Baliapal: Although the state government is taking up a slew of measures to ensure quality education for girls, there are several areas where the developmental initiatives fail to reach. Over 300 girls of Baliapal Government Girls’ High School under this block in Balasore district studying in a dilapidated school building is a case in point.
In the absence of opportunities, these girls have to risk their lives and study in a dilapidated asbestos-roofed building of their school which developed cracks during the last cyclonic storm.
The situation is so worse that studies get hampered even during a brief spell of rain as rainwater enters the classrooms. Students are also deprived of playing in the playground which often remains flooded with drain water and effluents discharged by various shops in the area.
The guardians have warned of agitation if new classrooms are not constructed and the playground is not developed.
The school has never caught the attention of the state government and is dying a slow death because of neglect and administrative apathy. The school has 17 teaching and non-teaching staffers.
Sources said the school was established way back in 1968 but it never received the attention it deserved as an old school. No one from the School and Mass Education (S&ME) department or from the district administration or any public representative has ever spared a thought for improvement of the school.
Every year hundreds of girls enroll themselves in this school, which is in the heart of seven to eight panchayats under the block, but the school grappling with poor infrastructure hardly fulfills their dreams.
The school is situated near the panchayat Samiti office along the Baliapal-Basta main road which comes to the notice of many government officials and public representatives visiting the area.
Kali Charan Jena, the school managing committee chairman, said he has informed the local MLA and block education officer (BEO) about the plight of the school but they are yet to take any remedial steps.
When contacted, headmistress Sulata Patra said they have submitted written complaints to the departmental officials, the S&ME minister, local MLA and MP but the problems of the school are yet to be resolved.