Tribals and Dalits are still to get quality education and safe environment in the SC/ST Development Department (SSD)-run Ashram schools, notwithstanding the provision of special schools for the underprivileged class under a separate department.
Notably, the Ashram schools are located in the interior tribal belts of the State for catering to the need of the tribals who are socially, economically and educationally backward. These separate schools apart from the general schools under the School and Mass Education Department have been set up for providing better justice to the tribals and ensuring their socio-educational advancement. Unlike the general schools, the poor tribals are provided free
accommodation and food in the hostels inside the school campus, besides various educational aids. The school head is also responsible for regular health check-ups of the students or shifting ailing hostel inmates to hospitals. The warden has to look after the welfare and safety of the students.
However, in practice, the tribal inmates in the hostels are left to fend for themselves with the school authority least bothered about their welfare. The pity is that in most of the Ashram schools there is shortage of staff. The Government has also taken little care to appoint tribals in various posts in the schools starting from teachers to caretakers. The non-tribals fail to maintain a ‘connect’ that is very much required to groom the tiny students of the schools.
Few school staff members are conversant with the dialects of the tribals or with their way of living. On the other hand, there is no dearth of persons set to exploit the innocence of the tribal students and their guardians. Since the schools are mostly located in the interior parts, they manage to throw all Government norms to wind and make laws themselves. There are instances in several schools where the hostel inmates are made to provide manual works, including raising vegetables inside the campus.
The school building and hostels are horrible. Many schools are yet to have electricity or face frequent power-cuts. As a result, there the inmates have to live in the hostel under insufficient light of solar or kerosene lanterns. When a school is situated in a secluded forest area without basic facilities like proper road, electricity and pipe water and remains dark after sunset, it is not difficult to imagine how secure the students are! The students have to go outside their campus to relieve them and run the risk of facing snake bite or attack from wild animals. There is also every possibility that the grown-ups could be assaulted sexually.
There are hostels whose roofs are not secure and floors broken. In a few hostels, the students overcrowd the rooms and have to sleep on mats or on the plain floor. There is little to dispute that in most schools the ambience is very unhygienic--Tattered buildings, unclean kitchens and filthy lavatories. There are schools where many projects have been undertaken without foresight and also in some cases the works have been executed with sheer mediocrity. Despite huge expenditure of funds under various schemes, modern amenities are either a far cry in a handful of schools or the students fail to use them for their poor execution.