Schools asked to take parents’ consent for students’ new APAAR card

The school education department has issued a letter addressed to the Commissioner of Education, which also referred to a letter by the Union Ministry of Education dated October 11 and addressed to all chief secretaries regarding creation of APAAR ID for students.

“Ministry of Education will generate APAAR ID based on Aadhaar number of each student for which separate consent of the parents is required,” states the letter by the ministry. The state has also asked teachers to update blood group, height and weight of students in UDISE data.

This increasing list of non-academic tasks has led to unrest among teachers. Schools have been asked to hold a special parent-teacher meeting from October 16 to 18 to create awareness about APAAR ID among parents and to inform them about its uses before taking their consent.

Pandurang Kengar from school principals’ association in Mumbai, said, “Schools just completed work of students’ AADHAAR Card update on UDISE. Now, a new ID card is in the making. We also have to update each student’s height, weight and blood-group on UDISE. This leaves us no time to focus on academics.” Mahendra Ganpule, spokesperson for the state principals’ association said, “The list of non-academic tasks given to teachers keeps increasing while number of teachers remains inadequate.”