qazi Zahoorul Haq said the government would soon announce the formation of the education authority.

`Schools in the elementary level along with the staff and teachers will be handed over to the education authority while the secondary schools will be managed by the education department. There is no uncertainty about the transfer of teachers,` he said.

The EDO said both the district education authority and the education department would remain under the provincial government but the working of the elementary and high schools will be slight different.