Headmasters of 2 Middle Schools arrested in Nawada

Speed Post News Network

Nawada:  Headmasters of two Middle Schools : Onkarnath Rai and Brajesh Kumar, were arrested on January 10, 2018, following an FIR filed by the District Programme Officer (DPO), Mid-day Meal (MDM). The arrests followed defiance of DM Kaushal Kumar’s appeal to school headmasters and teachers to provide mid-day meal to school students.

The district Primary School and Middle School teachers’ association has termed the arrests as illegal, vindictive and in defiance of the orders of Patna High Court as well as the right to education (RTE) Act, 2009.

FIR has been lodged against half-a-dozen Middle and Primary school headmasters and several contractual teachers of the district for not providing mid-day meal to the students belonging mainly to the extremely backward and dalit sections of the society.

The arrest of headmasters: Onkarnath Rai and Brajesh Kumar, have triggered a war of words between the district administration and the teachers association. While the DM Kaushal Kumar asked the teachers and headmasters to continue providing mid-day meals at their respective schools, the headmasters and  teachers insist on their disassociation citing orders of Patna High Court wherein it is clearly stated that “no teacher shall be deployed for anyno n-educational purposes other than the decennial population census, disaster relief duties or duties relating to elections to local authority or the State Legislature or Parliament, as the case may be”.
Nawada district Primary School Association President Bindeshwari Prasad Singh said that the arrest of the two headmasters was a contempt of the High Court and that he would inform the state president of the injustice.
It may be mentioned that the mid-day meal has become an untouchable issue for the teachers as they allege various irregularities such as 15 to 20 kg less rice provided in every 50 kg sack by the NGOs, harassment of the teachers by the village-level elected representatives as well as the Bock Education Officers concerned.