RAUTAHAT: Dostiya Primary School at Santapur VDC has only two classrooms, but there is no dearth of students. Hence, students are forced to study in the school toilet, a problem that reflects how difficult education still is for children in rural Nepal. Though the toilet where the students are currently studying was never brought in use, it certainly does not offer the classroom comfort.

Around 200 students are studying in the school that runs classes up to grade five.

Head teacher Upendra Prasad Yadav said they were forced to teach the first and second graders in the unused toilet for want of classrooms.

“As the number of students is increasing and two classrooms cannot accommodate them all, we were left with no other option,” head teacher Yadav said. Established in 1959, Dostiya Primary School is one of the oldest schools in the district. It had closed down in 1983. It is said that the head teacher and other teachers, however, were receiving payment for around 24 years. The school opened again a month ago after the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority launched an investigation. Ram Prabesh Yadav, a local, lamented that the village children were deprived of education due to the malpractice of then head teacher and other teachers for two decades.

With District Education Office’s initiative and villagers’ efforts, the school resumed its classes by hiring a new head teacher. Teacher Hasina Khatun asked the DEO to lend financial to construct classrooms and furniture.

School Management Committee Chairman Sesh Ejaj Ahamad said there were only four students on the day the school reopened. “But within two months, the number of students has reached 200,” Ahamad said. He pledged to take the problem of classrooms to the concerned authority and solve it at the earliest. The CIAA has been probing financial anomalies that took place for 24 years in the closed school. The anti-graft body is preparing to file a case against former head teacher.

source: the himalayan times,5 april 2014