Teachers of Delhi Government schools term themselves as ‘chaukidaar’ (guard) as the former believes that ‘No Detention Policy’ for classes1-8 leaves no scope for interest in the students to attend the classes on a regular basis.
Talking to The Pioneer, a senior teacher of a Government school located in South Delhi’s New Friends’ Colony said, “We all are worrying about bringing teacher-student ratio to a nominal count but we are ignoring the fact that a large number of students don’t even come to classes as they know they will pass their examinations in every aspect... I had met Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia twice and extended my concern over no detention policy…We teachers feel till this policy is dropped-no improvement can take place.”
No Detention Policy a key component of the Right to Education (RTE) was enforced on April 1, 2010, with the intention of ensuring that every child aged between six and 14 got a school education. A sub-committee of the Central Advisory Board of Education had recommended a review of the policy of automatic promotion up to class 8th, and its implementation in a phased manner. However, teachers in various Government schools in the Capital raised concern as they stated that the policy brings more ‘distraction’ than ‘improvement.’
A teacher from a Government school of West Delhi’s Tilak Nagar said, “We have to run behind each student as a chaukidaar for taking up exams... they will prefer going to their relatives’ house than sitting for exams as they know nothing can fail them.”
Teachers at several schools also reiterated that parents of the students also support their children over their low attendance. “Parents visit us to explain that their child was sick for two months or had gone to an important event…And then they ask us to re-take their exams.”
Another teacher on the condition of anonymity said, “A student remains absent from class for two-two months and still we can’t remove their name from the list as then we, not students, are questioned... We understand the intention of the policy but it bears no use to promote education and interest among students.”
A teacher of Government Girls’ Senior Secondary School in Vikaspuri talked about the recent incident in Karawal Nagar’s Government school where girls of class 9 and 11 vandalised school property over their failure in examinations and said, “This is what happens when a student faces failure after years of so-called success. No Detention Policy is more bane than boon because students lack interest in education.”
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Human Resource and Development is set to bring back the detention policy for class 5 and class 8 respectively. As per an official from HRD Ministry, a notification regarding the same might be issued “soon after consensus from every State is obtained”.
Also, the National Commission for Protection of Child rights (NCPCR) will on April 4 and 5 organise a review meeting in collaboration with HRD Ministry and NCERT to chalk out a plan to deal with the problems of drop-outs, non-enrolment and low attendance of students in schools.