New Delhi/Raipur
The rape of the minor tribal girl in Sukma district has brought the spotlight on the porta cabin residential schools in Chhattisgarh.
While the safety of students, mostly coming from underprivileged tribal families of interior villages, has come into question, some other functional issues plaguing the school system, in existence for over a decade now, have also come to the fore.
The Class 1 girl was raped in the hostel of a porta cabin residential school. Such pre-fabricated schools are functional across four Maoist-affected districts of the Bastar sub-division namely Dantewada, Sukma, Narayanpur and Bijapur since 2011-12.
The accused, 35-year-old Madvi Hidma, happens to be the husband of the school’s peon and used to stay along with her on the premises against rules that barred his presence in a girl’s hostel. He was also not an employee of the school that houses around 430 students.
The accused has been arrested even as the Hostel Superintendent and Assistant Superintendent have been suspended for not reporting the matter to police.
Sukma SP Kiran G Chavan said Hostel Superintendent Heena Khan did not report the matter to senior authorities and police in a timely manner, due to which more sections of the IPC and POCSO were included in the FIR and she was arrested. The alleged rape occurred on July 22 but was reported to police only on July 24.
The porta cabins, part of the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, a Government of India programme targeting primary education across the country, were conceived to provide education to students in the Left Wing Extremism (LWE) districts.
They were initially made up of bamboo, procured locally as well as under the National Bamboo Mission, and plywood. They gave way to pre-fabricated structures in course of time.
“When Salwa Judum started in Chhattisgarh as a counter-insurgency operation, residential schools like these were promoted to keep children safe and away from violence. It was a good strategy as many concrete schools in the interiors were blown apart by insurgents,” a State education official told The Indian Tribal on condition of anonymity.
“In the interiors, Maoists don’t allow the construction of pucca structures as they fear it will serve as base for the security forces in anti-Naxal operations,” the official said, adding, however, eventually porta cabins were somewhat concretised.
According to an official, absenteeism of teachers in many porta cabins is one of the problematic areas. There are separate cabins for boys and girls and there are 17 of them in Sukma, with four of them catering to girls. The incident which happened in Sukma occurred in a place near the Konta block headquarters of the district.
A community member pointed out another aspect. “When children fall ill, they are sent to villages and the blame is placed on the tribal community. There is minimal accountability of those heading the schools. Minimal monitoring is also a grey area.”
A Government teacher said though many porta cabins are safe, sometimes proper care is not taken and such incidents do happen. “However, these schools have helped arrest dropouts of Adivasi children in a big way,” she pointed out.
The teacher pointed out lack of supervisory staff at the hostels. “How can one hostel warden keep an eye on so many children? Though the government appoints teachers, most of them take transfer to their own areas outside Bastar. Many from Bilaspur, Raigarh and Raipur do not want to stay in Maoist-hit places. With supervision lax, relatives and other associates of the hostel staff slowly start visiting and even residing on the premises itself.”
Another teacher from a porta cabin in Sukma said the children go home only during holidays. “There is a hostel warden and sometimes only an assistant to look after them. Sometimes small children belonging to Classes 1-3 struggle to do things on their own. Many cannot wash their clothes,” she said.
This reporter tried reaching out to government officials of the district regarding the safety issues of porta cabins but did not elicit a response.
