Punjab: The education department plans to merge over 450 middle schools up to Class VIII with high and senior secondary government schools in the new academic session. “The middle schools will be merged with high or senior secondary schools located in the immediate neighbourhood. No school will be closed or shifted out of the existing location to any new village or town,” said school education secretary KK Yadav. The clarification about the location of schools after the merger was significant in the context of apprehensions among teachers and parents about the closure of institutions. Sukhwinder Singh Chahal, president of the government teachers union, said, “By the proposed merger of middle schools, the government is trying to close down the institutions.
In the name of integration of infrastructure, the existing buildings of middle schools will be vacated by shifting the students to new premises. No more staff will be recruited and the vacancies will be eliminated in due course.” Education minister Harjot Singh Bains had earlier said the government had no plans to close any middle government school. “This merger will be a dynamic step in integrating the existing infrastructure and manpower. The biggest advantage will be the availability of additional staff. In future, there may be a reduction in the total number of schools and less recruitment. No one can deny the low number of students in government schools,” said a principal on the condition of anonymity. In 2017, the state government had attempted to merge around 800 primary schools with less than 20 students. The main opposition party AAP had then opposed the move.
