Union Human Resource Minister Smriti Irani on Monday said that the Central Government would consider adopting Punjab’s model of ‘meritorious schools’ at the national level for economically backward students.
Irani, addressing a gathering at Government Senior Secondary Residential School for Meritorious School in Bathinda, otherwise known only as Bathinda meritorious school, asked Chief Minister Prakash Singh Badal to nominate a panel of experts to advise the Central Government on incorporating the model in its new educational policy.
“The Centre would explore the feasibility to adopt this unique model of imparting quality school education at national level to benefit the economically poor but bright students,” said Irani.
“Badal’s dedication to uplift education in the State has hardly any match in the country. Punjab has benefited from this dedication immensely,” she said.
Badal, in his speech, announced that the Punjab Government had recently sanctioned Rs90 crore to set up three more schools — at Sangrur, Ferozepur and Gurdaspur districts.
Earlier, Badal, Union Food Processing Minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal and Irani interacted with students of the school.
Meritorious schools are residential schools that take students who have scored not below 80 per cent marks in their Class X examinations. Besides regular academics, these schools also provide coaching for competitive examinations. The State currently has seven meritorious schools — at Mohali, Patiala, Bathinda, Jalandhar, Amritsar, ludhiana and Talwara (Hoshiarpur).