A video of a government school classroom in Odisha has gone viral on social media, which shows the door of the classroom being substituted for a blackboard. A teacher is seen writing exam questions on the door in the purported clip. After the incident came to light on Tuesday, December 6, the school has landed in trouble.
The school in the video was identified to be the Hingula Government High School. Interestingly, the school, situated near Antia village in the Jajpur district, was upgraded under the government's 5T initiative last year. This initiative aims to develop infrastructure in educational institutions, the Education Department officials said, as per a report by PTI.
“We were made to sit for some time as the teachers did not provide us with question papers for the examination. Later, a teacher wrote the questions on the door of the classroom,” a student of Class VIII said. Meanwhile, Pravat Moharana, the father of another student, alleged that the classroom door was being used as a blackboard throughout the year.
On the other hand, the school Headmistress, Saraswati Panda, refuted the claims. She alleged that the school did not receive the question papers from the Sarva Sikhya Abhiyan. "As the school has more than 400 students from Classes I-VIII, who are appearing for the examination, we made adjustments for sitting arrangements in all the rooms. Since the school building does not have blackboards, we had to write the questions on the classroom door,” Panda said, adding that the school had two smart classrooms.
Nonetheless, Jajpur DEO (District Education Officer) cum Project Director of Samagra Shiksha said that a show-cause notice has been issued to the school. “We have served a show-cause notice to the Headmistress of the school for dereliction of duty, and asked her to reply within three days, failing which necessary action will be initiated,” he said, as per PTI.
