A total of 511 external evaluators including 185 from outside the district have taken part in the ongoing second round of Gunotsav in Darrang district of Assam on Thursday.
They are to evaluate and assess various index related to the quality educational environment including cleanliness, academic standard and quality of midday meal among others.
Senior officials of the State Government outside the district who have taken part in the process of external evaluation that began from the second day included Revenue Secretary and Commissioner of Transport Manoj Kumar, Secretary of Cooperative department Madan Chandra Deka, Superintendent of Police (SB) Imdadul Hussain Bora, Deputy Inspector General of Police, CID Debajit Hazarika etc.
Darrang Deputy Commissioner Ashok Kr Barman; Superintendent of Police of Darrang, Shreejith Thiraviam ; Additional Deputy Commissioners of Darrang, Kalpana Deka and Pankaj Chakravarty are the senior administrative officials of the district who were also amongst the external evaluators on the day who had visited their allotted schools .
This time the Gunotsav has covered a total of 1,17,723 students in 1275 schools from class II to IX standard of the district.
Meanwhile, according to Additional Deputy Commissioner in charge of SSA, Darrang, Kalpana Deka , the average attendance of students in the ongoing Gunotsav in the district is 95 per cent.
“The average attendance in our district till the second day is very much encouraging and it is recorded as 95 per cent,” said Additional Deputy Commissioner Deka while talking to Northeast Now.
However, in comparison to the first round of the Gunotsav in 2017, the level of enthusiasm amongst the teachers, members of the SMDC and other local people related to the school environment is stated to be weak.
It is alleged by a section of educationally conscious people of the district that in the first round of Gunotsav, a total of 420 of the district were adjudged with the ‘A+’ Grade but the Government failed to keep their promise of releasing a cash prize of Rs 25,000 each to these schools as a mark of recognition.
According to a source of the Education Department as per the promise, the Government released the cash prize to the schools with Grade A+ of the first phase of Gunotsav, but the other schools with same grade in the second and third phase that included 420 schools of Darrang have been deprived of their due cash benefits and this is one major reasons for dampening the spirit in the second round.