CCPCR finds EWS class running from basement

Chandigarh, September 21

The Chandigarh Commission for Protection of Child Rights (CCPCR) on Thursday made a surprise check at KB DAV Public School, Sector 7-B, Chandigarh, and found that a section of Class IX of economically weaker section (EWS) had been running from the basement. It was Class IX-E.

CCPCR chairperson Harjinder Kaur hauled up the school authorities for this and said that classes in basement should be immediately stopped.

Principal Pooja Prakash clarified to Kaur that the section existed from a long time when there was no bar on segregation and now they did not have seats now to merge them. “But for the last seven years, after the RTE Act came into being, the school did not have any segregation of the EWS with regular students,” said Chanchal Singh, RTE consultant, CCPCR.

Prakash said they would wind up the classes in the basement as soon as possible.

Along with Kaur and Chanchal Singh, Viney R Sood, member of the CCPCR-cum-Deputy Director of Education Department, and Kartar Singh, law officer, along with the Chandigarh Traffic Police officials were also part of inspection team.

Kaur and Chanchal Singh pointed out that in junior classes; the grills on windows were missing. The chairperson herself checked washrooms and pointed out that the cleaning material should be kept out of reach of the students as it was found lying outside of washrooms. She checked the CCTV footage of previous days and said that display screen of the CCTV needs to be replaced by larger one for clear view of footage. The inspection stumbled upon the main electrical control panel, which were easy accessible to the students. The school was directed to cover them. The team found the CCTV cameras missing from the junior classes. It was advised to have web-based CCTV cameras in classrooms of pre-school classes i.e. play way, pre-nursery, nursery and KG classes are required to be installed and the IP address of these camera be given to the parents.

During checking of buses, inspection team raised questions over three seats in the front along with driver’s seat in some buses where there was no support to hold on in case bus gets jerk. But e staff clarified that they do not allow small children to sit there. —TNS