Students seek relief

Conservancy staff kids rue closure of municipal school

Children of civic conservancy staff, students of Walpakhadi Gujarati municipal school situated at Mazgaon, have demanded compensation for their displacement and loss of education, in a memorandum submitted to municipal commissioner Jairaj Phatak.

Their parents said, five years ago the children were displaced from the civic school forcing them to take admissions in private schools which were unaffordable. There were 18 students from IV to VIII standards in the school. They all belong to Meghwal community, a scheduled caste.

Jasubai Dabhi, whose two children, Kiran and Girish, were studying in the school said,

“We received a one-day notice about the closure of the school. Our children had no choice but to lose a year. The BMC closed down the school on some pretext but later the premises got transformed into a swank International Baccalaureate (IB) school.”
The civic chief has already ordered a probe into the matter.

Memorandum also requested Phatak to expedite the probe.

A 22-year-old Bharat Lakumbh is the one who had to forsake his studies to follow his father’s footsteps as a conservancy employee.

The fact is that no body wants to become a conservancy worker. But they are forced. This defeats the very purpose of social mobility,” said Simpreet Singh of the National Alliance of the People’s Movement, who led the students’ representation.

Singh said Phatak assured the parents that he would discuss the matter regarding relief with additional commissioner Kishore Gajbhiye.