Hundreds of bicycles meant for distributing to the school going girls under the Saraswati Cycle Yojana of the state government, have turned into a heap of scrap.The state government had launched this scheme to provide the girl students easy access to their schools and to curtail the school dropout rates in the state.However, alleged corruption, apathy and nepotism in the department have turned the cycles into a heap of scrap.
When the matter was brought to the knowledge of Block Education Officer Barsayi Paikra and Block Resource Co-ordinator Bheemsen Swarnakar, they denied having any knowledge of the matter.Apart from cycles, dozens of school uniforms are lying undistributed in the godown. The Education department is unable to take any action against the schools which have blatantly refused to purchase and distribute uniforms to the students. Moreover, the government guidelines direct the schools to buy clothes for uniform from CG handloom development, but things have remained static.
Following the indifferent attitude of departmental officers, the state government now has changed its mind and started depositing Rs. 3,000 each to the bank account of each girl child under the Saraswati CycleYojana, so that they could buy cycles of their choice. After the launch of this scheme, it is not be possible to distribute the cycles which were already purchased and stored by the department. In the meanwhile, assistant commissioner Jashpur JR Nagvanshi has assured taking action in this regard.Collector Himshikhar Gupta, during his recent visit to the schools, had directed the principals to distribute uniforms within 48 hours and assured to take note of the cycle scam.