After Union Human Resource Development (HRD) Minister’s clarification that there is no compulsion for the students to watch Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Teachers’ Day speech, the Uttarakhand education department has exempted the primary schools of the State from telecasting the PM’s speech.
The education department had directed all the school heads to make arrangements of live telecast of PM’s speech on September 5. On Monday, the Additional Chief Secretary S Raju along with the Director General School Education Radhika Jha, Primary education Director RK Kunwar and Secondary education director CS Gwal conducted a meeting of all the District Magistrates, Chief Education Officers (CEO) and District Education Officers (DEO) via Video Conferencing and reviewed the preparation for the telecast.
When contacted, Kunwar told The Pioneer that State primary schools are exempted from making arrangements for the telecast of the speech. There are more than 12,500 Government primary schools in the State and this decision has come as a big relief for the teachers and the parents of the students. One of a school teacher posted in a remote school of the State said that making arrangements for telecast was a tough task and besides primary school students are too immature.
The additional Director Secondary education NK Bahuguna told The Pioneer that concerned DEOs have been asked to make all the preparations for the students of class VI–XII. The schools would open for 11 am–5 pm and the principals have been directed to complete the events before 3 pm. Bahuguna said that school principals in very remote areas are directed to make arrangements for radio broadcasts if TVs are unavailable.