When a nine-year-old Shanti returned to school on Monday after the summer vacations, she was expecting benches in her classroom. The fourth class student at a North Delhi Municipal Corporation school in Jahangirpuri had been sitting on mats since last year.

She was, however, greeted with disappointment at the school. “We were told that there will be benches when we return after the vacations. But the situation was the same. The entire class was sitting on the mats spread on the floor,” Shanti said.

The excitement of attending the first day of school after the vacations was dampened for many other students like Shanti after they found that they will have to continue to sit on the floor. Charu (9), another student at the school said, “It’s still better now. We sat on these mats bracing winters in January and February.”

HT had reported in January that around 100 north corporation schools were struggling with the shortage of benches because of which students were forced to sit on mats spread on the floor. Officials had then said that the benches would be made available within a few weeks. Around six months have passed since and the schools are yet to get the benches.

Shanti and Charu’s school has only 180 benches for over 1,100 students. The school operates in two shifts— for girls in the morning and boys in the evening.

“We have one bench for every six students. Some of these benches are not even in good shape. We cannot make every student sit on the benches and hence, many of them sit on the mats,” principal of the school, who did not wish to be named, said.

At another north civic body school in Mukundpur only 150 benches are available for over 1,200 students, an official said. “We have been giving false assurances to parents who come every now and then to complain about the benches. We were expecting to get furniture before the beginning of the session,” the official, who requested anonymity, said.

North corporation mayor Avtar Singh said he visited some schools on Monday and witnessed students sitting on the mats.

“It’s a very sad sight to see students like this. We are trying hard to get the tender for procuring furniture passed and make sure that all the schools get benches within three months,” he said.

There are around 765 schools under the jurisdiction of the north civic body that offer education up to class 5.

According to an official in the department, the civic body purchases furniture through an e-portal.

“We had passed the tender and also given the work order to the suppliers. But the suppliers denied to give us the sample benches. We had to cancel the tender because we could not continue without checking the samples. The process for giving a new tender has started again,” the official said.

First Published: Jul 09, 2019 11:45 IST