NABARD team carries out inspection of schools

Amritsar, May 17

NABARD Chief General Manager Raghunath B led an inspection team that visited Government Senior Secondary Smart School at Heir and Government Senior Secondary School at Wadala Bhittevad here on Wednesday. They were here as development works are being carried out under the NABARD funding in several schools of the district.

The team was comprised of Jaskirat Singh, Assistant General Manager, district, NABARD, and Manjit Singh, DDM, Amritsar, District Education Officer, Secondary, Jugraj Singh and others.

The team inspected the schools along with Rajesh Kumar Sharma, District Education Officer, Elementary Education, Amritsar, and several officials in-charge from the District Education Department. Nabard had released funds to several elementary and secondary schools in the district to construct new classrooms, playgrounds and other infrastructure earlier this year.

Balraj Singh Dhillon, Deputy District Education Officer, Secondary, Amritsar, said the school at Heir would also be getting further grant by the NABARD team. Navdeep Kaur explained the details of the grants received under NABARD for Government Senior Secondary School, Wadala Bhittevad, and the needs of other schools in the surrounding areas.

Under the Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF) committed by NABARD for the construction of additional classrooms, integrated science labs and playgrounds in rural schools in Punjab, Amritsar had received the first instalment of Rs 7.53 crore earlier this year. The District Education Department has received an initial grant of Rs 7.53 crore. The funds were allocated to respective primary schools for the construction of 198 additional classrooms in elementary schools. The project will cover 150 elementary schools in the district.

District Education Officer (Elementary) Rajesh Sharma said there was a requirement of around 400 new classrooms in elementary schools in the district. “We had prepared a detailed report of the required infrastructure, including rooms, computer labs, science labs, projectors and other things, in elementary level schools. The initial amount has already been allocated and spent on building new classrooms, which the NABARD team inspected. Now, we will be receiving second instalment by the next week to complete further building work.”

The district will receive a total of Rs 15 crore from NABARD for infrastructure development of government schools, especially in rural blocks.