The division bench has issued notices to the respondent Sindh Education Department to file comments and fixed January 26, 2012, as the next date of hearing. Various civil society organisations, through advocate Faisal Siddiqui, have argued in their petition that under Article 25-A of the 1973 Constitution, the state is bound to provide compulsory education to all children from five to 16 years of age. And following the passage of the 18th Amendment, education has now become a right and no longer an arbitrary entitlement.
Filed on behalf of the Pakistan Institute of Labour Education and Research, the Aurat Publication and Information Service Foundation, the Pakistan Fisher Folk Forum, the South Asia Partnership Pakistan, the Institute of Social Movements Pakistan, the Bonded Labour Liberation Front, the National Trade Union Federation and the Bright Educational Society, the petition has made the Sindh government as respondent.
The petitioners have prayed to the court to declare that the respondent (Sindh government) is under the constitutional obligation to provide free and compulsory education to all children from five to 16 years age.
The petition has also sought a direction to the provincial government to establish a commission, comprising well reputed members of civil society and government officials, to monitor the implementation of the constitutional obligation of the respondent and to publish a detailed programme of measures to be taken by them to implement Article 25A.
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