Sorry State of Education: 50 percent zones headless in Baramulla district

‘Over 60 schools sans permanent heads’

5 Dariya News

Srinagar/Baramulla 23-Nov-2019

Signifying the sluggishness of the school education department in filling the key positions, around 50 percent zonal offices are without permanent heads in north Kashmir’s Baramulla district.“There are 18 zones in the district out of which 10 zones are without Zonal Education Officers,” an official told wire service—Kashmir News Observer (KNO). As per the official figures, 12 higher secondary schools and 49 secondary schools are without permanent heads as well. “The delay in filling the posts of heads of the institutions is telling upon the academic standards of these educational institutions"Also as many as 300 posts of lecturers and 270 posts of teachers are also unfilled in the district. "The schools are without heads and teaching staff at this crucial time when students are appearing in exams. The students don’t get quality teaching given the non-availability of teaching staff in schools," the official said.The official said the department has given the charges of vacant posts to other equivalent rank officials who are managing the job as their additional charges.  “In absence of the heads of the institutions, there is no academic monitoring in these schools which has adverse impact on the quality of education," the official told KNO.

Besides its poor performance in providing adequate teaching staff in schools, the department has failed to provide proper accommodation to students enrolled in government schools. As per the official figures, the construction of 179 school buildings has not been completed since their sanction by MHRD 10 years ago."The construction work has been halted due to cost escalation as the work was left in mid-way by contractors and the department also shelved the construction process," the official said. He said the work on around 130 SSA buildings has not been taken up in the district as well.Given the failure of the department in completing the construction of the school buildings, the students enrolled in government schools of the district are crammed in shabby congested rooms hired on rent by the department. “Around 200 schools are operating from rented accommodations due to non-availability of permanent buildings for students," the official said. Talking to KNO, Director School Education Kashmir (DSEK) Muhammad Younis Malik said the department has taken up the issue with administration department to fill up the infrastructural gaps and to provide adequate staff in schools. "All the issues will be resolved by the new academic session," he said. (KNO)