With government schools in Punjab not being the first choice of parents to send their children for education due to its abysmal educational standards, another aliment has been noticed in the government schools of the state: it has the lowest number of working days in a year, perhaps in the country.
The government sch-ools of Punjab impart education only for about 160 days in a year. This is due to large number of holidays in the government schools of Punjab. Now as the anomaly has been come to light, the state government is planning to rationalise the schools holidays of the teachers in state run schools.
Under the Right to Education Act, 2009, teaching in schools must be for minimum 220 days in year. How-ever, as government schools of Punjab clearly falls under the minimum teaching days criteria state government could impose cut on holidays. Punjab education minister Mr Sikander Singh Malooka said that it considers this as a criminal neglect against the poor students who cannot go to the private schools. He blames undue vacations for the low number of teaching days. “ We are considering to rationalise the holidays after discussions with the teaching community”.
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Panda expulsion puts spanner in anti-naxal op
age correspondent
Bhubaneswar, Aug. 11
The expulsion of Orissa’s top Maoist leader, Saby-asachi Panda, alias Sun-eel, from the CPI (Maoist) party has put a spanner in the plan of the state police administration to weaken the red rebels’ movements``, in this eastern Indian province.
According to sources, the Orissa police after years of strategic efforts and due diligence, had successfully engineered vertical divisions among various Maoist groups operating in the state. Sabyasachi, who was holding the post of organising secretary of CPI (Maoist) in Orissa, had recently formed his own outfit Orissa Maoist Party.
With the expulsion of Mr Panda, the Andhra Orissa Border Zonal Committee will now have full command over the CPI (Maoist) activities here.
“The expulsion of Sabyasachi Panda has thrown double challenges before the state police and government. Now, they have to deal not only with Mr Panda but also the new rebel leader who is going to take charge of Orissa,” said Maoist researcher Dr Nihar Nayak. Sabyasachi Panda, who masterminded the kidnapping of Italians Paolo Bosusco and Claudio Colangelo on March 12 this year, was ousted from the CPI (Maoist) on Friday on charges of “acting against the interests of the party.”