India may decline EFA moot invitation

By Shahzad Raza

ISLAMABAD: India is likely to decline Pakistan’s invitation to attend the ministerial meeting of the South Asian Education for All (EFA) Forum, Daily Times has learnt.

Sources said the Ministry of Education had received confirmation from Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal and Sri Lanka, but not from India. “Although we have not been formally refused by the Indian government, there is a possibility that no one will represent India at the meeting,” sources inside the ministry said, adding, however, the representative of Indian government would have the chance to reach Islamabad by May 23.

The EFA meeting is scheduled to be held in Islamabad from May 21 to May 23. The major purpose of the meeting is to devise a comprehensive and viable strategy for every SAARC country to attain the target of 100 percent literacy. According to the independent estimates 45 percent of world’s illiterates live in South Asia.

The delegates would review the progress in the education sector of the SAARC countries since Dakar (Senegal) Conference in April 2000, which was attended by 184 countries. The Dakar conference had been held 10 years after the launch of EFA global movement, in 1990, in Thailand.

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