As children in the city gear up to go to school, kitted out in their best, for another year of study and play, some at least would be reluctant to head back to institutions where the situation is not conducive to their development.
The students at Government Tamil Higher Secondary School, Chala, are put to immense hardship by waste, both degradable and biodegradable, dumped near the school premises, and reportedly burnt by Corporation workers. The noxious fumes rise up into the air and are inhaled by the students, especially the higher secondary students whose classrooms are located on the first floor. If that were not enough, a new spot for burning waste has emerged beside the school compound near an electricity post.
There are houses in the vicinity and a day care-cum-play school too. Pleas to Corporation workers to desist from burning waste have fallen on deaf ears. “Waste is burnt every other day before noon, and the fumes and the acrid smell linger on for hours,” say school staff.
Water is not available much in the girls’ toilet in the higher secondary section, forcing the students to head to the VHSE section to use the facility there or refrain from using the bathroom for the hours they are in school. Government Girls Higher Secondary School at Karamana, too, is waiting for a solution to its clogged toilets. The older toilet blocks in the school have very rudimentary facilities. Only a block inaugurated in 2013-14 has hygienic toilet bowls. However, the sewage lines are clogged.
A proposal for solving the problem by ward councillor Karamana Ajith to the Corporation is yet to take off, though the civic body has promised action. Funds for school maintenance in the Plan lapse each year, the councillor alleges. With a few more days to go for the new academic session to start, there is need to take up the issue urgently, he says. School authorities, too, are hopeful that the Corporation will look into the problem at the earliest.
Nursery school
The nursery school under the city Corporation at NS Depot Junction, Vallakkadavu, one of the nine such schools that are functioning, has cause for cheer with new admissions, nearly 60, taking its strength to over 105, up from 80 last year. However, the schools lacks space to accommodate all these students. With just one hall and one small room at its disposal, it was finding the going tough even last year.
There are other rooms in the building but an Akshaya centre is functioning there. On the floor above is a hall, which is let out occasionally for some programmes. Ragam Rahim, a social activist, says a way out will be to accommodate the Akshaya centre in a nearby market, or to shift the nursery building to another structure nearby. “We can’t do without the school or the Akshaya centre,” he says. The State Human Rights Commission had in April issued an order stating that facilities for education should be facilitated at the school.
