To ensure that the money meant for providing uniforms to school students is rightly used, North Delhi Municipal Corporation has decided to distribute uniforms instead of transfering cash to the students from the upcoming academic session.
Currently, the municipal corporations give Rs 300 each to nursery kids and Rs 500 each to students of class I to IV for buying uniforms every year.
“All the kids studying in municipal primary schools come from the lower strata of the society. It is difficult to monitor whether the money given to parents of the students is utilised for the purpose it is meant for. Therefore, we have decided to provide readymade uniforms to the students,” said education committee chairman, Rekha Gupta.
The North Corporation operates around 788 primary schools in which around 4.5 lakh students are enrolled. However, some corporation officials in the civic body have raised doubts whether the new initiative would be successful as such decisions have courted controversy in the past.
“Since the contract of supplying the uniforms would be given to private parties, allegations of corruption in tendering process and purchase of garment is bound to be labelled against the officials. Moreover, distributing uniforms to around 4.5 lakh students on time would also be a herculean task,” a corporation official said.
Rekha Gupta, however, said they have looked into all the aspects of this move and they would deliver the goods on time. “The uniforms would be distributed to all the students by June,” said Gupta.
The civic body officials also unveiled a sample of the designer uniforms.
“The school uniform of the primary schools have not been changed since 1977. We decided to change the uniform. Appearance wise, it would put these kids at par with students of public schools. It would also instill a sense of encouragement amongst the students,” said Gupta.
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