Prohibitory clamp on Siliguri school

Siliguri, May 10: Prohibitory orders have been clamped in and around Siliguri Hindi High School, the largest Hindi-medium institution for boys in the town, to check a students' strike tomorrow demanding resumption of classes that were halted since January.

"The students have threatened to sit on an indefinite hunger strike in the school from tomorrow. We suspect this will hamper law and order. So we have issued prohibitory orders under Section 144 (which disallows the gathering of five or more persons) in a radius of 100 meters around the school," said O.G. Pal, a deputy commissioner of Siliguri metropolitan police.

In recent memory, prohibitory orders have not been imposed in any school in Siliguri.

The management of the Siliguri Hindi High School, which has classes from Class VI to XII and has 1,400 boys on its rolls, has been in the middle of a long-drawn tussle with teachers and guardians since last year.

The root of the problem lies in the school management's contention that the institution enjoys linguistic minority status, a claim the guardians' body has refused to accept.

For the new academic session, the school managing committee increased the annual fees to Rs 4,800 for new admissions to Classes V and VI, Rs 1,600 for Classes VII and VIII and Rs 2,020 for Classes IX and X. The management said it had the right to set the fees as the institution enjoys linguistic minority status.

But a section of guardians said they would pay only Rs 240 a year, the stipulated fee for state-aided schools.

The management has said if it cannot increase the fees, it cannot run the institution and cannot pay its teachers, either.

As the school refused to accept the guardians' demand, their wards have been denied admission for the new academic year and classes are not being held as a result of this impasse.

The school is facing another problem. Since February, the majority of its 26 teachers - many of them working on contract - have been on a pen-down strike to protest the sacking of two of their colleagues, who were working on contract.

"The school enjoys linguistic minority status and the managing committee can stipulate the fees and appoint contractual teachers without the state government's interference," said Sitaram Dalmiya, a member of the school managing committee.

Since February, none of the teachers on strike has been paid. The teachers' strike is still on.

"The new fee structure has been fixed in order to meet expenses related to payment of salaries of contractual teachers, staff and maintenance of the school. It is impossible to run the school without adequate finances. The current impasse is because the teachers are on agitation and students, provoked by some people with vested interests, are threatening to go on hunger-strike," Dalmiya said.

Last month, the state education department had constituted a five-member team headed by Siliguri SDO Deepap Priya P to conduct an inquiry into the problems at the school.

The committee has sent its report to the state education department. According to the SDO, the team has recommended to the state education department that the students are minors and should not participate in any form of agitation.

Last week, a section of students from classes IX to XII threatened the indefinite hunger strike from tomorrow if the state did not take steps to restore normalcy and resume classes.

They said the state would be responsible if any of the students participating in the hunger strike took ill.

The deadline they set for the state government to take action to resume classes ends today.

"It is likely that a decision on the school will be taken within the next two to three days. We have recommended in our report that students should not participate in any form of agitation," SDO Deepap Priya P said today.

The students, told about imposition of prohibitory orders, appeared unperturbed.

"We had given a deadline to the state government to intervene in the matter and resume classes. The school managing committee should accept Rs 240 as annual tuition fees and resume the classes immediately. We will go ahead with our hunger strike unless our demands are met," a student of class XI said.

School authorities said outsiders with vested interest are provoking the students.

On January 22, the Darjeeling district magistrate had written to the secretary of the managing committee of the school, B.P. Dalmiya, asking him not to overcharge students for the 2015-2016 session. The letter said: “This is to inform you that a message has been received from the school education department that no fee other than that allowed by the government can be charged from the students. This is for your information and necessary action.”

But the managing committee did not heed the DM’s advice.

On February 19, around 2,000 students, teachers and guardians of the school took out a rally to demand the intervention of the local administration to solve the impasse.

The Guardians’ Forum in March threatened a humger strike from April 9, demanding that the state government must intervene to sort out the mess, following which the state government sent the team.