Playing an inspector, State Human Resource Development (HRD) minister Geetashree Oraon inspected buses of around 10 schools for an hour at lalpur chowk on Monday morning.
She found that most of the buses violate the basic guidelines like lack of safety and medical facilities, besides accommodating more number of students than required.
“It was pathetic to see that the school buses which have a seat limit for 48 to 52 students are accommodating 90 students. Four to five children are sitting in seats where only three students can sit. The students were badly cooped up. Except two school buses, no teacher was travelling in these buses. The students are managed by one conductor. I was shocked to see that many bus drivers were not wearing their uniforms. In such cases, we cannot be sure that these drivers belong to the specific schools,” Oraon told The Pioneer.
The minister has decided to call a meeting of all the city school principals once the schools are closed for summer vacations.
“School principals should adhere to the guidelines. I will probably meet them after May 10 on this issue.”
According to residents who were present on the spot, the minister interacted with students of all the buses.
“The children were telling Oraon that they feel like vomiting due to the congestion caused by overloading,” a local said.
list of the schools whose buses were checked are Bishop Westcott Girl’s School Namkom, Oxford Public School, Surendranath Centenary School, Star International School, St Anthony’s School, St Xavier’s School, loreto Convent, Bishop’s School Bahubazaar and DAV group schools.
District Transport Officer Rajesh Kumar who accompanied the minister during the inspection is mulling to put pressure on the schools to increase the number of school buses and replace majority of the old buses.
He said, “We were shocked to see that there were no fire extinguishers and first-aid kits in most of the school buses. I will soon talk to deputy commissioner, Vinay Choubey, to find a solution to this problem and thereafter hold a meeting with traffic police, local parents association, bus operators and school administration.”
Sources on the other hand, said that the minister had also raised objection to the norm of city schools collecting fees for 365 days.
“We heard the minister saying that schools cannot charge fees from the students for all the days of the year as there are weekends, festivals and seasonal vacations when the schools are closed,”
sources said.