It is bizarre but true that the State Government is mulling investing in Information Technology while keeping aside concerns related to infrastructures considered to be vital for the existence of a school. The Government wants a complete penetration of Aadhaar in schools including those that do not have sufficient classrooms and other infrastructures for their students!
The Government’s ambition of Aadhaar for every child has confused the stakeholders who believe that authorities must address basic concerns before starting ambitious projects. The objective behind the decision is to encourage Aadhaar based attendance system for students to help in ascertaining exact number of students in a school besides figuring out presence of students in a particular educational institution.
“This is not going to bring any revolution. District authorities conduct a survey yet they come out with wrong figures for school drop-outs. How will they manage things without computerization of a school,” said Arvind
Kumar Singh, Principal of a Government primary school and President of All Jharkhand Primary Teacher’s Association.
The Government is peddling with the idea anticipating it to play pivotal role in formulating student benefit schemes besides effective implementation of ongoing schemes. The idea was floated in a review meeting of Human Resource Development department on October 28.
Interestingly, the schemes- Mid-day Meal, Mukhyamantri ladli lakshmi Yojna, et al- are implemented by different government agencies- HRD and Welfare department. Some schemes are implemented under Sarv Shiksha Abhiyan. “There is a lack of coordination for among different Government wings so how the Aadhar system will bridge this gap is difficult to gauge at the moment,” added Singh.
Although authorities have kept students’ benefit central to the idea it seems to be devoid of proper explanation on how it would benefit a student.
“Government will invest tons of money for whomIJ The emphasis at the moment must be on qualitative improvement of education however it doesn’t seem to be the objective,” said Mukhtar Singh,
Principal of a government primary school.Notably, the drive meant specifically for students has not started.