‘Low enrollment’: School on Indo-Pak border shuts down

A week of apprehension of the residents of the Kuldharvas became a reality Thursday with the formal shutdown of the school.

“This was not an easy announcement to make. No one likes shutting the doors of a school to students. But then, I am a government servant and have to follow orders. The government has decided to merge the Kuldharvas school with Hussainvandh school and so, I had to inform the residents of Kuldharvas,” 30-year-old Chaudhary, whose maiden posting after being selected a teacher by the state government was in the Kuldharvas school five years ago, told The Indian Express over the phone.

The announcement came two weeks after Kutch district primary education officer (DPEO), JP Prajapati, issued a formal order directing the merger of government primary schools in Kuldharvas opened in 2005 and Bhuranivandh opened in 2008 in Dhrobana village with the Hussainivandh school.

Kutch district panchayat president Parul Kara and the DPEO could not be reached for comments. Kutch district development officer Bhavya Verma said he would seek details of the decision.

But the DPEO order dated June 16 refers to a meeting of the district education committee of Kutch district panchayat on January 13 this year. The committee, at the meeting, had directed the taluka primary education officers (TPEOs) of the district to submit opinion-cum-proposals for merging schools having less number of students with other schools located within a radius of one kilometre. Accordingly, the TPEO of Bhuj submitted a proposal on March 24 this year. On June 6, the district education committee adopted the merger resolution based on the proposal.

“With an objective of making quality education available to children and also to tide over the shortage of teachers, it is hereby ordered that Bhuranivandh Primary School (Grade 1 to 5) and Kuldharvas Primary School (Grade 1 to 8) be merged with Hussainivandh Primary School,” Prajapati wrote in his order.

Kuldharvas, one of the three localities or vandhs of Nana Dinara, has a population of around 300. The school there has 65 students with the highest number of 12 in grade 7 and the lowest, 4, in grade 2. Grade 4 and 5 have 11 and 12 students respectively while the other classes have less than 10 students each.

On the other hand, the Hussainivandh government school has around 150 students. There is a government primary school in Bhuranivandh–Dhrobana village’s third main locality–but it has only around 25 students enrolled this year.
Despite the DPEO’s order on June 16, the parents of Kuldharvas had opposed the merger order and continued to send their children to the same school. “But finally, I had to tell them today that now this school is being merged with Hussainivandh and that I will have to give school leaving certificates to students compulsorily,” the head teacher said, adding, “It will take around four-five days for transferring students of Kuldharvas school to Hussainivandh school.”

Since the merger order became public around 10 days ago, Kuldharvas residents have been making frantic efforts to save the school in their locality. Led by Meraj Sama, the former member of Dhrobana Group Village panchayat and whose younger brother Gafar is the chairman of the school management committee of Kuldharvas school, they have made representations to the DPEO, the state education department as well as to the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) but to no avail.

“Had our school had only a few students, we wouldn’t have protested. But there are 65 students enrolled and yet the school is being closed. It’s sad to lose an important government service in this manner,” Meraj said.
Hussainivandh is a neighbourhood of Muslims who earn their livelihoods by farming, cattle-herding and taking up casual jobs, among others, for a chemical company near Khavda.

The Kuldharvas school was set up in 2005. But Hussainivandh school is older than that and around 500 metres away from the Kuldharvas across a stream. “Our fear is, the Kuldharvas school will be crowded and education of our children will be affected due to that. I also worry some children might drop out as ours is a locality of labourers and parents may not have time every day to go drop children to Hussainivandh,” Meraj further said.

Incidentally, the state government has been trying to merge schools having less number of students with nearby schools with greater enrollment numbers with an aim to provide a competitive learning atmosphere and to pool in teachers. While the lower primary section is merged if a bigger school is available within a radius of one kilometre, the upper primary section is merged if another bigger school is available within a radius of three kilometres.

However, the move has been facing stiff resistance from teachers, forcing the government to change tack. It, instead, announced in 2020 that it will develop 50 per cent of primary and secondary schools run by the state into schools of excellence and that those deemed unviable will be closed down. There are around 34,000 government primary schools in the state.

With the closure of the Kuldharvas campus, Chaudhary and Patel will shift to the Hussainivandh school, at least temporarily. “I have not received any formal order of my transfer from Kuldharvas school. But the DPEO order means I and Patel are deemed transferred to Hussainivandh,” she said.