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Human rights panel steps in to lighten school bags

By Our Staff Correspondent

BHOPAL, OCT. 27. The Madhya Pradesh Human Rights Commission has advised the State School Education department to take appropriate measures to ensure that the children are not required to carry extremely heavy bags to school. The Chairman of the State Human Rights Commission, Justice, Narayan Singh yesterday reviewed the prevailing situation linked with heavy school bags and instructed the concerned authorities to solve the problem on top priority.

On being contacted today, Mr. Singh told The Hindu that the State Human Rights Commission has been duly concerned about the availability of drinking water, toilet and other basic facilities in schools. He said on inspection it was found that the situation on this count was satisfactory in Bhopal but not elsewhere.

When it comes to ensuring basic facilities in schools even in the most remote areas, the State School Education department has assured availability of adequate funds to equip all schools with proper toilet and drinking water facilities within two years.

Mr. Singh said that the State School Education department has been advised to utilise the services of the parent-teacher associations of different schools to address the problem of excessively heavy school bags. He added that the concerned authorities have been advised to warn the schools that they would have to face derecognition if they continued to burden their students with heavy school bags.

It had been concluded, Mr. Singh said, on the basis of a survey that children could even suffer brain damage if they were forced to carry school bags that are more than one-tenth of their body weight. He said another survey conducted in the State has revealed that the weight of school bags in the case of government school students was within reasonable limits.

In fact, the private schools were over-burdening their children with heavy school bags, he added. When contacted, the State School Education Commissioner, L.S. Baghel, said they are seized of the problem and the parent-teacher associations of various schools were being approached to take proper initiative to tackle the problem of school bags in right earnest, he added.

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Human rights panel steps in to lighten school bags

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