School Closure Issue: Odisha Edu Min Replies To Questions Raised In Odisha Assembly

Bhubaneswar: The decision of the Odisha government on closure of school has been revised, informed School and Mass Education Minister, Samir Ranjan Dash while replying to the question raised by the opposition on the issue.

In his reply, the Minister said that it is not the intention of the State government to close any school arbitrarily and the decision taken is legally appropriate.

In 2013, the Government had decided to open schools in scheduled and non-scheduled areas but now the number of schools stands at 66,594, said the Minister adding that all the classes shall have separate rooms and teachers.

The objective of the Government is to coagulate all the small schools and create big schools. This step has also been taken in the neighbouring state of Jharkhand, he informed.

The Minister, in his clarification, further said that the quality of education and teaching atmosphere can be improved through these measures and the Primary and Secondary education can be imparted under one roof.

The data shared by the Minister revealed that 40 schools out of the 14,382 total schools, do not have sufficient students due to which it has been decided to merge 7,771 schools as among them 1,725 schools have less than 25 students while 6058 schools have less than 20 students.

Written applications are invited incase there are any issues with the decision of the government, informed the Minister.