Search Page

The quality of education in Pakistan is extremely poor by world standards. Children study the same books as their parents did, or probably their grandparents. In Sindh, students who don't sit exams end up passing them. In Lahore, at the main examination centres located next to the board office, bribing and cheating are common practices. Professors are absent from classes and concentrate on maintaining their relations with influential individuals. Examination staff close the examination rooms to those who refuse to abide by the routine.

A teacher working for a school in Pune approached the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) complaining that two accounting officers of the state education department demanded a bribe of Rs 6,000 from him to verify documents relating to wage fixation under the Sixth and Seventh Pay Commission scheme. The ACB arrested them, and a first information report was registered under the provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.

The vice-president of the Ceylon Teachers Union has accused the Northern Province of misleading the education administration into corruption and bribery for years. Governors had been informed on several occasions about malpractices and abuses that took place in primary schools and notorious girls’ schools in Jaffna without any action being taken.

In 2018 an audit conducted to review the Basic Education Community Schools program authorized by the Public Accounts Committee revealed over 2000 ghost schools on paper but no teacher on record. Several years have passed and new cases have been reported. Yet criminals continue to embezzle money to bribe government officials to allow fake teachers to keep fake jobs and usurp salaries of honest teachers and deserving students.

The police arrested an education officer for allegedly receiving a bribe of Rs 50,000 from a school uniform supplier in Shamli. According to the anti-corruption unit, the supplier of school uniforms for government schools lodged a complaint after the official had asked him to pay up as part of the deal to deliver uniforms to a school.

A social activist alleged that large-scale corruption was being carried out in the District Education Office and nine girls’ schools in Bazgarha, Kamarkhel are locked. Dozens of female teachers of these closed schools are still receiving salaries at home, but paying a considerable portion of their salaries as a bribe to specific frontmen of the District Education Office. According to local sources, this practice of mismanagement is continuing since 2015.

Politicians, senior education officials, headmasters, and businesspeople are taking advantage of their positions to line their pockets with state funds. According to a study, the acts of corruption in Thailand range from the embezzling of state funds, colluding to mark up prices of educational and school construction materials, as well as demanding bribes from parents who want their children to be enrolled in a particular school. Irresponsible officials and school directors steal about 30% of the total budget.

The standard bribe demanded by officials for a teacher transfer in India is around Rs 1-2 lakh. Nevertheless, the government has developed a transparent online transfer policy for schoolteachers. A smartphone or computer, internet access and the teachers’ answers to around 10 queries will now decide the fate of teachers’ transfer requests. This new system is also designed to address the problem of job dissatisfaction and teacher absenteeism.

A Guwahati-based private company employee paid Rs 80,000 to a relative of his who works in the Directorate of Elementary Education to get his wife transferred to Guwahati. On the other hand, a female lower primary school teacher who holds a permanent job and works in a different school has been tired of applying for her transfer to Guwahati for the last five years through the legal process while her transfer remains pending. According to a secondary school teacher, any transfer request is processed in Guwahati only after paying bribes.