GCT collaborates with Al-Khidmat to extend school network to Balochistan

Two leading non-profits, Al-Khidmat Foundation Pakistan and Green Crescent Trust (GCT), have agreed to work together to jointly tackle the issues of out-of-school children and illiteracy in underprivileged areas of Sindh and Balochistan.

The agreement to this effect was reached as the chiefs of the two non-profits attended the inauguration of a charitable school in the underprivileged town of Winder in Balochistan. The school has been jointly built by Al-Khidmat Foundation Women Wing and the GCT. This is the second school jointly built by the two charities.

Al-Khidmat Foundation Pakistan President Dr Hafeez ur Rehman, who was the chief guest on the occasion, said that building quality schooling facilities in Balochistan would go a long way in tackling the issues of backwardness and mass poverty in the largest province of the country.

He said that enrolment of out-of-school children in Sindh and Balochistan had become a gigantic task and the concerned charities working in the education sector had no option but to combine their resources to jointly tackle the pressing problem.

He gave the example of Malaysian ruler Mahathir Mohamad who by massively spending on quality schooling and health facilities had enabled Malaysia to become an Asian tiger in the shortest possible time.

GCT CEO Zahid Saeed while welcoming the idea of working together with the Al-Khidmat told the audience that his non-profit had launched similar partnerships with other concerned charities for the education of the children belonging to deprived families. He said that this was the first time the GCT had stepped outside Sindh to expand its charitable education drive continuing for the past 29 years.

He explained that earlier, the GCT had established 163 charitable schools in Sindh having an enrolment of over 30,500 children from deprived families. Most of those schools had been built in underprivileged areas of Sindh where there was no prior proper educational facility, he added.

He said the GCT had been massively motivated earlier this year to extend its charitable work to Balochistan after holding three fundraisers in Lahore for collecting donations for its charitable schooling programme.