The month-long summer vacation is now over in almost all the schools but the students of Government schools in Hazaribad district are still waiting for the books of the current session. When asked about it, the officials of the district education department informed that the books have yet not reached Hazaribagh and they are also waiting for its arrival.
In the government schools Jharkhand Education Project Council provides the book to the students of class 1 to 8 free of cost. There are 1645 primary schools in the district where the students have started their classes with some old books available in the school. No books have yet been given to the students of class 3 and class 5 yet.
In class 3 there is need of 30000 set of book while for class 5 the requirement is of about 28900 sets. This time the order of printing books has been given to Swapna Printing Works Private limited which has supplied some books of class 4 at the district headquarters just 10 days ago.
As per the rules of State government it is printer’s responsibility to supply books to the block headquarters from where the responsibility shifts to BEEOs to provide the books to the schools. After receiving books from the suppliers BEEO informs the school headmasters who will have to receive the books of their school within one or two days.
A headmaster said that for receiving books from block headquarters the government reimburses us carriage cost only once while it is supplied in installments so we will have to pay money from our pocket various times. Another headmaster said that we have not yet received the carriage cost of last year and this year everyone has made at least three trips of the godowns located at block headquarters.
The most suffering one are the students who have been elevated to class 5 this year. From this year the state government has decided to introduce books printed at state level instead of NCERT books so old books are of no use for them. A teacher said that every year books are supplied late but we use to manage it by taking books from senior students. This time our this trick is of no use for the students of class 5.
The district president of Primary Teachers’ Association Praveen Kumar said that it is a general allegation made on us by higher officials that we do not give quality education to the students but what can we do when the books are not available in the market also. About 3 months of new session is now over and books are not available yet then how can they blame the teachers and how will the teacher manage the loss of these three months.
DSE Shivendra Kumar admitted complete set of books of class 1 to 8 has yet not arrived from the capital. However, he added that we do not take more than one or two days to provide books to the schools after receiving the books. When asked about the cause of delay he said that for printing books order has been given to different printers for different classes so books are coming in instalments.