Children studying in government schools in Bangalore perform menial tasks on a regular basis according to a study conducted by a city-based human rights organisation.

South India Cell for Human Rights Education and Monitoring (Sichrem), which conducted a study for the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights, found that most schools ask their students to clean toilets, wash vessels and sweep floors.

Forced to do

The study covered as many as 47 schools in five wards of Shivajinagar, Pulikeshinagar, KR Puram, Chamarajpet and Vasanthnagar.

The objective of the study was to know about the compliance of schools with the provisions of Right to Education Act.

Sichrem found that in almost all the government schools students were forced to perform usually done by Group ‘D’ employees (ayah).

“The State government has issued a circular in 2011 to appoint a Group ‘D’ employee to do all these jobs and had even released the money. But no appointment is made so far, ” said N Gangadhar Reddy, the programme co-ordinator.

According to him almost all the schools make the students unload the Akshaya Patra (mid-day meals) vessels from the vehicles and the heavy vessels are carried to the schools, served, cleaned and sent back by the students. 

Job of an attender

“It is the job of an attender to do this. The International Society for Krishna Consciousness (Iskcon), which supplies food to the schools makes it mandatory to send back the vessels at least after one wash,” he said.

According to one more member, who worked on this project, at least 20 schools of the 47 treat the children badly by making them do almost all kinds of menials jobs .

“At a school in KR Puram and another in Anandapuram and some schools in Pulikeshinagar, we found that children were cleaning toilets and other areas which were very clean. We have adequate proof for it,” said Reddy.

The poor payment of Rs 1,500 per month fixed by school authorities for a temporary group ‘D’ employee is another reason for the mess as there are few takers for the job (minimum wage for a worker under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme is Rs 176 per day) in many government schools.

Inactive School Development Monitoring Committees (SDMC) further worsen the situation, the report says.

“The members of SDMC (most of them are parents of the students of the respective schools) are all daily wage labourers who do not attend meetings called by schools as they tend to lose a day’s wages. They do not complain or protest against anything fearing that their wards studying in the schools might be affected,” said Reddy.
Commissioner, Department of Public Instruction S R Umashankar was not available for comment.