Excelsior Correspondent
MENDHAR, Oct 2: The hapless children of Govt Middle School, Behrote in Balakote area of tehsil Mendhar in district Poonch have been forced to study in the open as the school building is in shambles since long and District Education authorities have yet to awake from deep slumber to construct at least two `pucca’ rooms for the school.
Though State Government boasts of having constructed a large number of schools under SSA and other Centrally sponsored schemes, the condition of building of this school speaks itself about the callous and attitude of neglect of the State School Education Department. The schools having strength of nearly 250 children has only five teachers against the sanctioned strength of eight. It was Middle School even during 1955-56.
In case of rain, bad weather or intense cold the schools is closed and the children are asked to go home. As this Middle school is located hardly 500 meters from the LoC in Balakote zone, during recent firing from Pakistani side, the school children remained at their homes and schools remained nonfunctional for weeks, thus affecting their studies.
Sources in the Education Department said that new building with three rooms and a Vernada was sanctioned for this Govt School under SSA about two years back. But interestingly, the School Education Department failed to provide new building at the village. It is only due to vested interests of the concerned Educations Officers in the Zone and other staff that people of the area and school children have been made to suffer. The Village Level Education Committee led by Sarpanch and others after meeting with officers had selected one local Shafiq Khan for the construction of the building under SSA after a final sanction of Rs 10 lakh was accorded in February this year. The concerned officer of the Zone and other staff preferred their own man to do the job for vested interests. Therefore, allotment process was stalled by the people at ZEO office resulting in the delay. The present ZEO Mehmood Ahmed has also failed to resolve the issue and the children have been deprived of the facility due to the vested interests of the people in the department at the Zonal office, the sources said.
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