Rs 2,900-crore infra spend for Delhi Govt schools

NEW DELHI: Deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia on Tuesday announced that the government will build 12,478 new rooms - including 9,981 classrooms and 106 multipurpose halls - for the infrastructure development of its schools.

The Delhi cabinet, in its meeting chaired by CM Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday, approved the education department's proposal for the construction of the new structures. Sisodia informed that the whole process would be completed in a year or a year and a half.

Sisodia said that of the total 12,478 new rooms to be constructed in Delhi government schools, 9,981 would be classrooms, 106 multi-purpose halls, 328 laboratories, 204 libraries/principal and vice-principal rooms/staffrooms and 1,067 toilet blocks, including staircases, etc.

These new structures will be built on existing premises of Delhi government schools under the jurisdiction of directorate of education by the PWD, at an estimated cost of Rs 2,892.6 crore - with Rs 1,300 crore during 2018-19 and Rs 1,562.6 crore during 2019-20.

Announcing the new projects, Sisodia said that 8,000 additional rooms have already been constructed in Delhi government schools "with all modern amenities as part of the comprehensive agenda to impart quality education to the children of Delhi."

Sisodia said that "we have pressure from students who are leaving private schools to come to government schools now." He added that there are 44 lakh students in Delhi schools with 16 lakh in Delhi government schools. "We would hope that we have the capacity to accommodate all students," Sisodia said.

He also informed that adverse Student Classroom Ratio (SCR) has to be reversed and the construction of new classrooms is an important step in this direction. Sisodia added that schools in more than 280 buildings are running in double shifts with high enrolment of students. The government has also introduced new vocational streams in the school curriculum for which additional classrooms will be required, he said.

PWD has been requested to survey all the school buildings for preparing the estimates for construction of classrooms along with all the basic requirements i.e. multipurpose halls, toilet blocks, labs, staffroom, staircases, etc.