The year 2005 had
witnessed unusual occurrences in the school
education department, and with the advent of
the year 2006, a glimpse at the root cause
of deterioration of Government schools,
especially of hill districts of Manipur can
be made. The main obstacle is nepotism, and
measures needed to tackle it are: reducing
red tape and prohibiting the culture of
placing junior and ineligible teachers above
the senior and experienced teachers
indefinitely dispensing with service related
rules. It’s unfortunate. This practice has
greatly demoralized senior and experienced
teachers in the profession which is one of
the factors responsible for deterioration of
hill schools. The said culture can be curbed
and justified if teachers who are within the
zone of consideration are firmly united.
What is most essential for achieving quality
education is proper guidance of senior
teachers who are specialized in various
subjects.
There are altogether 1289 Government schools
for the whole of hill districts of Manipur,
the break-up being 1032 primary schools
under Autonomous District Councils, 178
Junior High Schools and 79 High Schools.
Primary teachers appointed by the education
department before the inception of district
councils are also utilized in those schools
with all pension benefits entitled to them.
There was a shortage of about 1353 teachers
of different categories of post in hill
district schools till the end of 2004 as per
data collected by the Headmasters’
Association of Hill Districts of Manipur.
324 science graduate teachers, mostly of
mathematics subjects, 613 arts graduate
teachers and 416 Hindi teachers were
required in addition to the existing
teachers for hill districts alone.
There was no reliable data about posts of
teachers to be filled up at a particular
point of time under different categories for
different schools. Will it be feasible to
fill up such a huge vacancy of posts at one
stroke? It is to be seen whether ground work
for recruitment of teachers is really afoot.
There were several schools both in the
valley and hill districts where there were
acute shortages of teachers. In some
schools, there were teachers far in excess
of the need of a school. This is what is
called “Surplus-Teachers” coined for the
present day’s school education. Despite
surplus of teachers in those selective
schools, performances of the schools were
alarmingly poor as it was evident from the
result-sheets of the BSEM. In order to
regulate the demand and supply of teachers
according to the actual needs of the
schools, Proper Management Information
System was necessary. Much was talked about
it. What had emerged from it is anybody’s
guess. One reason for dearth of good
teachers, especially Mathematics and Hindi
teachers in remote hill areas was that hill
villages had few graduates offering
Mathematics although some graduates knowing
Hindi were available. It was marginal.
Another reason for scarcity of Math Teachers
was that those teachers hailing from valley
areas refused to serve in the schools under
poor working conditions and they were always
home-sick which necessitated their revolt in
different forms.
In the meantime, even though some of the
teachers from valley areas were sometimes
more dedicated and capable in teaching and
counseling, many of them were conversant
with framing charges against the school
authorities on flimsy grounds. To strengthen
their pleading for abrupt departure from the
schools, they fabricated stories that there
were a handful of students in the schools
and no teachers’ quarters were available in
the vicinity of the schools. They even
complained that they were intimidated citing
the insanity of local situation. It was a
false-hood.
Reporting meticulously to the higher-ups at
Imphal, they could manage to get themselves
transferred to the schools of their own
choice. What deepened was deformity in the
matter of transfer and posting of teachers
from one school to the other and from hill
schools to valley schools just in
mid-sessions. Local teachers of a great
number of hill villages already weary and
mindless in carrying out their duties had no
inclination for updating their expertise
thereby worsening teaching in class rooms.
Enough was already known that the standard
of education declined gradually in the
schools of different villages.
During 1991-92, as many as 100 bond-signed
science graduate teachers serving in
different hill schools were herded into
different valley area schools with posts.
Deterioration of hill schools germinated
from this point of time. Hill boys and girls
preferred private English schools to
Government schools where medium of
instruction was imparted through Manipuri
and in some schools local tribal dialects
were invariably used as medium of
instruction considered as out-dated.
Mushrooming private English schools which
usually got fresh coat of paints every
session located in district headquarters
allured village boys and girls to join them.
At the same time, high rise buildings of
private English schools in greater Imphal
area also tempted them. Their longing for
urban schooling and monotonous village life
hastened them to leave village schools. Of
all these, parents and students felt
doubtful about the competency of local
teachers mainly in teaching Mathematics and
English. With the exception of 2 or 3 high
schools, there was hardly any reliable
school in the hill districts of Manipur.
Having lost confidence in those pathetic
schools which didn’t even have the requisite
number of teachers and infrastructures,
parents had no other option but to shift
their wards to more viable educational
institutions located at hill district
head-quarters and Imphal.
In their observation, Government schools
looked beyond redemption. It’s all an easy
thing to distribute teachers on equal basis
if the department is resolute ignoring any
political pressure or threat perception to
save those neglected schools. If the schools
are allowed to function without disturbance
of abrupt transfer of teachers and are
staffed according to norm prescribed by the
school education department itself, there is
every prospect of reviving Government
schools in hill areas in particular.
Teachers of every subject should be paraded
first in the schools before the commencement
of every session. Whether pass percentage of
a school is high or low is a different tale.
Blaming only teachers and students for weak
performances of schools in HSLCE is
unjustified. Now, to reduce the rate of
total dependence on valley based science
graduate teachers, scheduled tribe science
graduates and masters degree holders
offering Math, Physics and Chemistry can be
requisitioned for appointment as teachers.
At least, a new beginning has been made in
this direction that there are now a hundred
or more ST Masters degree holders in Math.
True, tribal students were weak in
mathematics subjects but the weakness was
not inborn. As had often been said, they had
no aptitude for the subjects in the past.
But the trend has considerably changed now.
Two ST candidates had even topped the
successful candidates in HSLCE held in
different years in the past.
Here, it is worth-treasuring to recall that
till 1978, there were only two ST
Mathematics teachers teaching in high
schools at Imphal namely Shri Meiphunlung
Thaimei and Shri John Zamkhomang,
respectively of Rongmei and Zou communities.
The former taught mathematics in the
erstwhile Adimjati High School and the
latter taught in the Don Bosco High School.
There are now dozens of ST Master's degree
holders in Math. If the Government is clean
enough to look for those highly educated
persons, everything shall sail smoothly. It
is ironic that the phenomenon of want of
Mathematics teachers persisted in hill
village schools. With a view to reviving
Government schools in hill districts of
Manipur, it has become imperative for hill
village authorities to initiate certain
measure for heart-warming to make the valley
based teachers feel that their places of
posting are safe and homely. If the
officials from clerks to heads of offices in
the hill districts are also intransigent in
dealing with the teachers, naturally they
would not feel like teaching in the hill
village schools. And again, what is often
ignored is grave injustice done to senior
and experienced teachers, both of valley and
hill areas in regard to payment of their
monthly salaries and writing of ACRs. It is
unethical to repudiate to write ACRs of
employees. Isn’t it irrational and
unbecoming of an officer whoever it may be
doing that way? Even the Headmasters of
Secondary and Elementary Schools appointed
within the purview of the Manipur Pubic
Service Commission are often rebuked,
allegedly of insubordination and
indiscipline. Insubordination! It is absurd
of those in-charge acting as officers to
accuse headmasters of being insubordinate
and indiscipline.
The jolt ever since the scandal of
fraudulent withdrawal of head-pundits’’ pay
arrears rocked the department of school
education Government school teachers across
the length and breadth of the state of
Manipur have been confronting an
unprecedented identity crisis with the
society being suspicious of their
genuineness and credibility. It has done a
great harm to hill schools already in
terminal decline where one is suspicious of
the other.
Over the years,
a number of MoU had been signed between the
State Government of Manipur and the
representatives of the ATSUM for improvement
of hill schools and filling up of vacant
posts of teachers with mathematics and Hindi
teachers as the immediate requirement.
Following a series of parleys with the
student leaders, the Government eventually
ordered for rationalization of teachers,
calling it a cabinet decision which met with
an all out resistance put up by the affected
teachers. All in a dramatic turn, the
Government was tamed and it conceded their
plea by keeping rationalization orders in
abeyance provoking the tribal students’
leaders to retaliate through road or
economic blockade on the national highways
in the not so distant future. Prolonged
impasse is imminent as long as high schools
and junior high schools of the hill
districts are robbed of Mathematics and
Hindi teachers which attributes to denial of
justice, and it will only harden the stand
of the leadership of tribal students to
refute that it is an act of suppression and
exploitation.
To end the dead-lock, a separate DPC meant
for ST candidates for appointment to the
posts of science and Hindi teachers can be
arranged. The arrangement will greatly
minimize the burden of persuading valley
based science teachers to teach in hill
district schools. Knowing fully well that
the state government will not be able to
fill up bulky vacancy of posts of teachers
at a time in view of financial crunch of the
state, scheduled tribe science graduates
should be appointed as teachers for every
vacant post of teachers on contract or adhoc
basis with a provision for future
regularization. Hill parents, guardians and
students are looking forward to new look of
schools in the new academic session to come
after all these years of decadence of school
education. Last word. A strong political
will of any hill legislator who can prove
his godliness in words and deeds will help
in the mission tremendously. |
