Divisional Commissioner Kashmir, Baseer Ahmad Khan, today convened a meeting to review the functioning of the School Education Department.Director School Education Kashmir, Principal Amar Singh College, Registrar Central University of Kashmir, CEOs and other concerned attended the meeting.The Divisional Commissioner was informed that there are 11766 Government Educational Institutes and 2610 schools in the Private Sector with an enrolment of 8.64 lakh students and 5.90 lakh students respectively in Kashmir.It was given out that the State has made significant progress since 1961 and as per the census 2011 total literacy rate has climbed up to 68.74%.The meeting was informed that around 6000 aspirants in Kashmir Division appeared in screening tests for the Super–50 Winter Tutorial and are studying at 10 District Headquarters and one main Centre at GHS Hyderpora.On the developmental front, the meeting was told that 57 works under Secondary Education State Sector are presently under execution at an estimated cost of Rs 42.80 crore, out of which 10 school buildings have been completed and 47 are at different stages of execution. While as the Government has approved 77 schools to be developed as Model Schools for which funds upto the tune of Rs 25 crore have been projected to Planning, Monitoring and Development Department.
It was said that during the recent unrest 32 school buildings were gutted out of which 14 were damaged fully.The Divisional Commissioner was informed that in order to foster the attention on quality education and proper utilization of manpower, rationalization was initiated by the Department which has resulted in clubbing of 2691 schools and made 779 buildings and 4718 teachers available for proper utilization. Besides 305 schools have been upgraded under RMSA scheme, while as the Department has approved construction of 44 girls hostels under RMSA at a unit cost of Rs 306.34 lakh.On the occasion, the Div Com said that focused priority should be given for completion of such school buildings which are at various stages of completion. He directed the CEOs to flag out issues impeding the progress and work in close coordination with the DDCs for effective functioning of the Department.He further laid stress on successful conduct of the winter coaching centres and regulation of coaching centres. He directed the officials to constitute teams for inspection and monitoring of Winter Tutorials and regulation of coaching centres.The Divisional Commissioner also called for giving special impetus to Physical Education and directed the CEOs for identification of 5 schools in each district for establishment of playing fields so that they are taken up with the RDD under convergence programmes.Later, the Registrar CUK and the Principal Amar Singh College briefed the Divisional Commissioner about the functioning and developmental scenario of the University and College respectively.