Punjab Congress on Sunday demanded a high-level probe into alleged “grace marks scam” in the State Education Department.
“Punjab Government should order high level probe into the grace marks scam which has erupted in the education department,” said Congress legislature Party (ClP) leader Charanjit Singh Channi.
He said that awarding 27 grace marks to more than one lakh students of Class X just to raise the pass percentage explains itself the proficiency of the education system in Punjab.
“Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal and Education Minister Daljit Singh Cheema should take responsibility for the denigration in education system in the last 10 years,” said Channi.
He said that the situation has become so worse that the government decided to give 27 grace marks to all the students of Class X just to improve the pass percentage thus taking the future of the kids for a ride.
Education department is highly corrupt and the education system in Punjab has virtually collapsed, he alleged.
Channi added that there is shortage of 50,000 teachers in the schools of Punjab and the worse is the primary education where for every five classes, there is only one teacher.
“If the level of primary education is of the lowest level, how will the student compete; or if his base is not made professionally, what the kids will do in senior secondaryIJ Mostly, these are the kids of poor people who are taking education from these government schools,” he said.
Channi said that even in higher education, 25 percent schools are “teacher-less” in rural areas. “This is well-planned strategy of the SAD-BJP government so that the kids of poor people don’t get education, thus, depriving them of their basic right. This anti-poor government has deprived the children from employment and education by putting them only on free atta-dal,” he said.