NA-75 by-election: Despite high literacy rate, Daska still yearns for a university

• Daska has a 90% plus literacy rate
• However, parents demand a university in the city since currently, Daska has none
• Children are sent to faraway cities to seek higher education due to the non-presence of a university here

DASKA: Residents of Sialkot's Tehsil Daska will take to the ballot box in a few days for the NA-75 by-election. One of the main demands of the city's residents is a university where their children can pursue higher education. 

The total number of voters in NA-75 Daska amount to over 460,000. There are 404 government and 319 private schools in the district. 

Students in these schools have access to libraries, computer labs and other avenues to take part in extracurricular activities. 

"The literacy rate in Daska is over 90%," according to Deputy District Education Officer Daska Qamar Zaman. 

"People here are concerned about getting their children educated. There hardly seems to be a house in Daska whose children aren't sent to a school," he said. 

Zaman said that each year, authorities aim to secure admission of over 7,000 new students in Daska to public schools. "Teachers say they used to face a lot of problems over the past few years relating to education. However, these problems, to a large extent, have now been solved," he said. 

A couple of teachers spoke to Geo News to reveal that students in Daska were determined to achieve big in the field of education but worried about higher education, since the tehsil is deprived of a university. 

A few parents complained how they were forced to send their children to faraway cities to pursue higher education, since the city does not have a university. 

In a few days, the PTI and the PML-N will contest a by-election here in NA-75 of the tehsil. 

Last time, armed conflict had broken out in the area, resulting in the deaths of two persons and others getting injured. 

Following the conflict, the PTI and the PML-N leaderships had traded jibes at each other, blaming the other party for violence in the constituency. 

The Supreme Court of Pakistan, a few days earlier, upheld the Election Commission of Pakistan's (ECP) verdict, according to which, re-polling has been ordered in the entire constituency.