Government Plans Textbook Size Cut, Offers Old Books to Half of Students
“Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Government Plans Textbook Cutbacks Due to Funding Constraints”
The financially strained Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has taken steps to trim textbook sizes and provide older course books to half of the schoolchildren, aiming to save approximately Rs3 billion in printing costs, as confirmed by officials following the recent cabinet meeting.
For the past three years, financial limitations have led to the provincial government withholding necessary funds required by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Textbook Board to publish course materials. Despite this, the government continued to distribute books to its schools’ students free of charge.
In the upcoming academic year 2023-24, the estimated cost for printing books was projected to reach Rs8.528 billion. However, by reducing textbook sizes and repurposing 50% of previously used books collected from students advancing to higher grades, the expense is expected to decrease significantly to Rs5.247 billion.
Official documents outline that students from grades 6 to 12 will utilize 50% of old books in good condition, contributing to a government saving of Rs1.8 billion. Additionally, grades 4 and 5 will utilize 20% of these older books, saving the government Rs334 million.
In a bid to cut costs further, the government has opted to reduce the sizes of course books for nursery through grade 12, projected to result in an additional saving of Rs1.11 billion.
However, this decision to downsize textbooks and distribute older books to students clashes with the standard textbook sizes set by the Single National Curriculum introduced previously. Officials clarified that this move was necessitated due to the finance department’s delayed release of funds for textbook printing.
The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Textbook Board officials expressed concerns over the delayed payments to publishers for the previous year’s book printing, leading to a lack of interest from printers in participating in the bidding process for the next academic year. This delay might cause a potential two-month learning setback for schoolchildren due to possible delays in book delivery.