Ground zero: Grants don146;t translate into marks in UP

When the Uttar Pradesh Government decided to cut through the red-tape and cash scholarships directly into a students8217; account 8212; th...

When the Uttar Pradesh Government decided to cut through the red-tape and cash scholarships directly into a students8217; account 8212; this was not a situation they had envisaged. Nearly a hundred schools in the state have registered a 8220;zero percentage pass8221; in the Class XII board exams.

Harish Chandra Inter College, Lucknow, is just one of them. Currently, the school8217;s status is this:

8226; Government grant: around Rs 72 lakh per annum

8226; Scholarship: around Rs 1.8 lakh per annum

8226; Teachers: 30

8226; Classrooms: over 32 with separate games and music room

8226; Students: 194 total, 18 in High School; High School result: Pass percentage zero

Such results 8212; despite the huge grants 8212; have forced the Uttar Pradesh Government to sit up. A state-wide list of such schools are being prepared and they will be asked to give an explanation. 8220;The list will be ready by next week,8221; said Prabha Tripathi, Secretary, UP Secondary Education Board. Arun Kumar Mishra, Principal Secretary, Secondary Education said: 8220;Action will be taken against all such schools after going through the replies they send.8221;

As for the schools, the management of the Harish Chandra Inter College feels that uninterrupted salary to teachers and scholarship to students 8212; without any check on either 8212; is to be blamed. 8220;The problem is evident,8221; said Ram Gopal Dixit, a member of the management of Harish Chandra Inter College. Students are not interested in attending classes once they receive their scholarship.

8220;Earlier, there was a compulsion, as a scholarship was distributed from the school. But now it directly reaches their account and they do not even have to pay any fee,8221; Dixit said. 8220;On the other hand, teachers are not interested in teaching as there is no check on them either.8221;

The Government, he said, is providing all facilities but is not keeping any check on performance. 8220;So, this was bound to happen,8221; he said. 8220;If you talk of maintenance, then management gets one rupee from a student every month as fee and out of this amount, we cannot purchase anything beyond chalk and duster.8221;

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8220;Such result is painful. I have tried hard to ensure that teachers take regular classes and students regularly attend them but had little success. This is the problem in not just my school, but almost all the schools in the state, which have given zero per cent or 1 or 2 per cent result,8221; said Principal Bhagwan Shankar Trivedi.

He said for the coming session, preparation will begin from Class IX. 8220;Next year I will organise extra classes for students in difficult subjects.8221;