Text book in trying times

Statesman News Service

MALDA,( India) , Nov. 27. — Malda primary school teachers belonging to the CPI-M, have backed the Nikhil Banga Primary Teacher’s Association in criticising the technique adopted for the distribution of text books in schools.

They announced that they would submit their complaint to the chairman of district primary school council. The protesting group alleged that more than fifty per cent of the primary schools had not received textbooks from government.

Moreover, some textbooks that the schools received were delivered six months after the beginning of the school’s academic session because they were not printed on time.

“Students of class III and IV had got the textbooks of Mathematics and Bengali after six months because the education department has adopted new syllabus for these books. As a result we faced problems conducting quarterly evaluation report of the students”, a primary school teacher said.

The speakers also demanded that the entire distribution system needs an overhaul, so that the students for the new session do not suffer.

Reports state that the district headquarters usually cater the text books to the school through its offices across the district.

But there is no proper system for its distribution from the distribution offices to the respective schools located in remote villages.

A primary school teacher told the reporters: “A visit to the Mangalbari distribution office in Old Malda block will prove that most of the times, the textbooks are lying there in stacks. There is no one there to undertake the responsibility to distribute them on time.”

On the other hand, the introduction of the mid-day meal project in schools has turned out to be successful.

Officials have recorded remarkable attendance of the students in primary schools after the implementation of mid-day meal project, which comprises of distributing free food to school students.

Despite of it being a difficult task for the primary schools for distributing food to school students owing to lack of sufficient funds, the teacher in schools located in remote villages stated that it made them happy to see children coming to school regularly. The food serves as a good bait. #

Posted on 28 Nov. 2005 at 17.33 IST