JIND: Women and girls from this district’s Rohad village near Safidon town on Wednesday locked down a government senior secondary school where a three-year shortage of teachers has forced many girls to drop out.
This school that was sanctioned 12 teachers is run by only one, a woman who teaches biology. It was upgraded from middle school in 2019 when Ram Bilas Sharma was the state education minister but the teachers have not been deputed, so far. Komal, Varsha and other girl students said there was no school for another 10 kilometers, so they came to school even if there was no teacher, otherwise their parents will tell them to stay home.
Most of the girls in this school come from conservative and poor families that don’t send their daughters outside for studies, so the girls come to the school, sit idle, and go home after the regular hours. The girl’s toilet is broken too.
Former sarpanch Pritam Singh said: “We knocked at every door, from chief minister’s political secretary Krishan Bedi to the director education and district officials, but no one looked into the matter. We give the education department until June to deploy teachers. Otherwise, we’ll intensify our protest.”
Safidon’s block education officer Dalbir Malik told TOI that there was only one teacher for the school’s 158 students of classes IX to XII. The Haryana government transferred the other teachers in 2019 and meanwhile, the school was upgraded. Thereafter, no teacher was transferred in the state and the district officials have no power to depute teachers on their own. Malik said: “We promised the villagers that we’ll sort out the issue by June, as we have conveyed the situation to the higher officials.”
