Despite the poor response to its ambitious Adarsh School Scheme not once but twice in the past, an undeterred Punjab government is looking to introduce it for the third time and proposes to open one such school in each block of the state. There are 148 blocks in Punjab. The state government has now asked the Punjab Educational Development Board (PEDB), which was set up under the chairmanship of the chief minister to open such schools, to identify sites in all the blocks of the state. Sources in the PEDB said instructions have been passed to all village panchayats in the state through respective district education officers (DEOs) to identify at least three to five acres of land where such schools can be opened after land is obtained on a lease from the village panchayats. The schools will be operated on the PPP mode with the government providing land to corporate or private houses engaged in opening such schools. The emphasis will be on opening these schools in rural areas or in locations where poor children can be benefited. Under the scheme, education is free for the students and the monthly operational cost is shared by the government and the private player in the 70:30 ratio. Punjab Education Minister Daljit Singh Cheema described the Adarsh scheme as a very ambitious plan of the state government and added that the chief minister was keen to open more such schools in rural areas to benefit poor students. The scheme was first started in the state in 1987 and since then only 11 schools including nine under Punjab School Education Board (PSEdB) were opened but it was discontinued. After a 20-year gap, Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal mentioned it as his dream project and included it in his party’s poll manifesto ahead of the 2007 elections. He promised to open at least three such schools in every Vidhan Sabha (VS) constituency including 128 such schools in the first phase Public Private Partnership (PPP) mode. There are total 117 Assembly segments in state. Since 2007, however, the Punjab government has not been able to open more then two dozen such schools despite identifying over 60 sites. Furthermore, 19 such schools were found indulging in various irregularities in past by fudging the students’ enrollment to get more grant from government.
