DIMAPUR, AUGUST 2 (MExN): A seminar on the role of public leaders and their responsibilities vis-à-vis communitisation of elementary education in Nagaland was held by the Chumukedima Town Council (CTC) at the CTC Conference Hall. The resource person was Bahauddin Ahmed, Head Teacher, Government Middle School, Chumukedima village.
In the seminar, Neichu Koutsu, Chairperson CTC said that the concept of communitisation of elementary education was introduced in Nagaland in the year 2002 and that it is the only state in India where communitisation of education has been implemented. The seminar was held to raise awareness among the public leaders with regard to this particular topic.
B.Ahmed opened his speech by quoting Tony Blair – ‘Ask me my three main priorities of the government; they are education, education and education’. He elaborated on the various stages into which the educational system has been broken up into, namely, Primary, Upper Primary/Middle, High secondary, Higher secondary, etc.
The Primary and Middle stage together are termed as the elementary stage. Thus, according to him, the elementary stage should be emphasized greatly as it is the foundation of a child’s education. With the universalisation of primary education taken up as one of the main goals of India, Nagaland is also being supported with funds from the central government, he said. But the sad fact remains that most of the money is being misutilised by a corrupt few, he added. He said that even in the surrounding government schools in Chumukedima, discrepancies have been found in the registration of the number of students, i.e. false names have been added to the students’ list. Thus, it is time that the local public themselves run their own government schools. He added that the state government decided to communitize elementary education in Nagaland due to the amount of criticism from the public, critics, journalists and also because of the dismal results that are being produced by government-run schools.
Ahmed defined community as a group of people living together for a common good. In defining education, he quoted Gandhi – ‘The all round drawing out of the best in a child in mind, body and spirit’.
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