The Standing Committee on Social Justice & Empowerment noted certain lapses in the implementation of the Eklavya Model Residential School (EMRS). EMRS is a scheme of the union government to establish model residential schools, specifically for Scheduled Tribes across India introduced in 1997-98. The Committee noted that the target of 452 new Eklavya Model Residential Schools (EMRSs) including 12 Eklavya Model Day Boarding Schools (EMDBS) by the year 2022 is nowhere near completion.
So far, only 350 schools are sanctioned and the remaining 102 schools are yet to be sanctioned. Not just that, the scheme was revised in 2018-19, while the target set in 1997-98 of establishing 288 is yet to be completed.
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Sadly, the National Education Society for Tribal Students (NESTS) established in 2019 to plan, construct, establish, endow and administer the EMRS, too, is not able to function properly. The committee is “perturbed” to note, that only two top posts have been filled out of 26 approved. This means NESTS is hardly functional till now.
Moreover, the committee shows concern over the damage caused by Covid-19 on learning. It noted, “the teaching activities have not been undertaken since the pandemic of COVID-19 started, there is all the more urgency that at least now the tribal children must have school facilities to resume their education, particularly since the online mode of education is not feasible for remote tribal areas.”
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NESTS/Ministry “failed” to devise a “workable solution” to prevent altogether stopping of learning for tribal school students during the COVID pandemic. “The Committee is surprised to note that the provision for Smart Classes and Atal Tinkering Labs (computer laboratories where students learn by experimenting) in EMRSs and the procurement of mobile tablets and educational kits for students have been delayed so much that the very objective to provide online education to EMRS schools during Covid-19 pandemic could not materialise,” it noted.
