DPI brings sports policy in schools

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, June 14

With an objective to boost physical and mental fitness among students in government schools, the Department of Public Instructions (Elementary) has devised ‘School Education Sports Policy 2018’ under the ‘Padho Punjab Padhao Punjab’ project.

The rationale of the introducing the sports policy is to keep students away from drugs. Under the policy, students will be made to do 10 exercises/ yoga postures in the morning assembly. To monitor the policy in an effective manner, sports education committees have been formed at the block, zonal, district, inter-district level. The role of these committees will be to conduct tournaments, impart training and provide refreshments to the students.

Under the policy, the sports funds are collected from classes XI and XII at Rs20 per month and for classes IX and X at Rs15 per month has been rationalised. Now, 15% of the fund collected will be allocated to the primary sports education as well.

DPI (Elementary) Inderjit Singh said, “Under Right to Education(RTE), we cannot take funds from students of primary classes, as a result, there was a shortage of sports fund for primary classes. We have now managed the sports fund for primary classes. We have identified a number of games for students which they can opt in schools. Our purpose to devise sports education policy was that each student should take at least one or two sports. We want a gap of at least one month in tournaments. For example, the block-level committee will conduct tournaments one month before the district-level tournaments”

School without playground

Many government schools are without the playgrounds, which is mandatory under the RTE Act. The notification issued on October 10, 2011, by the Department of School Education, Punjab, lays the requisite for the area of a playground as minimum standards of a school under Section 19.

Principal Rajinder Singh of the GSSS Sohian, said: “There is no playground in our school so we take the students to a nearby ground in the village.”

Principal Gurvinder Kaur of GSSS Miller Ganj, said: “As our school is built in a congested space. There is a problem of a playground in our school. We have asked so many times to the departments concernred shift our school to another building. Our school runs in two different shifts.