Kannada to be mandatory at Palike's CBSE school

Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan agrees to Committees rider on language

The BVB authorities allayed fears of the members of the Palike's Standing Committee on Education, headed by its Chairperson B V Ganesh, which visited the school premises on Wednesday.

School building

The Palike has given land and is constructing the school building with a budget of Rs 2.95 crore at Srirampura. The model school of the BBMP is facing teething troubles pertaining to the modalities and the sharing of responsibilities.

In the light of the general perception that CBSE promotes either Hindi or English, the Standing Committee members stressed that Kannada should not be ignored under any circumstances or they would oppose the project.

In reply, the BVB authorities said Kannada would be mandatory for the students.
Optional languages like Tamil, Hindi or Sanskrit would be taught only from the sixth standard to eighth standard.

Transportation costs

The Palike officials were also sceptical about who would bear the transportation costs and students from how far could be brought to the school. There was also no consensus on what should be the dress code, who should bear the expenses for the uniforms, what should be the fee structure and other issues.

The Palike officials were pulled up by the members of the committee for spending too much money on playgrounds. The members were stunned to see that the money spent on the development of the playgrounds did not match with the ground reality.

At the Malleshwaram Grounds, Palike officials wanted Rs 92.2 lakh for the tensile roofing at the audience gallery, which the standing committee found unnecessary.

They also found discrepancies at the Chikka Lalbagh where Rs 50 lakh has been spent for various development works.

Funds misuse

Committee Chairperson Ganesh said that he would discuss with the officials of the projects department to curb misuse of funds and to divert the money to make BBMP schools better.