Article on safety in school For school magazine
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The recent tragedies involving the death of two schoolchildren in Gurugram have evoked the usual responses — demonstrations in protest, the institution of a “probe”, the suspension of the principal, a flurry of debates in the media and so on. But the fact is that these tragedies (and indeed, many more before them, reported and unreported), are only the symptoms of an entire educational system that has gone horribly wrong.
Consider, for a moment, the following: Who sets up most of the private schools in the country and why? Barring exceptions, most private schools are set up by property dealers, liquor barons, politicians and the like, with a two-fold purpose. First of all, schools give them a fig leaf of respectability. And they are also a great avenue for the investment of dubiously acquired wealth. To impart education is very rarely the primary motive. The driving force thus becomes the recovery of the capital invested and in order to achieve this, corners have to be cut. Among the softest targets for the axe are safety and security and teacher training. After all, parents grateful for admission are hardly likely to ask questions relating to safety and security measures. Also, security measures go largely unnoticed, unlike swimming pools, air-conditioned buses and “smart” classrooms.
But do not these schools have to conform to some kind of regulations in order to secure affiliation? Of course, they do. And both the CBSE and ICSE have, on paper, very stringent norms governing the process. But the devil lies in the implementation. We all know how “inspections” are manipulated in this country. When I was heading a well-known residential school in the south, I was deputed by the CBSE to inspect a local school seeking affiliation. I was phoned by one of my own governors who happened to be a local MLA to offer the friendly advice that the promoter of the school was a very good friend of his and that I should carry out the inspection keeping this in mind! If the new schools circumvent the norms, the older ones do not do any better. They generally suffer from the fact that they are housed in very old buildings, and compliance with safety norms would involve huge expenditure — in some cases, so high that building afresh would be cheaper. I encountered this problem in both the old “public” schools that I headed. In fact, in one, I discovered to my horror, that none of the buildings had any fire escapes. The state of affairs in most government schools is pitiable. They are, for the most part, too starved for funds to make safety a priority, and are, by and large, manned by staff just intent on getting through the day. And I am not even bringing the state of our rural schools into this discussion..
Consider, for a moment, the following: Who sets up most of the private schools in the country and why? Barring exceptions, most private schools are set up by property dealers, liquor barons, politicians and the like, with a two-fold purpose. First of all, schools give them a fig leaf of respectability. And they are also a great avenue for the investment of dubiously acquired wealth. To impart education is very rarely the primary motive. The driving force thus becomes the recovery of the capital invested and in order to achieve this, corners have to be cut. Among the softest targets for the axe are safety and security and teacher training. After all, parents grateful for admission are hardly likely to ask questions relating to safety and security measures. Also, security measures go largely unnoticed, unlike swimming pools, air-conditioned buses and “smart” classrooms.
But do not these schools have to conform to some kind of regulations in order to secure affiliation? Of course, they do. And both the CBSE and ICSE have, on paper, very stringent norms governing the process. But the devil lies in the implementation. We all know how “inspections” are manipulated in this country. When I was heading a well-known residential school in the south, I was deputed by the CBSE to inspect a local school seeking affiliation. I was phoned by one of my own governors who happened to be a local MLA to offer the friendly advice that the promoter of the school was a very good friend of his and that I should carry out the inspection keeping this in mind! If the new schools circumvent the norms, the older ones do not do any better. They generally suffer from the fact that they are housed in very old buildings, and compliance with safety norms would involve huge expenditure — in some cases, so high that building afresh would be cheaper. I encountered this problem in both the old “public” schools that I headed. In fact, in one, I discovered to my horror, that none of the buildings had any fire escapes. The state of affairs in most government schools is pitiable. They are, for the most part, too starved for funds to make safety a priority, and are, by and large, manned by staff just intent on getting through the day. And I am not even bringing the state of our rural schools into this discussion..
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