By Rajib Roy
With the reopening of schools after a long lull, parents, guardians and their wards are busy purchasing text books, exercise copies, uniforms, schools bags etc. for the ensuing academic session.
The task of purchasing these books and copies is gigantic in the sense that imparting education is getting costlier day by day. With the curse of inflation now felt in every sector, it has come to notice that those parents who cannot afford to buy books depends on the past students so that the borrowed books can be recycled.
Although this trend is seen more in the government run schools where there is no binding on purchases of books but the other private and religious institutions run schools makes it compulsory for the students to buy books, copies, bags and other items from their respective schools only.
The Shillong Times spoke to such parents and guardians for whom buying text books, copies and other educational materials has become a headache.
One such guardian whose ward is studying in a reputed missionary school in the city has questioned the reason behind purchasing books, copies, bags only from the school instead of anywhere else. “These schools have entered into an agreement with the publishers and enjoys commissions from the publishing houses for sourcing text books and copies whereas the parents and guardians have to bear the brunt in the end,” said Pasang Lgngsting. She further said that there are some schools which compel parents to buy brown paper, stationery items like pencil, erasers, pens etc.
Another such parent Bikram Koirala fully agrees and observed that why a school bag has to be purchased every year when there is no need for that. “I wonder what our education department is meant for amidst these schools having a free extortive run,” he said. There are also observations that most schools in the city, which are run privately and by religious institutions, have engaged business houses for sourcing uniforms. It is learnt that these schools have made it mandatory for the parents and guardians to source school uniforms only from their designated shops. “The yearend notice to parents says that cloth for school uniform has to be sourced from a particular shop and that has to be stitched in a particular tailor. Are these schools not doing business in the name of education,” questioned this irate guardian Gauranga Deb.
These parents said that these particular schools are doing brisk business in the name of “customization” whereas it is high time that the education department issues strict guidelines to them. Parents have also opined that when they purchase books, copies, stationery items from wholesale stores in the market, they get sizeable discounts whereas they cannot avail the same when the school dishes out the same although these schools are getting huge discount for bulk purchases from the publishing houses and suppliers.
The trend in the government run schools is comparatively better. Here the parents and guardians are not dictated in terms of text books, copies, uniforms, schools bags, stationeries etc. as they can source them from their convenient places. Most parents of these schools, who are from the economically weaker section of the society and who cannot afford to buy books, uniforms, bags etc. source them from the past students and recycle them.
One such school in Polo area of the city, which has sizeable students base from the weaker section of the society, only ensures that the students are in their uniforms whereas they are even allowed to share text books in the classroom and is allowed to use any bags they can afford.
Another menace that has come to light is the issue of double pricing with double price tags on text books. Parents and guardians have urged authorities to conduct surprise checks on booksellers to check this nuisance of double priced books whereas there are some which are sold without any price tags on them as this is the time when such malpractices are found to be in practice, largely.