The Hindu : Other States / Uttaranchal News : Many schools closed for lack of teachers

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Monday, Nov 22, 2004

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Other States - Uttaranchal

Many schools closed for lack of teachers

By Our Staff Correspondent

DEHRA DUN, NOV. 21. The Dehra Dun Zilla Panchayat president, Chaman Singh, and the gram pradhans of the Jaunsar Bawar tribal area are fuming as the Government is not responding to their repeated requests to provide teachers in over 30 primary schools located in the remote areas.

Over 20 schools in Chakrata and higher areas are closed for several months now as there are no teachers. The existing teachers have either been posted out or are on long leave. The teaching process is more than adversely affected in many more schools in the remote areas as the teachers refuse to go there and find it easy to draw the salary by bribing the officials concerned.

"Although I have made repeated requests from the Basic Shiksha Adhikari to the Chief Minister level, no one seems to be interested in providing even the basic education facilities to the tribal children much against the Central Government's directives that all tribal children must be granted educational facilities', said Mr Singh.

The exasperated Zilla Panchayat president seems to be at a loss to explain the `ego problem' facing the bureaucrats. "They draw huge amounts of funds for tribal welfare but do hardly anything for them. They seem to be happy discussing hi-tech plans'', he said.

Another glaring example of how the Government machinery works is the construction of 80 school buildings in the district last year. Teachers are yet to be posted in 60 of these schools.

A number of the gram pradhans wanted the Chief Minister, Narayan Dutt Tiwari, to hand over the charge of education to a new State Secretary as the present officer was too busy with other responsibilities making it easy for the corrupt and inefficient to rule the roost. It is common knowledge that the district level education officials have to be bribed heavily by the teachers to get a suitable posting or other works done. Although the Government has repeatedly cancelled transfer lists of teachers over the past three years after allegations of corruption, not much has been done to set the system right.

The gram pradhans are also sore at the Government making them a laughing stock by saying that primary education has been transferred to the Panchayats. "All the financial and administrative powers continue to be with the `babus' and the Panchayats have no say in the running of schools. Is this the Panchayati Raj as dreamt by Rajiv Gandhi", wonders Tilak Ram of Tuini.

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Many schools closed for lack of teachers