Govt issues order banning online classes, finally

Six days after the Minister for Primary and Secondary Education announced a ban on online classes up to Class 5, the department finally issued an official government order on Monday evening.

The order directs all schools across the boards to stop online classes for children from kindergarten to Class 5 and not to collect fee from parents in the name of online education.

“Using the powers under Karnataka Education act (1983) Section (7), we are issuing an order where schools affiliating to ICSE, CBSE, State and other international boards are not allowed to offer online classes from LKG to Class 5. If the schools have already been offering online classes for these grades, the same should be stopped immediately. Even the pre-recorded video and audio contents should not be sent to students until the government receives a report from expert committee which is constituted to look into the matter.”

Due to the delay in issuing official order by the department, several private schools continued to offer online classes even on Monday and parents approached the helpline set up by the department and filed complaints.

A committee headed by senior academician Prof M K Sridhar will look into the scientific ways of offering online education to kids in Class 6 to 10, according to their age. Other members of the panel are: academicians Dr Gururaj Karjagi, Dr V P Niranjanaradhya, representatives from Early Brainhood Association, parents and managements representing ICSE, CBSE and state board schools, the commissioner for public instruction, paediatricians from Nimhans.