Gandhinagar:
A total of 341 state-run primary schools in Gujarat were functioning with separate classrooms, while over 1,400 posts of administrative officers in the Education Ministry were lying vacant as of December 2023, the government told the legislative assembly on Tuesday.
These facts were revealed in a written response by Education Minister Kuber Dindor to a question posed by Congress Member Kirit Patel during the Question Hour of the ongoing Budget Session.
Demolition of dilapidated classrooms in recent times, low attendance of students and unavailability of land to build new classrooms are some of the reasons cited by the minister.
He assured the House that new classrooms in these schools will be built in phases “as quickly as possible”.
Replying to another question from MLA Patel on vacant posts of Class 1 and Class 2 officers of the Gujarat Education Service cadre, Dindor said 781 posts had been filled while 1,459 posts were vacant as on December 31, 2023.
The minister said that these vacant posts will be filled through promotions and direct recruitment at the earliest.
During a discussion on the demands for subsidies, Mr Patel alleged that the quality of education in Gujarat under the ruling BJP is rapidly deteriorating and the state is nowhere compared to other states.
“The BJP government is good at just publicizing and projecting Gujarat as a model state, when the reality is different. According to the 2023 Performance Grading Index Report, almost 25 percent of children studying in primary schools in Gujarat cannot even read Gujarati, while 47.20 percent cannot read English. “Gujarat was not among the top five states that performed well in education,” Mr. Patel said.
Dindor said more than 65,000 smart classrooms have been constructed by the state government so far and another 43,000 are under construction.
“Under the Mission Schools of Excellence project, we have built 15,000 classrooms by 2023-2024, while the construction of another 15,000 classrooms is in full swing. More than 5,000 computer labs have been built and work is underway to create another 15,000 such laboratories in schools.” he said.
The minister also said that the dropout rate in primary schools has fallen from 37.22 percent to 2.68 percent in 2022-2023 due to the government's efforts.
“To ensure quality education in schools, a total of 22,349 Vidya Sahayak and Gyan Sahayak (contractual teachers) have been appointed in the year 2023-2024. For the year 2024-25, more than Rs 2,785 crore has been allocated for the upgradation of primary schools under the Mission Schools of Excellence,” he added.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)