Maharashtra Education Department Emphasizes Need to Assess Impact of Frequent Elections on Government Schools

 People reported that the school's education department informed the parliamentary committee that the government schools were impacted as the teachers were transferred elsewhere for voting and classes were suspended for a few days.

Maharashtra state education department has placed on record the fact before the joint parliamentary committee established on the significant 'One Nation One Election' Bill, regarding how schools under government control become loss-making because of regular elections as teachers are put on election duty.

Joint parliament committee (JPC) initiated the multi-city tour by beginning with Mumbai as day-one destination and cross-examined some of the witnesses. Senior Maharashtra government officers such as chief secretary and DGP among others were among those who were to be interrogated by the panel.

The state government went into elaborate detail explaining how this bill will be implemented to give more priority to governance and not get diluted due to consecutive elections.

Sources have described that the education department had appeared before the committee and detailed out the impact on government schools. They believed that if the elections were concurrent, the deployments would also be concurrent but that would be in government schools as the private schools were not closed during an election. The government schools were also affected with the deployment of the teachers for election duty work which left the classes pending for three days. One Nation One Election has been in the news for controversy among party workers who can prove useful to the education sector.

It was further reported that the RBI officials presented to the JPC the evidence. RBI has complained to the panel that since there is a code of conduct and cash transfer limit, it has clear mention of them, said the sources. RBI, they continued, proceeded to say that there should be detailed examination of the effect of the law for which they asked for six months to come back to the panel, they continued.

Aged politicians of all the various parties, and chief minister Prithviraj Chavan, and state party leaders were heard as witnesses by the panel. BJP and alliance leaders have appreciated the Bill, whereas others like Congress and NCP believed that it would restrict the freedom of the citizens to criticize their elected representatives. They also question the necessity of regional parties in such an alliance.

After a break on Sunday (May 18), JPC will resume hearing its proceedings on Monday (May 19). Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and his deputy Eknath Shinde and Ajit Pawar too would be facing the panel, it is learnt. A chief minister would be facing the panel for the first time in history.

The committee was formed last winter session of Parliament after the Centre stated it had conveyed its readiness in introducing the Bill into Parliament for debate following its tabling in Lok Sabha. It is led by former minister and Lok Sabha member PP Chaudhary and consists of 39 members, among them Congress MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra.

Some veterans such as MPs Kalyan Banerjee, P Wilson, and Manish Tewari are included in the panel. Congress's Mukul Wasnik and Randeep Surjewala, Shiv Sena (UBT) member Anil Desai, and NCP's Supriya Sule are Opposition MPs included in the panel.

BJP's Anurag Singh Thakur, former minister Baijayant Panda, Bhartruhari Mahtab and BJP's Anil Baluni are among the ruling party members sitting on the JPC. Shiv Sena's Shrikant Shinde and TDP's Harish Balayogi are among the others on the JPC. India Today.