Image Courtesy : www.facebook.com/ManishSisodiaAAP www.facebook.com/DharmendraPradhanOdisha

With allegations of a classroom scam flying these days, the Aam Aadmi Party's education model appears to be the latest target in the BJP's heightened offensive against it. Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan called Delhi's education system as hollow (khokhla) and a gimmick (nautanki). While the CBI investigates a case it has registered against Manish Sisodia, Deputy, over alleged corruption in the rollout of the now-scrapped liquor policy, the BJP has thrown a fresh attack against Sisodia, who also carries the portfolio of education minister. The minister also discovers himself at odds with Lt-Governor V K Saxena.

In the previous week, Saxena Saxena first sought a report from the Chief Secretary over an alleged delay of two and a half years by the vigilance department in acting on a Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) inquiry report into the construction of extra classrooms in the Delhi government schools. He wrote to the Chief Secretary asking him to investigate why enrolment and attendance in these schools have been dropping over the past few years despite an increase in per-student expense.

The letter written on August 26 stated that despite the substantial expansion in investment in the education sector by the state government- in absolute terms and as part of the total budget, it is witnessed that during the same period, the enrolment in Delhi government schools decreased from 15.42 lakh in 2014-15 to 15.19 lakh 2019-20. He flagged a delay in the audit of accounts of universities directed by the Delhi government- looked for justifications from the Vice-Chancellor of the Delhi Pharmaceutical Sciences and Research University (DPSRU) over postponing the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) audit for five years.

The L-G's office has been raising questions about the Delhi government's education administration every few days. Thus, the BJP has also singled out the AAP government's education model for attack amongst the political drama in the Delhi Assembly and the CBI investigation against Manish Sisodia.

The BJP leadership has also aimed in on the 2022 CVC inquiry report and is attacking the Aam Aadmi Party based on two findings. The report states that the Directorate of Education (DoE) had prepared a list of schools with a ratio of more than 50 students per classroom. So, the Public Works Department was to build 5,825 classrooms in 194 schools. It states that after guidance from the DoE, additional rooms, such as labs, toilet blocks, and multipurpose halls, were added to the conditions as equivalent classrooms (ECRs), increasing this to 7,180 ECRs.

It notes that 4,027 classrooms were built in 141 schools while the remainder were rooms, including 1,214 toilet blocks, which were constructed against the need for 160 toilet blocks. The report says that cost escalation took place to the expansion of Rs 326.25 crore in these constructions.

The BJP also mentioned the incident of two girls studying in a Delhi government school being harmed after a ceiling fan in their classroom fell on them. The number of toilets was counted and projected as classrooms by the Delhi government as part of the report. BJP MP Manoj Tiwari said in a press conference that- that is why ceiling fans are failing in Delhi government schools, BJP MP Manoj Tiwari said in a press conference.

Meanwhile, the AAP had doubled down on the insistence of its work on education is its most significant investment. Manish Sisodia attacked the BJP and stated that BJP is a party of illiterates (gawaar logon ki party). He added I have heard that the BJP has settled the matter of alcohol and turned to the complications of schools. They have acknowledged that nothing will come out of that liquor policy investigation. So, they have started making up a new story that there was a scam involved in the construction of schools.

The Delhi government has taken a step forward and initiated some of its new school projects in the past few days. On Wednesday, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal announced the blastoff of its Delhi Model Virtual School. During the announcement, he also said the government would soon commence its residential school for street children. He also inaugurated the government’s new Armed Forces Preparatory School a few days back.

Harish Khurana, Delhi BJP leader, stated the same problem of classroom corruption had been raised by Manoj Tiwari more than two years ago when he filed a complaint on financial abnormality in this issue and Sisodia filed a defamation case against him and other leaders. The problem is not new, but the CVC report, which they had been sitting on for over 2.5 years, has now come out in public. They are the people who claim that they have the best education model in the world but what is this based on? I filed an RTI and discovered that 33 schools do not teach science.

News Source: The Indian Express