A visit by Saurav Das, co-convener of the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), and his team to government schools in Ludhiana has brought into focus the stark contrast in infrastructure across Punjab’s government education system.
However, only some of the proposed schools have been inaugurated. Punjab has around 19,000 government schools, while the state government has announced 118 Schools of Eminence.
The CJP team subsequently visited Government Senior Secondary School, Jandiali. “The infrastructure is very old. Education minister Harjot Singh Bains welcomed the visit and the independent assessment of government schools. Bittu questioned the significance of Das visiting just one such school. He questioned why these shortcomings were not shown to Das during his visit.
Das said the school was established in 1936 and had largely retained its old infrastructure despite maintenance work carried out over the years.
Describing the school’s infrastructure as outdated, he said the government needed to focus on improving facilities for students studying there. I hope these children also get better infrastructure and the Punjab government pays attention to this,” he said. In a social media post, he thanked Das for visiting the schools and said the government was open to feedback and public scrutiny. Bains said he had taken note of the shortcomings highlighted by the team and would personally monitor their resolution. The observations, however, drew criticism from teachers’ organisations, which said improving school buildings alone would not resolve the larger challenges facing government education. Lecturer Cadre Union state finance secretary Dharamjeet Singh Dhillon said the government should focus equally on filling vacant posts of teachers and principals and reducing the burden of non-academic duties on teachers. Das’ visit to the schools triggered a political controversy with BJP leader and former Union minister Ravneet Singh Bittu calling it a “staged PR spectacle”. Bittu said he had recently visited the same school and raised concerns over its dilapidated swimming pool and poor playground conditions. “Punjab’s children deserve functioning facilities, quality education and accountability, not PR exercises dressed up as governance,” Bittu said.
