Mandi govt school without principal
Shariq Majeed
Tribune News service

Sawjian-Mandi (Poonch), July 21
It may sound bizarre but it’s true. A government school here is running without a principal for months together hollowing tall claims of the state government to provide quality education even in the remotest areas of the state.

Locals here said Government Middle School, Dhanna, here was running without a principal for about three months affecting the studies of the students.

“The school not only lacks a principal but also has staff who attend school off and on hitting the studies of the students who mostly belong to poor families,” they added.

“There is no principal in the school for the past about three months. Besides, the school has staff which attend the school off and on. This has badly affected the studies of our children. We are poor people and hence cannot afford to send our wards to private schools,” rued Manzoor Ahmed, a petty farmer whose son Rafi studies in class VIII in the school.

“We hear that every now and then the government makes tall claims of providing quality education in the remote areas of the state but on ground it is rhetoric. If the government is really serious about providing quality education, it should appoint more teachers in schools like this”.

He added that on several occasions, the locals have urged the education authorities to depute a principal for the school and also to make surprise checks about the presence of teachers in the school but to no avail.

A student of the school said since they had no school head, the teachers hardly taught them anything.

A local source in the education department confirming that there is no principal in the school for about three months said principal Ashwani Kumar, a local, had got himself attached to zonal education officer (ZEO) office in Mandi since the school was in the far-flung area.

He added that even a teacher, Shabnam, who is a maternal cousin of local MLA Ajaz Ahmed Jan visited the school occasionally.

The source said this was not the only school that lacked a principal in the Mandi area but there were two to three more such schools which were running without a head.

A senior officer in the education department while expressing shock on the matter said it would be thoroughly probed as to why the school was running without a principal.