Assam government provincializes schools administered by tea estates to enhance amenities for students

The 422 schools in the state that are managed by the tea garden authorities have been provincialized by the Assam government. The action comes after the state cabinet decided to provincialise the state’s 419 lower primary schools managed tea gardens, two schools for moral instruction, and one high school. “In the public interest and in the academic interest of the tea garden community, the state government provincialised 419 number Tea gardens to be managed in Lower Primary Schools, 2 tea gardens in M E Schools, and 1 tea garden in High School of the state,” a notification from the Department of School, Assam issued. The state government gave the authorities to create vacancies for teachers in the schools.

According to the announcement, “Students in the provincialised schools would get Mid-Day Meal (MDM), uniform, free textbooks, and government teachers. The state government also instructed the District Elementary Education Officers and Inspectors to make sure that the newly hired teachers had the proper working relationships with tea garden-engaged teachers. Internal teacher training and benefits will be made available to the teachers overseen by the tea garden authorities. The teachers overseen by the tea garden authorities will also be provided with many facilities like in-house training of teachers and access to teacher capacity-building programs run by the Department of School Education.

Previously, these schools were run by the State Tea Garden Authorities.