An important inter-provincial meeting of the education ministers scheduled to be held today (Thursday) to take up the situation arising of the alarming rise in coronavirus cases of Omicron variant, was postponed, reported 24NewsHD TV channel.

The meeting was set to start at 11:00 am but was deferred to next week, announced the Ministry for Federal Education and Professional Traning.

On Wednesday, the education ministry had announced that the provincial education ministers will be held Thursday to debate whether the prevalent COVID-19 situation in the country warrants the closure of schools.

According to a notification issued in this regard, the 34th meeting of the Provincial Education Ministers' Conference (IPEMC) was scheduled to be held at 11am on Thursday, chaired by Minister for Federal Education and Professional Training Shafqat Mehmood, to deliberate on a number of issues.

Among these was a review of the prevalent COVID situation in the country with respect to educational institutes.

Other issues to be discussed during the meeting included:

Interprovincial consultation for timely provision of quality textbooks in the academic year 2022

Interprovincial coordination regarding the timely provision of NOCs for textbooks

Any other agenda with the permission of the chair.

Earlier on Tuesday, while briefing the media of the decisions taken by the federal cabinet in its weekly meeting, Minister for Information and Broadcasting Fawad Chaudhry had said Pakistan would not undergo another lockdown and dismissed reports of the closure of schools despite rising coronavirus cases.

Reporter Saba Bajeer