The Assam State Committee of the Students’ Federation of India (SFI) has slammed the Himanta Biswa Sarma government for providing financial relief to teachers of schools managed only by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
The SFI’s State committee members told journalists on Wednesday that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led Assam government has taken up a discriminatory policy of providing one-time financial aid of ₹5,000 from the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund only to the teachers of Sankaradeva Shishu Niketan, a chain of educational institutions under Vidya Bharati, a private organisation managed by the RSS.
The aid is for minimising financial difficulties faced by lowly-paid private school teachers due to the prolonged COVID-19 restrictions.
“We condemn this biased act and demand extension of this one-time financial support to all teachers of private as well as venture schools,” SFI’s State general secretary Nirangkush Nath said. A venture school is a category of education institution established by the people of a locality or village prior to January 1, 2006.
The SFI said Dr. Sarma had earlier provided a financial grant to the Sankaradeva Shishu Niketans for building infrastructure when he was the Education Minister. “The current Education Minister, Ronoj Pegu, said ‘no’ when our delegation had met him on August 28 to ask if any financial support was being provided to the private schools,” SFI’s State vice-president Pratul Barman said.
The act of spending government or public funds for political gain cannot be accepted, the SFI said.
This story first appeared on thehindu.com