Himachal Pradesh chief minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu announced in the state assembly on tuesday that a new boarding school will be opened in Spiti, located in the tribal Lahaul and Spiti district, ensuring that no child is deprived of education. This initiative is part of the government's broader plan to reform and improve the quality of education in the state, which has recently fallen to the 18th position.
Addressing concerns raised by congress member Anuradha Rana about the merger of schools with low student numbers in challenging terrains like Lahaul and Spiti, Sukhu assured that the government would explore options such as relocating students to district headquarters and covering related expenses to prevent educational deprivation.
Education minister Rohit Thakur defended the decision to merge schools with fewer students, describing it as a necessary measure due to a nationwide decline in school enrollment. Over the past two decades, there has been a reduction of 5.13 lakh students in government schools across India, with 76,000 schools already merged nationwide. Uttar Pradesh led with 26,000 mergers, followed by Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, and Haryana.
In Lahaul and Spiti, 12 primary schools and one middle school have been merged, and 19 schools in the Jubbal and Kotkhai constituency have also been affected. Thakur noted that the Senior Secondary school Hansa in Lahaul and Spiti currently has only two students but eight teachers, while there are 750 teachers for 2,100 students across the constituency. He emphasized that the government will carefully consider the unique geographic challenges when making decisions about school mergers.
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