Flopped winter schooling

Political compulsions should not guide policy initiatives

The decision to provide winter schooling for higher classes was a positive move by the government. But reckless planning and political expediency of the coalition government killed the spirit of this move. The government chose to initiate winter schooling at a time when the schools had conducted the exams.

This initiative reeked of political ambition. The government wanted to induce an impression among parents that the separatists are the enemies of their children. To some extent, this impression was gaining ground due recurrent strikes called by Hurriyat. But the way government wanted to exploit the situation boomeranged. The parents started seeing the government as the enemy and thought that their wards were being used as a political weapon against Hurriyat.  And, it also exposed the underbelly of our poor school infrastructure. As was reported by this newspaper, Kashmir has 250 schools without proper windows while as 68 have no building at all; they are run in rented apartments without suitable premises. Worse still, around 924 high and higher secondary schools don’t have adequate space to accommodate the students already enrolled there. The pace of overall skill development in those schools can only be imagined. One tends to appreciate the government’s willingness to expend extra resources in order to make good the losses our school-goers inflicted due to full-season unrest.  The sceptics who believe that the officers might have thought of making quick bucks out of the winter schooling project that will cost 60 million rupees cannot be easily rebutted. Didn’t the officials know about the condition of school infrastructure across Valley before proposing the move? One does not need to be a genius to envisage the quality of teaching amidst sub-zero temperatures and bone-freezing chill. Now that the government has given up on its ambitious winter school project, it would do well by planning in advance. Let there be a phased winter schooling with a margin of vacations. The primary classes could be closed down beyond December 1 and the secondary classes 15 and the higher secondary classes till January 1. The government cannot hide behind the pretext of 'suggestions from the parents'. It was obvious that the authorities wanted to reap some political mileage out of the project. The New Year resolution for the present government should be this: Political compulsion will never guide our policy initiative.

Rising Kashmir

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