No education policy for children of slums

Tahir Mushtaq

Jammu, May 24 : The state government has failed to achieve its stated objective to provide education to each and every child irrespective of his caste and religion, and class also despite being a fundamental right mentioned in the constitution of India and the state of Jammu and Kashmir.


Even then many children of the poor families are seen involved in “child labour” doing menial jobs, sometimes forced labour, sometimes out of compulsion. These children are seen at every nook and corner of the state. Condition is not so different in our state. As per unofficial figures, there are more than ten thousand of such children in our state, mostly coming from other parts of the country because of extreme poverty.


This correspondent conducted a detailed survey of one of the biggest slum of Jammu city that was Maratha Colony-a slum area near Railway Station having almost five hundred slums inhabiting more than two thousand people. These people are mostly from the states of Haryana, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Maharashtra, here in search of livelihood; these people generally belong to landless schedule castes communities. Their source of livelihood is selling petty items in trains and in streets of the city, cobbler work, iron scrap collection, sometimes manual work also, and their children generally found begging in buses, trains, and on bus stops. There were many instances, when they were also involved in petty criminal activities. This correspondent found that despite the tall claims of the authorities, the literacy rate is “Zero” percent in this locality.


The state government particularly the school education department is practically doing nothing for the betterment of children of these poor people, so that at least their future is saved a bit. That is main reason; some locals are taking initiative to provide education to at least some children of the down trodden sections of the society.


Kanchan Sharma- a government school teacher is making efforts to make children of this slum literate, since at least five years. She established a school on her own for these children almost 7-8 months ago, where she had two unemployed youth for teaching in the school. This step was appreciated by all. They teach not only to the children but also to the adolescents as the literacy rate is zero percent. But she complained of little help from the government authorities in providing infrastructural facilities. 


Director, School Education Jammu Zahida Khan maintained that the department is ready to provide education facilities to such people as and when a demand arises. 


Also there are no further proposal for us from the higher authorities of the state and centre.