Prince Mahesh

Daijiworld Media Network - Udupi (SP)

Udupi, Jul 25: Mahatma Gandhi government higher primary school here is facing the question of its survival. Due to incessant rain since some days, a sidewall of the school built of mud had crashed to the ground. Classes are continuing inside this dilapidated building. Deputy director of public instruction of this district, H Divakar Shetty, has been promising to get the wall repaired in a couple of days, but no one seems to be bothered about finding a permanent solution to the problems of this very old school.

This school is well-past its centenary year of existence and is in its 132nd year. Most of the students of this school either are children of coolies or nomad families. As per information, during the school's 131 years, no development works were carried out here except painting of the walls on a couple of occasions.

The school came into being in the year 1885 in a land donated by Haji Abdulla, who later founded Corporation Bank. Sri Vishweshateertha Swamiji of Pejawar Math happens to be an old student of this school. He says he is aware about the bad current state of the school and he is open to discussions on renovating the school.

During the period Shambhu Suvarna. who has since retired, was the headmaster of this school, he had sent proposals three to four times for renovation and reconstruction of the school but the government did not show any interest in them. The school building stands testimony to the rule during British era. Although the school has enough student strength, there is lack of enough lighting and air circulation. The office of block education officer was located in this building in the past, but the office has been vacated. Now, this office has remained vacant.

As of now, one of the rooms in the school is used to run first to third standards, while the other room accommodates standards 4 to 7. Another room has been used as office room. The fourth room is meant for Akshara Dasoha implementation. Three teachers and a head teacher are conducting classes now.

No basic facilities

Although the children have other facilities here, basic need of any school, playground, is absent. Although the children had been given an opportunity to play in a spot nearby in the past, the children have been robbed of this opportunity as a super specialty hospital building is coming up there now.

Vehicles are parked in front of this school and Alankar bus stand is located adjacent to this school. The school is located in a spot where traffic is dense. Therefore, ensuring safety of students has become a challenging task for the teachers.

As the walls of this school are very old and built of mud, renovating the building is impossible. A huge private hospital is coming up near this school. A wall of the school had crashed on account of hospital construction work. The media had brought this fact to the notice of education department. The school now has about 68 students, and ten students have been sent to other schools by issuing transfer certificates to them.

This school responds to aspirations of labour families who want to provide education to children. In the past, a vehicle under Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan had been provided to carry children home but this facility was withdrawn because of stricter norms imposed after the accident near Trasi last year. Although it was proposed to the education department to shift the children to the school next to the city municipality building, there has been no response to this proposal. There are objections from certain people about proposal to close down this school, but the education department could have taken proper steps and ensured that the school functioned from another spot nearby.

The media persons had also drawn attention of Krupa Alva, president of women and child protection commission, and member of the commission, Vanita Torvi, but nothing significant seems to have been achieved out of this.

A wall of this school had developed cracks three months back. If the department was really interested, it could have conducted necessary repairs to the wall during April and May, when the school was closed for summer holidays. It is tragic that the department, in its report to the top brass in the department, has been projecting as if everything is going on smoothly, by concealing the real problems.

In the past , this school had about 300 students, but this number has been dwindling with the passage of each year. The school is facing the prospect of getting closed down for lack of students.

In spite of what the future has in store for the school, are the concerned right in making these innocent children to confine themselves between dilapidated, damaged walls and make them dream of big things in life? Is it not ironic that such a school exists at the centre of the headquarters of a district that claims itself to be 100 percent literate?