Mounesh Vishwakarma
Daijiworld Media Network – Bantwal (SP)
Bantwal, Sep 3: The government order mandating provision of facility in every school for viewing of interaction Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, will have with the children of New Delhi schools on Teachers Day has poured cold water on the plans of these schools to celebrate the event in their own way. Many teachers were heard expressing displeasure at the pressure being brought on them to work even on a day exclusively meant for them, after having to work hard the entire year.
On Teachers Day, the Prime Minister is scheduled to be engaged in direct conversation with about 1,000 children from different schools from New Delhi at Manekshaw Centre in New Delhi.
Simultaneously, he will be in touch with children at seven different centres all over the country through the facility of video conferencing. On the basis of a circular issued by the union human resource development ministry seeking provision of facility for the students to view this programme, the education department has sent instructions to the schools.
The above programme will be telecast by five national channels of Doordarshan apart from 15 regional Doordarshan Kendras, and 52 private channels. It will also be beamed to Edusat schools through satellite, and through Youtube via Internet facility of the human resource development department at the centre.
Although the circular explains how the children who do not know Hindi have to watch the programme, there are doubts about the extent to which this plan will be affective. The instructions want the schools to provide facility of watching direct telecast of the programme wherever computer facility is available, and to arrange for telecast of Doordarshan through television sets depending on the student strength of the schools and number of rooms available. Generators should be kept handy in case of power failure. In places where television and computer facilities are not available, television sets should be got on rent or the programme should reach the children through the radio, the circular says.
For example, only 16 out of 196 schools in the taluk have television facilities. The teachers are at a loss about getting television sets on rent, getting the programme televised through them, how to make all the children hear the speech, who will pay rental for generators, etc. Many expressed the opinion that it would have been better if recorded CDs were provided sometime later to enable the students to watch the programme.
Most of the teachers had been preparing for cultural and other programmes on this occasion since a month, and this circular, which came at the last minute, had dampened their spirits. They rue the fact that they will have to come to school to watch the said programme that will be telecast between 2.30 pm and 4.45 pm from the main programme. The block education officer has therefore, instructed the schools to make sure that half of the teachers will attend the Teachers Day programme, while the others should remain in schools and facilitate viewing of the above programme.
An educationist also expressed the view that the children would have been happier if they were allowed to watch Narendra Modi's programme from the comforts of their homes.
However, though DDPIs across the state have said that viewing of the speech was compulsory as per an official order, union HRD minister Smriti Irani issued a statement that it was optional. State education minister Kimmane Ratnakar Rai too is understood to have said that fresh circulars would be sent to schools stating that it is optional.