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Journalism of Courage
CHANDIGARH, July 28: Financial constraints and lack of facilities are a hinderance in the promotion of sports in most of the government schools in the city, evident from the play grounds which are in a neglected state.
Lack of proper facilities is a prominent reason which shuns budding players from flocking to the play field. Though, recently, the officials of the UT Education Department held a meeting regarding the improvement of the overall performance of the Chandigarh contingent in the National School Games competitions, and also came up with a proposal to open up of the sports wings facilities in more than 10 schools, yet many schools are wary of applying these.
The Sector 23 Government School, which had bagged medals in the last edition of the State Inter-School meets, may not be able to repeat their performance in this year, as their physical education teacher laments: “We dont’t have funds to buy equipments for the players. "It is the Horticulture Department which is responsible for the maintenance of the grounds. We have apprised the authorities several times but there is no one to pay heed to our request.”
There is a marked difference between the facilities which exist at the Government Model Schools and Government Senior Secondary Schools. According to another physical education teacher, Model Schools have more funds, thus they are in a better position to maintain their grounds.
This was evident from the fact that a Government School in Sector 23 had wild grass all over the field. The broken handball poles and wild growth on the small hockey field was enough to convey the sorry state of affairs.
On the other hand, new handball poles in a Model School in Sector 33 was a sharp contrast. The District Education Officer, Bharamjit Kalia, agreed that the Government Schools have less funds as compared to Government Model Schools. He, however, said that from time to time they provide equipments to the Government Schools.
Since the school authorities have meagre resourse at hand, the students during the National Social Service camps (NSS) are given the task to weed out the wild grass from the play grounds. “We take the services of the students to maintain the ground,” said a teacher.
