Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala State Jawahar Bal Bhavan has launched a programme, through which it hopes to benefit students at ten government schools, without taking the educational department into cognizance. The programme named ‘Dasapushpam’ was inaugurated by tourism minister Kadakampally Surendran on Thursday at Government Central High School, Attakulangara. Even though the DPI had not been informed about it, the opening session by television anchor G. S. Pradeep, a member of Bal Bhavan's governing council, was conducted during school hours.
There are standing instructions from the government that 200 working days and 1,000 curriculum-related instructional hours should be completed, said DPI K. V. Mohankumar. "Even the chief minister has said that the 1000 instructional hours should be completed. We have decided that not a single hour can be spared for extracurricular activities. Those can be undertaken beyond the instructional hours with the permission of the school head," he said. He added that other government departments and agencies need to approach the secretary of general education department for permission to do extracurricular activities. However, in this case, he was not aware if such authorization has been sought, he said.
When asked about taking permission from the general education department, Bal Bhavan principal S. Malini said that she was not fully aware of the details and that the programme was being looked after by Mr Pradeep. The governing council had recently met and decided to launch the programme so that students in government schools can benefit from it, said Mr Pradeep. "The governing council decided to put this into practice at the earliest. Instead of being an institution which trains children behind closed doors, Bal Bhavan should be able to reach out to public schools where children who face hardships study. We are in the process of identifying nine other schools, where a similar session by a noted speaker will be conducted. There will be follow-up programmes in the ten schools, later," he said. When asked about the permission issue, he said that the programme would be implemented with the support of general education department.
