Srinagar, December 2: The much-maligned five-year plan to solve the problem has not moved forward, and the government schools in Jammu and Kashmir are still plagued by ongoing infrastructure issues.
Overcrowding in classrooms negatively affects the quality of education that students get, especially in the basic sections.
The department will have a significant task when it begins the new academic year in March under the same circumstances, despite the government having shuttered schools up to class 8 for the Christmas break due to infrastructure deficiencies.
The School Education Department (SED) turned over more than 600 excess school buildings to other government agencies during the period when infrastructure deficiencies pervaded the government education sector.
The school-age children’s housing situation has not been resolved by these buildings, which have been vacant for a number of years.
The depressing finding of a recent nationwide poll was that 66.4 percent of J&K fourth-grade pupils share a classroom with more than one class, a sharp rise from 52.1 percent in 2018.
Furthermore, around 72% of children in the second primary class share a classroom with one or more classes.
Even after the J&K administration proclaimed 2022 and 2023 to be the “Year of Academic Transformation,” this grave scenario continues.
The obvious lack of attention to closing infrastructure gaps in schools has persisted even in the face of apparent academic gain.
According to a department official, the structures it inherited were built in a random manner, with two or three school buildings built in each community that were never used.
To rationalize the use of the school facilities and teaching personnel, the department has previously consolidated a number of schools that were subsequently declared formally closed.
According to the department, in the last few years, a five-year plan was developed, with the primary goal being the improvement of all single-room schools’ infrastructure.
The pupils are still suffering, however, and the much-discussed strategy has not yet been implemented.
The department was aware of the problem and was looking into it, according to the advisor to the lieutenant governor, Rajiv Rai Batnagar, who made this statement earlier.
“We are working to close the gaps in all schools, and there has been a lot of improvement in terms of infrastructure availability at various places,” said Batnagar.
