Vacated school buildings across the State will be used by the State Government for other ongoing projects in the State. Following the closure process, over 5000 Government schools are expected to face a shut down in Jharkhand.
Principal Secretary, Department of School Education and literacy, AP Singh, said that after looking at all possible aspects, the decision of closing schools with lowest enrollment rate has been considered and all vacated school buildings will be used primarily for three purposes.
“The existing setup will be given to the Self-Help Groups (SHGs) either registered under Jharkhand State livelihood Promotion Society (JSlPS) or functioning independently in that particular district. Else, it will be given to the district welfare committees. There are chances that a few such buildings can be used for the programmes operating under Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS) project converting the structure into ICDS centre or can be utilized for carrying out Saakshar Bharat initiative ahead,” Singh said.
Singh also stated that if the abandoned school buildings cannot be utilised for the above three ventures then the rights are reserved with Deputy Commissioners (DCs) to use those evacuated structures as per the requirement of that specific area.“A communiqué has been sent to all the DCs regarding the merger issue. The members of District Primary Education Committee (DPEC) have the final say over its utilization issue,” he further added.
Recently, the decision of merging the Government schools with fewer students with the nearby schools that have sufficient students and other facilities was taken by Minister of Human Resources Development Dr Neera Yadav during a meeting in Jamshedpur. Questions regarding the utility of big structures, absorption of resources for productive purposes have been surfacing for quite some time then.
According to the officials of Department of School Education and literacy, considering the Right to Education (RTE) 2009 norms, the school merger proposal was tabled a while ago taking care of the facts that resources associated with such schools are optimised well.
As per the Departmental Secretary, only after analysing reports, two months rigorous training and consultation exercise including taking into account legal perspectives, the merger decision has been put forward.
“No forceful merger has been done in any district. We have also looked upon the facts that exemption must be given to those areas where there are natural barriers. Distance will not be a hurdle for the students both in the urban and rural areas,” Singh added.
“At present, 10 thousand middle schools have less than the required number of students, if RTE norms are to be adhered to. Those schools with merely 60 students or even less are being closed down. In accordance to the RTE rules, it is mandatory to deploy at least three teachers on an average 50 students,” Singh said.
The RTE Act suggests the limits of neighbourhood schools as 1 km walking distance from the habitation of a child at the primary level (class 1 to 5) and within 3km walking distance for upper primary level (class 6 to 8). From the State Capital alone, more than 200 government schools have been identified for unification.
At present, around 38 thousand Government schools are functioning in the State. “As far as, utilization of human resources is considered, the only alteration will be that all teachers including Mid-Day Meal (MDM) preparation team will be shifted to other locations. None of them will be removed from their respective posts,” Singh said.