Man who converted dump yard into smart school gets national honour

Surinder Bhardwaj

Fatehgarh Sahib, August.20

Jagtar Singh Manela of Fatehgarh Sahib has not only brought laurels to the district, but to the entire state after being selected for this year’s National Awards to Teachers.

He is among the 44 teachers shortlisted by the Ministry of Education and will be conferred with the award by President Ram Nath Kovind on Teacher’s Day, September 5.

He was first appointed as a teacher at Government Primary School, Badesha Kalan, in 2007, which was in a dilapidated condition. “I worked hard and converted it into a smart school. Later, I was transferred to Government Primary School, Manela, which is my native village, as the head teacher in 2015. I am an alumnus of this school,” he said.

“The school building was declared unsafe in 2011 and the PWD Department had suggested razing it. I came to know that someone had donated one acre for the primary school in the past, which had been reduced to a dumping ground. With the help of the village panchayat, I got a boundary wall erected and constructed a state-of-the-art school building with the help of donations from NRIs, NGOs, individuals and the surrounding villages,” the 40-year-old teacher said.

The school now has six air-conditioned classrooms with projectors, CCTV cameras and other gadgets, a library, playground and parks, which were constructed at a cost of Rs 75 lakh.

Manela said Education Secretary Krishan Kumar managed to get a grant of Rs 20 lakh released for the school building. “As this was the state’s first government smart school, Kumar introduced a chain of smart schools across Punjab thereafter,” he said.

In 2018, the school was also declared the cleanest school in the state under Swachh Bharat programme. He said Kumar was impressed with his work and nominated him for a state award in 2017. “He even appointed me as the nodal officer of Fatehgarh Sahib to develop more smart schools,” he said.

“My wife Bhupinder Kaur, who teaches in the same school, has been my source of motivation throughout. My colleagues, the village panchayat and friends helped me realize my dream,” he added.