Shreyosi Chakraborty
Following a meeting with officials of the state education department on Monday, Telangana education minister Sabitha Indra Reddy directed the teaching staff of all government schools to report for duty from June 25.
The Telangana government has also decided to begin physical classes for classes 7 to 12 and continue online mode of classes for the students of classes 1 to 6. Considering the widespread financial crunch triggered by the global pandemic, the government has requested private educational institutes to reduce their fees by 30 percent.
The state government has also announced that marks for the second year intermediate students will be announced next week and has ordered to complete all the pending diploma, degree, engineering and post graduate final year exams by July 31, 2021 so that the entrance examinations can be held from August.
At a time when doctors from All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) and researchers have already warned of a possible third wave of the pandemic that might affect children, parents of the students studying in private schools are worried and have appealed to chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao to re-evaluate the decision.
“There are no detailed guidelines regarding the physical classes and parents are confused. We do not know if there will be any hybrid classes for the students. The parents were not given a choice before announcing that the schools will re-open for physical classes. We have also not received any mandatory guidelines from the government regarding vaccination of the school population. We are not against sending our children to schools but considering the situation, the government and the school management should have been more responsible,” said Kauser Sayeed, general secretary of the Telangana Parents Association and national core committee member of the Early Childhood Association.
“My ward’s school will re-open from July 1. The government has ordered the schools to re-open and so the private schools have an order to do so. Unfortunately, the authorities do not have any mandate or any guideline regarding the safety of students and teachers. The school management also did not take our consent before taking such a step. In such a scenario, whom should we hold responsible?” laments Sayeed, whose daughter studies in class 8 in a private school.
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