Chennai: Though Tamil Nadu government announced an allocation of Rs 26,932 crore for school education and around Rs 500 crore for infrastructure development and providing basic amenities to government schools, Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report has revealed that funds provided were not utilised well as schools had leaking ceilings, inadequate number of toilets, damaged kitchens and broken compound walls.
According to the CAG report for the fiscal year 2015-16, the Comprehen-sive School Infrastructure Development Scheme (CSIDS) for the provision of basic infrastructure and water supply facilities in the panchayat union schools located in rural areas only 182 works of 518 works were taken up.
The works taken up under CSIDS are not a part of the Tamil Nadu Habitations Improvement Scheme indicating that the government executed CSIDS based on exhaustive and incomplete survey reports.
As per the audit, an amount of Rs 1.09 crore was spent on construction of compound walls in 49 schools. CAG pointed to the partially constructed compound walls, which did not serve the intended purpose, in seven schools at the cost of Rs 15.47 lakh. Other facilities that the schools lacked were of repairs of ceiling, flooring, incinerator and water supply for toilets.
Owing to damaged walls and building, four classrooms could not be used and students of two different standards were accommodated in one classroom.
Rectification of such issues was carried out only in one school after repeated requests. The CAG said that there were leakages in ceilings in 20 out of 70 schools.
Though scheme guidelines mandate the construction of a kitchen shed in schools and carry out repair work on the da-maged sheds, but repair works were not taken up but will be done in 2016-17.
As the kitchen shed was in damaged condition in two schools, cooking for children was done in open space. The basic facility of toilets was inadequate in most of the schools, with shortfall ranging from 33 and 100 per cent in 18 schools. The water facility in toilets added to the plight, with nine schools not providing water facility in toilets.
The norms for provision of funds of flush-out the latrines in schools were one per 25 girls and one per 50 boys. Audit reveals the shortfall ran-ge between 50 and 100 for boys and 33 and 100 for girls.
