Driving Naari Programme launched in Chandigarh
Chandigarh, The Punjab Congress President, Mr Partap Singh Bajwa, today lambasted the Chief Minister, Mr Parkash Singh Badal, for the pitiable condition of the government schools even in towns like Ludhiana which mocked at the very model of development touted by this government which was totally divorced from the grassroots reality.
“It is shocking that schools continue to be without buildings, what to talk of other basic necessities while the government has been listing school education as a priority sector with much claims havening been made about improving the educational standards. Mr Badal personally owes an explanation to the people as the schools where the children of the weaker sections study are being totally and wilfully neglected”, he asked in a statement.
He reminded Mr Badal that he had been talking of adarash schools since 1977 when he came into power for the second time in the state. Since 2007, he had been trying to push the project of these so called Adarash schools under PPP model and even that had failed to get the desired response. He asserted that the basic issue was as to how much attention the state government was giving to the government schools which were functioning under the trees and had to be closed whenever it rained. And all this was happening under the leadership of the leaders who have been selling dreams to the people.
The PPCC chief said he was raising this sensitive issue in the context of the announcement that the Prime Minister, Mr Narendra Modi, would address the students of the country on the Teachers’ Day on September 5 and such schools were in a fix as to arrange for TV sets or radios in the absence of even a tin roof above the heads of the students. He wondered as to what message would the Prime Minister give to the students who continued to be uncared in a state like Punjab which used to considered among the most developed at one time.
He said the availability of teachers in such a schools was a far cry and that was an entirely a different issue as most of these schools without buildings were being managed by one or at the most two teachers.
He charged Mr Badal with playing with the future of the state by his utter neglect of this one of the most important social sectors and it betrayed his lack of vision, despite tall talk of providing Adarsh education to the students in the state.
