Winter gone, academic year almost over but BBMP students are yet to receive sweaters
According to officials, “technical glitches” have delayed the transfer of cash to the students.
3 min read
BBMP officials had said sweaters will be distributed at a total cost of Rs 2 crore with the price of each sweater ranging from Rs 800 to Rs 1,200, depending on the age of the students. (Representational/PTI) Schools run by Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) are yet to receive sweaters for this year, even as the academic year is about to end. According to BBMP officials and school teachers, the delay is because of the DBT (direct benefit transfer) method that the civic agency has adopted which allows the transfer of cash directly to the bank accounts of the students or the parents to purchase the sweaters.
According to officials, “technical glitches” have delayed the transfer of cash to the students. In fact, the BBMP had earlier faced flak for not providing sweaters to the students due to irregularities in procuring and distributing sweaters. As a result, the BBMP has also done away with the tendering process this year and switched to DBT for the purchase of sweaters.
Over 25,000 students study at BBMP schools and colleges in Bengaluru and around 4,000 students are yet to receive money through DBT. Some of the problems faced by the students are names not matching on Aadhaar cards and bank accounts, Aadhaar cards and bank accounts not linked, and wrong spellings of names among others. BBMP teachers said some students had entered their Aadhaar card numbers but the bank accounts provided were linked to their parents’ Aadhaar card numbers.
BBMP officials had said sweaters will be distributed at a total cost of Rs 2 crore with the price of each sweater ranging from Rs 800 to Rs 1,200, depending on the age of the students. Sweaters for each student of the age group of 6-10 years will cost Rs 800, Rs 850 for students of 10-14 years, Rs 1,050 for students of the 14-16 age group, Rs 1,150 for those of the 16-18 age group and Rs 1,200 for degree college students.
A BBMP teacher of a school in the west zone speaking to The Indian Express said, “For the last few months, all the teachers at the BBMP schools are engaged in clearing the confusion in the DBT process. Some students are managing with the sweaters that were distributed last year. Most of the students have not received their sweaters this year.”
The teacher added that out of the 280 students in his school, only 50 per cent have received cash to buy sweaters. The school authorities also said that the BBMP has given them the guidelines on the colour code of the sweaters to be purchased from the dealers near the school.
A headmaster of another BBMP school said, “We have around 50 students studying here and about 15 have received the cash and have purchased the sweaters. Thirty-five of them are yet to receive the amount due to technical glitches. Since the DBT process was introduced for the first time this year, there are some lapses being reported. But if some student receives the cash, we are helping them to immediately purchase the sweaters.”
A BBMP education official said: “We have 25,501 enrolled students of which 2325 are long-term absentees. 16,095 have been paid and another 2252 payment is in progress with the DBT team. However, payment to 4,829 kids which is pending will be done next week. The delay is because of software errors and because many students didn’t have Adhar for which we got new Adhar and bank linkage done.”
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