14,000 students in Karnal yet to receive uniform allowance

Parveen Arora
Tribune News Service
Karnal, January 16

It’s been nine months into the current academic session and 14,157 government school students of Class I to VIII in the district are still waiting for their uniform allowance.

Several parents claimed they had bought the summer uniform of their wards out their own pockets. And now, they would be buying the winter uniform as well since the Education Department has failed to give the allowance.

The department gives Rs800 in uniform allowance to every student from Class I to V and Rs1,000 per student from Class VI to VIII.

“I had somehow managed to purchase the summer uniform of my two children, but I have no money for the winter uniform. My children are managing with last year’s sweaters. The system of transferring money to bank accounts is riddled with glitches,” a father of a student said.

Parents demand that either the department gives them the allowance in cash at the beginning of the academic session or the schools take the responsibility of providing students with the uniform.

“I purchased the uniform from the market as I did not receive the allowance from the Education Department. For how long would I have waited? If Aadhaar cards of our children were not activated, we should have been told about it earlier,” another parent said.

The authorities claim the allowance could not be transferred to the bank accounts of students because of their “non-activated” Aadhaar numbers. Parents, for their part, alleged the cash transfer mechanism was “defective”.

The authorities say students have to get their fingerprints updated in the online system after every five years so that the Aadhaar cards remain activated.

“The fingerprints of students did not match with the ones stored in the online system, as a result of which the allowance could not be transferred to their accounts,” said Rajpal, District Elementary Education Officer (DEEO).

He further said, “The department has transferred the uniform allowance to the bank accounts of 63,648 out of 77,805 students. I have written to all Block Education Officers and Principals, asking them get their students’ Aadhaar cards updated.”