Plight of Govt. schools in city

By Our Staff Reporter

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, JUNE 8. Another academic year has just begun and in spite of the best efforts of the authorities concerned, the plight of some of the Government schools in the city continues to be as sad and bad as it has been for years.

However, most of the schools are now in good shape, thanks to the efforts put in by the City Corporation. Unlike in the past few years, the annual maintenance of majority of the schools has been taken care of by the Corporation and the works, including thatching of the buildings, are almost complete, despite the indifferent attitude of a few of the contractors who had been assigned the works.

With the launching of the People's Plan Campaign, it is for the local body concerned to take care of the maintenance and other related works in the Government schools.

According to Mr. K.C. Vikraman, the chairman of the Standing Committee on Health and Education of the City Corporation, almost all the high schools in the city are fairly well maintained. Now that the problems relating to the building construction are over, it would be the endeavour of the Corporation to provide adequate infrastructure, including furniture and laboratory facilities, he informed. Funds would not be a problem, he added.

However, there is no denying the fact that in some of the Government schools where the Plus Two course have been introduced, buildings of the desired standard are yet to come up and so are other facilities. The PTAs have also been chipping in to improve the condition in such schools.

A lot more needs to be done to substantially improve the condition of most of the schools in the coastal region. In the Government UP School at Beemappally, for which the City Corporation had provided sufficient funds last year for creating infrastructural facilities, things have improved considerably. With the amount released from the `own funds' of the Corporation, a double-storeyed building has already been completed. The work on the third floor is to begin soon, Mr. Vikraman said. Incidentally, this is the school with the maximum student strength in the coastal belt of the city and it is already bustling with activity right from day one.

However, the Government LP School at Valiyathura continues to be neglected. A small thatched shed on a seven cent plot is all that this school has which had earlier been identified as `uneconomic'. The student strength has been steadily on the decline in this school, mainly on account of the proliferation of private schools in the vicinity.

For the Upper Primary School at Valiyathura, which, perhaps, is the only school in the State which also houses a relief camp round the year, things have not changed a bit. It continues to house over a dozen families who refuse to move out of the school compound. The school has been their home for the past one decade. While the teachers and parents are concerned over the school premises having been converted into a rehabilitation camp on a permanent basis, the occupants keep grumbling over the lack of amenities for them in the school.

At a time when the much trumpeted IT revolution is expected to storm the schools all over the State, the physical condition of at least some of the schools in the city leave much to be desired.

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