Students suffer as high school running with hired teachers at Badulipar
DERGAON, April 7 - Badulipar High School in Golaghat district of Upper Assam with a student strength of around 200 is running with only one permanent teacher.
The school, which was established in 1981 at Badulipar, 1 km away from National Highway-37, was provincialised by the state government in 1985 with 15 permanent sanctioned post of teachers. But presently, only two teachers are rendering service. From among the two, one teacher is on deputation and undergoing training under the Bachelor of Education course.
Obviously, the only teacher left, who is also the Headmaster incharge, has been shouldering the entire responsibility of imparting lessons to the students. Interestingly, the school is running without a Mathematics or Science teacher since the last 13 years. Though four teachers were rendering service till September 2018, but two of them retired last year. Likewise, the last permanent Headmaster retired in 2012, and since then no appointment was made.
Similarly, the only office assistant too was also transferred to another school in September 2018. Though the school managing committee has requested early replacement to solve the existing problem, but their efforts have till date gone in vain.
Headmaster incharge Junu Mandal said the students were silently suffering from the acute shortage of teachers.
�We have in the meantime managed three teachers from Golok Borbora High School and Apiram Gogoi High School nearby purely on hire basis, she informed. Though we are trying to engage local youths for Mathematics and Science by giving money from our salary, but we have not been able to avail services of any such youth,� the Headmaster incharge added.
Talking to The Assam Tribune, the Inspector of Schools (IS), Golaghat, Dr Samiran Bora said that he was helpless as no government order was in force for transfer of teachers to solve the problem of acute teacher shortage.
�All the schools are running with shortage of teachers specially in Mathematics and Science. Hence, rationalisation is not possible�, the IS maintained.
Low attendance: Very poor attendance in the entrance examination of Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya (JNV) at Chinatoli in Golaghat district on Saturday has caused concern among the socially-conscious local residents.
Out of 2,366 registered candidates, only 909 with a percentage of 38.42 appeared through eight venues in the examination for 80 seats in Class-VI. Though candidates from remote areas and hailing from poor families applied for the examination, but due to online procedure made mandatory from this year, most of the candidates could not complete the required formalities.
Talking to The Assam Tribune, the Principal of JNV Chinatoli Surendra Kumar opined that due to complicacies associated with online submission of forms, downloading of admit cards, etc., most of the candidates remained absent.
�Poor internet connectivity too has hit the students hard,� the Principal said. The District Elementary Education Officer (DEEO) of Golaghat Lavja Jarambusa said that internet service was so poor in Golaghat district that students of Class-VI studying in government schools also found it difficult to follow the examination procedures like use of optical mark recognition (OMR) sheet, etc.
