Telugu medium scrapped in municipal schools

Vijayawada: In a shocking move, the State government on Tuesday issued orders converting all the existing Telugu medium municipal schools into English medium schools with immediate effect.

These orders are not applicable to class X for the academic year 2016-17.

The orders gave a rude shock to teachers in the State and the unions decried the decision of the government.

Union leaders said students would be badly affected in the middle of education year with the unilateral move of Municipal Minister P Narayana on English medium schools

“We will conduct massive protests at Municipal offices across the State from Wednesday opposing the government decision,” they stated.

The State government issued a GO No. 14 on Monday night converting all the existing Telugu medium municipal schools into English medium schools.

Principal secretary R Karikal Valaven asserted that the decision would be implemented with the immediate effect irrespective of the students strength as well as teachers strength.

In another GO issued on October 25, 2016, the government quoted education systems in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka as example to introduce English medium, where local languages, including Urdu, Arabic, Bengali and Tamil are being used as mediums for teaching in schools.

Contrasting this, the State government now decided to scrap Telugu medium in municipal schools and also asserted that the present GO will suppress all other the GOs issued earlier.

The GO will have an effect on 2,51,774 students in 2,118 municipal schools across the State.

AP United Teachers’ Federation general secretary P Babu Reddy said that the unilateral decision of converting all Telugu medium municipal schools into English medium in the middle of academic year would severely affect lakhs of students.

He asked how the Ministry gave such orders two months before the public examinations.

“The teachers in municipal schools have been teaching in Telugu medium for years. How can they teach science, social studies, mathematics or other subjects in English medium without any training or preparation,” he questioned.

Babu Reddy said 94 per cent of participants had voted in favour of Telugu medium in elementary schools and both English and Telugu medium in high schools at a meeting conducted by the State government on detention system in school education on October 5, 2015.

He said that the government did not take the opinions expressed in meeting into consideration before releasing present orders.

He alleged that Minister Narayana was violating the rules by tagging names like techno, IIT foundation to schools.

“The Minister categorised some municipal schools as techno schools and IIT foundation schools which are creating differences among the students, besides promoting corporate education in the State,” he charged.

Progressive Recognised Teachers Union (PRTU) senior leader S Sateesh said that it would not be possible to shift Telugu medium into English medium all of sudden and the decision would largely affect the students.