Body for out-of-school kids axed

While the state government is making all efforts to get out-of-school children back in school, the BMC has disbanded a committee that was set up in 1985 to do the job of finding out of school children and enrolling them in schools run by the civic corporation.

Members of the education committee of the BMC have alleged that it is a regressive move and will have an adverse effect on the out-of-school children in Mumbai but officials have said the decision to disband the committee was taken by the Standing Committee in 2012 and they are just implementing it.

According to Shivnath Darade, a member of the education committee, the Social Upliftment Programme of the BMC was launched in 1985 to ensure that out-of-school and street children were enrolled in schools.

“Since 1985 this committee with the help of social organisations set up 504 balwadis or pre-primary schools wherein lakhs of children from the street were enrolled and given a proper education,” said Mr Dharade.

“They worked selflessly and even went without pay till 2005 when the corporation started passing them. Now the education department says they are not serving the propose and hence transferred them to other departments,” he further added.

The confirmation of the transfer of the employees from the Social Upliftment department was issued on Monday. Mr Darade alleged that while the department had 42 employees the civic corporation started disbanding it a few years back by transferring the employees to other departments on the pretext that that they were not doing enough work.“This committee used to go around looking for out-of-school children, speak with parents, convince them to enrol their children in schools and so on. However now that the department has been disbanded, who will get the 50,000 out-of-school children in the school ” asked Mr Darade.