‘No school in South Delhi has 100 % infrastructure’

Not even one of the 429 municipal school buildings in South Delhi scores “100 per cent on basic infrastructure”, a senior civic body official admitted on Monday.

Ashish Sood, the chairperson of the South Delhi Municipal Corporation’s Education Committee, said the Engineering Department officials responsible for the delay in repair work will “have to face the music”.

“The truth is that not even one of the 589 schools, which operate from 429 buildings, is a 100 per cent ready on basic infrastructure like toilets, water facilities, etc.,” said Mr. Sood.

When schools reconvened after summer vacations last week, the renovation work was supposed to be finished. But, despite having three meetings with the engineers, Mr. Sood said some work was still pending in each school.

“Strict action is going to be taken against the engineers at fault,” said Mr. Sood, adding that the South Zone of the SDMC was the worst in terms of completion of projects.

However, Education Department deputy director N.K. Ghai said the delay will not affect students. “This is routine renovation that we do every summer. It is true that no school is fully done, but these are minor projects like painting of boundary walls, etc.,” said Mr. Ghai.

He explained that out of the 429 buildings, around 300 needed repairs as the rest are new structures.

New initiatives

The civic body will be looking to change this in the coming months with a range of initiatives planned. A social audit committee will be constituted soon to independently look into basic facilities in the schools.

“We have identified a senior bureaucrat and two journalists to be a part of this committee. We are waiting for their final consent and the terms of reference for the committee have been finalised,” said Mr. Sood.

Apart from that, the corporation will be inviting NGOs, public sector undertakings and corporate houses to take up infrastructure and training projects in SDMC schools. The corporation had two years ago proposed a ‘adopt a school’ policy, which was opposed by teachers and workers unions.

“Earlier, the NGOs were showing us their areas of interest and expertise and tailoring their plans for us. But, now we will call the NGOs, PSUs and corporate houses and tell them what we need,” said Mr. Sood.