Norms 'bypassed' for religious function at Nangal school

Arun Sharma

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Nangal, August 24

Giving two hoots to rules and regulations, the management of local Government Senior Secondary School (Boys) has handed over the playground to an organisation for holding a religious congregation.

For the past three days, the ground is being used to set up a stage, sound system as well as to make arrangements

for the ‘Shree Shayam Vandana Mahotsav’ to be held tomorrow. Due to this, the students have not been able to play in the ground.

Education Minister Harjot Singh Bains, who represents the area in the Assembly, has been invited as the chief guest on the occasion. Interestingly, the organisers were allowed to use the school premises even as several other venues, including staff club ground, cricket ground, Kangra welfare ground and NFL Stadium, are available to locals for holding such functions.

Vijay Dheer, president, Shree Shayam Mitr Mandal, said more than 25,000 people were expected to attend the programme, which would start from 7.15 pm onwards on Wednesday and continue till 2 am. The indoor patients of the 100-bed Bhakhra Beas Management Board Canal Hospital are also set to suffer due to the noise pollution as the distance between the venue and hospital is hardly 150 m.

On February 24, 2013, the then secretary-cum-Director General of School Education, KS Pannu had issued a circular to all District Education Officers (DEOs) and Deputy Commissioners, banning

all private and public functions — wedding, bhog or sports programmes — on the school premises. It was also directed to the authorities that school head was allowed to grant permission to use the playground only for sports activities to people of the area, provided these were held after school hours.

This is, however, not for the first time when the Education Department has turned a blind eye towards the misuse of the school premises. Three years ago, on December 12, 2018, relatives of a local Congress leader used a school campus to host a wedding.

When contacted, school principal Kiran Bala said DEO Jarnail Singh directed her on the phone to allow the religious event on the premises.

Meanwhile, the DEO said sometimes, such things had to be allowed. He, however, refused to give a proper reply on whether he had asked the principal to allow the religious function on the school premises.

Initially, justifying the religious programme on the school ground, Bains claimed that the earlier directions were issued by the education board keeping in view that the studies could get disrupted.

When pointed out that according to the guidelines, the school ground could not be used for any purpose other than sports activities, Bains said there was a little change in the norms to accommodate such requests. He replied in affirmative when asked whether the school playgrounds would be available for holding shabad kirtan, namaz or other religious activities. “Provided the studies are not disturbed and infrastructure is not damaged,” he added.

STUDIES WON’T BE DISRUPTED

No other place was available to host a gathering of over 25,000 people, expected on the occasion. The event is going to be held after school hours on Thursday. So, studies won’t be disrupted. — Harjot Singh Bains, Education Minister