Case of dilapidated school building, High Court seeks report from School Education Secretary
Bilaspur: Hearing the PIL on dilapidated school buildings, the High Court has asked the government and the School Education Secretary to submit a progress report on the repair of the buildings on affidavit. The next hearing has been scheduled for August 21.
The condition of buildings in many government schools of the state has become dilapidated, which becomes even more dangerous during the rains. Recently a student was injured due to the collapse of a bathroom balcony in a government school. Apart from this, a year ago also a student was burnt by a kitchen utensil. In view of such incidents, the High Court has taken suo motu cognizance and started hearing on a PIL.
The matter was heard on Wednesday in the division bench of Chief Justice Ramesh Sinha and Justice Ravindra Agarwal. The government has responded in an affidavit on behalf of the Additional Advocate General. According to this, before March 31, 2024, the government had counted the dilapidated and unsafe schools. In this, 2,219 schools were to be dismantled and 19,000 schools were to be repaired. Funds for these schools have to be raised from ‘School Jatan Yojana’ and DMF fund.
The Additional Advocate General said that Rs 1,837 crore was released for government schools for the session 2022-23. On this, the Chief Justice asked how this amount was used. He also said that is the condition of the schools actually improving or is it all on paper. The government told that the collector can also provide funds from his DMF fund. On this, the division bench said that how can a collector go everywhere? The Education Secretary should monitor the fund as to where it is going.
