School building stands idle sans students ; Contrasting claims between locals and teachers dog school
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, January 20 2018: Contrasting claims between local people and teachers have landed a Government school in a quandary.

Local people of Maibam Palli High School, located within Wabagai AC under ZEO Thoubal, have been asserting that the school is no longer included in the list of Government schools as there are no students since 7/8 years back.

On the contrary, teachers of the school have been claiming there were commendation prizes by the ZEO concerned for attending classes regularly even though the school does not have many students.

The school has good infrastructure and it was upgraded to the level of High School in 2016-17 .

Earlier, the school had classes from III to VIII.

The school was established in 1951 and it was recognised by the Government in 1965 before it was upgraded to the level of an Upper Primary School in 1982 .

After it was upgraded to the level of a High School in 2016-17, a new building having 10 rooms was constructed under RMSA and it was in the final stage of construction.

The school has six teachers but two of them have been utilised under DI Lilong.

Maibam Social Welfare Club and people of Mayang Imphal Maibam said that not a single student studied at the school since 7/8 years back and the school was totally defunct.

But the teachers are still there.

The local club had not only submitted a memorandum to the School Education Department but volunteers of the club had met officials concerned to revive the school.

Lamenting that no concrete action has been initiated so far, the club volunteers expressed keen desire to revive the school adding that being a rural area, majority of the people are economically backward.

They maintained that the existing teachers did not pay any heed to their proposal to hire private teachers.

On the other hand, teachers posted at the school said that there were 38 students last year.

However, the school is unable to commence this year's academic session despite the Government's directive to start academic session from January 15 as no student came for admission.

Although there were 3.8 students last year, most of them did not appear the final exam.

Even as some students came to appear the exam, they were turned back by some people.

The school authority is prepared to commence the new academic session, said the teachers.

Regarding the proposal to hire private teachers, they said that they have already appealed to the authority concerned to send the requisite number of teachers.

They said that hiring private teachers at a Government school is illegal.

"Nonetheless, we welcome the suggestion to revive the school by increasing the strength of students", said the teachers.

Even though the local people and the teachers have contradictory positions on the status of the school, they share a common wish to increase the number of students and revive the school.

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