[1]Toilets are considered luxury in not only government and corporation schools but also private schools, which fleece parents for their wards’ education.
While most of the government schools including those for girls in rural pockets lack toilets, many private schools in Madurai and Coimbatore have toilets but without sufficient water.
“We have enough toilets for students but taps are dry most of the time. My friends and I usually sneak into the toilets meant for staff as they are always clean and have water facility.
We do get caught sometimes and let off after a warning,” says S. Priya, a class 8 student of a famous matriculation school in Madurai.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered that the Centre and state governments should ensure that all schools—both government and private—have toilets and water facilities and this must be done within six months.
“The state government claims drinking water is available in all schools and about 64 per cent schools have toilet facilities. But in reality both the numbers are false.
Even if the schools have toilets, there is total mismatch between the students’ strength and the number of toilets,” said eminent academician Mr S.S. Rajagopalan.
When contacted, a senior official at the Directorate of School Education informed DC that all schools (class 6-12) have toilets and drinking water facilities in Tamil Nadu. “The deficiency must be around 10 per cent to 20 per cent at elementary school level,” the official added.
He further said that the government always gave priority to toilet and water facilities.
“Even when new toilets are built, students are not aware of using them properly. And we also struggle to get scavengers to clean them.
At times, even anti-social elements occupy the toilets during night hours,” said Samy Sathyamoorthy, state general secretary, TN High and Higher Secondary School Headmasters Association.
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