Chandigarh: AICC general secretary and Rajya Sabha MP Randeep Singh Surjewala on Sunday accused the BJP of conspiring to make Haryana illiterate. Highlighting an 18% drop in school admissions in Haryana during the current academic year, Surjewala said the Nayab Saini government had locked up the future of youth as parents and students were left at the mercy of private institutions.
Armed with the latest education department data, the Congress leader said government school enrolment had fallen from 21.53 lakh to 17.60 lakh in just one year. The situation is so alarming that not a single child was admitted to balwatikas in 1,300 schools, he added.
Engaging teachers in portal work and non-academic tasks instead of teaching is a deliberate conspiracy to destroy the government education system and force students towards private schools, Surjewala said.
Referring to Parliament records, the senior leader said the Haryana government closed or merged 292 government schools in 2022 alone. The 10-year UDISE data presented in Lok Sabha confirms a net loss of 256 government schools in Haryana, falling from 14,630 schools in 2014-15 to 14,374 in 2023-24, Surjewala said, adding that at the same time, the state is flooded with private schools.
He also alleged the forcible merger of schools under the guise of rationalisation. More than 20,000 posts are vacant in Haryana. Official records placed before the Haryana Vidhan Sabha reveal that the government is deliberately not recruiting teachers, Surjewala added.
